Page 12 of Bonded in Death

“Coffee, please?”

“Coffee, right. Two. Let’s get the vic’s ’link and the tablet I found in his shoulder bag to EDD after we check at the shuttle station. The killer wasn’t worried about that, either, but you never know. You never know,” she repeated, and used the in-dash to contact Roarke.

He sat at his desk in his home office, and lifted his eyebrows.

“Case closed already?”

“Nowhere near. Do you know a Giovanni Rossi, out of Rome?”

“The name doesn’t strike.”

“Seventy-nine, retired, cybersecurity. Gray and brown, big mustache. Wife—more than four decades—Anna Maria née Adolphi.”

“Your victim, I assume, and no. But let me check on retired employees in Rome. Why do you think I know your victim?”

“Just covering a base. He had a facsimile of my cop card in his fist. With a message printed on the back.”

Roarke’s eyes went hard. “A threat to you?”

“No. It called Rossi the Wasp. Does that mean anything?”

“It doesn’t, no.”

“Okay. Long shot anyway.”

“I’ll run that check before I leave for the office. If I find anything, I’ll tag you.”

“Thanks. Later.”

“You mind my cop.”

“I already am.”

“A good hunch,” Peabody said. “He could’ve done some work for Roarke, and that connects you. Otherwise, it stays weird.”

“The other angle’s the cybersecurity. Maybe he played a part in sending someone over, and this is a revenge killing. A team,” Eve speculated, “of twelve. Which seems like a lot to work a single cyber case, but we’ll consider a big one. Maybe busted a syndicate.”

“What was it? Fawn, Hawk, Rabbit,” Peabody remembered. “Already dead? That leaves the eight. And the message said there’d only be one. Why leave one if you’re on a vendetta?”

“The killer, or the one who hired the hit, is the one who’ll be left.”

“Someone the victim worked with then. Maybe on the take, and the others helped bust him?”

“It’s a theory.” A reasonably solid one, Eve thought. “Picked him up on the West Side, but drove across town to dump the limo and body. Maybe needed that much time for the poison to do the job. We’ll get a look at the security feed, and whoever picked Rossi up.”

At the international shuttle station, she left the car, On Duty light flipped on, at the curb. Inside, a group of travelers had the glazed look of red-eyepassengers. Others standing in the waiting areas let out squeals, calls of greeting.

People hugged, kissed, and some got teary.

Others in suits or uniforms held up passenger names.

“Could’ve got the vic that way. Hold up his name. ‘Hello, Mr. Rossi, I’m Chuck with Deadly Limo Service. How was your flight?’”

Peabody let out a half laugh. “Or ‘I’m Suzanne with Murders R Us.’”

“Yeah, could be a woman. Women go more for poison.”

Eve made her way to Security, held up her badge.

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