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"Did you sleep?" She started to search for her pants, and saw the robe neatly laid across the foot of the bed. The man never missed a damn step.
"Yes. I haven't been up long. I assume you're going straight in today?"
"Yeah. Team briefing at eight hundred."
"The report on Henson—what there is of it—is printed out."
"Thanks."
"I have a number of things to see to today, but you can reach me if you need to." He rose, looking dark and dangerous in the half light, the night's growth of beard shadowing his face, the black robe carelessly belted. "There are a couple of names on the match list I recognize."
She took the hard copy he offered. "I guess it was too much to expect otherwise."
"Paul Lamont rings the clearest bell. His father fought in the French Wars before the family immigrated here. Paul's father was very skilled and passed considerable knowledge on to his son. Paul is a member of the security team for one of my businesses here in New York. Autotron. We make droids and various small electronics."
"You pals?"
"He works for me—and we…developed a project or two several years ago."
"And it's not the kind of project a good cop needs to know about."
"Exactly. He's been with Autotron for more than six years now. We haven't had contact beyond that relationship for nearly that amount of time."
"Uh-huh. And what are these skills his dear old dad passed along to him?"
"Paul's father was a saboteur. He specialized in explosives."
*** CHAPTER THIRTEEN ***
Peabody hadn't slept well. She dragged into work heavy-eyed and vaguely achy, as if she were coming down with some nasty little bug. She hadn't eaten, either. Though her appetite was dependable—sometimes too dependable—she expected few could eat hearty after spending several hours tagging body parts.
That she could have lived with. That was the job, and she had learned how to channel all thoughts and energies into the job during the months she'd worked under Eve.
What she couldn't live with, and what spread a thin layer of cranky over fatigue, was the fact that a great deal of her thoughts—and not pure ones—and entirely too much of her energies had been centered on McNab during the long night.
She hadn't been able to talk to Zeke. Not about this sudden weird compulsion for McNab. McNab, for Christ's sake. And she hadn't wanted to talk about the bombing at The Plaza.
He'd seemed distracted himself, she thought now, and they'd circled each other the night before and again that morning.
She'd make it up to him, Peabody promised herself. She'd carve out a couple of hours that night and take him to some funky little club for a meal and music. Zeke loved music. It would do them both good, she decided as she stepped off the guide and tried to rub the stiffness out of the back of her neck.
She turned toward the conference room and rammed straight into McNab. He sprang back, collided with a pair of uniforms who toppled into a clerk from Anti-crime.
Nobody took his apology very well, and he was red-faced and sweaty by the time he managed to look Peabody in the eye again. "You, ah, heading into the meeting."
"Yeah." She tugged at her uniform coat. "Just now."
"Me, too." They stared at each other a moment while people shoved by them.
"You shake anything loose on Apollo?"
"Not much." She cleared her throat, tugged her coat again, and finally managed to start moving. "The lieutenant's probably waiting."
"Yeah, right." He fell into step beside her. "You get any sleep?"
She thought of warm slick bodies . .. and stared straight ahead. "Some."
"Me, either." His jaw ached from gritting his teeth, but it had to be said. "Look, about yesterday."
