“They may be a good choice for Nixie. I'll talk to them, tonight if I can manage it. They'll need to meet her, and she them.”
“You could give that a push. With the Dysons bowing out, GPS is going to start squawking about fostering pretty soon. Okay. Let's get down to it. What've you got for me?”
“Some names I've ferreted out that intersect in one way or another with both Kirkendall and Isenberry.” He moved over to his console as he spoke. “Some connect to CIA, some to Homeland Security.” He glanced over at her, and thought this would be one more punch to her psyche. “Are you going to be all right with that?”
“Are you?”
“I've made my peace there, best I can. They watched an innocent, desperate child suffer for what they deemed a bigger cause. I don't forget it, but I've made my peace with it.”
“I don't forget it,” she said quietly. Eve knew it was for love of her that he'd walked away from taking vengeance on the HSO operatives who'd witnessed her abuse those many years ago inDallas -they'd witnessed a man beating and brutalizing his own daughter, and done nothing to stop it. “I don't forget what you did for me.”
“Didn't do, more accurately. In any case, to nudge this any further, to access the data on these people through these organizations, I'll need this. Roarke,” he said, laying his hand on a palm plate. “Open operations.”
Roarke, IDverified, command acknowledged.
The console came to life, lights flashing on, equipment going to a low, holding hum. She came around the console to stand with him. And saw the framed photo he kept here. The baby, all vivid blue eyes and dark thick hair, held close to the young mother with her bruised face and bandaged hand.
That was private, too, she thought, and why he kept it here in this room. Something else he was making his peace over.
“Another thing I found interesting,” he told her. “Take a look.”
He ordered an image on a wall screen.
“Clinton, Isaac P., U.S. Army, retired. Sergeant. Looks like Kirkendall,” she commented. “Around the eyes, the mouth. Same coloring.”
“Yes, that caught me, too. Particularly when I noticed the birth date.” He brought up Kirkendall's image and data.
“The same date. Same health center. Son of a bitch. Different parents listed. But if the records were altered. If-”
“I think someone was naughty, and decided it would be worth a bit of hacking into those health center records.”
“Illegal adoption? Twins separated at birth. Could it be that strange?”
“Strange,” Roarke agreed, “but logical for all that.”
“They have to know. They end up in the same regiment, the same training. Guy's got your face-or close enough to make people notice-you're going to ask questions.”
“I take it you'd like that as first order of business.”
“Go.”
“This won't take long.”
He sat, began to work by voice command and manual while she paced.
Brothers, she thought. Teamwork. Twins, pulled apart, then brought back together. By fate? Luck? A higher power's vicious sense of humor?
Would the bond be stronger then, somehow? The anger deeper. And the murders even more personal. Denied their rightful family at birth. Denied one's rightful family by the courts.
Life's a bitch, so you kill.
“Was thisClinton ever married?”
“Shush,” was Roarke's response, so she looked for herself.
“Lotof mirrors here,” she noted. “He was married-the same year as Kirkendall. One kid for him, male. Both son and wife are listed as missing, the year before Kirkendall's punching bag and kids whiffed. They take off?” she wondered. “Or not get the chance?”
“Birth mothers on hospital records are the same as on later data,” Roarke said as he worked.
“Poke around, find others listed for that same day. Twin boys, deceased.”
“Already there, Lieutenant. Another moment. And here. Onscreen. Smith, Jane-original-delivered twin boys, stillbirths. I imagine the health center, and the doctor of record, gained a healthy fee on this.”
“Sold them. Yeah, betcha that's what she did. It happened. Happens,” she corrected, “even with the laws coming down on women getting themselves inseminated and incubating fetuses for big, fat fees, it happens.”
“Target couples-with the finances for it-can outline the physical characteristics they'd like, the ethnicity and so on, bypass mainstream routes with their screenings and regulations.” Roarke nodded. “Yes, healthy newborns are always a hot commodity on the black market.”
“And this Jane Smith hits the jackpot with twins. The Kirkendalls, the Clintons, walk away with bouncing boys-and their baby broker collects the fees, divvies up the rest of the shares. I'll pass this data to somebody in Child Protection Services. They'll want to dig into it, see if they can find the birth mother, the brokers. Long shot since we're talking fifty years, and I can't take time out for it unless it leads to Kirkendall. Selling kids. Pretty low.”
“It could be better to be wanted, even bought and paid for, than to be unwanted, discarded.”
“There are legitimate agencies to handle this stuff. Even ways to conceive-if that's what you want-if you have physical limitations. People like this want to cut corners, want to ignore the law and the system in place to protect the child.”
“I agree with you. And I'd say, in these cases, the ones who were wanted, bought and paid for, when learning of it, reacted badly.”
She paced. “I had a brother, and you stole him from me. I lived a lie that was beyond my control. I will take charge. So, we've got a couple of pissed-off guys who've been trained with our tax dollars to kill. Brothers, brotherly loyalty along with semperfi.”
“I think that's the marine corps, not the army.”
“Whatever. They meet up at some point, figure it out. Or one of them figures it out and seeks out the other. You're going to end up with two halves of one coin kind of deal, and the worse for it. They've changed their faces. Not only to avoid detection, but to look more alike, to what, honor their bond? Not just fraternal twins, identical. Or as close as can be to identical. Two bodies, one mind. That's how it looks to me.”
“Both their files, as well as a few others I found, indicate assignments from both CIA and Homeland, as well as Special Ops.”
I see you now, Eve thought. I know you now. I'll find you now. “How long will it take you to get in, pull it out?”
“A bit. You're restless, Lieutenant.”
“I need…” She rolled her shoulders. “Something physical. A good workout. Haven't managed one in a few days. More, I just want to pound on something awhile. Something that hits back.”
“I can help you with that.”
She lifted her fisted hands. “Want to go a round, ace?”
“Actually, no, but give me a minute to set this up.” He gave the machines orders, in the e-speak Eve could never fully translate. “It can start without me, then I'll come back to finish it off. Come with me.”
“It'd go quicker with you working it.”
“An hour or so won't make much difference.” He drew her into the elevator. “Holoroom.”
“Holo-room? What for?”
“A little program I've been playing with. I think you'll like it. Especially considering our recent discussion of Master Lu and our mutual admiration for his skill.”
He stepped with her into the blank square of the holo-room. “Initiate martial arts program 5A,” he said with a smile whispering around his lips. “Eve Dallas as opponent.”
“I thought you said you didn't want to-”
The room shimmered, swam, and became a dojo, with a wall of weapons and glossy wood Boor. She looked down at herself, studied the traditional black gi.
“Icy” was all she could think of saying.
“How much of a workout do you want?”
She rolled to the balls of her feet, back on the heels. “Hard and sweaty.”