"I'd guess, too." Together, they watched Leanore stride down the foyer on the thirty-eighth floor and buzz herself into Fitzhugh's apartment. Eve increased the time delay until Foxx strode out fifteen minutes later. "Doesn't look happy, does he?"
"No." Peabody narrowed her eyes. "I'd say he looks ticked off." She lifted her brows when Foxx kicked bad temperedly at the elevator door. "Very ticked off."
They waited for the drama to resume. Leanore left twenty-two minutes later, color high on her cheeks, eyes glittering. She jabbed a finger at the elevator, hitched her briefcase on her shoulder. A short time after, Foxx returned carrying a small parcel.
"She didn't stay twenty or thirty minutes, but more than forty-five. What went on inside that apartment that night?" Eve wondered. "And just what did Foxx bring back with him? Contact the law offices. I want Leanore in here for questioning. I've got Foxx at nine-thirty. Get her in here at the same time. We'll team play them."
"You want me to interrogate?"
Eve disengaged her machine, rolled her shoulders. "It's a good place to start. We'll meet here at eight-thirty. No, come by my home office at eight. That'll give us more time." She glanced at her 'link as it beeped, considered ignoring it, then gave in.
" Dallas."
"Hey!" Mavis's bright face filled the screen. "I was hoping I'd catch you before you left. How's it going?"
"Well enough. I'm just about to log out. What's up?"
"Good timing. Great timing. Mag. Listen, I'm at Jess's studio. We're going to do a session. Leonardo's here. We're going to make it a party, so come on by."
"Hey, listen, Mavis, I've put in a full day. I just want to – "
"Come on." There were nerves as well as enthusiasm. "We're going to get food in, and Jess's got the most rocking brew here. It'll debrain you in seconds. He thinks if we can lay something decent down tonight, we could run with it. I'd really like you around. You know, moral support shit. Can't you just stop by for a while?"
"I guess I could." Damn it. No backbone. "I'll let Roarke know I'll be late. But I can't stay."
"Hey, I gave Roarke a buzz already."
"You – what?"
"I 'linked him just a bit ago. Hey, you know, Dallas, I've never been by that meg-cool office of his. He had like the UN or something in there, all these off country guys. Wild. Anyway, they put me through to the inner sanctum because I was a pal of yours, and I talked to him. So," Mavis chirped on over Eve's heaved sigh, "I told him what was up and coming, and he said he'd stop around after the meeting or summit or whatever he was into."
"Looks like it's all settled." Eve watched her fantasy involving a whirlpool, a glass of wine, and a fat slab of steak go up in smoke.
"Too tops. Hey, is that Peabody? Hey, Peabody, you come, too. We'll party. See you soon, right?"
"Mavis." Eve caught her seconds before she disengaged. "Where the hell are you?"
"Oh, didn't I say? The studio's at Eight Avenue B, street level. Just beat on the door. Somebody'll let you in. Gotta go," she shouted as something that might have been music boomed. "They're tuning up. Catch ya."
Eve blew out a breath, scooped her hair out of her eyes, and glanced over her shoulder. "Well, Peabody, want to go to a recording session, get your ears fried, eat bad food, and get drunk on bad brew?"
Peabody didn't have to think twice. "As a matter of fact, Lieutenant, I'd love to."
It took a lot of banging on a gray steel door that looked as though it had been on the wrong end of a battering ram somewhere along the line. The rain from that morning had turned into steam that smelled unpleasantly of street oil and the recycling units that never seemed to be in full repair in that part of town.
With more resignation than energy, Eve watched two chemi-heads make deals under the dirty light of a street-lamp. Neither of them so much as blinked at Peabody 's uniform. Eve turned when one of the powder junkies took a hit less than five feet away.
"Damn it, that's just too arrogant. Bust him."
Resigned, Peabody headed over. The chemi-head focused, swore and, swallowing the paper his powder had been cupped in, swung around to run. He skidded on the wet pavement and banged face first into the lamppost. By the time Peabody reached him, he was flat on his back and bleeding profusely from the nose.
"He's out cold," she called to Eve.
"Idiot. Call it in. Get a cruiser over here to haul him into the tank. You want the collar?"
Peabody considered, then shook her head. "Not worth it. The beat cop can take it." She pulled out her communicator, gave the location as she walked back to Eve. "The dealer's still across the street," she commented. "He's got air blades, but I could try to chase him down."
"I sense a lack of enthusiasm." Eve narrowed her eyes, scanned the dealer hulking across the street, air blades steaming. "Hey, asshole," she called out. "You see this uniform here?" She jerked a thumb at Peabody. "Take your business someplace else, or I'll tell her to bump her weapon up to level three and watch you piss your pants."
"Cunt," he shouted back and whizzed off on his blades.
"You've got a real way with community relations, Dallas."
"Yeah, it's a gift." Eve turned back, prepared to beat on the door again, and found herself facing a female of massive proportions. She was easily six five, with shoulders wide as a highway. They rose out of a sleeveless leather vest and rippled with muscles and tattoos. Beneath, she wore a unisuit, snug as skin and the color of a healing bruise. She sported a copper nose ring and close-cropped hair fashioned into tight, glossy black curls.
"Fucking drug pushers," she said in a voice like a cannon boom. "Stink up the neighborhood. You Mavis's cop?"
"That's right, and I brought my cop with me."
The woman sized Peabody up out of milky blue eyes. "Solid. Mavis says you're right. I'm Big Mary."
Eve angled her head. "Yes, you are."
It took about ten seconds, then Big Mary's moon-sized face creased in a knife-edged grin. "Come on in. Jess is just heating up." By way of welcome, she took Eve's arm and lifted her up and into the short hallway. "Come on, Dallas 's cop."
" Peabody." With a cautious glance, Peabody kept warily out of Big Mary's reach.
"Pea body. Yeah, you ain't much bigger than a pea." Roaring at her own joke, Big Mary carted Eve into a padded elevator, waited for the door to close. They were cocooned together, tight as fish in a pan as Mary directed the unit to take them up one level. "Jess, he says to take you up to control. You got money?"
It was hard to maintain dignity of any kind when Eve's nose was pressed in Mary's armpit. "What for?"
"We got food coming. You gotta plunk in your share for the eats."
"All right. Is Roarke here yet?"
"Ain't seen no Roarke. Mavis says you can't miss him 'cause he is fine and prime."
The padded door opened, and Eve let out the breath she'd been holding. Even as she sucked in air, her ears were assaulted. Mavis's high, wild voice was screeching to the accompaniment of blistering noise.
"She's got a groove going."
Only deep affection for Mavis prevented Eve from leaping back into the soundproofing. "Apparently."
"I'll get your drinks. Jess, he brought the brew."
Mary hulked off, leaving Eve and Peabody in a glass-walled control booth that curved in a semicircle a half level above a studio where Mavis was singing her heart and lungs out. With a grin, Eve moved closer to the glass, the better to see.
Mavis had scooped up her hair so that it spewed in a purple fountain out of a multicolored band. She was wearing modified overalls, the black leather straps running up the center of her bare breasts. The rest of the material was a shimmering kaleidoscope that started at the midriff and ended barely south of the crotch. She danced to the beat on a fashionable pair of slides that left the feet bare and propped them onto four-inch stilts.
Eve had no doubt that Mavis's lover had designed the costume for her. She spotted Leonardo in a corner of the studio, glowing like a sunbeam at Mavis and wearing a body-skimming jumpsuit that made him look like an elegant grizzly.