Midnight in Death (In Death #7.5)(8)

“It won’t take long.”

“I’m going to keep working on this.” She gestured toward the screen. “He might have slipped up just enough to have let something identifiable come through.”

“All right.” But he crossed to her, framed her face in his hands. Lowering his head, he kissed her, long and slow and deep. And felt, as he did, some of the rigid tension in her body ease.

“I can handle this, Roarke.”

“Whether you can or not, you will. Would it hurt to hold on to me, just for a minute?”

“Guess not.” She slipped her arms around him, felt the familiar lines, the familiar warmth. Her grip tightened. “Why wasn’t it enough to stop him once? Why wasn’t it enough to put him away? What good is it if you do your job and it comes back this way?”

He held her and said nothing.

“He wants to show me he can do it all again. He wants to take me through all the steps and stages, the way he did before. Only this time as they’re happening. ‘Look how clever I am, Dallas. ‘ “

“Knowing that, understanding that, will help you stop him a second time.”

“Yeah.” She eased back. “Get me the data so I can hammer at his parents.”

Roarke skimmed a finger over the dent in her chin. “You’ll let me watch, won’t you. It’s so stimulating to see you browbeat witnesses.”

When she laughed, as he’d hoped she would, he went to his private room to circumvent CompuGuard and officially sealed files.

She’d barely had time to review another section of the recording before he came back.

“It couldn’t have been that easy.”

“Yes.” He smiled and passed her a new data disc. “It could. Thomas and Helen Palmer, now known as Thomas and Helen Smith—which shows just how imaginative bureaucrats can be, currently reside in a small town called Leesboro in rural Pennsylvania.”

“Pennsylvania.” Eve glanced toward her ‘link, considered, then looked back at Roarke. “It wouldn’t take long to get there if you had access to some slick transpo.”

Roarke looked amused. “Which slick transpo would you prefer, Lieutenant?”

“That mini-jet of yours would get us there in under an hour.”

“Then why don’t we get started?”

If Eve had been more fond of heights, she might have enjoyed the fast, smooth flight south. As it was, she sat, jiggling a foot to relieve a case of nerves while Roarke piloted them over what she imagined some would consider a picturesque range of mountains.

To her they were just rocks, and the fields between them just dirt.

“I’m only going to say this once,” she began. “And only because it’s Christmas.”

“Banking for landing,” he warned her as he approached the private airstrip. “What are you only going to say once?”

“That maybe all these toys of yours aren’t a complete waste of time. Over-indulgent, maybe, but not a complete waste of time.”

“Darling, I’m touched.”

Once they were on the ground, they transferred from the snazzy little two-person jet to the car that Roarke had waiting. Of course, it couldn’t be a normal vehicle, Eve mused as she studied it. It was a sleek black bullet of a car, built for style and speed.

“I’ll drive.” She held out a hand for the keycode the attendant had given him. “You navigate.”

Roarke considered her as he tossed the code in his hand. “Why?”

“Because I’m the one with the badge.” She snatched the code on its upward arc and smirked at him.

“I’m a better driver.”

She snorted as they climbed in. “You like to hotdog. That doesn’t make you better. Strap in, ace. I’m in a hurry.”

She punched it and sent them flying away from the terminal and onto a winding rural road that was lined with snow-laced trees and sheer rock.

Roarke programmed their destination and studied the route offered by the onboard computer. “Follow this road for two miles, turn left for another ten point three, then next left for five point eight.”

By the time he’d finished, she was already making the first left. She spotted a narrow creek, water fighting its way through ice, over rock. A scatter of houses, trees climbing steeply up hills, a few children playing with new airskates or boards in snow-covered yards.

“Why do people live in places like this? There’s nothing here. You see all that sky?” she asked Roarke. “You shouldn’t be able to see that much sky from down here. It can’t be good for you. And where do they eat? We haven’t passed a single restaurant, glide cart, deli, nothing.”

“Cozily?” Roarke suggested. “Around the kitchen table.”

“All the time? Jesus.” She shuddered.

He laughed, smoothed a finger over her hair. “Eve, I adore you.”

“Right.” She tapped the brakes to make the next turn. “What am I looking for?”

“Third house on the right. There, that two-story prefab, mini-truck in the drive.”

She slowed, scanning the house as she turned in behind the truck. There were Christmas lights along the eaves, a wreath on the door, and the outline of a decorated tree behind the front window.

“No point in asking you to wait in the car, I guess.”