Echoes in Death (In Death #44)(64)

It wasn’t a fast job, and it was mindless, which wasn’t always an advantage. Eve worked split screen, the list on one side as she did quick runs on the names, making a note when she hit one that fit all requirements.

She slogged through a hundred, switched back to coffee.

They worked in near silence, even when Galahad gave up the sleep chair to leap into Roarke’s lap, curl there.

At the halfway point, Roarke sat back. “Let’s take that dinner break before our brains melt.”

“What?” She looked up, distracted, then realized a low-grade headache had already started to brew. A short break wouldn’t hurt as she couldn’t do anything about whatever she put together tonight anyway.

“Sure. Yeah. Good. But maybe—”

He watched her eyes shift to the table by the terrace doors. “A deal’s a deal, Lieutenant.”

“Yeah, yeah. You want to eat down in the dining room?”

“I had something else in mind.” He got up, took her hand, and pulled her to her feet before she found some excuse. He glanced at the cat as he drew Eve to the elevator. “It’s a table for two tonight, my friend. You’ll find your dinner down in the kitchen.”

He tugged her into the elevator, kissed her between the eyes—where he’d already diagnosed that low-grade headache. “Roof terrace,” he ordered.

“Going fancy?”

“I expect the view will be.”

As usual, he was right.

It was like being in a reverse snow globe, Eve thought. Outside the glass dome, in the streams of the exterior lights, the snow fell fast, as if shaken from the sky by an angry hand. Winter winds swirled and tossed it into dramatic sweeps, and through the sweeps, the lights of the city gleamed and sparked. The great park spread in a study of black and white. The streets rayed in stark lines, empty of traffic with only a scatter of emergency vehicles trudging through the thick carpet of snow.

He lit candles on a table already set for two with silver warmers over the plates.

“How’d you manage this?”

“I gave Summerset an ETA.” He poured rich red wine for both, took her hand so they looked out the wide glass together. “We’re lucky, you and I. To be up here, warm and safe, without the worry of keeping that way. I remember being neither as a boy in Dublin when winter hit hard.”

“I don’t think I ever actually felt the snow until I was maybe nine or ten. Even then I sort of remember thinking: It’s cold and wet. What’s everybody so excited about? But from up here it looks pretty spectacular. Nice choice for dinner, ace. Very nice.”

“Let’s see what you think of the meal.”

He lifted the warming lids. Some sort of pasta deal, she noted, which was never wrong in her book. Not spaghetti, but the tube things in sauce with cheese melted all over it.

And the smell added more warmth and some spice to the air.

Reminded her stomach it wanted food.

“Looks great. What is it?”

“Baked penne, I believe.” No point in mentioning the spinach.

They ate it with a colorful little salad, a baguette to be torn apart and dipped into herbed oil. And more wine.

“Whatever it is,” Eve said between bites, “it’s pretty good. You snuck spinach in it.”

“I didn’t personally prepare it,” he reminded her.

“Ha. Still, it works. Will you keep your HQ shut down tomorrow?”

“I’ve advised anyone who isn’t essential to work from home, arranged for some to house on-site tonight. If you need to go into Central or into the field, take one of the all-terrains. Your vehicle can likely handle this, but you’ll be better off in an A-T.”

“Yeah. I might end up doing some of the interviews from here by ’link, possibly holo. I want a face-to-face with the bartender, so I may push for that, and I want another with Daphne. The more she sees me, I think, the more she’ll open up. Anyway, I’ll need to get into Central at some point. I’m the boss.”

“That you are.”

“You, too. You’ll take an A-T?”

“I will.”

“How many do we have?”

“More than enough,” he said, and smiled. “How many couples have you noted out of your portion of the list?”

“Six that meet all. That’s out of nearly two hundred and fifty people. A couple more that skim the margins. How about you?”

“Nine, that’s out of about three hundred. So we’ve made some progress.”

She told herself it didn’t matter he’d cleared through more than she had. It wasn’t a competition. Exactly. “So that’s fifteen, plus two marginal. Even if we triple that before we’re finished, it’s a workable number.”

“And how will you work it?”

“Talk to all of them. Cross-check any who use the caterer, have used the hospital, the rental company. Even any who socialize with any of the other vics. Look for a connection, put them on alert. Maybe one of them has had an incident—something. A thwarted break-in, an altercation, or the female will have had an encounter with someone who made her uncomfortable. I think the Patricks were the first, but that doesn’t mean this guy hasn’t practiced. Maybe he did the Peeping Tom deal, or broke into a house or two, stole a cocktail dress. Maybe he just got pushy with a female. Something.”