[In Death 08] - Conspiracy in Death Read online

  He could kill. She learned that anyone could under the right circumstances. But could he kill so cold-bloodedly? Would he protect, under the guise of professional loyalty, someone else who had?

  She wasn’t sure of the answers.

  The light on her computer was blinking green, indicating a new input of data. Peabody, she thought, had been hard at work. After stripping off her jacket, she called it up. It only took five frustrating minutes of grinding noises before the data popped.

  Victim identified as Samuel Michael Petrinsky, born 5-6-1961, Madison, Wisconsin. ID number 12176-VSE-12. Parents deceased. No known siblings. Marital status: divorced June 2023. Former spouse Cheryl Petrinsky Sylva, age 92. Three children from marriage: Samuel, James, Lucy. Data available on request in cross file.

  No known employment in last thirty years.

  What happened to you, Sam? she wondered. Why’d you leave the wife and kids and come to New York to fry your mind and wreck your body on brew and smoke?

  “Hell of a way to end up,” she muttered, then asked for the cross-reference on his children. She would have to notify next of kin.

  You have performed an illegal function. Please delete request and enter your ID number immediately or all unsaved data will be destroyed.

  “You son of a bitch.” Furious, Eve leaped to her feet and punched the side of her computer with a bunched fist. Even as the pain sang in her knuckles, she prepared to punch it again.

  “A problem with your equipment, Lieutenant?”

  She hissed, set her teeth, and straightened. It was rare for Commander Whitney to visit her office. And not too happy a moment to have him do so when she was beating up departmental property.

  “Respectfully, sir, this unit sucks.”

  It might have been a smile that flitted into his dark eyes, but she couldn’t be sure.

  “I suggest you contact maintenance, Dallas.”

  “Maintenance, Commander, is full of morons.”

  “And the budget is full of holes.” He stepped in, shut the door at his back, which made Eve’s stomach jitter uneasily. He glanced around, then shook his head. “Your rank entitles you to an office, Dallas. Not a dungeon.”

  “This suits me, sir.”

  “So you always say. Is that AutoChef stocked with your coffee or the department’s?”

  “Mine, sir. Would you like some?”

  “I certainly would.”

  She turned to order him a cup. The closed door meant he wanted privacy. The request for coffee indicated he wanted to put her at ease.

  The combination made Eve nervous. But her hand was steady as she offered him the cup, and her eyes stayed level on his.

  His face was wide, tended to be hard. He was a big man with wide shoulders, wide hands, and very often, fatigue darkening his eyes. “You caught a homicide early this morning,” he began, pausing long enough to sip and appreciate the genuine coffee from genuine beans Roarke’s money could buy.

  “Yes, sir. The victim has just been identified. I’ll be notifying next of kin.” She shot her computer a vicious look. “When I can drag the data out of that heap. I’ll have an updated report for you by end of day.”

  “I have a report from the first officer on-scene on my desk now. Along with a complaint. You and Bowers appear to have bumped heads.”

  “I came down on her. She deserved it.”

  “She’s filed a complaint that you used abusive and inappropriate language.” When Eve rolled her eyes, he did smile. “You and I both know that kind of a complaint is no more than a nuisance and generally makes the complainant look like a soggy-spined fool. However . . .” His smile faded. “She also claims that she observed your work on-scene as sloppy and careless. That you misused her trainee and threatened her with physical harm.”

  Eve felt the blood begin to sizzle hot under her skin. “Peabody recorded the on-scene investigation. I’ll have a copy of it on your desk immediately.”

  “I’ll need that to dismiss the complaint officially. Unofficially, I’m fully aware it’s bullshit.”

  There were two chairs. Because both of them were battered and creaky, Whitney gave them a dubious look before settling into one. “I’d like to hear your take on this before I act.”

  “My investigation will stand, and so will my report.”

  He laced his fingers, kept the expression on his wide face bland. “Dallas,” was all he said and had her blowing out a huff of breath.

