The In Death Collection, Books 30-32 Page 17

  “No, seriously. Project Super X, or PSX. Playtimes after five or six on weekdays, and some long multi-player sessions on weekends. Anyone who worked on any section of it had to log in and know the passcode, then had a user code. The four user codes that had full access track back to the four partners, but if any of those who worked sections confabbed with any of the others who worked sections, they’d have most of it.”

  “Then it could be duplicated.”

  “Close.” Callendar took another swig from the bright orange tube. “It would take a lot of time, trouble, skill, and cooperation, but you could get close.”

  “What about the scenario he was playing at TOD?”

  “That’s trickier. Passing to you,” she said to Roarke.

  “One of the security measures, what I’d call an on-the-fly sort of precaution, was to change user names and codes every few runs.”

  “So if anyone tried to hack from outside, or inside, they’d hit a new wall.”

  “Theoretically,” Roarke agreed. “Still, even with the firewalls and fail-safes, you’d only have to get lucky once, access from that point. I’ve found some hack attempts, some attempts at infections from outside sources, typical stuff, and none of it successful. And there are several hack attempts from inside, but they coincide with basic security checks. To run the game in its holo form, the player would have to input his current name, code, and ID with thumb- and voiceprint. All of those are possible to bypass, of course.”

  Eve aimed a cool look. “Of course.”

  “But they had their additional security, which would have sent out alarms at an attempted hack. Assuming the hacker hadn’t already bypassed those. The discs themselves, at least the one in Bart’s home unit and the copy we have here, are imprinted to jam if any of these steps are missed or the ID process fails. An attempt to remove the disc, as we learned, results in self-destruct.”

  “I know all of this.”

  “Laying the groundwork, Lieutenant. They were careful, clever, vigilant. But certainly not absolutely hack proof as nothing is. In any case, those precautions make it tricky to ascertain absolutely who played what and when. So we have to extrapolate.”

  “Meaning guess.”

  “A reasoned and educated guess based on probability. Bart used a variety of user names and codes between his home and office, but as with most people, he has a pattern, and he repeats. To simplify, I’ve had the computer cull him out and label him User 1 in both locations.”

  He ordered the data on-screen. “Here you see the dates and times he logged in on their PSX, by location, and whether it was solo or multiplayer. We’ve crossed that with the other players, going alpha last name, you have Cill Allen as User 2, Var Hoyt as User 3, and Benny Leman as User 4. We have a separate data run on every employee who worked on the game, when, how long, in what capacity. You’ll want to run an analysis on those, I expect.”

  “Who’s particular pals with who, sleeping with who, how long they’ve worked there. I know the drill.”

  Roarke smiled at her. “It’s taken us this long to get here simply because the log-ins for this game alone are legion, and between the four of them they used several dozen user names and codes. Next problem.”

  “Would be?”

  “The infinite variety of scenarios. They all have plenty of play on the defaults, but the bulk of the log-ins are off that menu. Some are saved either to play again with exactly the same elements, or discarded, or saved and replayed with alternate elements. Or two scenarios might be merged.”

  “Doesn’t it keep a record? What’s the fun of playing if you can’t keep score?”

  “It does, and the holo-unit would hard drive it. The problem is the data on Bart’s holo doesn’t match any of the scenario names or codes from prior uses.”

  “A new scenario?”

  “Possibly. It’s listed as K2BK—BM.”

  “Bart Minnock,” Eve concluded. “His particular game? Or did they routinely label them with initials?”

  “No, they didn’t. There’s no coordinating listing on the copy U-Play messengered over today. The scenario isn’t on disc under that name or code. There’s nothing on his holo-unit that shows him creating it on the day he was killed, or any other day. He put the other copy in, the one we’re trying to reconstruct, and called for that game, with a request to begin at level four.”

  “You don’t start on level four if you’ve never played it before. You want to start at the beginning.”

  “Yes, you would. Or certainly the probability is high.”

