“No. I can't help you. I've very busy so-”
“Mrs. Turnbill, it's very important that I locate Mr. Kirkendall. If you could tell me if you've had any contact-”
“I haven't, and I don't want any contact with him.” Her voice was strained, like a wire snapped tight. “How do I know you're who you say you are?”
Eve held her badge to the screen. “Can you read my ID and my badge number?”
“Of course I can, but-”
“You can verify by contacting Cop Central inManhattan. I can give you a contact number that won't cost-”
“I'll get the number. You'll have to hold.”
“Careful,”Peabody noted when the screen went to holding blue. “And a little pissy.”
“Not just careful, not just pissy. A little scared on top of it.” As she waited, Eve considered. She began to calculate how long a round trip toNebraska, including interview time, might take.
Roxanne came back on screen. “All right, Lieutenant, I've verified your information.” Her face was pale now. “You're with Homicide.”
“That's correct.”
“He's killed someone. Dian-” She broke off, bit down on her lip as if to block words. “Who has he killed?”
“He's wanted for questioning in the murders of at least seven people, including two police officers.”
“InNew York,” she said carefully. “He killed people inNew York City?”
“He's wanted for questioning for murders that occurred in New York.”
“I see. I'm sorry. I'm very sorry. I don't know where he is, I don't know what he's doing. Frankly, I don't want to know. If I did, if I knew anything, I'd tell you. I can't help you, and this isn't something I want to discuss. I have to get back to my children.”
The screen went black.
“She's still scared of him,”Peabody commented.
“Yeah. And her sister's still alive. That's what she thought, just for an instant there. Oh God, he finally got to Dian. She may know more than she realizes. She needs a face-to-face.”
“We're going toNebraska?”
“No, but you are.”
“Me? Just me? Out there in the wilderness?”
“Take McNab. Backup and ballast.” And, Eve thought, as someone who'd keepPeabody from overdoing. “I want you there and back tonight. You'll do better with the mother type, the family type, than I would first shot. She'll trust you faster.”
Eve used the house 'link, interrupted Roarke in the computer lab.
“I need fast, secure transpo.”
“Where are we going?”
“Not we-Peabody. Nebraska. I'm sending McNab with her, so something that'll hold two. But quick and small. They shouldn't need to be there more than a couple of hours. I've got the exact location.”
“All right, I'll arrange it. Give me a minute.”
“Wow, just like that.”Peabody gave a little sigh. “What's it like being with a guy who can snap his fingers and get you pretty much whatever you need?”
“Convenient. Use the sister on her if you have to. Show her the dead kids.”
“Jesus, Dallas.”
“She's got kids. It'll help crack her if she's hiding anything. We can't play nice. Have McNab take the edge if you need one. Can he handle bad cop?”
“He does it really well during personal role-playing games when I'm the reluctant witness.”
“Oh crap.” Eve pressed her fingers to her eyes and prayed the image wouldn't form. “Just work her, Peabody. She must know where to find the sister. Kirkendall's ex would be a valuable tool in this investigation.”
Roarke walked in, handedPeabody a memo cube. “There's your transpo. The pilot will be waiting for you.”
“Thanks.” She gathered her file bag. “I'll contact McNab, have him meet me there.”
“I want to know when you arrive, when you leave, and when you get back,” Eve told her.
“Yes, sir.”
“Safe trip,” Roarke said, then turned to Eve whenPeabody headed out. “I've got some bits and pieces, but I'm going to need the unregistered to pull them together.”
“Show me what you've got.”
“Let's take it in there.” He ran a hand down her arm as they walked. “You're tired, Lieutenant.”
“Some.”
“It's been a stressful, emotional day.”
She jerked a shoulder when he unlocked his private office with palm and voice ID.
“And Nixie?”
“Mira came by on her way out. She said the kid was doing a little better. That the trip to the morgue… Jesus.” She covered her face with her hands. “God, I didn't think I was going to be able to hold it together in there.”
“I know.”
She shook her head, struggling even now to maintain. “The way she looked at her father, touched him. What was in her eyes when she did. Sorrow, something beyond sorrow. And you knew, seeing that, how much she loved him. That she was never afraid of him, never had to worry if he'd hurt her. We don't know what that's like. We can't. I can find the man who did this, but I can't understand what she feels. And if I can't understand, how can I make it right?”
“Not true.” He brushed her face with his fingers, took away tears. “Who are you weeping for, if not for her?”
“I don't know. I don't know. She doesn't know what I do, but she's living through it. I can't know what she knows. That kind of bond? It's different than what we've got. It's got to be. Child to parent, parent to child. That was taken from her.”
She reached up with her own hands, wiped the tears away. “I stood over my father, with his blood all over me. I can't really remember what I felt. Relief, pleasure, terror-all of it, none of it. He comes back, in my head, in my dreams, and he tells me it's not over. He's right. It's not over. It's never going to be. She makes me see it.”
“I know.” He rubbed an errant tear away with his thumb. “Yes, I know. It's wearing on you, I can see that, too. There doesn't seem to be anything either of us can do about it. You won't pass the case to someone else.” He lifted her chin with his hand before she could answer. “You won't, and I wouldn't want you to. You'd never forgive yourself for stepping aside because of personal distress. And you'd never trust yourself again, not fully, not the way you need to.”
“I saw myself when I found her. Saw myself, instead of her, huddled in a ball, coated in blood. Not just thought of it, but saw it. Just a flash, just for an instant.”
“Yet you brought her here. You face it. Darling Eve.” His voice was like balm on the burn. “The child isn't the only one who shows grace in her steps.”
“Grace isn't the issue. Roarke.” She could tell him, say this to him. “On days like this, part of me wants to go back there, to that room inDallas. Just so I can stand over him again, with his blood all over me and the knife in my hand.”
She closed her fist as if she held the hilt. “Just to kill him again, but this time to know what I feel when I do, to feel it because maybe then it'll be done. Even if it doesn't, to feel that moment when I carved him up. I don't know what that makes me.”
“On days like this, all of me wants to be the one to go back to that room inDallas. To have his blood on me, and the knife in my hands. I know exactly what I would feel. And what it makes us, Eve, is who we are.”
She let out a long breath. “I don't know why that helps when it should probably scare me. She won't feel this way, because she had that base. Because she could lay her head on her mother's dead heart and cry. She'll have sorrow, and nights when she's afraid, but she'll remember why she was able to touch her father's face, her brother's hair, and cry on her mother's breast.”
“She'll remember a cop who stood with her, and held her hand when she did.”
“They're going to throw her into the system, Roarke. Sometimes it's salvation, sometimes it's good, but not for her. I don't want her to be another case file. To cycle through that like I did. I have an idea what could be done, but I wanted to run it by you.”
His face went absolutely still, absolutely blank. “What?”