  “I handled it. I don’t believe in running to a superior officer or filing papers over a minor incident between cops.” When he only continued to stare, she jammed her hands in her pockets. “The ranking officer on-scene had not secured the area properly upon my arrival. She was appropriately chastised about the lack of proper procedure. Officer Bowers displayed a marked tendency toward insubordination, which was dealt with, again in my opinion, appropriately. On his own, her trainee indicated to me that on previous scans of the area, there had been another crib beside the victim’s, which had, since the day before, been moved. He had reported same to his trainer and his observation had been dismissed. This observation, when followed up on, netted a witness. I invited the trainee, Officer Trueheart, to join in the interview of this witness, who was known to him. Trueheart, as will be stated in my report, shows excellent potential.”

  She paused in her flat recitation, and heat flashed in her eyes for the first time. “I deny all charges but the last. I might very well have threatened Officer Bowers with physical harm and will ask my aide for verification. My regret, at this time, is that I did not follow through with any threat I may have made and knock her on her fat ass. Sir.”

  Whitney lifted his brows but managed to conceal amusement. It was a rare thing for his lieutenant to add personal temper to a verbal report. “Had you followed through, Lieutenant, we’d have a nice little mess on our hands. I assume, knowing exactly how thorough you are, that you or your aide has done a run on Officer Bowers. At least a minimal run, and are therefore aware of her record of transfer. She is what we call a problem child. The department tends to move their problem children from area to area.”

  He paused a moment, rubbed a hand over the back of his neck as if to ease some ache. “Bowers is also a champion filer. Nothing she likes better than to file complaints. She’s taken a strong dislike to you, Dallas, and off the record, I’m warning you that she’s likely to make trouble for you, however she can.”

  “She doesn’t worry me.”

  “I came down here to tell you that she should. Her type feeds on trouble, on causing trouble for other cops. And she’s aiming for you. She copied Chief Tibble and her department representative on this complaint. Get the on-scene record, and your report, and a carefully worded response to this complaint on my desk before end of day. Use Peabody,” he added with a slight smile, “on the last. She’ll have a cooler head.”

  “Sir.” Resentment shimmered in her voice, in her eyes, but she held her tongue.

  “Lieutenant Dallas, I’ve never had a better cop under my command than you, and my personal response to the complaint will say so. Cops like Bowers rarely go the distance. She’s stumbling her way out of the department, Dallas. This is only a hitch in your stride. Take it seriously, but don’t give it more of your time and energy than necessary.”

  “Spending more than five minutes of my time and energy on it when I’ve got a case to close seems excessive. But thank you for your support.”

  He nodded, rose. “Damn good coffee,” he said wistfully and set aside the empty cup. “By end of shift, Dallas,” he added as he walked out.

  “Yes, sir.”

  She didn’t kick the desk. She thought about it, but her knuckles were still stinging from bashing them against another inanimate object. Rather than risk hurting herself again, she called Peabody in to deal with the machine and access the contact numbers for Snooks’s next of kin.

  She managed to reach the daughter who, though she hadn’t seen her father in nearly thirty years, wept bitter
ly.

  It did nothing to soothe Eve’s mood. The closest she came to cheerful was watching Peabody’s reaction to the complaint filed by Bowers.

  “That flat-faced, piss-for-brains bitch!” Red-faced, hands fisted on her hips, Peabody went into full rant. “I ought to go dig her out of whatever hole she’s in and kick her ugly butt. She’s a fucking liar, and worse, she’s a lousy cop. Where the hell does she get off filing some whiny, trumped-up complaint against you? What house was she out of?”

  Peabody whipped out her memo book and began to call it up. “I’ll go down there right now and show her just what a complaint feels like when it belts you between the eyes.”

  “Whitney said you’d be a cool head,” Eve said with a grin. “I’m so glad to see the commander knows his troops this well.” Then she laughed because Peabody’s eyes were all but bulging out of her head. “Take a couple of breaths, Peabody, before something explodes in your brain. We’ll handle this in an appropriate manner through the proper channels.”