  “So he played it before, but on the copy he used it had been given a name or code not previously used.” She walked and thought. “He had a date, so he had limited time. He didn’t want to waste it on the early stages. He pushed it forward. A section he wanted to work on, or one he particularly enjoyed, or one he had trouble beating before. But he’d played it before. There’s no question it was solo play?”

  “None,” Callendar told her.

  “The killer might have started the game, logged it that way to cover.”

  “Then he should’ve been logged as observer or audience. The room only registered one player, one occupant. If someone else was in there, he found a way around it.”

  “Murder takes at least two players,” Eve murmured. “He plays. He gets bruised up some, wrenches his shoulder. How?” She thought of Benny, smooth and graceful with his katas. “He knows how to fight, how to defend. He takes gaming seriously, so he’s studied, practiced, but there’s no sign he put up a fight. No trace, no blood, no fiber, no nothing from the killer in that room. And every reconstruct tells me he just stood there while the sword came down on him.

  “Someone else’s scenario,” she considered. “The killer creates the disc, adding defaults or elements or openings, and recodes it. Something that could override the system long enough to pull this off. That’s what these guys do, right? Find new ways. New ways to play the game. What did he play the most?”

  “There are four scenarios he favored,” Roarke told her. “He’d mix up and alter elements here and there, but usually stuck with the same basic story line and character grid. He named them Quest-1, Usurper, Crusader, and Showdown.”

  “Are they on the copy?”

  “They are.”

  “Stats?”

  “We’re pulling and collating them now.”

  “Good. And when you run the games, prioritize anything with swords. It’s pizza and a pipe wrench.”

  “What the hell does that mean?” Feeney demanded. “You’re losing it, kid.”

  “No point in wasting a good pie. No point bringing a sword to a blaster battle. You want to make use of what you’ve got, and take what’s useful with you. He took the sword, but he left the disc. The disc would be useless to us after self-destruct, and incriminating to him if found in his possession.”

  She stuck her hand in her pocket, nodded. “Sure. A woman says to the husband she wants dead, Hey, honey, I’ve just got to have a pizza. Be a sweetheart and run down and get us a large veggie. Now he’ll probably say, We’ll just have it delivered, but she’s ready for that. Oh, they take too long and I’m just starving for a pizza. Please, baby? I’ll open some wine, and maybe I’ll change into something you’ll like. We’ll have a little pizza party.”

  “What the hell does that have to do with this?”

  She glanced at Feeney. Cynical and rough-edged he might be, but he was a blusher. “Working it out. The guy goes for pizza—going to get lucky, so hey, it’s worth the walk. The wife who wants him dead has her lover waiting with the pipe wrench. Smack, bang. No need for a divorce and all that bother, no point losing the nice chunk of life insurance—and hey, there’s a nice fresh pizza, too. It’s mean, just a little mean, but efficient and practical, too, to take the pie, leave the wrench.”

  “‘Leave the gun, take the cannoli,’” Roarke said, and Feeney grinned.

  “Okay, that I get.”

  “It’s mean,” Roarke echoed Eve, “just
a little mean, but efficient and practical, too, to murder Bart during a game he enjoys, and to do so by means that play into one of his fantasies. Mean, efficient, and practical to do it in his own home—and it’s another game added to that. How will the cops figure it out? He’ll have played that scenario, your killer, tried the elements out until he was confident of the win.”

  “I just bet he has,” Eve agreed.

  “But a good game always tosses in an unknown, a bigger challenge. That would be you.”

  “Crib’s still up there,” Feeney muttered and earned a sour look from Eve.

  “Copy the copy. I’m going to want to work at home. They’re not going to give us a search warrant for private residences with what we’ve got. Everybody’s alibied, no clear motive, no physical evidence. Barely any circumstantial at this point. We need more.”

  “Whose residence?” Callendar asked her.

  “Partnership’s like marriage. It’s a freaking minefield. And one of Bart’s partners decided on that pizza and pipe wrench.”

  Back in her office, she deemed it time to dig deeper, a lot deeper on the three remaining partners of U-Play.

  She needed something, just a little something she could turn, twist, or tweak to convince the PA to go after a search warrant.

