In Death 25 - Creation in Death

dead. Names, last known locations, property deeded in their name.
    “Roarke, if you need any help on the property search, pull in any of the EDD team. Heads up,” she said, boosting her voice over the chatter and clacking. “When Captain Feeney isn’t in the house, and I’m not in the war room, the civilian’s in charge of electronics. Questions on that? Go to him.”
    “Lieutenant’s pet,” Callendar said just loud enough for Roarke to hear, and in a mock sulk that made him smile a little.
    “I’ll wager ten I hit on the property before you hit on the banks.”
    “You’re on, Prime Buns.”
    Eve left them for her office to update her notes, to take another pass through them. While she worked she tried Feeney.
    “Anything for me?”
    “There’s nothing on the records here. The business passed to our guy when his old man died. These records list the same bogus London address. Director said there were some paper records, some disc files in storage, but Lowell took them years ago. Sorry, kid.”
    “Tidy son of a bitch. Anyone still working there who was employed when Lowell was still in residence?”
    “No, checked that. I’m bringing in what records there are. We’ll pick through them. On my way in now.”
    “I’ll see you in the war room.”
    She pushed up, wanting to be on her feet. Her system was bottoming out, she could feel it, and if she didn’t keep moving, she’d drop.
    He was in New York, she thought. And wherever he lived and worked, wherever he was holding Ariel would be in New York, in a building that survived, or at least partially survived, the Urbans. It would have a connection to him, to her, to that time.
    Nothing else would do for him, she was sure of it.
    Death was his business. Body preparation or disposal, echoes of the Urban Wars, profit and science. He lived by death.
    By killing he re-created the death of one woman, over and over again, while feeding his own need to control, to give pain. To study pain and death.
    The torture devices were, in the opinions of the ME and the lab, tools and implements used during the Urbans with a few modern devices worked in. Same with the drugs found in the victims. He had to keep the connection.
    Opera. The drama, the scope, the tragedy, and again the connection to Edwina Spring. The disguises were really costumes, the aliases simply roles to play.
    Weren’t the victims the same? Just another element of his role-playing.
    How much longer before he gave Eve her cue to come onstage? And why the hell was she waiting?
    She got herself some coffee, took out another energy pill. Technically she wasn’t supposed to take a second one within the same twenty-four-hour period. But if she was going to push for her entrance in the play, she wasn’t going out so blurry she couldn’t remember her lines.
    She popped it, and with the coffee in hand went back to the war room.
    She opened communications so anyone in the field could hear and participate. “Updates. EDD first. Feeney?”
    “We’re about to run searches through the discs taken from Lowell’s Funeral Home. We’ll go through the paper records as well, looking for any pertinent data on Robert Lowell and/or Edwina Spring. Secondary unit has a list of prior open homicides and Missings that may be his earlier work. We’re requesting case files, moving from the highest probability down.”
    “Anything sing for you?”
    “Two. Both in Italy, one fifteen years back, one twelve. Both missing females that bull’s-eye our vic profile. One from Florence, one from Milan.”
    “Roarke, does Lowell have business operations in Italy, either of those cities?”
    “Milan, established just prior to Lowell’s inheriting the business.”
    “I want every detail of the Milan case first. Baxter, I want you to reach out to the investigating officer or his superior. Get a translator if necessary. Roarke, put the other Lowell operation locations on screen.
    “We hit these,” she said as he complied. “Blanket warrant—Feeney, make that happen. Three-man teams at each location, communication open throughout. Hit private and/or employee-only areas first. Get statements, get data, get every fucking thing.”
    “I have two prior business locations,” Roarke put in. “Buildings that were sold. One was severely damaged during the war, torn down and rebuilt as an apartment building. The second was intact, but sold by this Lowell’s father twenty-three years ago. He bought it shortly after the