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There was a lot more said between them that didn’t take words. “Kids today,” he said at length, “think they know every damn thing.”
His hand closed over hers, squeezed once. Then he got up, walked out. Went home.
She sat where he’d sat for a moment, laid her hands where his had laid. Then she got up, walked to her desk. Went back to work.
She brought up Cogburn’s data, then Halloway’s personal file. She was halfway through a search for any connections when her ’link beeped.
“Dallas.”
“Got one you’re going to want to see.” Baxter’s face filled most of the screen, but she could see the movements, hear the sounds of a crime scene behind him.
“I’m on a priority, Baxter. I can’t take another case. Handle it.”
“You’re going to want this. Vic’s a fifty-three-year-old male. First glance it looks like somebody got in, attacked him. But you look closer, he did all the damage in here himself. Including slitting his own throat.”
“I don’t have time for—”
“A lot of premortem bleeding. Ears and nose. And take a look at this.”
He turned. She caught glimpses of a spacious room, thoroughly trashed. Then the desk unit that lay screen-up on the floor.
ABSOLUTE PURITY ACHIEVED
“Don’t let anyone touch that unit. I’m on my way.”
She was halfway out the door when she swore, strode back to the desk to hunt up a memo.
“Listen,” she spoke into it as she crossed into Roarke’s office. “I got tagged. Related death. I’ll be back . . . when I get back. Sorry.”
She tossed the memo on his console, then bolted.
Chadwick Fitzhugh had lived, and lived well, in a two-level condominium on the Upper East Side. His profession was, primarily, being the solitary male of the fourth-generation Fitzhughs, which meant he socialized smoothly, looked snappy in a dinner suit, played a mean game of polo, and could, if pressed, discuss stock options.
The family business was money, in all its many forms. And the Fitzhughs had plenty of it.
His hobbies were travel, fashion, gambling, and seducing young boys.
Baxter filled her in on the basic data while Eve studied the bloody mess that was now Chadwick Fitzhugh.
“Name popped on the data search. Known pedophile. Trolled the clubs, surfed the chat rooms,” Baxter stated.
“He liked them between fourteen and sixteen. Pattern was to buy them alcohol, Zoner, whatever worked, lure them up here, with the promise of more. Then he’d pull out the toys. Into bondage. He’d do them, whether they were willing or not. Looks like he took vids if his homemade stash is any indication. Then he’d give them some cash, pat them on the head, and tell them if they squawked about it, they’d be in more trouble than he would.”
Baxter looked down at the body. “Mostly they believed him.”
“If we know this, have record of this, at least one of the kids squawked.”
“Yeah, he got reported four times over the last two years.” Baxter pulled out a pack of gum from the pocket of his on-duty suit, offered it. “In New York anyway,” he continued while he and Eve chewed spearmint contemplatively. “Got charged. Family money and lots of high-dollar lawyers stepped in and made it all go away. Nothing stuck to this creep. World’s a better place without him.”
Eve grunted and fitting on microgoggles, examined the throat wound. It gaped like a wide, screaming mouth. “No visible hesitation marks.”
“When you gotta go, you gotta go.”
With a sealed finger, she turned Fitzhugh’s head. His ear canal was thick with blood. “Surfed the chat rooms?”
“I got the statement here in the file from one of the complaints. That’s how he roped this one kid anyway. Looked for young boys going through a sexual identity crisis, or those just playing around. Got a playpen upstairs. Room’s done in black leather. You got your cuffs, your whips, your ball gags, butt plugs, and various mechanical devices. First-class vid setup.”
He tucked his notebook away. “How it looked was he had some kid in here who went bonkers on him. Place is pretty smashed up, and he’s got quite the potpourri of illegals around here. But security discs don’t show anyone coming in here or going out for the last three days. Not even the dead guy.”
