“Lovely,” Mira said with a slow, easy smile. “Romantic. Why does romance worry you?”
“It doesn’t. I— Okay, it scares the shit out of me, and I don’t know why. I’m not used to having someone there, having someone look at me like—the way he does. Sometimes it’s unnerving.”
“Why is that?”
“Because I haven’t done anything to make him care about me as much as he does. I know he does.”
“Eve, your self-worth has always been focused on your job. Now a relationship has forced you to begin evaluating yourself as a woman. Are you afraid of what you’ll find?”
“I haven’t figured that out. It’s always been the job. The highs and lows, the rush, the monotony. Everything I needed to be was there. I busted my ass to make lieutenant, and I figure I can sweat my way up to captain, maybe more. Doing the job was it, all of it. It was important to be the best, to make a mark. It’s still important, but it’s not all anymore.”
“I would say, Eve, that you’ll be a better cop, and a better woman because of it. Single focus limits us, and can too often obsess us. A healthy life needs more than one goal, one passion.”
“Then I guess my life’s getting healthier.”
Eve’s communicator beeped, reminding her that she was on the clock, a cop first. “Dallas.”
“You’re going to want to switch over to public broadcast, Channel 75,” Feeney announced. “Then get your butt back here to the Towe
r. The new chief wants to fry our asses.”
Eve cut him off, and Mira had already opened her viewing screen. They came in on C. J. Morse’s noon update.
“. . . continuing problems with the investigation of the murders. A Cop Central source has confirmed that while David Angelini has been charged with obstruction of justice, and remains prime suspect for the three murders, Marco Angelini, the accused’s father, has confessed to those murders. The senior Angelini, president of Angelini Exports and former husband of the first victim, Prosecuting Attorney Cicely Towers, surrendered to the police yesterday. Though he has confessed to all three murders, he has not been charged, and the police continue to hold David Angelini.”
Morse paused, shifted slightly to face a new camera angle. His pleasant, youthful face radiated concern. “In other developments, a knife taken from the Angelini home during a police search has proven through testing not to be the murder weapon. Mirina Angelini, daughter of the late Cicely Towers, spoke to this reporter in an exclusive interview this morning.”
The screen snapped to a new video and filled with Mirina’s lovely, outraged face. “The police are persecuting my family. It isn’t enough that my mother is dead, murdered on the street. Now, in a desperate attempt to cover their own ineptitude, they’ve arrested my brother and they’re holding my father. It wouldn’t surprise me to find myself taken away in restraints at any moment.”
Eve ground her teeth while Morse led Mirina through questions, prodded her to make accusations, tears gleaming in her eyes. When the broadcast switched back to the news desk, he was frowning seriously.
“A family under siege? There are rumors of cover-ups clouding the investigation. Primary investigating officer, Lieutenant Eve Dallas could not be reached for comment.”
“Little bastard. Little bastard,” Eve muttered and swung away from the screen. “He never tried to reach me for comment. I’d give him a comment.” Furious, she snatched up her bag and shot Mira one last look. “You ought to analyze that one,” she said jerking her head toward the screen. “That little prick has delusions of grandeur.”
chapter seventeen
Harrison Tibble was a thirty-five-year vet on the police force. He’d plodded his way up from beat cop, working the West Side barrios when cops and their quarries still carried guns. He’d even taken a hit once: three nasty rounds in the abdomen that might have killed a lesser man and would certainly have given most ordinary cops cause to consider their career choices. Tibble had been back on full duty within six weeks.
He was an enormous man, a full six foot six and two hundred sixty pounds of solid muscle. After the gun ban, he’d used his bulk and cold, terrifying grin to intimidate his quarries. He still had the mind of a street cop, and his record was clean enough to serve tea on.
He had a large, square face, skin the color of polished onyx, hands the size of steamship rounds, and no patience for bullshit.
Eve liked him and could privately admit she was a little afraid of him.
“What is this pile of shit we’ve got ourselves into, Lieutenant?”
“Sir.” Eve faced him, flanked by Feeney and Whitney. But at the moment, she knew she was very much alone. “David Angelini was on scene the night Louise Kirski was killed. We have that locked. He has no solid alibi for the times of the other two murders. He’s in debt big time to the spine twisters, and with his mother’s death, he comes into a nice, healthy inheritance. It’s been confirmed that she had refused to bail him out this time.”
“Look for the money’s a tried and true investigative tool, Lieutenant. But what about the other two?”
He knew all of this, Eve thought and struggled not to squirm. Every word of every report had passed by him. “He knew Metcalf, had been to her apartment, was working with her on a project. He needed her to commit, but she was playing coy, covering her bases. The third victim was a mistake. We believe strongly that the intended victim was Nadine Furst, who at my suggestion and with my cooperation was putting a great deal of pressure on the story. He also knew her personally.”
“That’s real good so far.” His chair creaked under his weight as he shifted back. “Real good. You’ve placed him at one of the scenes, established motives, dug up the links. Now we run into the hard place. You don’t have a weapon, you don’t have any blood. You don’t have diddly as far as physical evidence.”
“Not at this time.”
“You’ve also got a confession, but not from the accused.”