Leverage in Death (In Death 47)

“Do that. Trueheart, start checking rentals of late-model black panel vans.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Baxter, give me what you got from the wife and kid.”

“Same description as the first round. Black clothes, hoods, white masks, black gloves. The wife woke up to a punch in the face in the early hours of Tuesday morning. The husband’s unconscious, and one of them punches her again while the other drags her husband to the foot of the bed, binds him to it—he’s gagged already.

“She tells them to take whatever they want while they’re restraining her to the bed. She saw them snap something under the husband’s nose to revive him. He’s struggling, one punches her again, tells the husband to sit still, be quiet or he’ll hit her again. Then the other brings in the kid—screaming, crying for his mother. It’s like a replay, Dallas. They lock the kid up and away—don’t gag him so his parents can hear him crying. The only variation? When they threaten rape, she tells them she’s pregnant, begs them not to hurt her little boy or the baby.”

“They hadn’t told many people,” Eve concluded. “The killers’ research missed that.”

“They didn’t hit her much after that, backed off the rape threats. But . . .” Baxter hissed. “Fuckers. The last thing they said to the husband before they dragged her out, locked her downstairs? One pulls out a knife, tells the husband if he doesn’t do what they need him to do, he’ll slit the little boy’s throat. It’ll be fast, won’t hurt much. But then, he’s going to cut the baby out of the wife. She’ll die slow, and the baby? They’ll just have to see.”

Eve walked to the window, stared out. “Any connection to Rogan, his wife, kid? To Karson?”

“None we’ve found so far. She didn’t know any of them. The kid did say that the one who watched him most read him a couple stories.”

“Not the one who talked about carving a fetus out of the woman.”

“No, the other one.”

“Softer touch. The other one likes the violence, the power of it. Still, they let them live. That’s not going to hold if they start on another family. That’s going to break, and soon. Trueheart?”

“I’ve got a couple, Lieutenant. I want to check the suburbs and into New Jersey.”

“Good thinking. Line them up, go run them down. Peabody, let’s go harass a few people on our list. Baxter, hold the scene for the sweepers, then start running down the rental vans.”

She started down the steps. “Do a geographic on the list. We’ll take the first couple between here and Central, or close to that. Then you head home, and so will I. We’ll try cutting down the list before we start interv

iewing tomorrow.”

Unless something broke, Eve thought, they were in for a long night, and a longer day after.

16

After interviews, briefings, paperwork and reports, Eve dragged into the house. And Summerset loomed.

“You’re quite late tonight. Nothing lasts forever, I suppose.”

She raked him with tired eyes. “You’ve lasted. Gotta be two or three hundred years by now.” She stripped off her coat, tossed it over the newel post, trudged her way upstairs.

When she walked into her office, Roarke and the cat walked out of his. “There she is.”

“What’s left of me.” As the cat rubbed against her legs, she shrugged out of her jacket. Even excellent material and a perfect fit could morph into the misery of a straitjacket after fifteen hours.

Roarke took the jacket before she tossed it at the handiest chair. “First things,” he said. He took a little case out of his pocket, flipped it open.

Eve scowled down at the tiny blue pain blockers. “Do you have stock in those things?”

“I ought to by this point. Let’s deal with the headache I can all but hear banging, and take five minutes.”

“I could use five minutes.” Though the headache wasn’t banging—it was more a muted thumping—she took the blocker, let him nudge her to the sofa. “You’ve been working, too.”

“I have, yes, after Summerset and I had a meal together, and he told me a bit more about his holiday.” As he spoke, Roarke shifted Eve, began to knead her shoulders. “He and Ivanna enjoyed the time together.”

“How am I supposed to ditch the headache if I’m thinking about Summerset sex?”

“I didn’t mention sex.”