In Death 23 - Born in Death

London.”
    “A creature of habit,” Roarke put in. “As were your other two victims.”
    “Let’s hope Tandy makes out better than they did. I’m going to set up a board for her, and do a timeline.”
    “All right. Unless there’s something specific I can do for you here, you might send me some of those blind accounts on the Copperfield/ Byson case. I’ll start looking at numbers.”
    The fact was, he wanted to step away—at least for the time being—from the thought of a woman so completely vulnerable at the mercy of someone who wished her harm. Someone, he thought, she might have loved once.
    Eve stopped for a moment, turned to him. “If I’d been in your place on that one, I’d’ve told Whitney to kiss my ass.”
    “What?” He pulled himself back, into the now. “Ah, well, all in all, I’d rather have your lips in that vicinity than his.”
    “Find me something useful, they might find their way there.”
    “And my incentive keeps rising.”
    She swiveled away from the screen, looked him in the eyes. “Are you all right on this? The Tandy thing.”
    Foolish, he admitted, to believe she didn’t see, didn’t know. More foolish, he supposed, for him to try to block it from her, or from himself. “I’m not, actually, not completely. It resonates a little too deep for me. I don’t know if it’s anger or grief I’m feeling. It must be both.”
    “Roarke, we don’t know Tandy’s in the same kind of situation as your mother was.”
    “We don’t know she isn’t.” Idly, he picked up the little statue of the goddess Eve kept on her desk. A symbol of the female. “He waited until after I was born to murder her, my mother. But she was trying to protect me, do what she thought best for me. As I expect Tandy is doing, whoever has her now.”
    He set the statue down. “I just want my mind off it for a while.”
    He so rarely hurt, she thought. So rarely let himself, she corrected. “I can take this one back to Central. Keep it out of here.”
    “No.” He moved to her then, taking her face in his hands. “That won’t do, not for either of us. What once was made us who we are, one way or another. But it can’t stop us from doing what we do. They’ll have won then, won’t they?”
    She put her hands over his. “They can’t win. They can only screw with us.”
    “And so they do.” He leaned down, pressed his lips to the top of her head. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll steep myself in numbers for a while. They always clear my head.”
    “God knows how. I’m going to make coffee. All around?”
    “If I had some cake to go with it. I got shafted on that end of the deal.”
    “Cake?” Her mind circled around. “Oh, right. Mavis. I think there was some left. Those women were like vultures when something hadicing on it. Maybe the Dark Shadow stocked some of the leftovers in the AutoChef. I could probably choke down a piece myself.”
    And thinking that sugar and caffeine kept the blood moving, she made it a large piece along with strong, black coffee. He’d be all right, she told herself, because he wouldn’t let himself be otherwise. But she’d keep a finger on the pulse, and if she didn’t like the beat, she’d move the Tandy investigation out of the house.
    For convenience, she set Tandy’s board next to the one she’d already started on her other case. And on the side with a slick white surface began to handwrite a time line.
    She made lists of names. People she’d already spoken with on one side, those she would contact in the morning on the other. She tacked up Tandy’s ID photo.
    Her first step was to call the contact number of the parking lot. As she expected, she was transferred to an endless menu of choices, and quickly selected operator before the droning litany could bore her into a coma.
    “Courtesy Messaging Service.” The voice was nasal as a trombone and dense with Queens.
    “This is Lieutenant Dallas, NYPSD,” Eve began and gave her badge number. “I need information on the Park and Go, Fifty-eighth Street.”
    “For information, please call Customer Service between the hours of eight A . M . and—”
    “I need information now, and I don’t want to talk to some hand-patter at Customer Service.”
    “Well, jeez. This is a messaging service, you know, for, like, twenty businesses in Manhattan alone. I don’t have information about a parking lot.”
    “Put me through to the owner.”
    “I’m not supposed to bother the client with—”
    “Maybe