The Cabots sat at the conference table with their son between them. A unit, Eve thought when she walked in, bound together by grief. Each carried the pallor of the exhausted, and the stricken eyes of the shattered.
She saw Oliver Cabot reach for his wife’s hand when Eve approached the table.
“Dr. and Ms. Cabot, Ethan, I’m Lieutenant Dallas. Again, I’m very sorry for your loss, and appreciate you coming in to speak with us.”
Eve took a seat next to Peabody. Instinct had her speaking to the mother first. “This is hard, and the questions we’ll ask may make it even harder. I promise you, they’re necessary for us to find who hurt Mina.”
“Nothing you can say or do could make this harder than it is.” Rae Cabot, her bright hair drawn severely back in a tail, held Eve’s gaze with her devastated eyes. “All these months we believed—had to believe—we’d find her and bring her home. Now that’s gone, and Mina’s gone. Nothing can make it harder.”
“Do you know if Mina had any contacts or connections in New York, or any reason to come here?”
“She was taken from us. She was brought here. If you think she ran away—”
“I don’t.” The simple response tempered some of the fire that leapt into Rae’s eyes. “I’ve read Detective Driver’s reports and agree with her conclusions. But it’s a question I have to ask.”
“She didn’t know anyone here.” Oliver spoke now. “We brought the kids to New York a couple of times a year, to see a show, to visit museums.”
“She always wants to go shopping.” Head down, Ethan mumbled it, then knuckled his eyes.
“She does.” With a ghost of a smile on her face, Rae stroked his thatch of red hair. “And you always want the pizza. We’d come in as a family,” Rae continued. “Sometime during the holidays to see all the decorations and a Christmas show, and early summer, after school let out. She’s smart, and could have figured out how to get from home to New York on her own. But she didn’t.”
“We know, from Detective Driver’s files, the police conducted a thorough search on all of Mina’s devices and found no questionable correspondence or activities. But there are other ways for someone to connect with a young girl.”
“The investigators looked at that, and they—and we—talked to all Mina’s friends, her classmates, her soccer team, teachers, coaches, neighbors.”
“And she would tell us.” Rae interrupted her husband. “I’m not saying Mina didn’t have some secrets, some things she didn’t tell us. But she wasn’t sneaky.”
“It could have been very innocent on her part,” Peabody put in. “Something she didn’t mention because it didn’t seem important or unusual. Someone she passed on the walk home from school.”
“She’d never have gone with someone willingly, or gotten into a stranger’s car. Never. The short distance she walked is in a neighborhood,” Rae insisted. “It’s residential and quiet. It’s safe. It’s always been safe.”
As silent tears slid down Rae’s cheeks, Eve laid the printout of Dorian Gregg’s ID photo on the table. “Do you recognize this girl? Any of you?”
“I don’t. Oliver?”
“No, she doesn’t look familiar.”
“Mina has lots of girlfriends, but not this one,” Ethan said.
“Who is she?” Rae demanded. “Does she have something to do with Mina?”
“We have reason to believe this girl was abducted also. Evidence indicates she was with Mina last night.”
“What does that mean?” Oliver demanded. “Do you think—is this girl a suspect?”
“At this point we consider her a witness.”
“Do you think Mina knew her? There haven’t been any other child abductions from our area,” Rae added. “We’d have heard. She looks about the same age as Mina. If they went to school together…”
“She wasn’t from your area.”
Rae’s eyes narrowed. “Where?”
“New Jersey.”
“Oliver, why don’t you and Ethan go grab a snack?”
“You don’t want me to hear, but I’m not going. I’m not.” Ethan’s face reddened with temper under a scatter of freckles. “She’s my sister. And I was mean to her that morning. That morning before school I said how Nick was gonna try to touch her boobies.”
“Oh, Ethan.” With a sobbing laugh, Rae laid her cheek on the top of his head.
“I’ve got a sister,” Peabody told him. “And two brothers. Sometimes we said silly and mean things to each other because it’s what you do. That’s all. But I love them, and they love me, just like you love Mina and she loves you.”
“I’m not going. Somebody killed my sister, and I’m not going out for a stupid snack.”
“Okay.” Oliver leaned over, got his arm around both of them. “It’s okay. We’ll stay together.”
“All right. All right.” Rae straightened in her chair. “You’re considering the possibility of child trafficking.”
“We are. So were the investigators on Mina’s abduction. The investigation’s in its very early stages, but we consider this a high probability.”
“She hadn’t been raped.” On the table, Oliver clutched his hands together. “Dr. Morris confirmed that. You may not think that should be important to us after—”
“No, sir. I understand it’s important to you as her family. It’s also important to Detective Peabody and me as investigators.”
