Chapter Sixteen
Just before Eve turned into the bullpen, she heard the mix of voices, Baxter’s quick laugh, and inexplicably, a child’s bubbling giggle.
Peabody said, “Oh, gosh!”
A dark-haired little girl, somewhere in the neighborhood of four, wearing pink pants, pink jacket, a white shirt featuring a smiling yellow sun, sat on Jenkinson’s lap. She played with his atomic tie as they held what appeared to be an intense conversation.
Baxter leaned back against his desk as he held an obviously more jovial one with the little straw-haired boy riding a woman’s hip.
The woman wore dark brown baggies, well-worn boots. A thick brown braid fell down the back of her denim jacket. A man, built like a god in jeans with frayed cuffs and a gray hooded sweatshirt, stood beside the woman, one hand on her shoulder.
The golden brown god with a mass of messy straw-colored hair turned, shot a smile at Peabody that Eve calculated could charge every vehicle in Manhattan in three seconds flat.
“Hiya, Dee.”
“Ben, jeez. Cassie,” she said as the woman turned.
And when she did, Eve had no problem concluding: sister.
The boy all but popped off his mother’s hip to fly into Peabody’s arms.
“Dee! Dee, Dee, Dee!” As he squealed, he plastered her face with kisses.
The little girl deserted Jenkinson to rush over and wrap around Peabody’s leg.
“We got pizza,” the girl announced. “It was yummy! Come to see your work. We played in the park and walked and walked and looked and looked.”
“Wow, that’s a lot.”
Meanwhile, the boy turned his head to stare at Eve as if she might be something interesting enough to lick or poke.
“You must be Dallas.” The woman shot out a hand to grip Eve’s. A strong, hard-palmed hand. “I’m Dee’s sister, Cassie. This is my husband, Ben.”
“Meetcha,” Ben said, and added that smile.
“These are our wild ones, Fawn and Simon. We made the mistake of pointing out the building, telling them that’s where Dee works.”
“So we came in,” Ben continued, “to avoid the nuclear fallout. Detective Sergeant Jenkinson got us visitor’s passes, cleared us right on up.”
Out of the corner of her eye, Eve saw Jenkinson lift his shoulders, let them fall.
“I sit Dee’s desk. Catch bad guys.” As Simon informed Eve, his focused and measuring stare switched into his father’s blinding smile.
“Somebody’s got to,” she said as she gave the room a long, cool stare of her own.
The room got back to work.
“Wow, power.” Cassie grinned. “We know you’re busy, and won’t stay. We wanted to see as much of the city as we could while we’re here. We’re going to meet up with Mal, Leah, and the kids, Zeke, too, in about an hour, walk the High Line.”
Eve imagined Peabody did the internal squeal as both kids clung to her like sticky vines.
“Peabody, take ten, show your family around some.”
“Can we see one of those rooms where you and Dee interview suspects?”
Cassie tipped her head toward Ben’s magnificent shoulder, laughed. “Ben’s addicted to the Law and Order channel.”
“Sure. Hey, Simon, we’re going to see the room where we take the bad guys after we catch them.”
“Okay, yeah! Bye,” he said to the room at large.
Cassie took Fawn’s hand, but the kid stopped in front of Eve. Looked up.
“I don’t wanna be a cop like Dee.”
“Okay.” After a beat, Eve realized she was supposed to ask. “What then?”
“I’m gonna be a farmer. And a fairy princess.”
“Well, good goals.”
“Ben.” Cassie put the girl’s hand in her father’s. “I’ll be right behind you. Just one minute of your time,” she said to Eve, “to thank you for what you’ve given Dee.”
“I didn’t give her anything.”
“You gave her the chance. This is what she wanted.” She gestured to Peabody’s desk. “To sit there, to catch bad guys. She’d have gotten there eventually, because she doesn’t give up. But you gave her the chance.”
“I saw a smart cop who deserved one. She earned the desk, and the detective’s shield.”
“I didn’t want her to go. It was hard to let her go from just my little sister, Dee, to Detective Peabody.”
“Looks like she’s both now.”
“You’re right about that. I’d better catch up. See you at the party.”
“Nice people,” Jenkinson commented. “Got the ground solid under them.”
“Yeah. Santiago, Carmichael?”
“In the lounge interviewing a wit.”
With a nod, Eve walked to her office to contact Reo.
The contact went about how she’d expected.
“Dallas, you know that’s not enough for a warrant to search and seize Banner-Wyst. Since Calvin Banner’s not obligated to let you inside or talk to you, I can’t get you a warrant to get inside Banner’s estate and compel him to talk to you. Not at this point.”
“Delgato worked for them, top secret shit, Reo, at the same time Redman’s apartment building blew up. I’ve got her glamming it up in Acapulco with the guy who lit the fuse.”
“You believe he lit the fuse.”
“Jesus, Reo, what do you want? A vid of him setting the charges?”
“Would be nice.” On-screen, Reo held up a hand.
