She locked and sealed the apartment. “I’m going to review the security feed in the car, save time. Junta won’t let me near the drops or the search for the nerve agent. Which is a pisser and understandable, as I’d do the same damn thing in her place.”
In the elevator she rocked back on her heels, wanting to move, to move. Once she had the security disc, she plugged it into her PPC even as they walked out to the car.
She scanned through while Roarke drove.
“Doorman had the time right. There he is. Walks right by the desk guy, who greets him. Obviously he comes by often enough nobody questions him.”
She switched to the elevator cam when he got on. “Okay, there he is. Checks his wrist unit. Checking the time. Taking out a ’link—drop ’link. Yeah, yeah, answering a tag from Cosner, you bet your ass. We can get a lip reader on this if we need. Quick convo, puts the ’link away—one he’ll ditch later. Smirks. Oh yeah, that’s a smug fucking smirk.”
She switched to the corridor cam, which showed him strolling straight to Cosner’s apartment, using his own swipe and palm print to gain entrance.
“Doesn’t he realize you’d check the security?”
“Cosner wasn’t killed there—that’s how he sees it. Why would we bother? And again, by the time we found the body, the feed’s overwritten. And here he is, heading back out. He spent thirty-two minutes inside. Whatever he removed—say, spare drop ’links, any other electronics—are inside the briefcase and messenger bag. I need to know where he was tonight, what his cover is.”
“He’d need time to slip away, get to the warehouse, deal with Cosner, get back.” Roarke drove through the gates of home. “So it’s most likely something more public than private. He’d need a crowd, wouldn’t he?”
“Another club, maybe, or a concert, a sporting event, a banquet—business but not a client dinner. This took too long to fake taking a tag.”
“Let me see what I can find out.” Roarke smiled as he opened the door. “I still have my ways.”
“Good. You can use your ways while I check in with Junta, with Reo. I figure to give Feeney a few hours of downtime, then we’re going to hit Whitt with the search. Bright and early.”
“He thinks he’s home free, and is feeling very good about himself right now. Likely sleeping like a baby.”
“Babies are always crying.”
Roarke stopped on the way up the stairs with her. “That’s quite true, isn’t it? I’ll give you that one. He’s sleeping like a sociopath. And he’s bound to have the formula for the nerve agent.”
She turned to him as they walked into her office. “What would you do if you were a sociopathic bad guy and had the formula for a chemical weapon that can kill in a kind of pinpoint way, in minutes, before it dissipates?”
“Sell it. If I wasn’t a complete berk as well as a sociopathic bad guy, I’d wait several months first. A year, maybe two.”
“He won’t wait a year or two, but he’ll wait awhile. I’m betting he’s already doing some due diligence on where to sell for the best return.”
She went straight for coffee.
“You won’t give him the opportunity. Let me see what I can find out.”
He stopped by her board. “Will you update this tonight?”
“It’s routine for a reason.”
“He had everything going for him,” Roarke said as he studied Marshall Cosner’s ID. “Wealth, privilege, education, opportunities. All wasted.”
“Now he’s in the morgue.” She sat at her command center, got to work.
She touched base with Junta, with Reo, wrote up her report, then yes, updated her board. As she finished, Roarke came back.
“The Whitt Group had a major client seminar, dinner, with entertainment following tonight at the New York Grand Hotel. Whitt was a featured speaker.”
“Where is it? What time did he speak?”
“He was the dinner speaker, scheduled for eight. As for where, let’s do this.”
He leaned over her, did a few keystrokes to bring a map of New York onto the wall screen. “Here’s the Grand.” He highlighted it. “And the warehouse.”
“Too far to walk, not enough time for that. Or to run even if you were a speedy naked marathoner.”
“A what?”
“Later,” she said. “He had to have transpo.”
“Agreed. Even with that it would take several minutes.”
“Wouldn’t get a cab.” She got up to pace. “Wouldn’t risk that, certainly wouldn’t risk the subway. He’d have his own—not a driver because that adds another person in. Does the Grand have parking?”
“It does, but valet only.”
“That won’t work. So he needs to park somewhere close, where he can get out then back in easy, fast. What’ve we got within a block?”
More keystrokes. “You’d have the Hubble Hotel, which has an accessible parking garage, a block away. The next closest parking would be three blocks more.”
“We need the security cams for both hotels.”
He turned to her. Fired up, yes, he thought, but running on fumes nonetheless.
“And I imagine there are cops capable of doing that who are actually on duty at near to two in the morning. You need to get some sleep.”
“I don’t…” She realized she was revved by the movement in the case, and that it wouldn’t last. She needed to be sharp to go up against Whitt in the morning. “You’re right. He’s not going anywhere, the rest of the targets are secure, and Junta’s team will find the package. I’ll get someone to handle the hotels.”
Roarke brushed a hand over her hair. “Well now, that was easy.”
“Because it’s either some rack time or I have to take a booster before I take Whitt down. I hate those things.”
She made the arrangements, then tried to turn her brain off as they walked to the bedroom.
“I wonder who he’d targeted next?” she said as she undressed.
“Whoever it was, they’re safe.”
“You had a big part in seeing they are.”
“We can both rest easy for a few hours knowing we did our part.”
She slid into bed where the cat already stretched out, tried again to let the long day go as Roarke drew her back against him. She took Roarke’s hand.
“They had everything we didn’t. Now one’s in the morgue, and the other will spend the rest of his life in a cage.”
He kissed the back of her head. “And here we are. Sleep now.” Knowing it lulled her, Roarke rubbed her back. “Morning comes soon enough.”
* * *
Morning came at five-twelve when her communicator signaled. “Block video,” she mumbled as she groped for it.
Already up, Roarke ordered the lights on at ten percent.
“Dallas.”
“Junta. We’ve got the package. It’s secured.”
She shoved a hand through her hair as she rolled out of bed. “Where?”
“They went Allied again, made the drop at nineteen-forty. Kiosk’s just a couple blocks from the warehouse. We tracked it to the shipping port, confiscated it. They got cute with the bogus sender. Duck, Duck, Goose. It was addressed to Lilliana Rosalind.”