The in Death Collection Books 11-15 - J. D. Robb [708]
A smile ghosted around Franco’s mouth. Her eyes were alive with it—and, Eve noted, with arrogance. “Do you really believe you can make any of this play?”
“I’ve got Dukes.” Eve shrugged a shoulder. “I’ve got Purity in pieces. You slipping by me isn’t so hard to take with more than forty other arrests and a closed case on my record.”
“So, this little scenario you’re writing here is between us.”
“Just you and me. Girl talk. Post-game chatter.”
“Then by all means.” Franco gestured a go-ahead. “Continue.”
“It fell apart on you, Franco, but you still had a button to push. Leak the story. Shove the mayor into the muck. Defend him, but carefully. If he’s convicted, you mourn the loss of a man who was corrupted by his own power, his own skewed sense of duty. If he’s acquitted, you praise the system for exonerating an innocent man. But either way, you step into his shoes and run the city. Maybe, maybe some of it was about your twisted sense of justice. But under it all, it was just politics.”
“You’re wrong.” Franco wandered over, picked up the second cup of coffee Eve had programmed. “Since it’s just the two of us here, since I respect you, I won’t say you’re wrong about all of it. Purity was a solution. An extermination of a plague. It could be again.”
She angled her head. “We could have used someone like you. Pushing to have you as a media symbol wasn’t an accident. You have impact, Dallas. With your passion, your skills, your presence, you’d keep the story hot as long as I needed. I think I knew when we met in Tibble’s office you’d find a way to break it apart. I had to accept that, deal with that. I always pick my battles.”
“Why this one?”
“Every politician needs a platform. This is mine. Dukes wanted to infect you,” she added. “But that wasn’t the agenda. That wasn’t the program. How many innocent children did we save, Dallas?”
“Is that your spin?”
“If I needed one it would be. And it’s the truth. Peachtree has good intentions, but he’s soft, and he’s cautious, politically. And sooner or later he was going to be exposed for his sexuality. Why should I go down with him?”
“So you nominated and pushed on Greene as a twofer. You eliminate another predator, and you see that Peachtree’s sexual conduct is exposed, and that he’s under suspicion at the same time for multiple murder. It bothered me that no attempt was made to get to the blackmail vids. Didn’t make sense, unless you turned it around that the idea was for them to be recovered and used.”
“The people on those vids deserve to be exposed. For their weaknesses. For their foolishness, and for their dealings with a man like Greene.”
“And you’re the judge of all of that, of all of them.”
“I am. Or part of a group of people who believe it’s time for judgment. You and I, Dallas, we’re neither soft nor cautious. We act. We make things happen. I’ll be Mayor of New York,” she said simply. “And in a few years, governor. From there, East Washington. I will be the third female President of the United States before I’m fifty. I could take you up with me. Wouldn’t you like to be New York’s top cop, Dallas? Chief of Police Eve Dallas. I can make that happen in five, maybe six years.”
“No, thanks. Too much politics for me. How do you plan to do all this, Franco, from a cage?”
“How are you going to put me in a cage?” she countered. “I’ve been very careful. As far as that transmission from Peachtree’s office, my legal team will get around it. It may have been set and saved for sending. The assistant may have been mistaken about seeing me go into his office at that particular time. It’s a very busy place.”
“But it wasn’t set and saved, and the assistant wasn’t mistaken.”
“No, but you’ll never prove it. Nothing I’ve said in this room will do you any good. It’ll be your word against mine. And at the moment, Dallas, with the very efficient Chang convinced you leaked this story to Furst, with public opinion still deadlocked over Purity,