“Run your evening through for me.”
“After I went up, spoke with Aileen, I checked on some work, watched part of a vid. It had been a long day. I was asleep by ten or so. I thought I heard someone walking down the hall. I sleep light. And it’s not my home, so probably lighter yet. But I’d drifted back to sleep when Aileen’s screams woke me. I ran out, and I ran downstairs. I heard her screaming from Nate’s office, and I saw Nate. I saw Aileen trying to hold him. I turned on the lights, and I ran over to them first to try to see if I… Then I called nine-one-one.”
“You had your ’link with you?”
“She was screaming. Yes, I grabbed it on the run. I got down on the floor with her, tried to see if Nate… Uma came rushing in, then John and Divine at some point. It’s mixed up a bit. The MTs got here, then the police.”
“You know all of this,” Chloe said. “Why make them relive it?”
“I know more now,” Eve said simply.
One of the uniforms came in. “Excuse me, Lieutenant. The transport and security team are here.”
“I’ll be right there. You need to excuse me for now.”
“Just get those goddamn things out of our house.” Aileen laid her head back, closed her eyes. “Get them out of my husband’s house.”
Chapter Seven
When Eve stepped out, Roarke turned his attention to Aileen.
“Ms. Carville, is there anything I can do for you? Is there anyone I can contact for you?”
“I—no. We tried to reach Nate’s mother, but…”
“She’s on one of her retreats,” Joy supplied. “Don’t worry, Aileen. I’ll track her down. We’re going to take a little time before we let anyone else outside the household know.”
“I know who you are.”
Roarke shifted his gaze to Chloe’s. “I’m here to assist the lieutenant and the NYPSD, and your family, in any way I can.”
“Why?”
“Chloe.”
“It’s a reasonable question,” he said to Aileen. “A few years ago, I would have heard about your father’s death through business associates or the media. I would have been sorry, but unless we had had a personal relationship, I would have moved on. But I’ve come to see the intimaciesand cruelties of the willful taking of a life, what it does to those left in its wake. I’ve certainly seen that finding those responsible for the taking of a life isn’t simply a job for Lieutenant Dallas or those she works with. It’s a calling.
“She won’t stop,” he added, and with such quiet surety it rang in the room. “I hope it’s some small comfort to you at this horrible time to know she won’t stop until she finds the person who took your father from you.”
“It won’t bring Nate back,” Aileen murmured.
“No, she can’t do that. But she’ll do everything she can do, and more if more’s needed, to find who took him away. Why am I here?” He looked back at Chloe. “I have a great need to help her.”
Outside, Eve waited for the armored truck and its escort. Just a few billion being transported across Manhattan, she thought. No big deal.
Then her shoulders relaxed. She saw SWAT commander Lieutenant Lowenbaum get out of an escort vehicle.
“Good to see you, Lieutenant. Sorry about the weekend duty.”
He shrugged, a good-looking fair-haired man with an easy attitude and nerves of steel. “Happens. Doesn’t much happen we guard a shitload of art and so on. We’ve got museum security tagging on.”
He gestured to another group wearing Kevlar and sidearms with their dark suits.
“More meeting us at the drop-off. You sure pull some interesting jobs, Dallas.”
“Yeah, I’m lucky that way. Let me take you in.”
“Let me introduce you to Morbelli. Head of Met security. She thinks she’s in charge.”
