In Death 27 - Salvation in Death

lead to the sex this isn’t about. But mostly, when you don’t run on my line, it makes me think. And even after, I think if I don’t switch my line to run on yours, it’s okay. Because what you think makes you who you are. And that’s my girl.”
    “Well, damn,” she said after a moment. “Damn. You have to go and be all lucid and smart.” No matter how she tried, it seemed it just wasn’t the day for keeping the wind in her sails. “And right. I guess, see I felt sorry for her, for Juanita, and you coming down on the hard line made me feel like maybe I wasn’t a straight enough cop.”
    “It’s not what it means.” He gave her a light, affectionate poke in the shoulder. “Bogus, Peabody.”
    “Some days I can’t believe I made it here. New York, Cop Central, Dallas, a detective’s shield. And you know somebody’s going to take a good look and say, what the hell, send her back to the farm.”
    “You start heading there, think about all the bad guys you’ve helped put away.”
    “Yeah.” She took a breath. “Yeah. But . . . Juanita’s not a bad guy. Not the kind you can just lock up and say, ‘Real good job, have a brew.’ It’s hard to shake, feeling that and knowing that’s just what we have to do.”
    He gave her another poke, and a good, straight look in the eye. “Did you make the case?”
    “Yeah.”
    “That’s all there is. You can’t take on the PA’s job, the judge, the jury. You just make the case.”
    “I know. I know. But this one . . . Dallas worked some stuff. She had Reo and Mira, even the priest. Juanita’s got to go down for it, but not as hard as it could’ve been.”
    “The other one’s going down harder. That’s what you and Dallas are aiming for, right? And I’ve got a little something that’s going to help.”
    “What?”
    “I was on my way to tell Dallas, when I saw you. I got distracted by the She-Body.”
    “Let’s go.”
    “Hey, maybe we could just take five more to—”
    “No.” But she laughed, and gave his ass another squeeze. “Absolutely no. But tonight? Your dents are going to have dents.”
    “Hot damn.”
     
    In her office, Eve studied the map on her comp screen. Calculated. There were ways, she thought, and ways to run a con. The problem—and she could work around it if need be—was that every one of the Ortega properties was currently occupied. If she ran an op in any of them, even anything as simple and basic as the sting she had in mind, she would have to move them out.
    If anything went wrong, if a civilian got hurt, it would be on her.
    But there were ways, she thought, and ways. She turned to the ’link and contacted Roarke’s office. Knowing the routine, she did the obligatory chitchat with Roarke’s admin, Caro.
    “He’s in a meeting,” Caro told her, “but I can put you through if it’s important.”
    “No.” Could be. “Can you give me an idea when he’ll be done?”
    “He has another appointment scheduled in thirty minutes. So I’d say no longer than that.”
    “Thirty would be fine for him to get back to me. If it’s longer, I may hit you up for that interruption. Appreciate it.”
    “Happy to help, Lieutenant.”
    Eve programmed coffee, went back to studying the map. “If you don’t have something for me,” she said when Peabody and McNab came in, “go away.”
    “How about a toss-away ’link Juanita Turner didn’t toss away?”
    Eve’s head came up, and her gaze burned into McNab. “If you’ve got Penny Soto on there, talking about murder, I’ll ignore the next time the two of you play grab-ass on duty. And may, in fact, grab your ass myself.”
    “My ass is sure getting a lot of play today.” McNab pulled the ’link he’d sealed, and a disc, out of one of his pockets. “I copied the transes onto disc. The caller blocked video on her end, but there’s plenty for voice match. Which, anticipating, I went ahead and ran against the interview you did with Penny Soto. Bull’s-eye.”
    Eve snatched the disc, shoved it into her comp slot.
    “The last one should do it,” McNab said.
    “Computer, run last transmission on current disc.”
    Acknowledged . . . Transmission is voice only. Running . . .
    Hello. Pen—
    No names, remember? And don’t forget. It’s really important for you to toss the ’link in a recycler when this is over. Don’t forget.
     
    Eve’s smile spread, went fierce.
     
    I won’t forget, but—
    I just thought you might need someone to talk to, just to know