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He heard the regret in her voice, and brushed a hand over her arm. “Why?”

“In case I misjudged him. In case . . .” She blew out a breath and tried to let the guilt blow out with it. “In case I was wrong. I liked him, right off, the same way I didn’t like Renquist.”

“So you worried part of it was personal for you.”

“Some. And Breen could’ve been involved, that was an angle I had to factor in. He could’ve provided the killer with data, pooled all of it to put into his next book. How he acted and reacted, answered, didn’t answer, in interview mattered.”

“He’ll get through it, Eve, or he won’t. It’s his wife who betrayed him, not you.”

“Yeah, all I did was shatter his nice fantasy shield. Anyway, anyway. Renquist’s got a good line on Breen. I bet he knows about the wife’s sidepiece. I’ll double that bet and say we’ll find unregistered equipment in his office, equipment he’s used to research and track the other suspects. He lined them right up for me, the son of a bitch.”

“I value my money too much to take that wager. Why not Carmichael Smith?”

“Because he’s pitiful. He needs a woman to adore him, and tend to him. He doesn’t kill them or who’d rub his feet and stroke his head?”

“I appreciate a good foot rub myself.”

“Yeah.” She snorted. “Take a number.”

He reached out to twist a lock of her shaggy hair around his finger, just to touch. And asked the next question just to keep her talking. “Fortney, then.”

“Peabody’s favorite. Mostly she leaned toward him because he offended her sensibilities. She’s soft yet, you know.”

“Yes. I know.”

“She’ll keep some of that, the soft.” Eve tried not to think about the exam in the morning, and how much of Peabody’s ego and esteem was wrapped up in it. “That’s good,” she added. “It’s good she’s got the makeup to keep some of it. You get too hard, you stop feeling, then the job’s just being on the clock.”

You’ve never stopped feeling, he thought. You never will. “You’re worried about her.”

“I’m not.” She shot the words out, then hissed when he chuckled. “Okay, maybe I am. A little. Maybe I’m worried she’s so nervous and sweaty about this damn, stupid detective’s exam that she’ll blow it. Maybe I wish I’d waited another six months to put her up for it. If she blows it, it’s going to set her back—inside. It’s so fucking important to her.”

“Wasn’t it to you?”

“That was different. It was,” she said with conviction when he raised an eyebrow. “I wasn’t going to blow it. I had more confidence in myself than she does. Had to. I didn’t have anything else.”

She surprised herself by smiling, looking over at him. “Then.”

It didn’t surprise her to feel his hand brush her cheek. “Enough mush. Back to Fortney. He clouded Peabody’s thinking. He’s a putz, and just not smart enough for this. Not an organized thinker, and not cold enough. Violent tendencies toward women, but a sock in the eye isn’t mutilation. You gotta be cold to mutilate. And brave, in a screwed-up way. Fortney’s not brave enough to go the whole route. For him, sex is his way of humiliating women. He bought the paper second, and I imagine that gave Renquist a smile—if he was following the purchases.”

“And you believe he was.”

She gazed at the rearview to make sure the team was still behind her. “Dead sure, and he likely did a search on Fortney and knew he’d be in New York during this period. Takes time to put on a show, months of lead time. Renquist didn’t plan this overnight.”

“Keep going.”

Roarke was keeping her talking, she realized, so she wouldn’t lose her temper and her patience with the traffic. Which was hideous. She toyed briefly with hitting the sirens and punching it. But that violated procedure. She’d do this straight, right down the line.

“He needed time to scope out his targets, so you’ve got several weeks between him sending the paper to Breen and the first murder. The first in New York,” she amended. “We’re going to find more bodies, or what’s left of them, scattered over the planet, and possibly off.”

“He’ll tell you,” Roarke deduced.

“Oh yeah.” Her face was grim as she threaded through