Brotherhood in Death (23 page)

Feeney sat on the throne, looking rumpled, wrinkled, and normal.

“This butt-ugly desk has two locking drawers. Neither locked now.”

“Is that so?”

“It looks to me like somebody riffled through them pretty good.”

She crossed to him over red carpet so thick she wondered it didn't suck the boots off her feet. Both bottom drawers were fitted with keypad locks. Feeney had them both open.

“Paper files?”

“Looks like house and personal stuff in one, work stuff in the other. Finances, insurance, repairs, like that. Lot of people don't trust digital, keep paper backups. You're one of them.”

“Yeah.” She fingered through. “Either he's disorganized and messy, or someone went through these, at least superficially. Looking for what?”

“Can't say, but the desk comp was riffled with, too. Full scan and search executed at nineteen-twelve.”

“He changed clothes about an hour before that—closet comp—getting ready for his date. Date comes in, with a friend because there's two of them, and likely three. Stuns him, maybe roughs him up a little. We didn't see anything like this at Wymann's, but I'm going back, looking again. What did they want here?”

She circled the office with its hard colors, elaborate space.

“Nothing to find in the Spring Street house, and they can't get into the Mira penthouse.”

“Tortured him.”

She turned back, nodded. “Yeah, and maybe he gave them something on Betz. Betz has this or that. Maybe, like you said, that roster, those rules, something on this brotherhood of theirs. But what's the difference if they're going to kill them anyway? It's not like they're looking for evidence. They've already tried and convicted.”

She looked behind art of strange, long-bodied dogs and rearing horses.

Finding nothing, anywhere, she looked back at Feeney as he busied himself checking 'link transmissions.

“You cheated on your wife.”

He kept working. “Not if I wanna live past Tuesday.”

“Think like a cheat. You end up marrying one of the women you cheated with. You're still cheating—it's what you do. Do you keep anything to do with your sidepieces, and more, anything to do with something that would turn a woman murderous, where the current wife could find it?”

“Me? I'd have a separate account she didn't know about, maybe a bank box, too. And, if I'm rich like this asshole, I've got a place she doesn't know about. If I had a place when I was cheating with her, it's gone, sold, done when I'm cheating
on
her. Anything I did cheating with her, I switch up now.”

“A place. A place,” she murmured. “Like Edward Mira had the hotel. His wife knew he cheated, so he didn't have to worry about it. Wymann wasn't married—I'm still waiting for Roarke to tell me if he used the hotel. We'll do the same with Betz. But, a place. A place just for sex. You can only have it here when your wife's out of town, and you really like cheating.

“He'd need a key, a swipe, codes, something. And he wouldn't keep it in a desk drawer, even a locked one, where his wife might get to it.”

She opened a door, looked into a red and silver powder room, turned and studied the bar in the corner of the office.

“I bet I know where she doesn't go.”

Eve walked out, jogged downstairs, back into the master.

She found Peabody and McNab beside the huge red (naturally) bed with its avalanche of pillows. They had a look in their eyes, but fortunately for them nobody's hands were on anybody's ass.

“I don't think anybody broke in a second-story window.”

“Nobody broke in anywhere,” McNab told her. “Two other doors on the main, and neither of them have been opened for twenty-six hours. The windows haven't been opened for weeks. I figured I'd take the 'links and comps in here.”

“Is that what you figured?”

He grinned. “Abso-true. And hang with She-Body while I'm at it.”

Saying nothing, she walked over, looked into the hers bathroom.

As she suspected, it was filled with frills and a carnival full of pink.

The cleaning crew had started there, so fresh pink towels and white towels with pink edging were stacked on a painted bench or hung on a standing rack. Surfaces—all pink and white—shined, and the air gave off a faint whiff of citrus. Jars of various girl products stood on the long counter between two pink vessel sinks. The faucets were silver mermaids, and that motif was repeated in the triple-glass shower.

In addition to the divan—pink-and-white stripes—there was a curvy vanity; drawers full of creams, lotions, enhancements; a closet filled with various robes and slippers; a mini AutoChef and friggie built into the wall.

