Possession in Death (6 page)

“Okay.” Eve watched the willowy blonde glide out.

“You wanted to see me?” She had a breathy, baby doll voice that made Eve
think it was Allie’s good luck ballet didn’t require vocals.

“Just verifying some information. Would you mind telling me where you
were this afternoon?”

“Sure. Alex and I had brunch with some friends at Quazar’s. Caviar and
champagne—it was CeeCee’s birthday—which probably wasn’t a good idea right
before practice. I’m still carrying those blinis.” She smiled easily. “Doesn’t bother
Alex, I guess, because he jumped right in when we got here. Pushed me through
that damn pas de deux until I thought about just sticking my fingers down my
throat. But Barinova will skin you for purging, and she always knows. Anyway, I
got through it. My Angel to his Devil.”

“His what?”

“Devil.” She lifted the water bottle she carried, took a long sip. “We’re
performing the final pas de deux from
Diabolique
. I’m dancing Angel. Alex is
Devil. Let me tell you, it’s a killer.”

Eve looked past her to the studio doorway. “I just bet.”

“That’s what I’d call a devil of a coincidence,” Peabody commented when
they stepped out on the street.

“Are you buying it?”

“Not even for the couple of loose credits in my pocket.”

“I want you to check with the other people the blonde gave us, and the
restaurant. We’ll see if Alexi could’ve managed to slip away. See what the timing
is from the restaurant to the alley, from the school to the alley.”

“Beata turned him down, pissed him off. He kills her, buries the body.”
Peabody scanned the area. “God knows where, but that would fit in with the
west of the alley, underground deal.”

“She’s not dead. She’s trapped.” Eve snapped it out furiously, shocking
herself as much as Peabody.

“Okay… So you think—”

“It’s what she thought. Szabo.” Eve rubbed a hand between her breasts
where her heart beat, hard and dull, a hammer against cloth. “I’m saying Szabo
thought Beata was alive.”

“Right. Behind a red door. Why do people have to be so cryptic?”

Think like a cop, Eve ordered herself. Facts, logic, instinct. “Szabo spends
time at the school, with Alexi et al, sniffs it out, suspects, hints around. Maybe
trying to get Alexi to make a move. He kills her.” Eve rolled it around. “Awful
damn tidy, but sometimes it just is.”

“Well, the old lady told everybody Beata was still alive, so that doesn’t ride
the train very well.”

“She poofs. She’s got a job, her classes, landed a part. Sounds like
everything’s working out for her, but she poofs. Odds are she didn’t poof
voluntarily—that’s Lloyd’s take, and I agree.”

“Three months is a long time,” Peabody put in. “A long time to hold
somebody who doesn’t want to be held. And for what reason?”

“Szabo didn’t want to believe the girl was dead, and who can blame her?”
Eve added. “Not only her great-granddaughter, but she overrode the rest of the
family so Beata could come to New York.”

“Had to feel sick about it.” Like Eve, Peabody scanned the street, the
buildings, the traffic. “What did she say exactly? To you, I mean.”

Eve didn’t want to go back there, to kneeling in the street, the woman’s
hand clasped with hers. Blood to blood.

“She said Beata’s name, she said she was trapped, couldn’t get out. The
below bit, the red door. She asked for help.”

You are the warrior. I am the promise.

Fighting to stay steady, Eve shoved a hand through her hair. “She was
dying.”

But her eyes, Eve remembered, had been alert, alive.

“We comb through the alibis, check her other habitats.” Do the work, Eve
thought, take the steps. “I’m going to check in with Morris, contact the arresting
officers about Alexi, get their take on him.”

“Beata’s disappearance and the old woman’s murder—if they’re not
connected, it’s another devil of a coincidence.”

“We pursue the investigation as if they are. We figure out one, we’ve got
the other.”

“I could tag McNab, have him meet me, go by the theater where she was
supposed to work. Lloyd covered it,” Peabody added, “but we could try fresh
eyes on it.”

“Good thinking. Send me whatever you get.”

She needed thinking time, Eve told herself as they split up. A stop at the
morgue to confirm TOD—which was just stupid, since she’d been right there at
TOD—to see if Morris or the lab had been able to get a handle on the type of
blade used, if the sweepers had found any trace evidence.

Deal with the facts first, she thought as she got in her vehicle—then move
on to theory. But she sat a moment, suddenly tired, suddenly angry. It felt as if
something pushed inside her brain, trying to shove her thoughts into tangents.

