Page 63 of Thankless in Death

She’d have the sweepers go over it, but didn’t expect much.

“Just a place to stay for a few hours while he ran errands, made plans, showered, changed into his new suit. We’ll see him going out with the suitcases again—who notices that in a hotel lobby, but he’s worked out where he’ll try to sell what he didn’t liquidate on Sunday. Takes it out, or pieces of it. Does some selling, does some buying. The suit, maybe, more clothes, the duffel, the bat. Need the duffel for the bat.”

She wandered as she thought it through. “In and out, using this as a temporary home base. Jewelry stores, secondhand stores, pawnshops, selling, trading. Even the suitcases at one point, and probably at least some of his old clothes. Shedding it all now, for profit.

“Then, all done, he just walks out of here, catches a cab, and goes down to kill Lori Nuccio.”

She paced circles in the top-flight business-style suite. “Shopping bags. He’s bound to have come back with shopping bags, so we’ll see where he went at least.”

She rubbed fatigue from her eyes. “Look, I’m going to go ahead and review the discs back at Central, catch a couple hours in the crib.”

“I have a better idea. I had them hold us a room at The Manor, it’s close enough. You can review the discs there and we can both catch a couple of hours in a room that doesn’t include Peabody, McNab, and potentially other cops.”

It was the room without other cops that decided her. “Sold.”

THE ROOM AT THE MANOR SOOTHED WITH warm, deep colors, soft fabrics and thick, age-faded rugs over the gleam of hardwood.

Over a small stone fireplace a wide-framed mirror reflected the style and dignity of the parlor. And at the touch of a button inside a wall niche, the mirror wavered away into the dark surface of a screen.

“Well, that’s... pretty frosty,” Eve decided.

“Manor guests prefer the look of Old World, with the convenience of the new. We’ve blended them wherever we can.”

She needed the screen to view the security discs, but there were other priorities. “Does that include an AutoChef with decent coffee?”

“It does, but we’ve both caffeinated enough at this point. I’ll make a deal,” he said before she could argue. “If you find something you can move on tonight, I’ll load us both up.”

It was probably fair. She didn’t like it, but it was probably fair.

While she sulked over that, he went through a doorway, came back a few moments later with two tall glasses of water with a slice of lemon in each.

“Really?”

“Yes.” He kissed her nose. “Really.”

She was thirsty enough to settle for it, and tired enough to sit on the arm of the big, plushy sofa while he set up the disc.

“He didn’t want to settle for a business hotel,” Eve calculated. “Good enough while he ran around the city, but not where he wanted to bunk. And he was smart enough to use Golde’s old ID. He’d need his own to cash the checks, but smart enough, or nervous enough to use a ploy to register at the hotel. Maybe he’ll try using it again for his bedtime place.”

“Wiser to spend some of that running-around-the-city time getting a new ID, a fake one.”

“You need to know how. And yeah, he could’ve found out how. Run it,” she told him.

Roarke sat on the opposite arm of the sofa, watching with her.

Less than twenty minutes after check-in, they spotted him again. Roarke slowed the feed.

“Same outfit as check-in. Just the briefcase. Bank time, get the cash before the bodies are discovered. He pulled that off,” she muttered.

She watched him come back through the lobby, a fat, smug smile on his face—time stamp 9:38.

“He hit the luck again,” she said. “Just frigging breezed through the banking, and now the briefcase is full of money and cashier’s checks.”

He all but strutted into the elevator, and was back again, strolling out—one suitcase—eleven minutes later.

“Just one suitcase. Gotta get rid of everything he can, maybe not the big tickets. He didn’t have a suitcase when he went into Ursa’s, but the smaller ones. Cash those checks before the bodies are discovered and his face and name hit the media. He’s still ahead of the game, by just enough. Speed it up again.”

He came back without the suitcase, but wearing a suit, and carrying a garment bag.