Eve took out another photo—this of the underwear. “Mina was wearing her school uniform pants and a white short-sleeved shirt, not the shirt she wore when abducted. She also wore these. Do you recognize them as hers?”
The instant Rae took the photo, she shook her head. “God, no. Mina would never—she’s much too young. She most usually wears a sports bra, cotton blend panties—hip skimmers they call them. And from the look of these, she couldn’t afford them on her allowance. She liked young, sporty, nothing like this.”
Rae looked back at Eve. “She had a French manicure. I didn’t think—I couldn’t think when we saw her. But she had a French manicure. Fresh, wasn’t it?” She rubbed a hand on her temple. “Mina thought they were boring and old. Whenever we went to the nail salon, or she went with her friends, she got color. I usually got a French, and she’d roll her eyes. ‘Boring, Mom.’”
Now she looked down at her son again, then took a long breath. “They were grooming her. Whoever took her, they were grooming her, for trafficking, for sexual slavery.”
“Why would they want her in traffic?”
Oliver rubbed Ethan’s arm. “It’s not that kind of traffic, baby. Don’t interrupt now.”
“We’re working on that possibility,” Eve told them.
“Could I see the photo of the other girl again?” Rae asked. Then nodded when Eve showed her. “Yes, she’s striking, isn’t she? A strikingly pretty girl, like Mina. You haven’t found this girl?”
“Not yet.”
“Why do you think she and Mina were together when Mina was killed?”
“We’re not going to share certain details with you at this time, but we believe she was.”
“Maybe they were friends, Mom. Mina liked her girlfriends. She talked to them all the time.”
“Yes, maybe they were friends. Maybe she wasn’t alone.”
Eve stayed where she was after Peabody escorted them out. They’d held up better than she’d expected. She could be grateful for that, just as she was for the opportunity to see and judge the family dynamic.
Close, tight, but not smothering.
Peabody came back with tubes of Pepsi and Diet Pepsi. “I didn’t program your coffee into the AC in here.”
“This is fine, thanks.”
“They’re going to stay, at least a day or two. They’re going to visit the spot where we found her body.”
“Did they tell you that?”
“They didn’t have to.”
Nodding, Eve cracked the tube. “The possibility Mina ran or got into a vehicle with someone was always low. It’s now below zero for me. She didn’t run from that, from them, and everything says she had too many smarts to climb into a ride. The mother? She’s smart, sharp, and observant.”
“She knows her kids.”
“That’s right. The underwear, the manicure—not a choice. Adds weight.”
She pushed up, drank from the tube as she paced. “Roarke’s asking the Miras over for dinner tonight.”
“Oh. Nice.”
Eve shook her head. “Working dinner—consult dinner. I don’t much like the combination, but it got away from me. He got away from me. He keeps popping up here at Central unexpectedly lately. Have you noticed that?”
“Well, not really, but I guess.”
“Projects, meetings.” Eve waved a hand in the air. “Whatever. Bad timing on this. He’s decided he has to worry about me given the circumstances.”
Peabody followed the dots. “Hard to blame him.”
“Not for me it’s not. He—” She broke off when her comm signaled. “Looks like the caseworker got here a little early.”
“I’ll go bring her back.” Peabody stood. “You know, my mom’s pretty smart.”
“Scary about it,” Eve agreed.
“She’s proud of me. She and my dad didn’t really want me to be a cop, much less in New York, but they let me choose, and they’re proud of me. But she worries, and I know it. She says worrying is part of loving.
“So. I’ll bring Truman back.”
“He’s not my mother,” Eve pointed out as Peabody walked from the room.
“But he loves you.”
Yeah, yeah, she thought, then put it away.
She sat, started reviewing the file she had on Dorian as Peabody brought the caseworker in.
Pru Truman looked like a human rag that had been wrung dry too many times and tossed aside. Pale and bony in what even Eve’s unfashionable eye noted as an ugly suit, she clutched an ancient briefcase and kept her thin mouth pursed tight.
If Eve hadn’t skimmed her data, she’d have gauged the woman as early sixties. But her bio claimed a decade younger.
“I’m Lieutenant Dallas. Thanks for coming in, Ms. Truman. Have a seat.”
“Can I get you coffee?” Peabody asked her. “A soft drink?”
“I don’t consume caffeine, faux or otherwise. Still water, please.”
Because she found herself taking an instant dislike, Eve took a slow sip of her Pepsi.
“This is all very inconvenient,” Truman began.
“What’s that?”
