Taken in Death (In Death #37.5)(18)

The police reports might have lost a bit in the translation, but she couldn’t see where the Swedish cops hadn’t done a reasonably thorough job.

On the other hand, the institute’s internal and external reports came off spotty and smelled ever so lightly of cover-up.

Still, they all contributed to the whole.

She added key elements into her own notes, reorganized them. Borgstrom had worked in the prison library, laundry, kitchen, infirmary. She’d studied alternative medicine and had bartered sex for gain.

Could she have used any of those experiences or predilections to establish her identity, her location, her revenue stream?

Had she worked in medicine, education, food or domestic services to establish identity, to earn enough to pay for a place to live? A place she could hold two young kids?

“There’s an interest in the occult, of the dark and nasty variety,” Eve said to Roarke while Peabody continued to slave away on the map. “And her violence doesn’t seem random or impulsive, but planned and purposeful.”

On a short break from e-work, Roarke downed water and studied Eve’s data on screen. “The medical area might be her choice. Access to drugs, a chance to give pain or withhold it.”

“Yeah, I’m looking at that. Or one of those wicca-whatever shops. Herbals, rituals. Maybe a combo of traditional and nontraditional. Peabody! Do a search in the working area for small clinics and witchy places. Maybe alternative medicals. Like that.”

“I’ll add it in.”

“I wonder . . .”

Eve looked up, over at Roarke. “Wonder out loud. We can use anything.”

“If it is shadowed by the occult, and touching on ritual, would the knife she used to kill the nanny be a ritual knife?”

“It’s a thought. It’s an angle. Trueheart! Do a search for any occult retail in the working area, and see if any are open this late.”

“On it, Lieutenant.”

“She used sex for gain. Maybe she’s continued that pattern. An LC license? It would give her unlimited opportunities. Or she may have an accomplice, bound by sex—willing and informed or not. Or may have used one then disposed of him.”

“I’ll take that angle,” Feeney called out. “IRCCA’s my baby. I’ll dig in, look for like crimes.”

“Okay. Okay. Baxter, take it from Callender when she gets back. McNab, keep scanning for a transmission from the boy. He’s going to try again.”

She moved off, into the kitchen. She needed some quiet, some space to think. She couldn’t just put her boots up on her desk and study her board, let her mind shift from point to point, not with this setup.

But she could program coffee, let it all circle around, and try to find a new starting point.

Roarke came in, got coffee of his own. “I could set you up somewhere else in the house.”

“No, I just need to think a minute without all the chatter. And the bopping and jiggling. What is it with e-geeks and that constant—” She bopped and jiggled to demonstrate, made Roarke laugh.

“Even Feeney, a little. He bobs his head around, bops his shoulders once he really gets going.” She got the coffee, frowned at Roarke. “You don’t. Why don’t you do the geek boogie when you’re working?”

“It’s heroic control,” he told her, and skimmed a finger down the shallow dent in her chin. “Inside I’m a dancing fool.”

“Hmm,” she said, and veered back on track. “She plans, and though she’s batshit as previously stated, she thinks things through. She has an agenda, a goal, a purpose, and apparently a taste for human flesh and blood.”

“Always a bonus.”

“She may have bought things to outfit some sort of confined space for the kids. Beds—he said there were two beds. She may have hired someone to put in locks or doors, or to outfit a bathroom. She’d have to know without an accessible bathroom she’d have a big mess on her hands. She thinks, she plans, she acts. We can check on a lot of that tomorrow.”

He glanced around the kitchen, the family feel of it, the wall board covered with bright, childish drawings. “She plans to kill those children.”

“Oh yeah. She’s not going to let them go. But she may plan to torture her sister for a while, try to extort money, more at some point, lure her. Then she’d have it all. The sister she’s convinced is sucking up her power, and the progeny from said sister who would, in her logic, do the same. I don’t worry about her killing them tonight. Much.”

“Then what?”

She stared down into her coffee a moment, into the black depth of it. “You can do a lot to the human mind and body without destroying it. We both know just how much you can hurt a kid without killing.”

“What will she do next? You’re trying to put yourself in her head,” Roarke said before she could respond. “You’re asking yourself what the next steps are. What do you think she’ll do next?”

“Torture them—hopefully just mentally, emotionally right now. That’s bad enough, and she’d enjoy it. She has to contact the sister at some point. Sooner is better. Rub it in, hear the fear and distress. It’s not enough to project it. Maybe she starts the deal making then, but . . . I’d string it out for maximum pain. And I’d want to get some sleep, or at least relaxation time, so I’d drug the kids. Wouldn’t want them trying to pull anything while I was sleeping. Better to put them out, start again tomorrow. Early. Get some sleep knowing her sister won’t. So she has to make that contact.”