Obsession in Death (In Death 40)

“Easy for you to say, married to money.”

Before she realized her temper snapped, Eve slapped her hands on the desk, hard enough to make it shudder. “I was ten years on the job before I set eyes on him. You think it’s about money for me? You think it’s about money for any cop worth the badge? You’re a fucking disgrace.”

“You don’t know what it was. You don’t know anything. Everybody did it, a little here and there. It’s right there, and where’s it going? You think, what does it hurt? You think, I risk my life every damn day. You think that because it’s easy. You think I haven’t asked myself every damn day why I didn’t walk away from it? I knew Taj. I knew him.”

Tortelli drew a shuddering breath as she spoke of a dead cop, a good cop. “I didn’t have anything to do with what happened to him. None of that. Just took some here and there. It’s why I only got demoted. I only got demoted because I spilled my guts to IAB after it went down. And I couldn’t live with that, either, so I’m in this shithole.”

Tears wanted to come. Eve could see them fighting behind the anger. “You think I blame you for it? Yeah, on good days I can talk myself into that. On bad days I can barely look at myself in the mirror. I didn’t kill anybody. You’ve got no cause to drag me into this, drag my family through this again.”

“Show me the receipt, from the lobby bar.”

Tortelli opened a file already on the desk, took it out.

“Okay.” Eve handed it back. “You’re clear.”

“It was only five or six thousand over a couple years,” Tortelli said as Eve started out with Peabody. “Six grand tops.”

Eve glanced back. “Your badge should’ve been worth more.” And kept walking before she said something else.

“I feel sorry for her.”

Eve stopped on the steps, the cold snatching at the hem of her coat, to burn a stare back at Peabody.

“Okay, don’t toss me off the stairs. Everything you said to her was right. Everything. And you could’ve said more and worse and been right. But I feel sorry for her because she knows it, and she’s living with it.”

“You’re wasting your sympathy.”

“What I’m saying is she was good enough to get her detective’s shield, to close cases, maybe make a difference. And she tossed it, all of it, for a few thousand dollars.”

“Double that, minimum. She’s still lying, still justifying.”

On the street, Eve jammed her hands in her pockets because she actively wanted to punch something, someone—and her partner didn’t deserve it.

“And it’s not the money, it’s never just the money. It’s the idea you’re entitled to it. Some DB had a wad of cash on him, what’s he going to do with it? Hey, that’s a nice wrist unit, and he’s got no pulse, so I might as well have it. Shit, that was a big illegals bust, and I got a little bloody on it. The department’s just going to light it up, so what’s the harm if I take a chunk, sell it to some mope? I bust my ass, risk my ass, I deserve it. The first time you think that, do that, pocket something from a crime scene, dip into the pockets of a DB, you’re done. You’re finished, and rolling on cops as dirty as you won’t make you clean again.”

“She’ll never be what she wanted to be, could’ve been. She traded that for money. It doesn’t matter if it was ten dollars or ten thousand.” Peabody hunched her shoulders. “She knows it.”

Eve passed the harmonica player again. A jumpy tune now. She didn’t know how he had it in him to play something so insanely cheerful while he huddled in the cold.

She doubled back, dug into her pocket for what she thought of as her bribe cash, pulled out a fifty, crouched so he could see it, her badge, her eyes.

“Get a goddamn meal. If I find out you took this to the liquor store down the block, I’ll kick your ass. Got that? No,” she said when she saw Peabody reach in her own pocket. “This is enough—and you still owe me on payday. Got that?” she repeated to the sidewalk sleeper.

“’Preciate it.” He tucked the fifty into a fold of his coat.

“Get a meal,” she repeated.

Annoyed with herself—why not just light a match and burn the fifty?—she headed to the overpriced lot and her vehicle.

“Now I’m short till payday,” she muttered, and swiped her card, got the receipt for parking for her expense report.

“I’ll spring for lunch, if we get it. As long as it’s cheap.”

With a half laugh Eve stopped at a light. Then just lowered her head to the wheel a moment. “You weren’t wrong—about Tortelli. I can’t feel it, but you’re not wrong to. Fourth-generation cop, and she’s taking vids of some woman diddling her brother-in-law. You think, maybe they were all dirty along the way—that’s what she’s done, that’s the smear on her family legacy, and she knows that, too.”

“You weren’t wrong either. Her badge should’ve been worth more.”

The light changed; Eve drove.