Not enough downtime, she decided. No time to take some good, deep
breaths between cases. So she took them now, just closing her eyes for a
moment, ordering her mind and body to clear.

Alive. Trapped. Help.

Keep your promise!

The voice was so clear in her head she jerked up, had a hand on her weapon
as she swiveled to check the seat beside her, behind her. Her heart pounded
painfully against her ribs, in her throat, in her ears as she lowered her unsteady
hand.

“Stop. Just stop,” she ordered herself. “Do what you have to do, then get
some sleep.” She pulled away from the curb, but gave in to need and called
home.

And her heart slowed, settled a little when Roarke’s face flowed on-screen.

“Lieutenant, I was hoping I’d—What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Well, nothing except having some old Hungarian woman bleed
out under my hands. Tired,” she admitted. “I’ve got to head down to the morgue
because there was a glitch with the TOD. I need to get it straightened out, then
talk to a bunch of cops about a Russian ballet guy. Sorry,” she added. “This one
literally fell in my lap.”

“I’ll meet you at the morgue.”

“Why?”

“Where else does a man meet his wife—when they’re you and me?” She
looked pale, he thought, her eyes too dark against her skin.

“Yeah, okay. I’ll see you there.”

When she broke transmission, Roarke stared at the blank screen of his ‘link.
Not even a token protest? More than tired, he thought.

His lieutenant was not herself.

She got lost. She would have deemed it impossible, but she couldn’t find her
way. The streets seemed too crowded, too confusing, and the blare of horns
when she hesitated at a light had her jumping in her seat. Frustration turned to
sweaty fear that ran a snaking line down the center of her back. Battling it back,
she ordered the dash navigator to plot her route, then gave in and put her vehicle
on auto.

Tired, she assured herself and closed her eyes. Just tired. But there was a
lingering unease that she was ill—or worse.

Need a boost, she thought, nearly shuddering with relief as she arrived at
the morgue. She’d grab a tube of Pepsi at Vending, down some caffeine. Maybe
even choke down a PowerBar because, Jesus, she was starving.

What was wrong with the air in here? she wondered as she started down the
white tunnel. The lights glaring off the tiles slapped into her eyes and made them
ache. It was frigid, an icy blast after the heat of the summer night. Yet under her
chilled skin her blood beat hot, like a fever raging.

She headed for Vending, digging into her pockets, her mind on food and
caffeine. A woman sat on the floor beside the machines, her face in her hands,
weeping.

“I’m scared. I’m scared,” she repeated. “Nobody sees me now.”

“What’s the problem?” As Eve crouched down, the woman dropped her
hands. Her face, livid with bruising, shone with shock and what might have been
hope.

“You can see me?”

“Of course I can see you. You need medical attention. Take it easy. I’m
going to get someone, then—”

“It’s too late.” Tears ran down the swollen face as the woman dipped her
head again. “Look what he did to me.”

Eve froze as she stared at the gaping wound on the back of the woman’s
head, at the dried blood matting the hair, soaking the blouse.

“Hold on. Just—” Eve reached out, and her hand passed through the
woman’s arm. “Jesus God.”

“It was Rennie.” Sniffling, she pushed the heels of her hands through the
tears.

“What are you? What is this?”

“I don’t know, but I have to tell
somebody
. It was Rennie,” she repeated.
“The bastard. He was mad at me ‘cause I helped Sara get away from him. He
must’ve followed me from work, and when I was in the park, he was just there.
And he yelled and he hit me. He kept hitting me, and I couldn’t get away.
Nobody came to help. Nobody saw, and he hit me and hit me, and I fell. And he
picked up a rock and he killed me. It’s not right. What am I going to do now?
I’m scared to be here. I’m scared to be dead.”

Eve couldn’t swallow, could barely breathe. “This has to stop.”

“Rennie killed me.”

The woman—the hallucination—held out her hands. Tore them up, Eve
thought in some cold part of her brain. Tore them up when she fell, when she
tried to crawl away.

“He killed me, and now I won’t ever get married or eat ice cream or buy
new shoes and have drinks with Sara. Rennie Foster killed me with a rock in
Riverside Park, and maybe he’ll kill Sara next. What’s going to happen?”

“I don’t know.”

