In Death 23 - Born in Death

lock. Careful and cautious.
    Whatever she’d known or had that had killed her, she hadn’t known or had it long. Eve judged Natalie Copperfield as a woman who knew her mind.
    Shared the information with someone else besides the boyfriend, maybe. If so, it had been the wrong person.
    Taking the list provided, Eve began a standard run on the victim’s coworkers, superiors, and the heads of the firm. Then she tagged Peabody on the interdepartment ’link. “Do a search and run on the other tenants in Copperfield’s building. Maybe she saw something at home, or in the neighborhood.”
    “I was heading there. Just went over the statement from the neighbors, both scenes. Nothing on the surface on either.”
    “So we go under. I got the click on a search of their financials. I’ll look there.”
    “They weren’t blackmailers. There’s no vibe.”
    “We look anyway.”
    No vibe, Eve agreed, but brought up Natalie’s data. What she found was, she supposed, what should be expected for a number cruncher. Organized, frugal, balanced accounts. The occasional spree, and a big, fat chunk laid out three months before at White Wedding for a dress, veil, undergarments.
    There hadn’t been any fancy wedding dress in the apartment. Eve relayed the same to Peabody.
    “It would have to be fitted,” she was informed. “They’d probably keep it at the shop, and schedule fittings up to a week or so before the big day.”
    “Oh. Right. Let’s check anyway, be sure.”
    “Got a couple minor possessions—illegal substance—on the first-floor tenant, first scene. Pauli, Michael. Last one three years back. A D-and-D, and a shoplifting charge on tenant on second scene. Neither recent.”
    “I’ve been running the office. I’m going to shoot that data to you—you keep at it—and head up to EDD. See if they’ve dug anything off her pocket ’link.”
    “I can go to EDD.”
    “I’m not sending you up there to play grab-ass with McNab.”
    “Aw.”
    “Run the names, Peabody. Anything pops, tag me. Otherwise, send the results back to my unit here, and at home. Clock out when you’re done. You can go home and play grab-ass.”
    “He doesn’t have much to grab, but what there is—”
    To save herself, Eve cut the transmission. She saved herself again by taking the glides rather than the elevator to EDD. At change of tour, the elevators were a box of bodies and odors. The glides were bad enough, jammed with cops coming on, going off, bringing in subjects for questioning, hauling others down to Booking.
    Eve squirmed her way off and took the stairs to the last level. She came out into the corridor of the EDD unit and was all but blinded by the wild squiggly pattern of blue lightning bolts on violent pink that only Ian McNab would call a shirt.
    “I want to know where you shop,” she demanded.
    “Huh? Hey, Dallas.”
    “Because I never want to make the lethal mistake of going there.” She dug out credits. “Get me a tube of Pepsi from that sarcastic, sadistic thing people call a vending machine.”
    “Sure.” He caught the credits she tossed him.
    Peabody was right, at least about the fact he didn’t have much ass. He was built like a reed, dressed like a circus star, and had the soul of an e-geek.
    His hair was slicked back in a blond tail leaving his thin, pretty face unframed. There were countless silver hoops in his left ear. She wondered why he didn’t list to that side when he walked.
    “I caught your case,” he told her, and tossed her the tube. “Just on my way back from making a pit stop. About to tag you.”
    “You got something for me?”
    “Got the first vic’s trans, seven days back. Can get you more. See, even when you clear the ’link, the trans are on the hard drive for—”
    “I don’t want a nerd lesson, just the results.”
    “Come on back.”
    If Homicide was business casual, EDD was haute couture. On Venus. McNab’s lightning bolts sizzled among a storm of clashing colors, shiny materials, gel-boots, and pounds of body adornments. Where Homicide hummed, EDD sang. Shrieked, actually, Eve thought, with beeps and buzzes, voices, music, and electronic whistles.
    She’d go mad in an hour under these conditions and often wondered how her old partner, Feeney, captain of the division, survived. In fact, she corrected, thrived among the peacocks and passion flowers.
    McNab grabbed a disc from his workstation. “We’ll take a booth.”
    He wound his way through the jungle. Most of EDD