Promises in Death (In Death #28)(3)

They headed down a stairway, boots and cop shoes clanging on metal. “Didn’t see a weapon, but she’s got burns here.” He tapped fingers on his carotid. “Looks like she got zapped.”

“I want two officers knocking on doors. Who saw what when. See the tenant and his boy are secured. Names?”

“Burnbaum, Terrance. Kid’s Jay. We’re sitting on them in six-oh-two.”

She nodded at the two officers securing the scene, engaged her recorder. “Dallas, Lieutenant Eve, on scene at five twenty-five West Twenty-third. My partner’s on her way. Find out if the building’s got a super or manager on-site. If so, I want to see him.”

She scanned the area first. Concrete floor, caged lockers, pipes, spiderwebs. No windows, no doors. No security cameras.

“I’m going to want any security discs from the entrances, and from the stairwells. Find the super.”

Lured her down here, Eve thought as she opened her kit for her can of Seal-It. Or forced her down. Maybe she came down for something and got jumped. No way out.

She studied the body from where she stood, coating her hands and boots with sealant. Slim build, but didn’t look soft. The head was turned away, with long blond hair curtaining the face. The hair had a shine to it, and the clothes were good quality.

Not from the streets, she thought. Not with that hair, those clothes, the nicely manicured fingers on the hand she could see.

“The victim is lying on her left side, back to the stairs. No visible prints on the concrete floor. It looks clean. Did Burnbaum move the body?”

“He says no. Says he went over, took her wrist. Said it was cold, got no pulse, and he knew. He just got his kid out.”

Eve circled the body, crouched. Something set off a low alarm in her brain, a kind of sick dread in her gut. She lifted the curtain of hair.

For an instant, one sharp instant, everything in her went cold. “Goddamn it. Goddamn it. She’s one of us.”

The cop who’d stayed with her stepped forward. “She’s a cop?”

“Yeah. Coltraine, Amaryllis. Run it, run it now. Get me an address. Detective Coltraine. Son of a bitch.”

Morris, she thought. Oh, f**king hell.

“This is her place, Lieutenant. She’s got four-oh-five, this building.”

She ran the prints because it had to be done, had to be official. The sick dread rose to a cold rage. “Victim is identified as Coltraine, Detective Amaryllis. NYPSD. This address, apartment four-oh-five.”

She flipped back the light jacket. “Where’s your piece, Coltraine? Where’s your goddamn piece? Did they use it on you? Do you with your own weapon? No visible defensive wounds, clothes appear undisturbed. No signs of violence on the body but for the stunner burns on the throat. He held your own piece to your throat, didn’t he? On full.”

She heard the clang on the stairs, looked up as her partner came down.

Peabody looked spring fresh. Her hair flipped at her neck, dark sass around her square face. She wore a pink blazer and pink skids—a color choice Eve would have made numerous pithy comments on under any other circumstances.

“Nice of them to wait until we were almost officially on shift,” Peabody said cheerfully. “What’ve we got?”

“It’s Coltraine, Peabody.”

“Who?” Peabody walked over, looked down, and all the rosy color drained out of her cheeks. “Oh my God. Oh God. It’s Morris’s . . . Oh. No.”

“She isn’t wearing her weapon. It may be the murder weapon. If it’s here, we have to find it.”

“Dallas.”

Tears swam in Peabody’s eyes. Eve understood them, felt them in her own throat. But shook her head. “Later for that. Later. Officer, I want you to take a man and check her apartment, make sure it’s clear. I want to know either way. Now.”

“Yes, sir.” She heard it in his voice—not the tears, but the simmering rage. The same that rolled in her gut.

“Dallas. Dallas, how are we going to tell him?”

“Work the scene. This is now. That’s later.” And she didn’t have the answer. “Look for her weapon, her holster, anything else that might be hers. Work the scene, Peabody. I’ll take the body.”

Her hands were steady as she got out her gauges, went to work. And she froze the question out of her mind. The question of how she would tell the chief medical examiner, tell her friend, that the woman who’d put stars in his eyes was dead.

“Time of death twenty-three forty.”

When she’d done all she could do, Eve straightened. “Any luck?” she said to Peabody.

“No. All these lockers. If the killer wanted to leave the weapon and hide it, there are a lot of places.”

“We’ll put Crime Scene on it.” Eve rubbed the space between her eyes. “We have to talk to the guy who called it in, and his son, and take her apartment. We can’t have her taken in until Morris knows. He can’t find out that way.”

“No. God, no.”

“Let me think.” Eve stared hard at the wall. “Find out what shift he’s on. We don’t let the morgue unit have her until . . .”

“The uniforms know a cop went down, Dallas. It’s going to start spreading. Cop. Female. This address, or just this area. If Morris gets wind—”