The toilet rated its own little room with mermaid art and a wall screen.

She stepped back out. “Have you been in there?”

“Yeah. Any woman would kill for a bathroom that size all her own. But she showed how even that mag space can be ruined.”

“Her side. Her bath, her closet/dressing room, her sitting room, her side of the bed, her dresser—the one with all the pink bottles. Right?”

“Yeah. His side.” Peabody jerked a thumb. “You know they've got a toddler, but you don't see any kid stuff in here. Not even a stray teddy bear. It's a little sad.”

“When your nanny has a helper, you don't spend a lot of time with the kid, and this space is adults only. With a definite line of demarcation. Anyway, you're the woman of the house.”

“I'm the queen of my castle,” Peabody agreed, and got a wink from McNab.

“This house, Peabody. Keep up. You've got staff and servants, and three floors to decorate into terrible death. Where's the one room you don't go into?”

“The doll room. Okay, that's just me. She must like dolls. Well, from my brief conversation with her, I'd cross off the laundry facilities. That's staff territory. And she probably doesn't go into the kitchen much.”

“Try this. What's the one place he goes you don't go?”

“I . . . his bathroom!” Peabody shot her two index fingers in the air. “She's all pink and shiny in hers, and his is full of man. What woman wants to go into a bathroom after a guy?”

“We do all right,” McNab said.

“Abso-true.” But when his back was turned again, Peabody rolled her eyes at Eve. “You're thinking potential hidey-hole.”

“Let's check it out.”

If the hers bathroom was an explosion of pink and fuss, the his was a study in desperate masculinity. Black tile with red flashes covered the floors, the walls. The odd addition of a bar—red, with cherub
carvings—along one wall stood before a portrait of a zaftig reclining woman eating a fat purple plum. The black counter held a large square of red sink with a wolf's head faucet that would vomit out the water.

Shelves held bottles and bowls, the manly versions of creams and lotions and oils, as they were all cased in red or black leather.

The rest of the wolf pack occupied the shower, where they'd spit out water from the showerhead and jets.

The drying tube had a padded bench, in case its occupant grew too tired and needed to rest in the two minutes it took to dry most humans.

He had a vanity of his own, fashioned to resemble a desk. Peabody started there.

“I think this may be uglier than hers, but it's neck and neck,” Peabody said. “Wow, he's got as many face and body enhancements in here as she does—almost. Big on the tanners and bronzers, and hair products. This vanity's an eyesore, Dallas, but it's well-constructed. I'm not finding anything out of proportion, nothing that looks like a secret compartment.”

“How about the bar?” Eve circled around it. “You've got a good eye for compartments.”

It was how Peabody had first come to her notice, as a uniform finding a hidey-hole in a murderer's apartment.

“Well. Again, really good work wasted on the ugly.”

Peabody swiveled on the vanity stool, studied the bar from that perspective. “All that carving—I mean it mirrors what they've got all through the house, but it's also the kind of thing that can hide a mechanism. And a cabinetmaker this good? He could hide one really well. My dad's done some totally mag hideys.”

She angled her head as Eve ran her hands over cherubs. “Maybe microgoggles would help—if there's anything to see.”

“Go get some from the field kits.”

Eve hunkered down, putting aside how odd it was to rub her fingers all over fat, naked butts.

Wouldn't be on the front face, she decided. What if someone inadvertently hit the release? If there was one.

She straightened, moved around the back.

Glasses and mixers and liquor on shelves, and a single cabinet with the carved front. She opened it, peered in at the ice machine, the wine friggie.

Closed it again, opened it. Closed it.

“Got the goggles.”

“Why have a door in front of the ice-maker thing, the wine friggie? Anytime you want ice, you have to open the door. Everything else is on open shelves. Handy.”

“Could just be the design. Or he didn't want the mechanics to show.”

“Maybe. But how deep are these units? They wouldn't be the depth of the bar, right?”

Now Peabody hunkered down beside her. “Dad and Zeke have made some nice bars—fully outfitted, custom. One this size . . . Seems like the ice deal wouldn't need that much depth.”

