«Yes, especially when you're poking it into my business.»
«See hers.» Peabody tapped a finger on one of the automated posters lining the elevator walls. Perfect faces, perfect bodies, modeled for passengers.
«I could get that one. It's chiseled. Yours is chiseled.»
«It's a nose. It sits on your face and allows you to get air through two handy holes.»
«Yeah, easy for you to say, Chiseled Nose.»
«You're right. In fact, I'm starting to agree with you. You need plumper lips.» Eve balled a hand into a fist. «Let me help you with that»
Peabody only grinned and watched the posters. «This place is like the palace of physical perfection. I may come back and go for one of their free morphing programs, just to see how I'd look with more lips, or a skinny nose. I think I'm going to talk to Trina about a hair change.»
«Why, why, why, does everybody have to change their hair? It covers your scalp, keeps it from getting wet or cold.»
«You're just scared that when I talk to Trina she's going to corner you and give you a treatment.»
«I am not.» She was, too.
It was a surprise to hear her name paged through the elevator's communication system. Frowning, Eve cocked her head.
«This is Dallas.»
«Please, Lieutenant, Dr. Icove asks that you come, right away, to the forty-fifth floor. It's an emergency.»
«Sure.» She glanced at Peabody, shrugged. «Reroute to forty-five,» she ordered, and felt the elevator slow, shift, ascend. «Something's up,» she commented. «Maybe one of his beauty-at-any-price clients croaked.»
«People hardly ever croak from face and body work.» Peabody ran a considering finger down her nose again. «Hardly ever.»
«We could all admire your skinny nose at your memorial. Damn shame about Peabody, we'd say, and dash the tears from our eyes. But that is one mag nose she's got in the middle of her dead face.»
«Cut it out.» Peabody hunched her shoulders, folded her arms over her chest. «Besides, you couldn't dash the tears away. You'd cry buckets. You'd be blinded by your copious tears and wouldn't even be able to see my nose.»
«Which makes dying for it really stupid.» Satisfied she'd won that round, Eve stepped off the elevator.
«Lieutenant Dallas. Detective Peabody.» A woman with a— hmmm—chiseled nose and skin the color of good rich caramel rushed forward. Her eyes were black as onyx, and currently pouring tears. «Dr. Icove. Dr. Icove. Something terrible.»
«Is he hurt?»
«He's dead. He's dead. You need to come, right away. Please, hurry.»
«Jesus, we saw him five minutes ago.» Peabody fell in beside Eve, moving quickly to keep up with the woman who all but sprinted through a hushed and lofty office area. The glass walls showed the storm still blowing outside, but here, it was warm, with subdued lighting, islands of lush green paints, sinuous sculptures, and romantic paintings—all nudes.
«You want to slow down?» Eve suggested. «Tell us what happened?»
«I can't. I don't know.»
How the woman managed to stand much less sprint on whip-thin heels Eve would never understand, but she bolted through a pair of double doors of frosted sea green and into another waiting area.
Icove, pale as death but apparently still breathing, stepped out of an open doorway.
«Glad to see the rumors of your death are exaggerated,» Eve began.
«Not me, not… My father. Someone's murdered my father.»
The woman who'd escorted them burst into fresh and very noisy tears. «Pia, I want you to sit down now.» Icove laid a hand on her shaking shoulder. «I need you to sit down and compose yourself. I can't get through this without you.»
«Yes. All right. Yes. Oh, Dr. Will.»
«Where is he?» Eve demanded.
«In here. At his desk, in here. You can…« Icove shook his head, gestured.
The office was spacious yet gave the feeling of intimacy. Warm colors here, cozy chairs. The view of the city came through tall, narrow windows in this room, and was filtered by pale gold screens. Wall niches held art or personal photographs.
Eve saw a chaise in buttery leather, a tray of tea or coffee that looked untouched on a low table.
The desk was genuine wood—good old wood by her estimate, in a masculine, streamlined style. The data and communication equipment on it was small and unobtrusive.
In the desk chair, high-backed and buttery leather like the chaise, Wilfred B. Icove sat.
His hair was a thick, snowy cloud crowning a strong, square face. He wore a dark blue suit, and a white shirt with thin red pencil stripes.
A silver handle protruded from the breast of the jacket, just under a triangle of red that accented the pocket.
The small amount of blood told Eve it had been a very accurate heart shot.
2
Peabody.
«I'll go get the field kits, and call it in.»
«Who found him?» Eve asked Icove.
«Pia. His assistant.» He looked, Eve thought, like a man who'd just taken an airjack in the gut. «She… she contacted me immediately, and I rushed up. I…«
«Did she touch the body? Did you?»
«I don't know. I mean to say, I don't know if she did. I… I did. I wanted to… I had to see if there was anything I could do.»
«Dr. Icove, I'm going to ask you to sit down over there. I'm very sorry about your father. Right now, I need information. I need to know who was the last person who was in this room with him. I want to know when he had his last appointment.»
«Yes, yes. Pia can look it up on his schedule.»
«I don't have to.» Pia had conquered the tears, but her voice was rusty from them. «It was Dolores Nocho-Alverez. She had an eleven-thirty. I… I brought her in myself.»
«How long was she here?»
«I'm not sure. I went to lunch at noon, as always. She needed the eleven-thirty, and Dr. Icove told me to go ahead to lunch, as usual, and he'd show her out himself.»
«She'd have to go out through security.»
«Yes.» Pia got to her feet. «I can find out when she left. I'll check the logs now. Oh, Dr. Will, I'm so sorry.»
«I know. I know.»
«Do you know this patient, Dr. Icove?»
«No.» He rubbed his fingers over his eyes. «I don't. My father didn't take many patients. He's semi-retired. He'd consult when a case interested him, and sometimes assist. He remains chairman of the board of this facility, and is active on several others. But he rarely did surgery, not for the last four years.»
«Who wanted to hurt him?»
«No one.» Icove turned to Eve. His eyes were swimming, and his voice uneven, but he held on. «Absolutely no one. My father was beloved. His patients, through over five decades, loved him, were grateful to him. The medical and scientific communities respected and honored him. He changed people's lives, Lieutenant. He not only saved them, he improved them.»
«Sometimes people have unreal expectations. A person comes to him, wants something impossible, doesn't get it, blames him.»
«No. We're very careful with whom we take into this facility. And, to be frank, there was little my father would consider unrealistic in expectations. And he proved, time and again, he could do what others considered impossible.»
«Personal problems. Your mother?»
«My mother died when I was a boy. During the Urban Wars. He never remarried. He has had relationships, of course. But he's been, by and large, married to his art, his science, his vision.»
«Are you an only child?»
He smiled a little. «Yes. My wife and I gave him two grandchildren. We're a very close family. I don't know how I'm going to tell Avril and the kids. Who would do this to him? Who would kill a man who's devoted his life to helping others?»
«That's what I'm going to find out.»
Pia came back in, a few strides ahead of Peabody. «We have her going through exit security at twelve-nineteen.»