“You still have some contacts in organized crime.”
A smile ghosted around his mouth. “Do I?”
“You know people who know people who know scum of the earth.”
He tapped a fingertip on the dent in her chin. “Is that any way to talk of my friends and business associates? Former.”
“Damn straight. You could make some inquiries.”
“I can, and I will. But I can tell you I never associated with child killers. Or anyone who would slaughter a family in their sleep.”
“Not saying. I mean that. But I need every angle on this. The little girl? The one he killed in place of the kid downstairs? She was wearing a little pink nightgown with—what do you call it—frills around the neck. I could see it was pink from the bottom. The rest was red, soaked through with blood. He’d slit her throat open like it was an apple.”
He set his coffee down, walked to her. He put his hands on her hips, laid his brow on her brow. “Anything I can do, I will.”
“It makes you think. You and me, we had the worst most kids can get. Abuse, neglect, rape, beatings, hate. These kids, they had what it’s supposed to be, in a perfect world: nice homes, parents who loved them, took care of them.”
“We survived,” he finished. “They didn’t. Except for the one downstairs.”
“One day, when she looks back on this, I want her to know the people who did this are in a cage. That’s the best I can do. That’s all I can do.”
She eased back. “So, I’d better get to work.”
4
HER FIRST STEP WAS CONTACTING FEENEY, CAPTAIN of the Electronic Detectives Division. He popped on her ’link screen, wiry ginger hair threaded with silver, saggy face, rumpled shirt.
It was a relief to her that his wife’s recent attempt to spruce him up with eye-popping suits had gone belly-up.
“I’m catching up,” she said briskly. “You got word on the Swisher case, home invasion?”
“Two kids.” His face, comfortably morose, hardened. “When I got wind, I went to the scene myself. I got a team working on the ’links and data centers. I’m doing the security personally.”
“I like getting the best. What can you tell me?”
“Good, solid home system. Top of the line. Took some know-how to bypass. Camera shows squat after one hundred fifty-eight hours. Remote jammer, with secondary jam as the system had an auto backup.”
He tugged on his earlobe as he read data from another screen. “Visual security shuts down, backup pops within ten seconds, with alarms both in-house and at security center. Compromised the works.”
“They knew the system.”
“Oh yeah, they knew the system. Deactivated camera alarm, lock alarm, motion alarm. I’m going to pin it for you, but my prelim indicated entrance ten minutes after the camera blanked, four minutes after the secondary jam.”
“Ten minutes? That’s a stretch of time. Might’ve held, insurance the system didn’t make the signal, in-house, to the security company. Four after hitting the secondary. Is that as slick as I think it is?”
“Slick enough. They worked fast.”
“Did they know the code?”
“Can’t tell you that yet.” He lifted a mug to his lips that had MINE printed on it in murderous red. “Either knew it or had a first-class code breaker. Couple of kids not safe in their own bed, Dallas, it’s a fucked-up world.”
“It’s always been a fucked-up world. I’m going to need all the transmissions, in and out, personal and household. All security discs.”
“You’ll have them. I’m putting weight on this one. Got grandchildren that age, for Chrissake. Whatever you need on this one, you got it.”
“Thanks.” Her eyes narrowed as he sipped again. “That real coffee?”
He blinked, eased the mug out of sight. “Why?”
“Because I can see it on your face. I can see it in your eyes.”
“What if it is?”
“Where’d you get it?”
He shifted. Even with her screen view she could tell he squirmed. “Maybe I swung by your office, to update you, and you weren’t there. And maybe since you’ve got a damn unlimited supply of the stuff I got myself one lousy mug. Don’t see why you have to be so stingy when you’ve—”
“You help yourself to anything else while you were there? Such as candy?”
“What candy? You got candy in there? What kind?”
“That’s for me to know, and you to keep your hands off. I’ll get back to you.”
Thinking of coffee and candy reminded her she’d missed breakfast and lunch. She ordered up data on Grant Swisher, then strode into her office kitchen to grab a nutribar and another hit of caffeine.
