The Unquiet

nodded to the uniform outside the lab doors. “Key me in, Tweed, then I’m going to want those discs. The originals.”
    “I’ll take care of it.”
    “And stand by,” she told him.
    Wrecked was a mild word for it, Eve thought as she scanned the area. Smashed comps lay on the floor on a sea of broken beakers, dishes, specimen bowls. The body lay faceup—what was left of the face. Blood stained the hacked and ripped clothes, spread over the floor, left its obscene abstract art on the sides of a counter.
    And on the top, in blood, his message.
     
    Memo to: Lt. Dallas.
    Nobody liked him anyway.
    You’re welcome!
    Sincerely, Dr. Chaos.
    “It’s Billingsly.”
    “How can you be sure?”
    “That’s the suit he had on this morning.” She took a can of Seal-It out of her kit, used it, tossed it to Roarke. “This takes him off the suspect list.”
    “I doubt he’d feel grateful.”
    “What was he doing in here? He doesn’t strike me as the type who’d come by for a late-night visit with Rosenthall, and this isn’t his area. He’s another floor up, in the other wing.”
    “He might have been lured here.”
    “Yeah, maybe. But it’s late, way after hours. Why is he in the building, and where’s Rosenthall? I need to know who keyed in before Security.”
    “Would you like me to see to that area?”
    “Yeah, that would save time.”
    “His nose is gone.”
    “It sure is. What does that mean? Smell no evil? No, that’s just stupid. To me it says nosy. You’re nosy, Billingsly; now you’re dead.”
    She turned as Peabody came in.
    “Wow. Another day, another slaughter.” Peabody eased out a breath. “McNab’s with me. I had him start on Security. I thought maybe Roarke would be here, so we’d have two e-men on it.”
    “Then I’ll go hook up with Ian.”
    “What do you see?” Eve asked Peabody when they were alone.
    “I see Billingsly’s off the suspect list.”
    Despite the circumstances, Eve smiled a little. “And?”
    “He’s been stabbed a whole bunch. It might even be more than Bickford, but it’s hard to tell. He’s missing his nose.”
    “What does that say to you?”
    “It’s another quiz. This time I want a grade. It says to me Billingsly won’t be sniffing around anymore. Maybe around Arianna, maybe around something else—something lab related. The note’s addressed directly to you this time, so he knows it’s our case—and that Billingsly wasn’t a popular guy around here.”
    “I’d say A minus.”
    “A minus?” Both insult and sulk piped through Peabody’s voice. “I want A plus.”
    “For an A plus you’d need to observe, identify, and relate the teeth marks in the vic’s face and throat.”
    “Teeth . . . oh jeez.” Observing and identifying them now, Peabody swallowed hard. “He ate him.”
    “Just here and there. He’s accelerating,” Eve concluded. “This time blood wasn’t enough. He wanted a taste of flesh.” She scanned again, noted the open door on an empty cabinet. “Did the killer walk in on the vic, or the other way around?”
    “If this is extra credit, I want a review of my earlier grade. Let me think.” To help herself do that, Peabody looked away from the body. “I can’t think why Billingsly would be here. He and Rosenthall aren’t pals, and this isn’t his area—not only sector-wise, but professionally. Maybe if Rosenthall asked him to come in—but I don’t buy it. He’s not going to do his competitor any favors. He’d come if Arianna asked him, but that puts her in this, and it just doesn’t fit well for me.”
    Pausing, she made herself look at the body again. “If he came here—which, okay, obviously, he did—it was to get something on Justin, or screw with something, or poke around looking . . . Poke his nose in!”
    Eve took the cloned key card and recorder out of Billingsly’s pocket. Hit Play.
    “Justin Rosenthall.”
    “Billingsly tried a little B&E,” Peabody commented.
    “That’s an A plus.”
    “Yay!”
    “Billingsly keys in using the dummy card and the recorder. He’s poking around. The killer is already here—looking for something, doing something, waiting for something. Billingsly sees him, and that’s the end of Billingsly. The killer chews on him, stabs him, amputates his nose, wrecks the lab, takes time to leave the message, then boogies out. They’ve got him on disc, so we’ll be able to track his movements.”
    “That’s a break.”
    “For us, not for Billingsly.” Eve