That got an eye roll from th
e boy, a wide grin from the girl.
“We have taken the house for the three months,” Jean-Paul continued. “And are having a short holiday before work and school begin.”
“Have you seen anyone next door since you arrived?”
“No.” He glanced at his family, got head shakes.
“It’s always dark,” Claudette added, “the windows.”
“Okay.” Dead end here, Eve thought. “So you found the property through your work?”
“I work for Travel Home. We are a global agency listing homes and flats for travelers who prefer this rather than a hotel, you see?”
“My cousin lives only one block,” Marie-Clare told Eve. “We can walk to see each other, and she has children close to the ages of ours. I worked with my husband’s assistant to find this house, this neighborhood. Through my husband’s business people can travel and stay in homes, a night, a year.”
“Handy,” Eve said, getting a polite, if puzzled, smile in return.
Wouldn’t it be really handy? she thought.
“The properties you—and clients—can rent belong to this Travel Home?”
“Listed with,” Jean-Paul corrected. “We take applications, you see, and screen the owners and the properties, visit them to be certain they are as they claim to be.”
“Got it. You’d probably know who owns this house.”
“I could not tell you from the top of my head, but it would be easy to find out.”
“I’d appreciate that.”
He rose. “Excuse me one moment.”
“Maybe somebody’s dead in the next door,” the boy said when his father walked out.
“I doubt it,” Eve said.
“Maybe.”
His mother sighed and patted his knee.
“I like also your boots very much,” Claudette told Peabody.
“Thanks.”
“Yours are very nice,” she added for Eve.
“They do the job.”
Jean-Paul came back in with a PPC. “The owner is Terra Consultants, and the address for the owner is next door. The property has our highest rating or I would not have brought my family into it. Is there a worry here?”
“No. No worry. We appreciate your time and your help. Enjoy your time in New York.”
Outside, Eve started toward the houses on the other side. “Get us a search warrant, Peabody. The ID for Angela Terra and her company is very shaky, and we believe this is an alias and front for Larinda Mars. Go ahead and move my vehicle before we start an insurrection—bring my field kit back with you. I’ll knock on some doors.”
“Buy the whole duplex, rent out the connecting half to people who come and go—and don’t look to make pals. Smart.”
“Yeah, she had brains.”