Settling, she ordered the data on wall screen, and scanned.
Swisher, Grant Edward, DOB March 2, 2019. Residence 310 West Eighty-first, New York City, September 22, 2051 to present. Married Getz, Keelie Rose, May 6, 2046. Two children of the marriage: Coyle Edward, DOB August 15, 2047, male. Nixie Fran, DOB February 21, 2050, female.
Three of those names would be listed as deceased by end of the day in Vital Records, she thought.
She read through the basic data, requested any and all criminal records, and got a pop for possession of Zoner when Grant Swisher had been nineteen. Medical was just as ordinary.
She dug into finances.
He did well. Family law paid enough to handle the mortgage on the house, a time share place in the Hamptons, private schools for both kids. With the wife’s income factored in, you had a cozy buffer for a live-in domestic, family vacations, restaurants, and other recreational activities—including a hefty golf tab—and enough left over for a reasonable savings or emergency account.
Nothing over the top, she mused. Nothing, from the looks of it, under the table.
Keelie Swisher, two years younger than her husband, no criminal, standard medical, had a master’s degree in Nutrition and Health. She’d put it to use, prior to children, with a position on staff at a high-end city spa. After the first kid, she’d done the professional mother gig for a year, then gone back to the same employment. Repeated the routine with kid number two, but instead of going back as an employee, she’d opened her own business.
Living Well, Eve mused. Didn’t sound much like Nutrition, but it must have worked. She tracked the business, shaky first year, middling second. But by the third year, Keelie Swisher had developed a solid clientele, and was cruising.
She ran the boy. No criminal, no flag for sealed juvenile records. No flags on the medical to indicate violence or abuse—though there were some bumps, some breaks. Sports related, according to the medicals. And it fit.
He had his own bank account with his parents listed on it. She pursed her lips over the regular monthly deposits, but the amounts weren’t enough to arrow toward illegals sales or criminal profits.
She found the same pattern, with smaller amounts, in Nixie’s account.
She was pondering it when Peabody came in carrying a white bag, stained with grease and smelling like glory. “Picked up a couple of gyros. Ate mine, so if you don’t want yours, I’ll be happy to take it off your hands.”
“I want it, and nobody should eat two gyros.”
“Hey, I lost five pounds when I was on medical. Okay, I put three back on, but that’s still two by anybody’s math.” She dropped the bag on Eve’s desk. “Where’s Nixie?”
“Summerset.” Eve dumped the nutribar she’d yet to open in her desk drawer and pulled out the gyro. She took a huge bite and mumbled something that sounded like “Slool ressa.”
“Got the school records on both.” Translating, Peabody pulled out two discs. “Their school officials were pretty broken up when I notified. Nice schools. Coyle did well, no suspicious dips in grades or attendance. And Nixie? That kid’s a blade. Aces all the way. Both scored high on IQ tests, but she’s a level up from her brother, and makes the most of it. No disciplinary problems on either. A couple of warnings about talking in class or s
neaking game vids, but no major. Coyle played softball and basketball. Nixie’s into school plays, does the school media flash, school band—plays the piccolo.”
“What the hell is that?”
“It’s a wind instrument. Kinda like a flute. These kids have a lot of extracurricular, good grades. Didn’t have time to get in trouble, from my view.”
“They both have their own bank accounts, and make regular monthly deposits. Where do kids get up to a hundred bucks a month?”
Peabody turned to the wall screen, scanned the data. “Allowance.”
“Allowance for what?”
She looked back, shook her head at Eve. “Their parents probably gave them a weekly allowance, spending money, saving money, that sort of thing.”
Eve swallowed more gyro. “They get paid for being a kid?”
“More or less.”
“Nice work if you can get it.”
“Household like that, the way this is shaping up, the kids probably had regular chores, even with a full-time domestic. Keeping their rooms clean, clearing the table, loading the recycler. Then you got your birthday or holiday money, your school report money. Being a Free-Ager, we did bartering more than pay, but it comes to the same.”
