the law and on what’s right that he won’t forget. He won’t be forgetting the reward either, but it’s you he’ll remember first. And so will I.”

“And it seems to me, Mrs. Johnson, that a lot of boys in Tiko’s position could’ve looked the other way—or more, tried to angle their way into a piece of what was going on. But I’ll take the pie.”

“I hope you enjoy it.”

“I may have to knock a few of my men unconscious to get it into my office, but believe me, I will.”

Eve got a good grip on the box, and put blood in her eye as she walked into the bullpen. She swore a dozen noses lifted up, at the very same instant, to scent the air. “Not a chance in hell. Peabody, my office.”

After shooting a smug and evil smile at her sorrowful colleagues, Peabody breezed in behind Eve. “What kind of pie is it?”

“It’s my kind of pie.”

“You can’t eat a whole pie by yourself. You’ll get sick.”

“We’ll find out.”

“But…I brought you crullers.”

“Where are they?”

Peabody’s mouth opened, closed on a pout as she shifted her eyes away. “Um…”

“Exactly.” Eve set the pie box out of reach on top of her AutoChef. “What have you got besides cruller breath?”

“It’s not like I ate them all personally, and you left them behind so—Okay.” She deflated under Eve’s icy stare. “I’ve got the duplicate names, and I’ve started running them. FYI, Mrs. Tibble’s on there. She’s worked on multiple projects with Ava Anders.”

“I think we can take her off the list.”

“Yeah. Also the mayor’s wife and a number of other prominents.”

“We won’t discount them. Staff and volunteers go into the mix, but we’re going to focus on the participants. The women Ava played Lady Bountiful with.”

“I’ve got some with criminal, got some who were or are LCs.”

“Keep them at the top. Trying to figure her. Would she go for somebody with experience, with tendencies, or somebody blank, somebody who’d run below the radar?”

She paced to the window, stared out. “She wouldn’t expect us to get here, to look where we’re going to look. But somebody who plans as meticulously as she does would have to consider all the possibilities. How did she weigh it?”

“Another question would be how do you convince somebody to kill for you.”

“Some people bake pies. Copy all the files, shoot them here and to my home unit. And keep working it, Peabody. If somebody in there was her trigger, I bet she has plans for them, too. I just bet she has plans.”

She worked it as well, formulating notes from her conversations that day, pushing through the repeated names Peabody had culled out. And she considered the logistics and man hours of interviewing literally hundreds of potential suspects.

Needle in the haystack. But sooner or later.

She pushed back, circled her head around her shoulders to loosen knots. Her incoming beeped, and it pleased her to see Nadine had sent her a file. “Copy to my home unit,” she ordered.

She rubbed her tired eyes. Time to go home herself, she admitted. Take it home, pick it up again, bounce it off Roarke.

She shut down, loaded her bag, shrugged into her coat. She picked up the pie box as Mira stepped to the doorway.

“On your way out?”

“Yeah, but I’ve got time. They told me you were booked solid today.”

“I was. And I’m late heading home. If you’re leaving, why don’t we walk out together, and you can tell me what’s on your mind.”

Tags: J.D. Robb In Death Mystery
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