Page 13 of Concealed in Death

“Bad luck building.”

Peabody looked at the board, the crime scene photos. “It sure as hell seems like it.”

“Well. Let’s go talk to Pittsburgh and Tennessee.”

“Philadephia and Nashville.”

“Close enough.”

•••

Higher Power Cleansing Center for Youths made its base in a tidy, four-story building just below the hip edge of the East Village. The short stretch on Delancey had rejected the Village’s artistic edge, and just missed the Bowery’s late twentieth-century facelift—and the bombings, pillaging, and vandalism that had infected its neighbors during the Urbans.

Most of the buildings here were old, some rehabbed, some gentrified, others defiantly clinging to their shabby urban shells.

The whitewashed brick building boasted a tiny courtyard where a scatter of short shrubs shivered in the cold. A couple of teenagers, impervious to that cold, sat on a stone bench playing with their PPCs.

Eve passed them on the way to the front entrance. Both wore HPCCY hooded sweatshirts, sported various face and ear piercings, and identical expressions of suspicious disapproval.

Street vets already, smelling cop, she concluded.

At her steady gaze, their expressions shifted to cocky smirks, but she noted the girl—or she assumed girl—slid her hand into her companion’s.

She heard the hoarse whispers, the quick giggle (definitely female) behind her as she and Peabody climbed the trio of steps to the front door.

Security there included cam, palm plate, and swipe unit. She pressed the buzzer, over which a sign helpfully advised: PLEASE PRESS THE BUZZER.

“A clean and healthy day to you. How can we help?”

“Lieutenant Dallas, Detective Peabody, NYPSD. We’re here to speak with Philadelphia and Nashville Jones.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t see your names on Ms. Jones’s or Mr. Jones’s appointment books today.”

Eve pulled out her badge. “This is my appointment.”

“Of course. Would you please put your palm to the plate for verification of ID?”

Eve complied, waited for the scan.

“Thank you, Lieutenant Dallas. I’m happy to buzz you in.”

There was indeed a long buzz, followed by the clack of locks opening. Eve pushed the door open, entered a narrow lobby with an offshoot of rooms and hallways presumably to other rooms on either side, and a set of stairs jogging up.

A woman rose from a desk at the rear of the room, smiling as she crossed a buff-colored tile floor.

Matronly was the only description given her old-fashioned bubble of shoe-black hair, the dowdy pink sweater over a floral dress, the sensible shoes.

“Welcome to Higher Power Cleansing Center for Youths. I’m Matron Shivitz.”

Fits, Eve thought. “We need to speak with Jones and Jones.”

“Yes, yes, so you said. I’d love to be able to tell them what you’re here to speak to them about.”

“I bet,” Eve said and let the silence hang a moment. To the left the door held a plaque for Nashville Jones. The one to the right named his sister.

“It’s police business.”

“Of course! I’m afraid Mr. Jones is in session at this time, as is Ms. Jones. Ms. Jones should be free shortly. If you choose to wait, I’d love to bring you some tea.”