“So if everybody stayed a kid, nobody’d have to get a job. They could have seen something at school,” she continued before Peabody could comment. “Heard something. Something off. We’ll take a look at teachers and staff. We can run the adults’ business associates and clients, fan out from there to friends, neighbors, social acquaintances. These people weren’t picked out of a hat.”
“Doesn’t feel like it, but can we discount straight urban terrorism?”
“It’s too clean.” Roarke had it right on that one, she thought. “You want to terrorize, you’re messy. Kill the family, rape and torture first, wreck the house, slice up their little dog.”
“They didn’t have a little dog, but I get you. And if it was terrorism, some whacked-out group would be taking credit by now. Did we get any reports in? EDD, sweepers, ME?”
“I talked to Feeney. He’s on it. Fill you in on the way.”
“To?”
“Morgue, then Central.” She rose, stuffing the last of the gyro in her mouth.
“Want me to let Summerset know we’re leaving?”
“Why? Oh. Hell. Yeah, do that.” She crossed to the door joining her office with Roarke’s. “Hey.”
He was rising from his desk, slipping on one of his dark suit jackets.
“I’m heading out,” she told him.
“So am I. I’ve rearranged a few things. Should be back no later than seven.”
“I don’t know when.” She leaned against the jamb, frowning at him. “I should put the kid in a safe house.”
“This house is safe, and she’s fine with Summerset. A more detailed media bulletin’s come through. It doesn’t list the names, as yet, but reports on an Upper West Side family, including two children, killed early this morning, in their home. Lists you as primary. Details to follow.”
“I’ll have to deal with that.”
“And so you will.” He came to her, cupped her face, kissed her. “You’ll do your job, and we’ll figure out the rest. Take care of my cop.”
As she’d expected, the chief medical examiner had taken charge of the Swisher homicides. It wasn’t the sort of detail Morris would pass to someone else, however qualified or skilled.
Eve found him, suited up, over the body of Linnie Dyson.
“I’ve taken them in order of death.” Behind his microgoggles his dark eyes were cool and hard.
There was music playing. Morris rarely worked without it, but this was somber, funereal. One of those composers, she imagined, who’d worn white wigs.
“I’ve ordered tox screens on all victims. Cause of death is the same in all. There are no secondary wounds or injuries, though the minor male vic had several old bruises, two fresh, with minor lacerations—long bruising scrapes on his right hip and upper thigh. His right index finger had been broken, set, and healed at some point within the last two years. All injuries look consistent to me with a young boy who played sports.”
“Softball primarily. Fresh deal sounds like he got it sliding into base.”
“Yes, that fits.”
He looked down at the little girl, at the long slice in her throat. “Both minor vics were healthy. All vics had a meal at approximately seven p.m., of white fish, brown rice, green beans, and mixed-grain bread. There was an apple dish with wheat and brown sugar topping for dessert. The adults had a glass of white wine, the children soy milk.”
“The mother, the second adult female, was a nutritionist.”
“Practiced what she preached. The boy had a cache somewhere,” Morris added with a faint smile. “He’d consumed two ounces of red licorice at about ten p.m.”
Somehow it cheered her to know it. At least the kid got a last taste of sweet. “Murder weapons?”
“Identical. Most likely a ten-inch blade. See here.”
He gestured to the screen, magnified the wound on the child’s throat. “See the jags? There, on the edge of the diagonal. Swipe down, from his left to his right. Not a full smooth blade, or a full jagged. Three teeth serrating from the handle, the rest smooth-bladed.”
“Sounds like a combat knife.”
“That would be my take. It was employed by a right-handed individual.”
“There were two.”
“So I’m told. Eyeballing it, I’d have said the same hand delivered the killing blows, but as you can see . . .” He turned to another screen, called for pictures, split screen on Grant and Keelie Swisher. Magnified the wounds.
