Dark in Death (In Death 46)

Gomez turned to the room. “Ladies!” she called out. “And Beau,” she added with a little smile to the only male in the room. “This is Lieutenant Dallas with the NYPSD. She needs to speak with us.”

“Does anyone know the whereabouts of Ann Elizabeth Smith?”

Eve watched people glance at each other, a couple baffled, others fascinated or curious. Nobody spoke until Beau shrugged.

“She used to work here. Quit. She was stuck-up anyway.”

If Eve had seen him from a distance, she’d have pegged him as mid-teens. He had an explosion of curling purple hair under a knit cap, a narrow goatee with a silver stud in the center of his chin, and a slouchy posture now that he’d kicked back from his machine.

Still, he had about fifteen years on the mid-teens.

“Stuck-up.”

“Wouldn’t talk to you if you were on fire. Wouldn’t contribute to the pool. We do pools for birthdays and stuff. And the Secret Santa deal. Hell, I put in for that, and I’m Jewish.”

“You didn’t much like her.”

“I didn’t like her at all. Sorry, Cheeta,” he added with a grin to his supervisor. “It didn’t break my heart when she split.”

“Any idea where she split to?”

“Not a clue.”

In the back, across from Smith’s former station, a tiny redhead raised her hand. “Um, is she in trouble?”

“We need to speak with her,” Eve said.

“It’s just, she was sort of nice to me once, and I don’t like to get people in trouble.”

“Yolanda, it’s very important you tell the police anything you know.”

At her supervisor’s firm, quiet voice, Yolanda hunched up her shoulders. “Once, when I was really slammed, she helped me out a little bit, and that was nice of her.”

“I think she was writing a book or something.”

Eve looked over at a sturdy blonde. “Did she tell you that?”

“She never told anybody anything. I came in early one day to finish up some work because I was going on vacation. She was here, back in the break room. You have to pay for snacks, but the coffee and tea and water are free. She was back there with coffee, working on her tablet. She was into it because she didn’t even hear me, and I looked over her shoulder like you do. She was writing stuff, and I said: ‘Hey, you writing a book or what?’ She jumped like a mile, and grabbed her stuff. Didn’t even say a word, just ran out.”

“I saw her once. After she quit,” Yolanda added.

“When?” Eve fired back. “Where?”

“Well, gosh. A couple months ago. I was shopping for Christmas with my mom and sister. She looked a little different, but I knew it was her.”

“Different how?”

“Her hair. She’d cut it. She always wore it long, back in a tail, but she’d cut it to right above her shoulders, and dyed it really red. I thought it was a nice change for her. I guess—I don’t want to be mean—but maybe she gained some weight? She had on this big coat, and she looked a little bulky in it.”

“Did it have penguins on it?”

“Yes! So I saw her, and I called out, like you would. And I waved. I was going to cross the street and say hi, see what she was doing, but when she saw me, she just kept going. Walking away fast. It hurt my feelings a little.”

“Where?”

Yolanda chewed on her lip, then her thumbnail. “Um.”

“Just try to think back to what you were doing when you saw her. Across the street,” Eve prompted. “In the big coat with penguins on it.”