Strangers in Death (In Death #26)(99)

“Suzanne Custer,” Baxter murmured.

“Yeah, she’s the needle in the haystack and the needle for the thread. She trusts you.”

“Yeah.” Baxter sighed it. “Yeah, she does.”

“We’ll use that. We’re going to break her down, Baxter, you and me. We’ll break her because she’s not built like Ava.”

“She got nervous.” Trueheart shifted his attention to Baxter. “When we went back to talk to her, a few days after the murder, she was jumpy and nervous. She didn’t want to talk to us. You smoothed her down.”

“Yeah, yeah. It set off a little buzz, but there was nothing to tie her. Nothing. So I put it down to regular nerves and the situation. She had me, goddamn it.”

“Now we’ve got her,” Eve reminded him. “Dr. Mira, can you give us a personality profile on Suzanne Custer?”

“From Detective Baxter’s overview, I’d say she’s a woman who accepts or perhaps expects her own victimization. She accepted, or certainly lived with, her husband’s behavior. While it appears she sought more for her children, she failed to take advantage of programs offered for abused women. It’s possible she didn’t see herself as such. She doesn’t control, or seek control. At this point, until further study, my opinion would be she fears and seeks those with authority over her.”

“A woman who does what she’s told.”

“So it would seem,” Mira said, “from the data I have at this point. I’d like to look at her background, her childhood.”

“I’d appreciate if you could do that ASAP. Feeney, McNab, I need a search on electronic purchases. Look for the wig, costumes re Ava. Dig in. She may have picked them up a year ago, two years. Hell, she might’ve had them for a decade. Look for all communications between her and Suzanne Custer and her personal ’links, and any at Anders’s. I’ve got warrants to check all communication devices owned by Plowder and Bride-West.”

“On it,” Feeney told her, and kept eating.

“Trueheart, you’re with Peabody. Check for Suzanne’s purchases at a smut shop called Just Sex. Her husband shopped there, so odds are if she needed anything for the job, that’s where she’d go. Get the medicals on her from her health clinic—a Dr. Yin—and prescriptions from its pharmacy. Tap the Transit Authority. She had to get from her apartment to the Anders house and back. Mother of two, I bet she uses the subway routinely, and a fare card.”

“Lieutenant.” Trueheart raised his hand and lowered it again as Baxter elbowed him. “I don’t think she’d leave the kids alone. I don’t think she’d have gone out and left her kids unattended. She’s just not the type for it.”

“Okay. Then let’s find out if she got a sitter, or where her kids were on the night of. If the civilian has time…”

“The civilian can probably carve out a few minutes here and there,” Roarke commented.

“A remote was used to shut down the security at the Anders house. A high-end and illegal remote. Where did it come from and which one of our killers obtained it? I haven’t picked up a hot one there. You find out.”

“Not as entertaining as a visit to a smut shop,” Roarke considered, “but the black market has some appeal.”

“Good luck.” Feeney saluted him. “Coulda been any of a couple dozen types—or versions of types—picked up any time within the last couple years. Coulda been homemade, for that matter, you had any snap for it.”

Roarke smiled at him. “Adds to the fun, doesn’t it?”

“Let’s all go out and have fun. Baxter,” Eve said, “with me.”

Iwouldn’t have pegged her.” Baxter brooded out the side window as Eve drove. “She snowed me right from the get.”

“You didn’t peg her because she didn’t do it.”

“Same thing as doing it, and I didn’t get a whiff. The boy did. When we went back and she was nervy, he caught the whiff. And I blew it off, explained it away. I didn’t see it, didn’t smell it, didn’t hear it.”

“Guess you’d better turn in your papers, then. I hear private security’s a good gig for washed-out cops.”

“To borrow a phrase, bite me.” But it didn’t seem he could work up any steam. “She’s soft, Dallas. Mira’ll come up with her psycho-whatever, but it comes down to her being a soft sort, a little wounded, a lot tired. Mousy, if you get me. Right now, with all you worked out, I’m trying to see her going into that house, pumping Anders full of tranqs and setting him up like a kink kill, and I can’t see it.”

“You like her. You feel sorry for her.”

Irritation tightened his face. “I like lots of people, and feel sorry for some. That doesn’t stop me from seeing a stone killer when she’s in my damn face.”

“You’re taking it personal, Baxter.”

“Damn right I am.” There was steam now as he jerked toward Eve. “And don’t give me any of that objectivity crap. You wouldn’t be so f**king good at the job if you didn’t take it personal.”

Eve gave him a minute to stew. “You want me to tell you you screwed up? You missed it? You didn’t see what you should’ve seen? Nothing I’d like better because it makes my day to ream out a smart-ass pig-eater like you. But I can’t do it. You didn’t screw up. You can’t miss what’s not in play, and can’t see what isn’t there.”