“Being obligated to come all the way into New York. I had to reschedule several appointments.”
“I have a thirteen-year-old girl who’ll never have to worry about appointments again, seeing as she’s dead.”
“This unfortunate girl wasn’t one of my charges.”
“Dorian Gregg is.”
“Yes.” Truman reached into the briefcase, took out a disc file. “I have all my files on minor female Gregg, going back nearly five years. As you’ll see, I conducted numerous home visits over that length of time, arranged meetings and interviews with the teachers in her schools. I recommended, I believe you’ll find three years ago, for the custodial parent to attend and complete an addiction program, which she did.”
“You did all that?” Eve said, very pleasantly. “Oddly, we found a number of illegal substances in Jewell Gregg’s apartment, along with cheap wine and brew.”
“Perhaps she had a recent relapse, as often happens.”
“No mandatory testing?”
“She had completed the program.”
“Perhaps she had a recent relapse,” Eve repeated.
“And we will look into the matter.”
“A little late for that, isn’t it, since Dorian hasn’t been in that apartment since sometime around August of last year.”
Truman’s pointy little chin jutted up. “I was not aware of that circumstance.”
“It’s your job to be aware.”
Annoyance flashed, and Truman’s thin lips vanished as she pressed them together. “I won’t tell you how to do your job, you won’t tell me how to do mine. Minor female Gregg—”
“She has a name. She has a goddamn name.”
“Be sure I’ll report your language,” Truman responded with a sharp nod. “I do not refer to charges by name in order to keep a professional distance. She is a difficult, recalcitrant child,” Truman continued. “And as you can see from my files, and her juvenile record, has a history of truancy, of running away, of petty theft.”
Eve found the words, the tone, the voice pounding in her head. Except for the petty theft, Truman might have spoken of minor female Dallas.
“There’s also documentation of sporadic physical and verbal abuse of the custodial parent by the minor female.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
“I won’t tolerate that language. You have copies of my files, so we’re done here.”
“Sit your tight ass down, Truman, or I’ll not only see you’re cited for dereliction of duty, I’ll bring charges of my own and toss you in a cage.”
“You threaten me!”
“I promise you. Whatever your files say, you haven’t conducted a home visit for months.”
“I certainly have.”
“Not with Dorian present. And if in those files you claim otherwise, or claim to have spoken to her since last August, I’ll charge you with conspiracy to defraud the government.”
“I’m not a criminal!” She squawked it, and made Eve think of the chickens on the Brody family farm.
“I’m a public servant. I had no idea the female—the child,” she amended, “wasn’t in parental custody. Ms. Gregg said they were trying tutors and homeschooling, and it was working better.”
“And isn’t it your duty to speak to the child?”
“The child was, as I said, difficult. And very, very rude to me. I had no reason not to trust the custodial parent.”
“A woman with a history of illegal and alcohol abuse. One reported to you by witnesses of striking Dorian.”
Truman lifted her chin. “Neighbors have agendas, and will gossip.”
“Did you ever see bruises on Dorian?”
“She’s a clumsy child, and in addition, often got into physical altercations with other children.”
“Who says?”
Truman looked away. “Her custodial parent.”
“The one smacking her around, booting her out of the apartment when she wanted alone time with her newest ‘date,’ the one pulling in a monthly check even when the kid doesn’t come home for months? The one who never bothered to file a missing persons report on her own daughter, send up an Amber Alert? That custodial parent?”
“Obviously Ms. Gregg wasn’t forthcoming and failed to inform me, and the authorities. Naturally, she’ll be disqualified as a professional parent, and I will certainly recommend foster care for the child.”
“The missing child. The child who may be dead because you couldn’t be bothered to do your job.”
“I did my job!” Truman’s face bloomed red at the accusation. “You have no idea what goes into my job! The stress, the hours, the unruly, difficult children, the careless parents and guardians. I’m not responsible if that girl ran off again, or if she met a bad end because of it. She had choices, and made poor ones.”
With everything inside her burning dark, Eve got slowly to her feet. “Now would be a really good time for you to leave.”
“I will not have some—some New York City bully accuse me of—”
“You need to get out, and now.”
“I’ll be reporting this treatment, your language, and your behavior.”
“Yeah? Same goes. Now get the fuck out of my house.”
Moving fast, she got out.
“Peabody, get me that fucking negligent asshole excuse for a human being’s supervisor. Get me her boss. Now.”
“I’ll do that, but do me a favor, and take five minutes first. Just five minutes,” Peabody repeated, standing up and standing firm when Eve rounded on her.
