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"She matters to me, too." The words were out before he could yank out his tongue and bite it off. "Not that she gives a damn about that. She brushed me off this morning, so you've got nothing to worry about." He kicked her chair, sent it skidding across the room. "Goddamn it."
"Oh hell, McNab." The anger she'd worked up so nicely dipped toward nerves. "What are you doing here? You're not getting sticky on her?" His only answer was one long, miserable stare. "I knew it. I knew it. I just knew it."
"It's probably just a blip," he muttered. "I'll get over it."
"Do that. Just do that, will you? This isn't the time—it's never the time, but this is really not the time. So forget it, okay?" Eve didn't wait for his reply—she wanted him to understand. "Her brother's on the hot seat, we've got bombs all over the damn city. I've got one body in the morgue and another in the river. I can't afford to have two members of my team tripping over heartstrings."
He surprised himself by laughing, and meaning it. "Christ, that's cold."
"Yeah, I know." She remembered the way Roarke had looked at her that morning. "I suck at this, McNab. But I need you on your toes."
"I'm on them."
"Stay on them," she told him and walked out.
• • •
Since she calculated she couldn't do worse on her record of offending, insulting, and injuring people who mattered to her that morning, Eve put a call through to Roarke as she headed to the garage.
Summerset answered, and her instinctive reaction of clenching her teeth felt a lot better than guilt. "Roarke," was all she said.
"He's engaged on another call at the moment."
"This is police business, you cross-eyed putz. Put me through."
His nostrils flared in annoyance, and her mood lightened just a little more. "I will see if he's available to take your call."
The screen went blank. Though she didn't doubt he'd have the nerve to cut her off, she counted to ten. And ten again. She was heading toward thirty when Roarke came on.
"Lieutenant." His voice was clipped, the Irish in it frigid temper rather than music.
"The department needs one hundred million in fake bearer bonds—good fakes, but not good enough to pass a bank check. Sheets of ten thousand."
"When's your deadline?"
"I could use them by fourteen hundred."
"You'll have them." He waited a beat. "Anything else?"
Yes, I'm sorry. I'm an idiot. What do you want from me? "That's it. The department—"
"Appreciates it. Yes, I know. I'm on an interplanetary conference call, so if that's all…"
"Yeah, that's all. If you'd let me know when they're ready, I'll arrange transport."
"You'll hear from me."
He cut her off without another word and made her wince. "Okay," she mumbled. "That hurt. Bull's-eye." She jammed the link back in her bag.
She remembered her advice to McNab. Just forget it. She did her best to follow it, but some of her feelings must have shown on her face. Peabody kept her mouth shut as Eve stepped up to the car. And they drove to the morgue in silence.
• • •
The dead house was packed like a lobby bar at a Shriners' convention. The corridors were full of techs, assistant MEs, and the medical staff drafted from local health centers to wade in during the current crisis. The stench of humanity, alive and deceased, smeared the air.
Eve managed to snag one of the morgue staff she knew. "Chambers, where's Morris?" She'd hoped for a five-minute consult with the chief medical examiner.
"Up to his eyebrows. The hotel bombing brought in a lot of customers. A lot of them in pieces. It's like putting a jigsaw puzzle together."