  “Then we’ll flatten the bitch, right?”

  “You’re supposed to be a good influence.” With a shake of her head, Eve sat down. “I need you to copy the on-scene record to Whitney and to write your own report. Keep it straight and simple, Peabody. Just the facts. We’ll write them independently. I’ll compose a response to the complaint, and when you have that cool head Whitney believes in, you can go over it for me.”

  “I don’t know how you can take this so calmly.”

  “I’m not,” Eve muttered. “Believe me. Let’s get to work here.”

  She got it done, keeping her tone coolly professional throughout. During the final pass of her response, the list she requested from Cagney came through. Ignoring the headache beginning to blaze a trail behind her eyes, she copied all discs pertaining to the case, made what she considered a rational, reasonable call to maintenance—she only called them morons twice—then took everything with her. It was end of shift, and by God, she was going home on time for a change, even if she did intend to work once she got there.

  But her temper began to simmer and spike as she drove. Her hands clenched and unclenched on the wheel. She’d worked hard to become a good cop. She’d trained and studied and observed and was willing to work until she dropped to stay a good cop.

  Her badge didn’t simply define what she did but who she was. And in some ways, Eve knew, that badge, what it meant, had saved her.

  The first years of her life were either gone or a blur of pain and misery and abuse. But she’d survived them, survived the father who had beaten her, raped her, who had damaged her so badly that when she was found broken and bleeding in an alley, she hadn’t even remembered her name.

  So she’d become Eve Dallas, a name given to her by a social worker and one she had fought to make mean something. Being a cop meant she wasn’t helpless any longer. More, it meant she was able to stand for those who were helpless.

  Every time she stood over a body, she remembered what it was like to be a victim. Every time she closed a case, it was a victory for the dead, and for a young girl without a name.

  Now some stiff scooper with an attitude had attempted to put a smear on her badge. For some cops, it would be an annoyance, an irritation. For Eve, it was a deep, personal insult.

  A physical woman, she tried to amuse herself by imagining what it would feel like to take Bowers on in a good sweaty match of hand-to-hand. The satisfying sound of bone against bone, the sweet scent of first blood.

  All the image managed to do was infuriate her. Her hands were tied in that arena. A superior officer couldn’t go around whipping on a uniform, no matter how much she deserved it.

  So she drove through the gates and up the gracious sweep of private road to the stunning house of stone and glass that was Roarke’s. She left her car in front, hoping, really hoping, that tight-assed Summerset said something snotty about it.

  She barely felt the cold as she jogged up the steps and opened the tall front door. There she waited, one beat, two. It normally took Roarke’s butler no longer to slide into the foyer and insult her. Today, she wanted him to, craved it.

  When the house remained silent, she snarled in frustration. The day, she thought, was going just perfectly. She couldn’t even take a swing at her worst enemy to release some steam.

  She really, really wanted to hit something.

  She stripped off her leather jacket, deliberately tossed it over the carved newel post. But still, he didn’t materialize.

  Bastard, she thought in disgust and stalked upstairs. What the hell was she supposed to do with this barely controlled fury bubbling inside her if she couldn’t hammer Summerset? She didn’t want a round with the sparring droid, damn it. She wanted human contact. Good, violent human contact.

  She stepped into the bedroom, intending to sulk in a hot shower before going to work. And there was Roarke. She eyed him narrowly. Obviously, he’d just come in himself and was just hanging his suit jacket in the closet.

  He turned, angled his head. The glittering eyes, flushed face, and aggressive stance told him just what kind of mood she was in. He closed the closet door and smiled. “Hello, darling, and how was your day?”

  “It sucked. Where’s Summerset?”

  Roarke arched a brow as he crossed the room. He could all but see waves of temper and frustration pumping off of her. “He has the evening off.”

  “Great, fine.” She swung away. “The one time I actually want the son of a bitch, he’s not here.”

