In Death 25 - Creation in Death

force. Its soul purpose will be to investigate this crime, and to apprehend and incarcerate the perpetrator. We will use every resource, every man-hour, and all the experience at our disposal to do so. Questions.”
    They flew like missiles. But the fact that there were so many allowed her to cherry pick.
    “How was she killed?” Eve repeated. “Ms. York was tortured over a period of days, and died as a result of blood loss. No, we do not have any suspects at this time, and yes, we are, and will continue to follow any and all leads.”
    She fielded a few more, grateful her time was nearly up. She noted Nadine tossed out no questions, and had in fact moved out of the pack to talk on her ’link.
    “You said she was tortured,” someone called out. “Can you give us details?”
    “I neither can nor will. Those details are confidential to this investigation. If they weren’t, I wouldn’t give them to you so you could broadcast her suffering and cause yet more pain for her family and friends. Her life was taken. And that’s more than enough for outrage.”
    She stepped back, turned, and walked through the doors of Central.
     
    I t would take Nadine a few minutes to get up to Homicide and charm her way through any potential roadblocks to Eve’s office.
    Besides, Eve thought, she could wait. Just wait.
    First, Eve needed to speak to Roarke.
    She caught the scent as soon as she stepped into the conference room, and much preferred it to the olfactory bombardment at Scentual.
    Somebody, she thought, brought in gyros.
    She made her way over to Roarke’s workstation, noted he’d gone for the cold-cut sub. He paused in his work long enough to pick up half the sub, hand it to her. “Eat something.”
    She peered between the slabs of roll. “What is it?”
    “No substance in nature, I can promise you. That’s why I said eat something .”
    More to please him than out of appetite, she took a bite. “I need to talk to you.”
    “If you’re after some answers on this chore you gave me, you won’t get any as yet. There are, literally, countless homes, private residences, warehouses, and other potential structures in New York, the boroughs, into New Jersey, that have been owned by the same person or persons or organization for the last decade.”
    “How are you handling it?”
    “Dividing into sections—quadrants, you could say. Subdividing by types of structure, then by types of ownership. It’s bloody tedious work.”
    “You asked for it.”
    “So I did.” Watching her, he picked up a bottle of water, drank.
    “There’s something else. The lab’s identified the soap and shampoo used to wash down the vic.”
    “Quick work.”
    “Yeah, Dickhead’s got his teeth in it. He worked the case before.”
    “Ah.”
    “He uses extremely high-end products. Very exclusive. Only one outlet in New York, two locations. It’s yours.”
    “Mine?” He sat back, eyes cold and hard on her face. “And so was the sheet he used.”
    “That’s right.” Now, simply because it was there and so was she, Eve took another bite of mystery-meat sub. “Someone less cynical might think coincidence, particularly since you manufacture or own big, fat chunks of everything.”
    “But you and I aren’t less cynical.”
    “No, and so I tagged Feeney and put you into the Missing Persons search he was running. You’re not going to like it.”
    “Who is she?”
    “Gia Rossi.” She picked up his water, took a gulp. “She’s a trainer and instructor at BodyWorks. Do you know her?”
    “No.” He pressed his fingers to his eyes a moment, then dropped them. “No, I don’t believe so. Were there any of these connects, any of these overlaps in the previous investigation to me or mine?”
    “No, not that I know of, and I started a check on the way back. He changed the products with this one. If you’re part of the reason, we need to figure out why. A competitor maybe, a former employee. We need to work that angle.”
    “When did he take the second one?”
    “She was reported missing yesterday. I don’t have the details yet—Feeney’s on it. I’ve got to go pull another chain now, but we’re going to dig into this. I know this is a kick in the ass, but it’s also a mistake. His mistake. There was nothing connecting the victims in any of the other cases. Now there is.”
    “Yes. Now there is.”
    “I’m sorry, I have to go do this.”
    “Go on. I’ll stick with this for now.”
    She didn’t kiss him, though part