“Under it all, whoever she coats herself in, she’s one woman. And that woman knows how to sew, watches her pennies, came from Delaware. Lives alone. Is likely in her forties. If I get a sketch out of that bartender, it’s going to turn this around. Whatever mask she puts on to haunt the clubs, she’s going to show through.”
“You said the bartender described her as a loner, and not very friendly. But in the book, as I recall those scenes, people knew her by name.”
“Yeah, she was part of that scene in the book. I figure either Strong-bow couldn’t pull that off, or she saw it as a mistake in the plot. The killer blends, but goes unnoticed. Except the bartender noticed and remembered her, because she didn’t really blend.”
“Or can’t,” Roarke suggested. “Think of the woman you described. She sews, watches her pennies, is likely twenty years older than many in the club, she lives through books. The writing and the reading.”
“She doesn’t know how,” Eve mused. “It’s not hard to figure out how to book a street-level LC. You can be nervous, look out of place. They don’t care, and they get all kinds. Anybody can sit in the dark at a vid.”
“But weaving yourself into a club scene, and these particular kinds of clubs?” As she did, Roarke studied the board. “It’s more than being able to craft a reversible coat or doctor a drink. It’s attitude, it’s vernacular.”
“A woman sitting alone at the bar at that kind of place, she’s going to get hit on by somebody who figured to get laid up in a privacy room. She can’t do that, not even living inside the character. Not just because she needs to observe, but she can’t get that personal and stay unnoticed.”
“The fuck-off tends to discourage most.”
“Yeah, especially since there are plenty in there who’ll give you a roll with less effort. She’s already altered the character there.”
Rising, Eve walked back to her board. “Still, one of these has to be the object. The vic is the obstacle. It’s not going to matter if he’s on scene at the killing, but he matters. Until he doesn’t.”
“Why don’t we eat, then I’ll see if I can help you find him?”
“Yeah. I’ve got Peabody on it, too.”
Roarke lifted the domes. “This looks dead perfect. What is it?”
“It said pork and beer stew. I figured if there’s beer it’d neutralize the vegetables.” And she’d programmed a single bowl first, prepared to ditch it if it looked awful. It hadn’t, and the smell had done the rest.
“I fed the cat while I was in there,” she added, which explained why Galahad was currently sprawled in her sleep chair in a kibble-with-tuna-chaser coma.
She sampled some stew, decided the beer did help the healthy parts go down easy.
“You know, Nadine’s hooked with that rock guy. Maybe he knows some of those guys.”
“Possibly, though I don’t think Kincade or the band’s played the small club scene in more than a decade. Big venues, major tours. ‘Hooked with’?” he asked. “Going out a time or two doesn’t necessarily lead to the ‘hooked with,’ does it?”
“I had her come in for a one-on-one today, and I poked her a little about him. She got flustered and … girl-like. Maybe I’m not supposed to say how she was and what she said about it. She didn’t say, ‘Don’t say how I was or what I said,’ but maybe it’s supposed to be understood.”
Trying to walk that minefield gave Eve another headache.
“One of those stupid unwritten rules,” she complained, “which make them impossible to keep track of.”
Because he knew her, Roarke followed the convoluted logic. “Before you tangle yourself up in the invisible, I have to say it’s already too late. So, she fancies him then?”
“I guess—if that means she’s got some hots going for him, in American.”
“It does. We could have them to dinner sometime. And you could grill him like a trout.”
Maybe she’d enjoy that, maybe she would. But … “She’s all grown up and capable of making her own decisions on who she’s banging and hooked with. Besides …” Eve ate more stew.
“You ran him, didn’t you now?”
“Yeah, sure. So?”
He laughed, grabbed her hand to kiss it. “I’d say having a man you may be or become serious about run by a cop when that cop is your friend is one of those unwritten rules.”
“It ought to be actually written down somewhere, if you ask me.”
“Either way. Well then, let’s have it. Do we have to worry about our Nadine being hooked with a scoundrel?”