Golden in Death(60)

“Go ahead.”

“We have—had—a dinner party. Cocktails and hors d’oeuvres from seven to eight. At eight there was dinner and more conversation. At ten coffee and brandy.”

“Okay.” Eve pushed to her feet. “Thanks for your time.”

“I will escort you to the door.”

As they approached it, Eve murmured to Iryna, “If you’re not happy here, I can help you.”

Iryna sent her a look of genuine surprise. “No, I am very happy. Mr. Greenwald is very kind, and very generous.” She opened the door for Eve. “He does not hurt me. I know what it is like when men do. He does not, and would not, as he has no violence, so I am happy.”

“All right. If anything changes, you can contact me.”

Eve walked to the elevator and wondered what Iryna had experienced to be happy with a man old enough to be her grandfather simply because he didn’t hurt her.





13


She drove through the gates after dark, and there they were. All those welcoming lights.

She had to stop, just lower her head to the steering wheel. Until that moment, she hadn’t realized how much the day had dragged at her. All the death, all the grief, all the ugliness.

So she pushed it back, swallowed it down, and drove the rest of the way home.

She got her file bag—her day wasn’t nearly over. She’d reached the names on her list, issued the warnings, struck fear into more than one person, more than one family.

But better fear than death.

She walked inside, where Summerset waited. He took a look at her.

“I’d say look what the cat dragged in, but he’s been here all day.”

Rather than punching back, she tossed her jacket over the newel post. “Don’t open any packages. Even if you’re expecting them.”

He stepped forward as she started up the stairs. “All deliveries are scanned.”

“Don’t open any, scanned or not. Just don’t.”

“Very well.” He frowned after her as she continued up with the cat on her heels.

She went straight to her office, got coffee, checked first to make sure all the names from Gold had been notified.

Didn’t mean someone might not ignore the warning, or just forget, but at least they had notification.

She updated her board, then sat down with her notes.



* * *



Roarke walked in the house mildly annoyed by a delay—another delay—on a project in Maine. Five straight days of rain might be good for the flowers, but it meant the exterior work on a rehab in progress shut down.

He couldn’t control the bloody weather, but at times like this he yearned to find a way.

When he came in, he told himself to put it aside and focus on what he could control. But it burned a bit.

“As the cat’s not with you,” he said to Summerset, “the lieutenant must be home.”

“She is, and something’s troubling her. She looked tired, and … sad. You should deal with it. And she told me, very specifically, not to open any deliveries.”

“There was another murder this morning.” Roarke glanced up the stairs as he spoke.

“Yes, I heard. I can’t see how it would apply to deliveries here.”

“If she’s worried about it, she has a reason. I’ll find out what it is.”

“You look a bit tired yourself,” Summerset added as Roarke started up the stairs.

“Bloody rain.”

“It hasn’t rained today.”

“In Maine it has.”

He continued up, and because he couldn’t quite shake off the irritation, detoured to the bedroom to strip off the suit—and the workday—changed into a light sweater and jeans.

When he went into her office, she sat at her command center. Rather than his usual spot on her sleep chair, the cat sat on a leg of her workstation, staring at her.

“You’re starting to wig me, pal. Go take a nap or something.”

She continued to work; Galahad didn’t budge.

And Roarke could see the headache behind her eyes as clearly as a flashing sign. Likely the result of fatigue and skipping any resemblance to an actual meal through her day.

Annoyed all over again, he pulled a case out of his pocket as he strode to her command center. Both she and the cat turned heads to look at him.

The cat’s look said, as clearly as Summerset’s words: Deal with this.

“Take the blocker. You won’t work well with that headache.”

She started to refuse—he saw that—just as he saw her change her mind. When she took it without protest or excuse, he decided he did, indeed, have something to deal with.

At least it got his mind off his stalled project.

He glanced at her board, saw the stills of the second victim, the crime scene.

“The report said she had two teenage sons.”

“Yeah.”

“You don’t suspect the husband.”

She shook her head. “He teaches at Columbia. Dennis Mira knows him. He helped with the notification. The guy was shattered, just broken to pieces. Mr. Mira helped.”

“Dennis is made of kindness and compassion.”

She often thought if everybody in New York had just a little bit of Dennis Mira in them, she’d be out of a job.