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“The shit hitting the fan isn’t all going to land on Peachtree’s face. A lot of it’s going to fly into yours.” As she spoke, Nadine angled her chair, brought up data manually on her computer screen. “He had a fifty-three percent popularity rating before this. And many of the voters included in that percentage are very vocal, very staunch, and very monied supporters. On the other side’s the faction who’ll want to lynch him politically, and will use you as the rope.”
“No comment. Curious. Which side do you bet on? Supporters or lynching party?”
It was a good angle, she mused, and one it wouldn’t hurt her to get a jump on. “He’ll resign. No way out of it. Without the dirty details of this sexual misconduct, I can’t project. He’ll take hits for cheating on his wife, and for any connection with Greene.”
“Off the record, Nadine?”
Eve could see Nadine strain against the bonds. “Okay, damn it, off the record.”
“If it’s a little juicier than cheating? If it involved some sexual kinks?”
“Oh God, you’re killing me. If it’s good and juicy, he’s probably cooked, at least short term. Convicting him of murder, unless you’ve got him with fresh blood on his hands, is another matter. Public support will swing both ways, which puts him center ring. People have short memories, and selective ones. They won’t necessarily remember if he’s guilty or innocent, but they’ll remember he did something big. If he doesn’t do hard time, if he can slither on the sex, he could run again in a few years. And he’d probably win.”
“That’s politics,” Eve stated. “Later.”
“Dallas—”
But Eve cut her off.
“You’re pulling on a string, Lieutenant,” Roarke said. “I’m beginning to see the shape of the ball it comes from.”
“Yeah, let’s see how it unravels. Head straight to garage level. Oh, and if you run over any reporters, I give you extra points.”
Inside she moved fast. She had Dukes and his team of lawyers in Interview within fifteen minutes. She teamed with Peabody, deliberately choosing to piss Dukes off by having two females go at him.
She turned on the recorder, input the salient data, then sat back. “Let’s get started.”
“Lieutenant Dallas.” The head of the legal team, a broad-shouldered, square-jawed man named Snyder, interrupted. “Mr. Dukes has opted to have all questions and comments directed through and answered by me or one of my associates. As is his right. He prefers not to speak to or be spoken to by you directly.”
“No problem. You’re going to want to inform your client that with duly executed warrants his data and communication centers were confiscated from his residence in this city, and from the portable registered to him found in the Albany location. Said units were then officially logged. Technicians attached to NYPSD extracted data and transmissions from said units. This data, these transmissions, lock your client in a cage, away from his family, away from his friends, away from whatever has previously passed for his world for the rest of his natural life.”
She smiled when she said it, and kept her eyes on Dukes’s face. “You can also relate to your client that I’m just as happy about that as I can be. I danced all the way in here this morning. Right, Peabody?”
“You do a mean tango, Lieutenant.”
“Your sarcasm is noted on record,” Snyder said.
“You betcha.”
“If, as you claim, you are in possession of such damning evidence against my client, I fail to see why you’re wasting your time in this interview.”
“Mostly I wanted to gloat.” She grinned. “And, as much as it offends my sensibilities, I’m required to give this asshole—excuse me—your client an opportunity to show remorse, and to cooperate so that such remorse and cooperation may be considered during his sentencing. Have you guys done the math? Eight counts first-degree murder. There’s a cop in there, which puts that single count at full life, off planet facility, no possibility of parole.”
“Lieutenant.” Snyder spread his hands. “You don’t have first and you certainly can’t hang the cop on my client. The fact is, you don’t have any direct evidence linking Donald Dukes to the alleged activities of this supposed organization.”
“Either you’re as bloody as your client, or he hasn’t given you full disclosure. Which do you figure, Peabody?”
“I think we should give Mr. Snyder the benefit of the doubt. I think Dukes is too puffed up with his own importance to believe he needs to tell his lawyer everything. He likes being in charge too much.”
“You think wearing that uniform makes you somebody,” Dukes said under his breath.
“Yeah.” Peabody edged closer. “It makes me a cop. It makes me somebody who’s sworn to protect the public against people like you. It makes me,” she said, slapping her palms on the table and pushing her face close to his, “one of the people who walked through the blood you spilled.”
“You will not speak directly to my client.” Snyder shoved to his feet, and to Eve’s delight, Peabody shifted and got up in his face.
“Your client spoke directly to me, on record. He does that, I’m free to respond, on record.”
“Now, now, class.” Eve clapped her hands once, made a sit-down gesture. “Let’s not let our tempers override our manners. If we’re going to give Snyder the benefit of the doubt, then we owe it to him, and his associates here, to inform them of the evidence that is now in our hands.”
