In Death 32 - Treachery in Death

diamond she wore behind her back.
    “You got some tan.”
    “Jesus, Feeney.”
    “I’m just saying ’cause I’ll need to adjust the tone, blend it in. I can make it damn near invisible even when you’re naked. Stop fidgeting. Talk about the murder.”
    She put herself back in the filthy bathroom, which was somehow better than thinking about standing half naked in EDD.
    “I think the killer put the new lock on the front door. Why would Keener do that? New locks just dare some asshole to break it and see what’s worth locking up inside.”
    “Wanted him to be found.”
    “Yeah. Not this fast, but yeah. If some asshole found him, it’s probable they’d have messed up the crime scene, riffled through Keener’s junk. He had some clothes, a little cash, a toss-away ’link in the room he’d flopped in. And shoes. They always take the shoes. If it had gone that way, we’d have less to work with. I have a source, which I made up, telling me Keener wouldn’t OD. I play that against his record, his experience with his recreation of choice.”
    “How are you going to work her?”
    “I’ve got some ideas, but I need a face-to-face to refine them. And I need to talk to Mira. I have to make first contact now, but I want a run-through with Mira.”
    “Done.” He immediately turned his back. “Put something on, for Christ’s sake.” He picked up an earbud the size of a baby pea. “When and if you need it, one of us will be able to communicate with you through this.”
    “How do I turn the recorder on and off?”
    “I’ll set you up key phrases, whatever you want.”
    “Ah. Cinnamon donuts. I missed breakfast,” she told him. “I could go for a cinnamon donut.”
    He sat, keyed the phrase into a control panel. “That’s on. I could go for a cinnamon donut myself.”
    “Who couldn’t?”
    “And it’s reading five-by-five. Off phrase?”
    “Down the block.”
    He keyed it in, tested it. “Those phrases, your voice print. That’s a go. It’ll record into this.” He tapped a mini-monitor. “I’ll be bringing this to Roarke’s lab. We’ll set up another in your office. Peabody will be keyed in the same. The kid okay?”
    “Yeah. Can you have McNab hook her up? They can use one of their rendezvous closets and everybody’ll just think they’re groping.”
    “I like to pretend I don’t know about the closets and the groping. Yeah, I’ll tell the boy.”
    She nodded. “Sixteen hundred, HQ, initial full briefing.”
    “I’ll tell the wife not to hold dinner.”
    She started out, hesitated. “Do you always remember? To tell her?”
    “She doesn’t complain if I have to work a seventy-two-hour stretch, if I crash in the crib because I’m too beat to get home. She’s a damn good cop’s wife. But if I don’t tell her I’m going to be late for dinner, my life isn’t worth living.”
    “I guess that’s fair. So, we’ll provide the chow.”
    “That’s fair, too,” Feeney told her.
    She walked out and headed for the Illegals division.
    She made her strides brisk as she passed through the warren and angled off toward Renee Oberman’s squad. Engaged the recorder. She scanned the squad room, noted the case board, the assignments listed, the open cases, the closed ones.
    Like any squad there was noise and movement, the tap of fingers, the beep of ’links, but it was muted—more to her mind like a droid office pool than a cop shop. And unlike her division every cop at a desk wore a suit. Nobody worked in shirtsleeves, and every man wore a tie. The smell was off, too, she decided. No hint of processed sugar or burned coffee.
    No personal clutter either, mixed in with the files and disks, the memo cubes—not even in the cubes where a couple of uniforms worked.
    A female detective with a short crop of curls and toffee-colored skin swiveled in her chair. “Looking for somebody?”
    “Your boss. Lieutenant Dallas, Homicide. I need to speak with Lieutenant Oberman.”
    “She’s got somebody in with her. Shouldn’t be long.” The detective wagged a thumb at the wide window and door—both with the blinds down and closed.
    “I can wait. Any problem letting her know I’m here?”
    “No, ma’am.”
    “It’s sir in my unit.”
    “Sir. Hold on.” Rather than go to the office, the woman tapped the keys of her interoffice com—added, Eve noted, the privacy mode. “Lieutenant, pardon the interruption. There’s a Lieutenant Dallas from Homicide here to see you. Yes, ma’am. One