  The killer’s home comps would certainly have been doctored by now. She wasn’t dealing with an idiot. But EDD had its ways, as did her expert consultant, civilian.

  While her own computer dug, she rearranged her murder board. Studied it, rearranged it again.

  She thought she understood, at least partially, the why. It was small and it was shallow, but murder had been done for much, much less. Without Reineke’s nose, a man’s death might very well have been put down to the contents of his wallet and a veggie pizza.

  There’d be bigger under the small, and deeper under the shallow, but it was enough for now. Enough to help her create her own scenario.

  “I’m back! Did you miss me?” Peabody bounced in, then flopped in the visitor’s chair. “Jeez, do you know what the shuttle’s like this time of day? It’s a zoo—animal ferocity and smells. Plus, the air unit fizzled twenty minutes out of the station. Add jungle heat to that. I want a two-hour shower.”

  “You had sex.”

  “What? What? Why do you say that? You can’t have sex on the shuttle! You’d die of heat prostration, then be arrested.”

  “You had sex before you got on the shuttle. There better not be an expense chip for some cheap by-the-hour flop on my desk tomorrow.”

  “We didn’t use some cheap by-the-hour flop. We ...” Peabody cleared her throat as Eve simply kept up the long, steady stare. “Played games. As ordered.”

  “I don’t want to know what kind of games.”

  “Really, really good games. Ones that call for excellent reflexes and superior physical stamina.” She grinned, unrepentant. “We’re going to save up and buy a new, juicy game system for each other for Christmas.”

  “Is this your report?”

  “No, this is the shuttle-boiled-my-brain babble. Whew.”

  “What’s on your tit? What the hell is that?”

  “Oh.” Peabody ducked her chin to glance down. “It’s my love dragon. It’s a temp.”

  “A love dragon? You’re wearing a love dragon on your tit, most of which is spilling out of whatever that is you’re not covered up with.”

  “It’s a look—and it works. Trueheart nearly choked on his tongue when I walked through the bullpen.” Peabody sighed. “It’s pretty satisfying.”

  “It may be you confused undercover with undercovered. Either way, I don’t want to see your love dragon tomorrow. Now if you’ve rested and recovered from your arduous assignment, I’d like that report.”

  “Sure. The contact, Razor, the King of All Weaponry, hasn’t heard of a sword like we’re after—not a real. Props, toys of a similar and nonlethal nature, but nothing that could decapitate or leave those burns.”

  “Could’ve been made custom.”

  “We thought of that after ... after a little gaming inspired us. We went back, discussed. After a little persuasion he gave us the names of a couple of sources who might be able to make something along the lines, for a price. A really, really whopping-ass price. Out of those, there was maybe one who might do it off the grid, unregistered. But that ups the price to about double whopping-ass. I know we looked at the financials, and nobody on our radar had an expenditure that comes close.”

  “I’m doing deeper runs right now. Maybe it’ll pop. Some people game for money,” Eve considered. “Some game for money off the grid. So, we might have somebody who had a double whopping-ass pile of unreported cash.”

  “Well, meanwhile, we did some poking around on the underground game sites on the way back. Razor’s already putting out feelers. We left it like we’d be willing to pay, and how we’d heard one of these swords was out there. Now he’s looking, and we’re watching him while he’s looking. McNab’s going to keep tabs. If Razor gets a hit, we’ll get it, too.”

  “That’s good thinking. Go home and take that shower. I can smell you from here.”

  “It’s not my fault. Plus, with the sweating I think I might’ve lost a pound or two just sitting there trying not to breathe.” She pushed herself up. “Oh, nearly forgot. We got you a present.”

  “Why?”

  “Because.” She unzipped one of her pockets and pulled out a very small gun.

  “What is it?”

  “It’s a toy gun. A derringer—like cardsharps and saloon girls carry in western vids. It’s like a clutch piece.”

  “Hmmm.”

  “And check it.” Peabody cocked it, and a sultry female voice purred out of the barrel. Put those hands where I can see them, cowboy.