  Roarke’s eyebrow stayed lifted as he slanted a look toward the fat gray cat curled on the bed. They shared a brief, silent stare, and Galahad, preferring to avoid violence, leaped to the floor and slinked out the door.

  Cautious himself, Roarke ran his tongue around his teeth. “Something I can do for you?”

  She whipped her head around, scowled at him. “I like your face, so I don’t want to break it.”

  “Lucky me,” Roarke murmured. He watched for a moment as she paced, prowled, kicked halfheartedly at the sofa in the seating area. And muttered to herself. “That’s a lot of energy you’ve got going on in there, Lieutenant. I think I can help you with that.”

  “If you tell me to take a goddamn soother, I’m going to—” It was as far as she got before her breath whooshed out and she found herself tackled onto the bed. “Don’t mess with me, ace.” She shifted, bucked. “I’m in a pisser of a mood.”

  “So I see.” He barely blocked her elbow, managed to cuff her wrists with one hand, and used his weight to keep her pinned. “Let’s just put all that to good use, shall we?”

  “When I want sex, I’ll let you know,” she said between her teeth.

  “Okay.” Even as she hissed at him, he lowered his head and bit her lightly on the throat. “While I’m waiting, I’ll just amuse myself a bit. You have a . . . ripe taste when you’re mad.”

  “Damn it, Roarke.” But his tongue was doing incredible things to the side of her neck, and the juices stirred by anger began to swim in a different direction. “Cut it out,” she muttered, but when his free hand closed over her breast, her body arched toward him.

  “Nearly done.” His mouth skimmed her jaw, then crushed onto hers in the fierce and feral kiss her mood seemed to demand. He tasted temper, the edge of violence, the whip of passion. His body tightened, his own needs flashed. But when he eased back, he gave her a bland smile. “Well, if you’d rather be alone—”

  She broke his loosened hold on her hands and grabbed him by the front of his shirt. “Too late, pal. Now I want sex.”

  Grinning, he let her shove him onto his back. She straddled him, planted her hands on his chest. “And I’m feeling mean,” she warned him.

  “Well, I did say for better or worse.” He reached up, releasing her weapon harness before he began to unbutton her blouse.

  “I said mean.” Her breath was already coming short as her fingers curled into the black silk of his shirt. “How much did this thing cost?”

  “I
have no idea.”

  “Just as well,” she decided and tore it open. Before he could decide whether to laugh or curse, she pounced, her teeth digging into his shoulder. “It’s going to be rough.” Empowered by the taste of flesh, she fisted her hands in his hair. “And it’s going to be fast.”

  Her mouth dived to his, taking greedily, driving the kiss toward violence. Glorying in it. She clawed at him, ripping at his clothes as they rolled over the bed.

  Wrestling now, hands grappling to take, mouths ravenous. Frantic groans, quick shudders came from both of them as weaknesses were sought out and exploited. They knew each other’s bodies and those weaknesses well.

  All the frustrated energy peaked into hunger, a need to take and take quickly, to take all. His teeth on her naked breast, his hands bruising her flesh in their rush to possess, only heightened the appetites. Her own breath was in rags and her mind in tatters as she arched up, pressed sex to sex.

  There was a feral sound in her throat as he yanked her up to her knees, as their bodies met, torso to torso, and mouth plundered mouth.

  “Now, damn it.” Her nails bit into his back, scraped, slid off skin gone damp with sweat. Desire, of the darkest and most dangerous hue was swirling inside her. She saw something of the same mirrored in Roarke’s brilliant blue eyes as they dragged each other down again.

  She rose over him, lowered onto him in two agile motions, and arched her back with a moan, as pleasure lanced through her.

  Then it was all speed again. Speed, motion, still more greed. More and more was all she could think as he pounded into her, harder, faster. The orgasm had claws.

  He watched her give herself to it, to him, her body bowed back now, gleaming with sweat, her eyes dark and blind to everything but what they brought to each other.

  And when she shuddered, when she screamed, he yanked her down, shoving her onto her back. And dragging her hips high, thrusting deep, deeper, drove them both over.