Page 4 of Thankless in Death

“She’ll not, no.” And he himself would always carry the image of the little girl in the morgue with her head resting on her father’s unbeating heart. “It’s not like you going back to Dallas.” Now he rose, stepped to her. “Revisiting, reliving all that pain and trauma. She had a family who loved her, and was taken from her.”

“So the connection’s important. Okay with me, but nothing’s going to induce me to go to that parade.”

“So noted.” He drew her in, kissed her. “We’ve a lot to be thankful for, you and I.”

“And a houseful of Irish relatives, plus a ravaging horde after turkey and pie are part of that?”

“They are indeed.”

“I’ll let you know on Friday if I agree with that. Now I’ve gotta go.”

“Take care of my cop.”

“Take care of my gazillionaire.”

She left the house resigned to the coming invasion.

•••

What was it with people? Eve wondered. Clogging up her streets, flooding her sidewalks, jamming on glides, swarming crosswalks. What made them pack into New York for holidays?

Didn’t they have homes of their own?

She fought through three nasty knots of traffic on the trip downtown to Cop Central while ad blimps blasted the news from overhead of:

BLACK FRIDAY MEGA-SALES!

GOBBLE UP BARGAINS WHILE THEY LAST!

DOOR-BUSTER HOLIDAY SALES AT THE SKY MALL

She wished to God they’d all go to the sky mall and get out of her city. Snarling with equally pissed drivers at yet another tangle, she watched a quick-fingered street thief make hay with a gaggle of oblivious tourists crowded around a smoking glide-cart.

Even if she hadn’t been packed in among Rapid Cabs and a farting maxibus, the odds of catching him were slim. As fast-footed as fingered, he zipped away, richer by three wallets and two pocket ’links by her count.

The early bird catches the loot, she supposed, and a few less people would be hitting the sky mall.

She spotted a thin fracture in traffic, gunned it, and ignoring the rude blat of horns, wound her way downtown.

By the time she walked into Central, she had her plan. She’d hit the paperwork first, clear off her desk—righteously. Then she could spend some time reviewing the active cases of her detectives. Maybe she’d toss the expense reports to Peabody, let her partner handle the numbers. There might be room to pull out a cold case, give it another hard look.

Nothing much more satisfying than catching a bad guy who thought he’d gotten away with it.

She stepped off the glide—a tall, leanly built woman in a leather coat—turned toward Homicide. Her short, choppy brown hair framed an angular face accented with a shallow dent in the chin. Her eyes scanned, as cop’s eyes always did, long, golden brown and observant as she strode down the busy sector to her department.

When she turned into her bullpen she spotted Sanchez first, his feet propped on his desk as he worked his ’link. And Trueheart, spiffy and innocently handsome in his uniform, industriously at his comp. The room smelled of bad cop coffee and cheap fake sugar, so all was right with the world.

Jenkinson strolled out of the break room with a giant mug of that bad cop coffee and a lumpy-looking doughnut. He wore a gray suit the color of tarnish with a tie of nuclear blue and green curlicues on a screaming pink background.

He said, “Yo, LT.”

“That’s some tie, Jenkinson.”

After setting the mug on his desk, he flipped it. “Just adding a little color to the world.”

“Did you steal that from one of the geeks in EDD?”

“His mama bought it for him,” Sanchez said.