“I feel what you feel. You feel more of it, I get that, but I feel it. I wanted to pound her with my fists, choke her till she popped, then kick what was left of her into squirmy pulp. She needs to be reported, she needs to be fired, and I think, I really think, brought up on charges. But that part, that last part’s not our call.”
She could barely find her breath. All she could find was rage.
“Fuck that.”
“I want to fuck that, I do. And if you’d told me to toss her in a cage, I’d’ve done it. Hopefully you’d have covered me when she sued our asses off for it, but I’d’ve done it either way. It’s not that she didn’t help Dorian, and who knows how many others, but that they weren’t kids to her. They were just charges. Nameless charges.”
Because Eve paced, said nothing, Peabody kept going. She’d get that five-minute cooldown.
“We’ve worked with Child Services before, and we know most of them are dedicated, caring, compassionate, overworked. Some of them burn out, sure. And maybe, maybe there are more like that piece of shit out there. But she’s the first for me.”
“Not for me,” Eve muttered. “Not for me. But she ranks high on the worst list. You’re right, most of them go into it because they care and want to help. It’s not like it pays the big bucks. And that’s just one more reason she’s revolting.”
Eve stopped pacing, turned. “I don’t need the five.”
“Dallas—”
“No, you did the job, and it’s appreciated. I can be outraged, but not throw a tirade, and that’ll have more impact. I’d have you do it, but I’m rank, and that’ll have more impact.”
“Okay, I’ll get you her boss.” Now, for the first time, Peabody let out a breath. “You scared the crap out of her.”
“Did I?” Eve pressed the knuckles of her fist to the headache drilling between her eyes. “She’s lucky I told her to get out. I was close to pounding her, then I’m the one you’d be tossing in a cage.”
“She’s not worth it.”
“No. It would have felt good, but she’s not worth it. I’m going to need to pound something.”
“Please, not me.”
“I’ll bust up another sparring droid when I get home. Thanks, and I mean it.”
“I’ll get the boss. You want to take it in your office?”
“Yeah, better.”
“And I’m going to write all this up. I’m going to do Truman first because we want copies of that going to her boss, to the cops in Freehold, and to the Professional Parent Service.”
“Good thinking.” And now with the red haze of fury subsiding, Eve could think, too. “Copy Mira and Whitney on it. I’ll write up the interview with the Cabots. You can take off and go visit your kitchen cabinets and whatever.”
“That can wait.”
“No, we’re already near end of shift, and I’m going to work from home. But first I have a date with a sparring droid.”
Since the meeting with Truman had lit a fire in her, Eve willed a coating of cold professionalism over her tone when she spoke to Truman’s supervisor.
She knew the heat burned through in spite of—maybe because of—the supervisor’s shock and lame—to her ear—excuses.
Maybe she found some satisfaction in Truman’s immediate suspension and the internal investigation to follow, but not enough.
She drove home pissed, which suited the traffic that snarled and bitched all the way uptown.
Most days, driving through the gates, winding up the drive toward the castle-like house that was home brought relief, even gratitude. She had a home, and she had all its beauty, its grace, its peace.
But tonight, it made her feel itchy. She firmly believed Roarke had pushed buttons he had no business pushing, and now she’d have to slog through the whole thing with Mira instead of just getting down to work.
And fine, fine, she thought as the lush green lawns spread and the glorious flowers bloomed, slogging through the whole thing with Mira equaled work.
But.
She didn’t know exactly what followed but because she was too itchy and pissed to think about it.
Her go-to solution when something stuck so hard in her craw to make her itchy and pissed? Punch something. An inanimate something.
She parked, and with visions of beating the crap out of a sparring droid in her head, walked into the cool, lightly fragrant air of the foyer.
Summerset stood, of course, the black-clad, silver-maned scarecrow with the pudgy gray cat at his feet.
It occurred to her Summerset could almost qualify as inanimate.
The cat pranced over to wind between her legs before she headed for the stairs.
“The Miras will arrive at seven-thirty. That should give you enough time to make yourself presentable.”
She kept walking. Punching him could be fun, but—and she knew what followed this one.
She’d feel guilty, then be duty bound to arrest herself on assault charges. And Roarke would be—justifiably pissed.
Instead of a punch, she threw out a rhetorical question as the cat bounded up the stairs ahead of her.
“Do all those suits come with the stick up your ass, or do you just interchange it?”
“Seven-thirty,” he said as he watched her head up. “Cocktails on the patio.”
“Yeah, yeah, fucking yeah.”
Galahad perched on the bed when she walked in, and gave her a long stare with his bicolored eyes. She walked over to give him a scratch and a stroke.
“Crap mood. Need to work it off.”
