“Wait. Jesus, did something happen to Roarke?”
“No.”
“Will you wait one damn minute!”
Instead, feeling her stomach revolt, Eve sprinted into the closest bathroom. She let the sickness come—what choice did she have? She let it come, the bitter bile of it, pouring through the fear and panic and memory, until she was empty.
“Okay. Okay.” She was shaking, and her face ran with sweat. But there were no tears. There wouldn’t be tears to add to the humiliation.
“Here. Here you go.” Peabody pushed dampened tissues into her hand. “It’s all I’ve got. I’ll get some water.”
“No.” Eve let her head fall back on the wall of the stall. “No. Anything goes in now is just going to come up again. I’m okay.”
“My ass. Morris has guests in the morgue that look better than you.”
“I just need to go.”
“Tell me what happened.”
“I just need to go. I’m taking the rest of the day, comp time. You can handle the case, you’re up to it.” I’m not, she thought. I’m just not. “Any problems, just… just stall ‘til tomorrow.”
“Screw the case. Look, I’ll get you home. You’re in no shape to—”
“Peabody, if you’re my friend, back off. Let me be. Just do the job,” Eve said as she got shakily to her feet. “And let me be.”
Peabody let her go, but she pulled out her pocket ‘link as she headed back up to Homicide. Maybe she had to back off, but she knew someone who didn’t.
And wouldn’t.
* * *
Eve’s first thought was to set her vehicle on auto. But it was better to be in control, better to concentrate on navigating the trip uptown. Better, she thought, to deal with the traffic, the snags, the time, the sheer bad temper of New York than her own misery.
Going home, that was the object. She’d be okay once she was home.
Maybe her stomach was raw and her head pounding, but she’d been sick before, and unhappy before. The first eight years of her life had been a slow ride through hell, and the ones following it hadn’t been a damn picnic at the beach.
She’d gotten through, she’d gotten by.
She’d get through, she’d get by again.
She wasn’t going to be sucked back in. She wasn’t going to be a victim because some voice from the past panicked her.
But her hands shook on the wheel nonetheless, and she kept all the windows down to the harsh air, the city smells.
Soy dogs smoking on a glide-cart, the sour belch of a maxibus, a curbside recycler that hadn’t been serviced in recent memory. She could take the stench of all that, and the sheer weight of aromas layering the air from the mass of humanity that thronged the streets and glides.
She could take the noise, the blats and the beeps that thumbed their collective noses at noise pollution laws. The tidal wave of voices rolled toward her, through her, past her. Thousands crammed the streets, the natives clipping along, tourists gawking and getting in the way. People juggling and hauling boxes and shopping bags.
Christmas was coming. Don’t be late.
She’d bought a scarf off the street from a smart-ass kid she’d enjoyed. Green and black checks, for Dr. Mira’s husband. What would Mira have to say about her reaction to today’s ugly flashback?
Plenty. The criminal profiler and psychiatrist would have plenty to say in her classy and concerned way.
Eve didn’t give a rat’s bony ass.
She wanted home.