“Aren’t I supposed to go somewhere? I don’t want to stay here. It’s cold
here. It’s too cold and it’s too bright. Can you help me? I’m Janna, Janna
Dorchester, and I didn’t do anything wrong. Is this hell?”

“No.” But she wasn’t entirely sure.

Maybe hell was cold and bright. Maybe hell was losing your mind.

“Eve.” Roarke dropped down beside her, took her arms. “Christ, you’re
burning up. Come on now.”

He started to lift her, but she resisted. “No. Wait.” She sucked in a breath,
shuddered it out. “You don’t see her?”

He pressed a hand to her forehead. “I see you, sitting on the floor of the
morgue looking like a ghost.”

“At one,” she murmured.

“I guess he can’t see me because I’m dead and everything,” Janna said. “Why
do you?”

“I don’t know. I need Morris,” she told Roarke. “And God, I need
something to drink.”

“Don’t leave me,” Janna begged, dropping her head again so Eve could see
the ugly wound that killed her. “Please don’t leave me here alone.”

“I’m just going to sit here. Bring Morris, will you? I just… need to sit
here.” Deal, she ordered herself. Deal with what’s in front of you, then figure
out the rest. “Could really use something cold to drink.”

Roarke rose, cursing under his breath as he ordered a tube of Pepsi.

“He’s gorgeous.” Janna smiled a little even as she knuckled at tears. “Mega
frosted. Is he your boyfriend?”

“We’re married,” Eve murmured.

“Seriously icy for you,” Janna said as Roarke glanced down.

“So we are,” he said. “And I’ll be taking my wife to a doctor in short order.
I’ll get you Morris first, but then you’re done here.”

“He’s got a really sexy voice, too.” Janna sighed as Eve took the tube Roarke
had opened, drank.

“Thanks. I’m going to sit right here,” she said as much to Janna as Roarke,
“while you get Morris.”

And while she sat wondering if she had a brain tumor or had dropped into
some strange, vivid dream, she put on the cop and interviewed the dead.

Minutes later, Morris hurried down the tunnel with Roarke.

“Dallas.” He knelt, laid a hand on her brow as Roarke had. “You’re
feverish.”

“Just tell me if you’ve gotten a body in—female, mixed race, midtwenties,
ID’d as Janna Dorchester. Beating death in Riverside Park.”

“Yes. She’s only just come in. How did you—”

“Who caught the case?”

“Ah… Stuben’s primary.”

“I need to contact him. Can you get me his contact data?”

“Of course. But you don’t look well.”

“I’m feeling better, actually.” Odd, she thought, how the cop approach
steadied her, even when her interviewee was dead. “I think I’ll feel better yet
once I talk to Stuben. I’d appreciate it, Morris.”

“Give me a minute.”

“Eve.” Roarke took her hand as Morris strode away. “What’s going on
here?”

“I’m not sure, and I need you to give me a really open mind. I mean wide-open.
Yours is already more open than mine about, you know, weird stuff.”

“What sort of weird stuff is my mind going to be wide-open about?”

“Okay.” She looked into his eyes, so blue, so beautiful. Eyes she trusted with
everything she had. “There’s a dead woman sitting right beside me. Her name’s
Janna Dorchester, and some asshole named Rennie Foster bashed her head in
with a rock in Riverside Park. She’s worried her friend Sara might be next on his
list. So I’m going to pass the information to the primary. I can read Russian.”

“I’m sorry?”

“I can read Russian. I think I can speak it, too, and I’m pretty sure I can
make Hungarian goulash. And maybe borscht, possibly pierogies. The old
woman, the one who fell into my lap and happened to be a Gypsy speaker for the
dead, did something to me. Or I have a brain tumor.”

Staring into her eyes, Roarke cupped Eve’s face in his hands.
“Kak vashi
dela?”

“
U menya vsyo po pnezhne mu.
Hey, you speak Russian?”

He sat back on his heels, rocked right down to the bone. “A handful of
phrases, and certainly not as fluently as you, apparently. And despite your
answer, I doubt you’re fine.”

They looked up as Morris came back. “I have what you need.”

“Great.” Eve took out her ‘link, and staying where she was, contacted
Detective Stuben. “Lieutenant Dallas,” she said, “Homicide, out of Central. I’ve
got some information on your vic, on Janna Dorchester.” She looked at Janna as
she spoke. “You’re going to want to find Rennie Foster and get some protection
to a Sara Jasper. Let me lay it out for you.”