Survivor in Death (In Death 20)

“What?”

“You keep saying that. You need to eat.”

Her mind cleared slightly as he moved into the kitchen. “I’m not talking about Baxter and Trueheart.”

“I’m perfectly aware of that. And yes, I agree. Kirkendall and associates would want a place in the city. Why risk running into pesky commuter traffic, or pesky commuter traffic cops?”

“I bet it’s Upper West.”

“We agree again.” He came back in with two plates, and this time Eve sniffed the air.

“What is that?”

“Lasagna.” Veggie lasagna, he thought. One of the easiest ways to get something green in her system that wasn’t a gumdrop was to disguise it in pasta.

“Why do you agree? About the Upper West?”

He set one of the plates in front of her, the other across the desk. Then went to get a chair, and two glasses of wine. When a man wanted to eat a meal with his wife, and his wife was Eve, Roarke thought, the man learned to make adjustments.

“Considerable time and effort went into casing out the Swisher property. Not only the electronics, but lifestyle. They knew where to go and when to go. So—”

He set her wine down, tapped his glass against it, then sat. “More efficient to have a location near the target point. You can do drive-bys, walk-bys, test your jammers and so on against their system. And you’d want to watch them.”

She watched him as she cut into the lasagna. “Because you’d want to see them alive before you saw them dead.”

“Oh yes. It’s personal. So though the kill is clean and quick, you’d want the rush beforehand. Look at them, they don’t know I have the power to end them. When and how I like.”

“It’s a little strange being hooked up with someone who can think that much like a killer.”

He lifted his glass to her. “I’ll say precisely the same. And make a considerable wager that your thoughts ran parallel to mine.”

“Yeah, you win.” She sampled the lasagna. Something in there tasted like spinach. But it wasn’t half bad. “You come up with anything for me?”

“I’m a little hurt you’d have to ask. Eat first. You’ve heard from Peabody?”

“They’re on their way back. Want to hear the roundup?”

“Of course.”

She told him while they ate.

“Torturing a pregnant woman,” Roarke commented. “Lower and lower. But he should’ve killed her, in hindsight. It seems his long-suffering wife learned enough from him to keep her location—more likely locations, as she’d be smarter to move every few months at least—from everyone. He kept the sister alive assuming that his wife would, at some point, run to her family.”

“Then they’d all be dispensable. I really want this guy.”

This time Roarke reached over, laid a hand on hers. “I know.”

“Do you? He’s not like my father. There’s a world of difference, but somehow they’re exactly the same.”

“Brutalizing his children, day after day. Training them in his own sick fashion. Breaking their spirit, destroying their innocence, driving a young boy to contemplate suicide. The difference between him and your father, Eve, is Kirkendall has more skill, more training, and a sharper brain. But inside, they couldn’t be more alike.”

It helped that he saw that, and understood why her mind kept circling around it. “I have to get past it, or I’ll mess up. Location.” She nodded toward the map on her screen. “Lots of prime property Upper West. Have to be solo occupants. He can afford it. All those hefty fees, combined with his brother’s hefty fees—and possibly Isenberry’s. Investments like the dojo show me he likes business, making money from money. Yeah, he’s plush. You have any luck with the money?”

“Again, my sensitive feelings are bruised.”

“You can take a punch, ace. Let me have it.”

He merely sent a meaningful glance at the food still on her plate.