  “It has all sorts of audio streams—male, female. I figured you’d want the female. Plus—”

  She aimed it at Eve, pulled the trigger even as Eve said: “Hey!”

  The little gun let out a brave little bang. Next one goes lower, and you won’t be poking a woman with that stick of yours for the rest of your miserable life.

  “Isn’t it cute? You could play saloon girl and Roarke could be high-stakes gambler, then ... and that’s entirely none of my nevermind.” Peabody offered a big smile.

  “Yes, it’s cute, no, it’s none of your nevermind.” Eve took the derringer, recocked it. You’d better hightail it before that tail’s sporting another hole.

  “It could use better dialogue, but it’s apt enough. Hightail it.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Peabody? Thanks.”

  Eve studied the gun, shook her head. Unable to resist, she shot her computer, her AutoChef, amused by the lame insults that followed.

  That was another thing about partners, she decided. They knew what would make you laugh, often before you did.

  12

  THERE’D BEEN A TIME, ROARKE THOUGHT, NOT so long ago in the bigger scheme, when a few hours in a cop shop would’ve been something to be carefully and ruthlessly avoided. Now, he spent so much time in one he knew which Vending areas to avoid, which glides tended to drag or crowd up, and just how filthy cop coffee could be by the end of a tour.

  His life had taken a sharp and strange turn the first instant he’d laid eyes on a cop, his cop, in an ill-fitting coat and a truly ugly gray suit.

  He fingered the button from that suit, one he kept for luck and sentiment in his pocket.

  She’d been a first for him at a time when he’d come to believe he’d done nearly everything worth doing at least once. Had he been bored? he wondered as he angled his way onto a down glide. No, not bored, but perhaps a bit unsettled, restless, certainly dissatisfied in ways he hadn’t been able to put his finger on at the time.

  Then, there she’d been, and everything shifted, everything sharpened. He couldn’t say what fell into place. Nothing with Eve was quite that easy, but pieces had begun to fit together. Some of them, on both sides, had required a bit of reshaping, and likely s
till would as more and more of their picture emerged.

  As he rode down, a pair of uniforms rode up. The rattail-thin man between them protested loudly and continually.

  “Somebody musta planted that wallet on me. I got enemies. I was only running ’cause I had a bus to catch. Do I look like a pickpocket? Do I? Do I?”

  You do indeed, Roarke thought, and if you can’t lift a wallet without fumbling the snatch, you deserve your ninety-day stretch.

  Eve wouldn’t think quite that way, he mused. It wasn’t the getting caught, but the act itself that earned the stretch. Most of the time he agreed with her, and in fact had edged over to her side of that line more and more as time went by. But a bit of quick fingers? Well, everyone had to make a living, didn’t they? Even a street thief.

  He ought to know.

  He crossed into Homicide where the sounds, the sights, the smells had come to be as familiar to him as those in his own headquarters.

  Detective Baxter stood by his desk, straightening his tie. He paused, tapped a finger to his temple in salute.

  “LT’s in her office. Trying to get a head.”

  Roarke acknowledged the black humor with a quirked brow. “You’ve had all day, and that’s the best you’ve got?”

  “Already used up all the good ones. Anyway, I’ve been off shift for, hey, look at that, an hour. So my brain’s a little ... detached.”

  “Better, marginally. Where’s your boy?”

  “Sent him home, and stayed back to finish the Fours and other crap. He’s got a date.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Yeah, our Trueheart’s finally worked it up to ask out the little redheaded cutie in Records. He was seeing somebody else, but it fizzled. Civilians can have a harder time working it out with cops. Present company excepted.”

  “Understood.”

  “Anyway, he’s trying out the dinner and a vid routine, after which, they’ll likely exchange a friendly handshake. Kid moves like a glacier when it comes to the female persuasion. Otherwise, he’s a quick study.”

  “You suit each other.”

  “Yeah, who’d’ve thought? Anyway, I’m gone. I’ve got a date myself, and I expect to be shaking more than her hand at the end of the night.”