“Blasting me won’t get you a warrant, either.
And I agree with you, right down the line.
But a judge is going to need more. You connected Cruz to Delgato, Delgato to Banner-Wyst, and very likely Delgato to your prime suspect.
But you haven’t yet connected Cruz to Banner-Wyst, and that’s the sticking point. ”
“If you lay it out the way I have—”
“I’m going to hear that I’m reaching and need more, and I don’t want to hear that because when I go back with more, the judge remembers the first time. Get me the more, I’ll go in with it, and I’ll get the warrants.”
Reo let out a sigh. “I may not know all the nit and grit of your job, and you may not know all the nit and grit of mine. But I know enough for me to understand why you had to give this a push, and you know enough to have expected my response.”
“Yeah, yeah. She was dirty, Reo. She died in Spain, but she’s mine now. So I’ve got four bodies. Redman may be the weapon, but the cause is inside Banner-Wyst.”
“I believe you, and I want them, all of them, just as much as I want Redman. What I can do is take this to the boss. Maybe there’s a trick or an angle I’m not seeing.”
Eve paced to her AC, got water, since those chips had been pretty damn salty. “If there were a trick or angle, you’d see it.”
“Thanks, but I’ll run it by anyway.”
“We’ll get the more, and I’ll get back to you with it. Later.”
She glugged water, paced some more. And started updating the board when she heard Peabody coming. Her usual clomp had a bit of a bounce in it.
“Thanks. I know that was really bad timing.”
“It’s okay. Their first time in New York?”
“Yeah. Mom and Dad came when I graduated the Academy, and the rest of the family watched the live feed. Mom and Dad have been here a few times, and Zeke that once. So the first for my sister and older brother.
“Did you talk to Reo?”
“Yeah, no joy. Need more.”
Peabody set her shoulders. “I’ll replace my shovel with a backhoe. A backhoe’s a—”
“I know what a backhoe is. Go start it up.”
Eve finished updating the board, the book, wrote her report. Process mattered, she reminded herself.
She wanted to go back to EDD, but accepted that hit dead on nagging, add interrupting any progressive flow in the insane river of tech.
Instead, she got coffee, sat at her desk. Put her boots up, studied the board.
Back to the primary.
She knew why Redman killed. She knew how he killed. The order of that changed with Delgato, but the pattern remained.
Colleagues first. And the first of them, the woman he knew or believed had put Cruz on the company’s radar.
Was he done with colleagues? He’d eliminated those with access to the restricted area. Then killed Cruz.
Logically, done with colleagues.
Who came next?
Her vote went to either O’Brian, Banner, or Wyst, but Cruz may have had help, may have worked with someone. Someone in his line of work, someone from Banner-Wyst.
O’Brian, she thought, knew things. His admin knew things. Would Redman consider him a colleague? More a superior, Eve thought. He wasn’t one of the names listed for the restricted area. But that didn’t mean he’d been blocked from what had gone on inside it.
He hadn’t come to the memorial, she remembered. Chu’s direct supervisor, but he hadn’t come to pay his respects.
Worth finding out why.
She started to contact O’Brian’s office, then opted to go around that and took the time to hunt up his coordinator’s personal ’link.
“Hello. Good afternoon.”
“This is Lieutenant Dallas.”
“Yes, I see that.”
“I’d like to speak with Director O’Brian.”
“I’m sorry. He’s unavailable.”
“Mae, it’s important I speak with him.”
“Call me back in five minutes,” Mae mumbled, and ended the call.
Eve got up, paced, sat, brooded. Called back.
“Lieutenant, I couldn’t speak freely.”
“Where are you?”
“A bathroom stall. I only have a few minutes, and if someone comes in, I’ll have to hang up. Director O’Brian left yesterday. He just told me to cancel all his appointments, his meetings, everything for the next three weeks.”
“Where did he go?”
“He didn’t tell me, just said he’d be out of the country.
She knows. Ms. Reynolds. She knows everything.
Something’s going on. Emergency meetings.
Mr. Wyst stormed out of Director O’Brian’s office yesterday, and not an hour later, Director O’Brian called me in.
I could see he was very upset. That’s when he told me to cancel everything.
“Lieutenant, I don’t think Mr. Wyst knew Director O’Brian was leaving. Mr. Wyst came in after Director Chu’s memorial, demanded to know why Director O’Brian hadn’t attended.”
“Is that right?”
“Yes, and she—Ms. Reynolds—told Mr. Wyst that Director O’Brian had a family emergency, so had taken part of his annual leave. Lieutenant, Mr. Wyst was furious. He demanded to know where Director O’Brian had gone, but she claimed she didn’t know.”
“She was lying.”
“Yes, she was lying, Lieutenant. I’m sure of it. I’m not supposed to talk to you. Mr. Wyst told me specifically that if you contacted or approached me, I was to refuse to talk to you and contact Legal. But you’re the police, and something’s very wrong.