Eve closed the door again, wiggled her fingers for the goggles. With them on, she began to scan inch by inch.

“This one.” Eyes huge behind the goggles, Peabody gripped a cherub butt between her fingers. It turned fractionally.

“Why does it turn and not open any damn thing?”

“A code or a pattern,” Peabody muttered, “like a puzzle. Yeah, yeah, I've seen this kind of thing. We have to figure out which ones to turn, in what order. It's pretty damn clever. It's really good work.”

“I'm getting a hammer.”

“No!” Sincerely appalled, Peabody scooted over. “I can figure it out. Give me a little room. You can't bust up this kind of work.”

“It's fucking ugly.”

“It's still art. Here! Here's another. I bet there's three. A combo of three. We've got this.”

Eve would've preferred the hammer, but since she didn't have one handy, she let Peabody tap and twist and rub cherubs.

“Hey, Dallas?” McNab stepped to the doorway. “I've got a transmission from Marshall Easterday, unanswered. It came in today, at eight-fifty-two.”

“Right after we talked to him,” Eve said. “About the time he went upstairs ‘to rest.'”

“He doesn't sound restful. He says it's urgent they speak, and says he's tried his personal 'link, tried the office. Guy's sweating scared, LT.”

“He should be.” Eve started to push up, to listen for herself, when something clicked and Peabody let out a “Woo!” When she opened the door, the shelves holding the ice machine and friggie slowly swung open.

“Frosted,” McNab said, coming in to hunker down with them.

As they were hip to hip, Eve caught his scent and thought of cherry lollipops.

A small silver box sat in the hidden compartment. Eve pulled it out, stood, set it on the bar top.

“That's old,” Peabody said. “Like antique old. I know it's locked, Dallas, but you can't just smash it.”

“McNab, get my field kit, would you?”

“Sure.” He rose, turned, grinned. “Hey, Captain, my girl found a secret compartment in the john bar, and we got ourselves an antique box.”

“What kind of sick fun house is this?” Feeney wondered as he looked around. Curious, he poked at a power pad. The black tiles shimmered into mirrors. “Oh, hell no,” he said and deactivated. “Dug out an e-mail from Marshall Easterday on the office comp.”

“From this morning,” Eve said.

“Yeah. Copied to an Ethan MacNamee. Marked urgent. ‘My brothers,'” he quoted, “‘beware. Contact me immediately. Seek safety. Come home.'”

“‘Come home,'” Eve murmured.

“Got your field kit.” McNab brought it in, set it beside the box. “We could scan that thing and work on getting it open back at Central.”

“Give me a minute.”

From the field kit, Eve took a small leather wallet (a gift from Roarke), opened it, and selected lock picks.

“Extra frosted,” was McNab's opinion.

“We'll see about that.” She went to work and, as Roarke had taught her, used her ears, her instincts as much as the feel.

“Step back.” Annoyed, she rolled her shoulders. “You're crowding me. Just stop breathing all over me.”

Maybe Roarke would have had it open in a finger snap, but she felt enormous satisfaction when after three struggling minutes, the lock fell.

“New skills,” Peabody said.

“I've been practicing.” Eve opened the lid, looked at the two large, old-fashioned keys and the two twenty-first-century key swipes resting on dark blue velvet.

“Little hidey-hole to hold the keys to bigger ones. Old doors,” Eve decided. “Those are too big for anything but doors—I think. And new doors.”

She used tweezers to pick up one of the swipes, turned it. “No logo, no name or code. Probably a code buried in it, right? Can you get that out, Feeney?”

“I'd have to turn in my bars if I couldn't.”

McNab pulled a scanner out of one of the dozen pockets in his neon orange baggies, offered it to Feeney.

“Let's have a look.”

Feeney ran it, frowned. “Got a shield, and we can break that down. This kind of code and protection? It's probably a bank box or a secured area. He's a chem guy, right? So maybe a secured area, lab deal. Let's see the other.”

He repeated the process. “Shielded, but thinner—this isn't the high-security level.”

He did something to McNab's scanner that made it whine, picked up and put on Eve's goggles. He scanned the first swipe again.