“I'm obliged to consider what's in the best interests of-”
“The minor subject,” Eve concluded. “Then you know that it's in her best interests to feel safe, to avoid more stressful situations. She's scared shitless. Why add?”
The woman looked back. “My supervisor won't like it.”
“Your supervisor can deal with me. I'm taking the kid. Go file a report.”
“I need the location, the situation where-”
“I'll let you know. Peabody? Pack what you figure Nixie needs.”
She walked back to Nixie. “You know you can't stay here anymore.”
“I don't want to go with her. I don't want-”
“And you've had it hit really hard tonight that you can't always have what you want. But for right now, you can come with me.”
“With you?”
While Newman stalked away, Eve drew Nixie across the room. “That's right. I can't stay with you, because I've got to work. But there'll be people there who'll look out for you. People I trust, so you can trust them, too.”
“But you'll be there? You'll come back?”
“I live there.”
“Okay.” Nixie took Eve's hand. “I'll go with you.”
2
ALL THINGS BEING EQUAL, EVE WOULD RATHER have been transporting a three-hundred-pound psycho hopped on Zeus in the back of her police issue than a little girl. She knew how to handle a homicidal chemihead.
But it was a short ride, and she'd be able to pass the kid off soon enough, and get back to work.
“After we notify…” Eve glanced in the rearview, and though Nixie's eyes were drooping, she left off next of kin. “We'll set up in my home office. I'll swing back to the scene later. For now, we'll work with your record.”
“EDD's picking up all the home and personal 'links and comps, and they'll run a check on house security.” Peabody shifted so she could keep Nixie in the corner of her eye. “Maybe they'll have something by the time we do a second pass through the scene.”
Had to get back in the field, Eve thought. Work to do. Interviews, reports, runs. She needed to get back to the scene. Her concentration had been fractured by finding the child. She needed to get back there, get the vibe.
Walked in the front door, she thought, going back in her head. Kid was in the kitchen, would've seen if someone had come in the back. Through the front, through security like it wasn't there. One up, one down. Fast and efficient.
Housekeeper first. But she wasn't the target, she wasn't the goal. Otherwise, why go upstairs at all? The family was the target. Parents and kids. Don't even deviate for a second and scoop up an expensive wrist unit lying in plain sight.
Straight kill, she thought. Impersonal. No torture, no talk, no mutilation.
Just a job, so-
“You live here?”
Nixie's sleepy question broke Eve's rhythm as she drove through the gates toward home.
“Yeah.”
“In a castle?”
“It's not a castle.” Okay, maybe it looked like one, she admitted. The vastness of it, the stones gleaming in the early light, with all those juts and towers, all that space of green and the trees shimmering with the last sparks of fall.
But that was Roarke for you. He didn't do ordinary.
“It's just a really big house.”
“It's a mag house,” Peabody added, with a smile for Nixie. “Lots of rooms, tons of wall screens and games, even a pool.”
“In the house?”
“Yeah. Can you swim?”
“Dad taught us. We get to go on vacation for a week after Christmas to this hotel in Miami. There's the ocean, and there's a pool, and we're going to…”
She trailed off, teared up, as she remembered there would be no family vacation after Christmas. No family vacation ever again.
“Did it hurt, when they got dead?”
“No,” Peabody said, gently.
“Did it?” Unsatisfied, Nixie stared hard at the back of Eve's head.
Eve parked in front of the house. “No.”
“How do you know? You never died before. You never had somebody take a big knife and cut you open in your throat. How do you know-”
“Because it's my job.” Eve spoke briskly as Nixie's voice rose up the register toward hysterics. She shifted, looked back at the child. “They never even woke up, and it was over in a second. It didn't hurt.”
“But they're still dead, aren't they? They're all still dead.”
“Yeah, they are, and that blows wide.” Typical, Eve thought, letting the fury roll off her. Anger usually held hands with grief. “You can't bring them back. But I'm going to find out who did it, and put them away.”
“You could kill them.”
“That's not my job.”
Eve got out of the car, opened the back. “Let's go.”
Even as she reached out a hand for Nixie's, Roarke opened the front door, stepped out. Nixie's fingers curled into hers like little wires.
“Is he the prince?” she whispered.
As the house looked like a castle, Eve supposed the man who'd built it looked like its prince. Tall and lean, dark and gorgeous. The flow of black hair around a face designed to make a woman whimper with lust. Strong, sharp bones, full, firm mouth, and eyes of bold and brilliant blue.
“He's Roarke,” Eve answered. “He's just a guy.”
A lie, of course. Roarke wasn't just anything. But he was hers.
“Lieutenant.” Ireland cruised out of his voice as he came down the steps and walked toward them. “Detective.” He crouched. Eve noted that as he looked into Nixie's eyes he didn't smile.
He saw a pretty, pale little girl, with dried blood in her sunlight blonde hair, and bruises of fatigue and grief under eyes of quiet blue.
“You'd be Nixie. I'm Roarke. I'm sorry to meet you under such terrible circumstances.”
“They killed everybody.”
“Yes, I know. Lieutenant Dallas and Detective Peabody will find who did this horrible thing, and see that they're punished for it.”
“How do you know?”
“It's what they do, what they do better than anyone. Will you come inside now?”
Nixie tugged on Eve's hand, kept tugging until Eve rolled her eyes and bent down. “What?”
“Why does he talk like that?”
“He's not from around here, originally.”
“I was born across the sea, inIreland.” Now he did smile, just a little. “I've never quite shaken the accent.”
Roarke gestured them inside the spacious foyer, where Summerset stood, with the fat cat sprawled at his feet. “Nixie, this is Summerset,” Roarke said. “He runs the house. He'll be looking after you, for the most part.”
“I don't know him.” And eyeing Summerset, Nixie cringed back against Eve.
“I do.” It was a big cup of bile to swallow, but Eve gulped it down. “He's okay.”
“Welcome, Miss Nixie.” Like Roarke, his face was sober. Eve had to give them both credit for not plastering on those big, scary smiles adults often wore around vulnerable kids. “Would you like me to show you where you'll sleep?”
“I don't know.”
He reached down, picked up the cat. “Perhaps you'd like some refreshment first. Galahad would keep you company.”
“We had a cat. He was old and he died. We're going to get a kitten next…”
“Galahad would be pleased to have a new friend.” Summerset sat the cat down again, waiting while Nixie loosened her grip on Eve's hand and moved closer. When the cat bumped his head against her leg, a ghost of a smile trembled on her lips. She sat on the floor, buried her face in his fur.
“Appreciate this,” Eve said to Roarke under her breath. “I know it's a major.”
“It's not.” There was blood on her as well. And the faint scent of death. “We'll talk of it later.”
“I need to go. I'm sorry to dump this on you.”
“I'll be working here most of the morning. Summerset and I will deal well enough.”