“There’re slight deviations. Male vic’s wound is deeper, more of a slicing motion, more jagged, while the female’s is more of a draw across. When all five are put up . . .” He nodded as the screen shifted to show five throat wounds. “You can see that the housekeeper, the father, and the boy have the same slicing wound, while the mother and the girl have the more horizontal drawing across. You’ll want the lab to run some reconstructs, but it’s going to be a ten-inch blade, twelve at the max, with those three teeth near the handle.”
“Military style,” she stated. “Not that you have to be military to obtain one. But it’s just one more piece of the operation. Military tactics, equipment, and weapons. None of the adults did military time, or appear to have any connection to the military. Can’t link any of them, at this point, to paramilitary or game playing.”
Then again, she thought, sometimes a cozy family was the perfect cover for covert or dark deeds.
“I’ve cleared the Dysons.” Eve glanced back at Linnie. “Have they seen her yet?”
“Yes. An hour ago. It was . . . hideous. Look at her,” he urged. “So small. We get smaller, of course. Infants barely out of the womb. It’s amazing what we enlightened adults can do to those who need us most.”
“You don’t have any kids, right?” Eve asked.
“No, no chick nor child. There was a woman once, and we were together long enough to consider it. But that was . . . long ago.”
She studied his face, slickly framed by black hair pulled cleanly back in one sleek tail that was bound in crisscrossing silver twine. Under the clear, protective suit, stained now with body fluids, his shirt was silver as well.
“I’ve got the kid, the one they didn’t get. I don’t know what to do with her.”
“Keep her alive. I would think that would be priority.”
“Got that part handled. I’ll need those tox reports, and anything that pops, as soon as.”
“You’ll have them. They wore wedding rings.”
“Sorry?”
“The parents. Not everyone does these days.” Morris nodded toward the scribed band Eve wore on the ring finger of her left hand. “It’s not very fashionable. Wearing them is a statement. I belong. They’d made love, about three hours prior to death. They used a spermicide rather than long-term or permanent birth control, whi
ch tells me they hadn’t ruled out the possibility of more children in the future. That, and the rings, Dallas? I find that both comforts and angers me.”
“Anger’s better. Keeps you sharper.”
When she walked toward Homicide in the massive beehive of Cop Central, she spotted Detective Baxter at a vending unit, getting what passed for coffee. She dug out credits, flipped them to him. “Tube of Pepsi.”
“Still avoiding contact with vending machines?”
“It’s working. They don’t piss me off, I don’t kick them into rubble.”
“Heard about your case,” he said as he plugged in her credits. “And so did every reporter in the city. You got most of them hassling the media liaison and hammering for an interview with the primary.”
“Reporters aren’t on my to-do list right at the moment.” She took the tube of Pepsi he offered, frowned. “You said most. Why is Nadine Furst of Channel 75 even now sitting on her well-toned ass in my office?”
“How do you know? Not about the ass, anybody could see Furst’s got an excellent ass.”
“You’ve got cookie crumbs on your shirt, you putz. You let her into my office.”
With some dignity, he brushed off his shirt. “I’d like to see you turn down a bribe of Hunka-Chunka Chips. Every man has his weakness, Dallas.”
“Yeah, yeah. I’ll kick your well-toned ass later.”
“Sweetheart, you noticed.”
“Bite me.” But she studied him as she broke the tube’s seal. “Listen, how’s your caseload?”
“Well, as you’re my lieutenant I should say I’m ridiculously overworked. I was just coming in from court when I was distracted by Furst’s ass and cookies.”
Keying in his code, he ordered a tube of ginger ale from the machine. “My boy’s writing up the three’s on one we caught last night. Double D that went nasty. Guy’d been out drinking and whoring, according to the spouse. They got into it when he crawled home, smacked each other around—as per usual according to the neighbors and previous reports. But this time she waited until he’d passed out, then cut off his dick with a pair of shears.”