In Death 17 - Imitation in Death
ass."
"Kids, kids." Eve could feel her eye starting to twitch. "Let's save all this until after we catch the mean man and send him to his room. Feeney, control your moron. Not another word, Peabody."
She gave her aide a solid push out the door.
Peabody held it in until they'd driven five blocks. Eve figured it was a new record.
"I just don't think he should talk about other women that way. Or look at them with that gleam in his eye. We signed a lease."
"Oh Jesus Christ.on stilts. You've got lease fear, Peabody. Official document phobia. Get over it."
"Jesus Christ on stilts?"
"It just came to me. You're obsessing because you signed up for-what is it, a year? And now you're all, what if it doesn't work out? Who moves out? Who takes the communal salad plates or some stupid shit."
"Well, maybe. But that's normal, isn't it?"
"How the hell do I know what's normal?"
"You're married."
Sincerely shocked, Eve jerked the vehicle to a halt at a light. "That makes me normal? It just makes me married. Do you know how many abnormal married people there are out there across this great land and beyond? Just take a look at the double Ds that get called in, Manhattan borough alone. Marriage doesn't make people normal. Marriage isn't normal, probably. It just... is."
"Why did you get married?"
"I... Her mind went blank.- "He wanted to." Hearing just how lame that sounded, she shifted in her seat, and punched the gas. "It's just a promise, that's all. A promise, and you do your best not to break it."
"Like a lease."
"There you go."
"You know, Dallas, that's almost wise."
"Now I'm wise." She sighed. "Let me give you my little tidbit for the day. You want-McNab to stop thinking about, looking at, talking about other women, then you'd better take him to the vet and have him fixed. He'll make a nice pet. Women are the worst. They zero in on some guy. Oh boy, he's the one, gotta get. me that one. So they do. Then' they spend the rest of their time trying to figure out how to change him. Then if they manage it, they're not all that interested anymore, because guess what? He's not the one anymore."
Peabody was silent for several moments. "Somewhere in there is a lot of good sense."
"If you tell me I'm sensible in. addition to normal and wise, I'm going to punch you in the stomach.- I'm as screwed up as the next person, and I like it that way."
"In many ways, Lieutenant, you're even more screwed up than the next person. It's what makes you, you."
"I think I'll punch you in the stomach anyway. Put it on my calendar."
She toyed with double parking, which always put her in a good mood, but found a spot on a street ramp.
The Seventh Avenue building looked ordinary, even shabby, but the security there rivaled that at the U.N.
She passed through the first post, which' required her badge, a palm print,. and a scan. At the second post, a uniformed guard requested her business and a second scan.
She looked around the small lobby with its aging linoleum floor and bare beige walls. "What, you keep government secrets in here?"
"More vital than that, Lieutenant." The guard offered a slight grimace as he passed her back her ID. "Fashion secrets. Competitors try every damn thing to get a peak. Delivery scams mostly, trying to get up to the design floor carrying deli bags or pizza boxes. But you get some more inventive ones, too. Phoney fire inspector last month. ID cleared, too, but the scan picked up his recorder and we booted him."
"You on the job?"
"Was." And he seemed pleased she'd made him. "Put in my twenty-five, most of it out of the one-two. This pays better, and it can get pretty lively around here before the big spring and fall shows."
"I bet. You know Serena Unger, designer here?"
"I might if you draw me a picture. "
"Tall, thin, black, beautiful. Thirty-two. Short black hair with a reddish overcast, sharp face, long nose. Likes the ladies."
"Yeah, I know the one you mean. Got a Caribbean accent. You got a line on her?"
"She may be a line to somebody else. There's a woman she's playing with. About the same age. Blonde, snazzy looker. Five ten, curvy, slick, and professional. Married. Gates, Julietta."
"She's cleared- through here a few times. Fashion writer. Seen the two of them go
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