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“Have you walked it off already?”
“Yeah, I went through. They’re in, they’re out. Three minutes. The blood on the floor down here, going into the kitchen and into the toilet’s going to be from Knight. Upstairs it’s going to be Preston’s. Coming off the knives, coming off the gear. The trail of it, the pattern, shows they were moving fast. See, look.”
She strode to the kitchen doorway, swung her weapon right, left. “See the blood there? Pause, sweep the room, move in.”
She looked back up the stairs. “Preston shouldn’t have come down like that, exposed. Two seconds where he acts before he thinks—he’s thinking about his partner instead of with cop instinct—and he’s dead.”
She lowered her weapon, holstered it. “Fuck.”
“Truer words. I’ll take care of them now, Dallas.” He didn’t touch her—his hands were smeared with blood—but the look in his eyes was as steady as the clasp of a hand.
“We’re going to bury them for this, Morris.”
“Yes. Yes, we are.”
She went outside. Most of the reporters who’d gathered had scattered after Whitney had given them a brief statement. Stories to file, she thought.
But she saw Nadine over with Roarke by her vehicle. Some of the anger, the cold hard tips of it, clawed through. She strode toward them, ready to rake the reporter bloody—and have a few swipes left over for her husband—when Nadine turned.
Her face was streaked with tears.
“I knew them,” she said before Eve could speak. “I knew them.”
“Okay.” The anger retracted, scraping those keen tips over her own gut on the way. “Okay.”
“Knight . . . We used to flirt. Nothing serious, nothing that either of us meant to go anywhere, but we did the dance.” Her voice broke. “Preston used to show off pictures of his kid. He’s got a little boy.”
“
I know. You ought to take some time off, Nadine. A couple of days.”
“After you get them.” She swiped her fingers over her cheeks. “I don’t know why it’s hit me this way. It’s not the first time somebody I know . . .”
“Preston may have hit one of them. I’m telling you that friend to friend, not cop to reporter. Because you knew them. Because I knew them, and thinking he might’ve hit one of them helps me.”
“Thanks.”
“I’ve got to go finish up here, seal the scene, then go in,” Eve said to Roarke. “I don’t know when I’ll be home.”
“Call, will you, when you do?”
“Sure.” She thought of what he’d said earlier about the risks she had to take. And what it might be like for him to see other cops, bloody and dead.
So despite Nadine, despite the other cops, the techs, the few gawkers who’d yet to be nudged on their way, she stepped to him, stepped into him. Laid her hands on his face, laid her lips on his.
“I can get you a ride in one of the black-and-whites.”
He smiled at her. “There is nothing I’d like less. I’ll take care of my own transpo. Nadine, I’ll give you a lift.”
“If I could have a kiss like that, I’d be lifted into orbit. But I’ll settle for a ride to the station. Dallas, if you need some research on the side, another pair of hands or eyes, mine are yours. No strings on this one.”
“I’ll keep it in mind. Later.” She strode back up the sidewalk, and back into the narrow box that smelled of death.
11
WORD SPREAD QUICKLY WHEN COPS WENT DOWN. By the time Eve reached Central, that word had streamed through the maze, slid into cubes and offices, and had the air thick with fury.
She stepped into the bull pen, paused. She wasn’t much for speeches. She preferred briefings or orders. But she was rank here, and the men deserved to hear from her.