She turned to grab shorts and a tank, caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror, and frowned. Summerset didn’t know she had a date with the sparring droid. Why the hell wasn’t she already presentable?
No visible blood, no rips or tears.
She shrugged out of her jacket, tossed it on the bed, removed her weapon harness, and stood in a sleeveless white shirt and khaki trousers.
Presentable, she thought.
“Stick up the ass,” she muttered as she changed, and took the elevator down to the gym.
Moments later, Roarke walked in the front door.
“The lieutenant seems a bit off-kilter,” Summerset told him.
“I’m not surprised.”
“You’ll straighten that out before your guests arrive.”
As Eve had, Roarke strode straight to the stairs. “And why, I wonder, am I the one always obliged to straighten the lieutenant’s bloody kilter?”
Summerset lifted his eyebrows. Apparently, the lieutenant wasn’t the only one off-kilter.
“Children.” With a shake of his head, he headed back to the kitchen to ensure at least his part of the meal passed muster.
Upstairs, Roarke noted Eve’s work clothes on the bed with Galahad keeping guard.
“Gone down to the gym, has she?” Just like Eve, he gave the cat a scratch and a stroke.
As he loosened his tie, he considered joining her. He could take twenty or thirty minutes to sweat out some of the day’s annoyance.
Stripping off his suit coat, he called for the gym on-screen.
He watched Eve execute a side kick to the sparring droid’s breastbone, pivot, then follow up with a left jab to the jaw.
She’d chosen a beefy female he’d yet to try out himself.
And obviously programmed for full contact, as the droid’s countered right cross slipped by Eve’s guard and connected high on her cheekbone.
“Bloody hell.”
Eve went for a leg sweep that knocked the droid off-balance enough for her to land a body blow and a solid uppercut before the droid’s elbow jab snapped his wife’s head back.
He took two steps to the elevator before he stopped himself.
He could go, shut down the droid, turn Eve’s obvious fury on himself. They could go a round, and Christ knew he wouldn’t plant a fist in his wife’s face.
“Hell with it. Let her do it her way.”
He turned off the screen and took himself off to the shower.
When she came up, he finished buttoning his jeans.
“Your mouth’s bleeding,” he said as he reached for a T-shirt.
She swiped the back of her hand over it. “The droid said it needed some minor repairs and needed about twelve hours to deal with it.”
“Might take you a bit longer,” he said in a voice like a shrug. “You’ve got a black eye coming on, and your jaw’s swelling.”
“It’s got a sneaky left.”
“You might opt for light contact rather than full next time.”
“What’s the point in that? Look—”
“I am, and I take it you feel getting punched in the face multiple times was somehow worth it.”
“I figured it for a better choice than punching you or some innocent bystander.” Planting her feet, she prepared to stand her ground. “How would you react if I came into your office and told you what to do, what not to do?”
He held up a finger, turned, and walked into the bathroom. He came out with several cold packs, tossed them at her.
“First, I didn’t tell you what to do, or what not to do. I asked if you’d consider doing something.”
“That’s a real slippery line.”
“But a line nonetheless. Second, decisions I make in my office don’t affect my emotional health. You’re already exhausted, and now bruised and bloody with it.”
“I’m handling it. If I can’t handle any case I catch, I’ve got no business on the job.”
He just looked at her. “You wouldn’t say that about anyone in your bullpen.”
“My bullpen,” she tossed back, firing up again. “I’m the boss. I’m in charge, and that makes it different. You know that. You know it.”
“And I know this. Every day you strap that on.” He gestured to her weapon harness. “And you walk out the door. I know what you risk, every day, and I accept it, support it, respect it, even admire it. I know what I risk, every day, because you’re my goddamn world, but I stand with you. And you know that. But I question something I can see hurts you, and I have no right? I’m to back off, have no voice, no say, no opinion? Well, bugger that. I’m your husband, not your pet.”
Stunned, she took a step toward him. “I never—”
And he stepped back, very deliberately. “You’ve about a half hour before the Miras get here.”
He walked away from her, left her frustrated, furious, and flummoxed. Okay, so he was a lot more pissed than she’d realized, but that? That, she thought, was bullshit.
“Pet, my ass.” Turning to the cat, she threw up her arms. “What the fuck is that?”
Galahad, apparently opting to stay neutral, stretched out and closed his eyes.
“He questioned my judgment. That’s just what he did, so he can bugger it right back.”
She stalked into the bathroom for a shower, caught sight of herself again. Damn it, she did have a black eye coming on.
She stripped, then slapped one of the cold packs on her eye before stepping into the shower and ordering jets on full.