The In Death Collection Books 6-10 - J. D. Robb [615]
But she spotted Quim. He was clearly in charge now, in his element. He gestured, a kind of theater sign language that meant little to her. She saw him consult briefly with the prop master, nod, then glance downstage left.
“There.” Eve leaped to her feet again. “He sees something, something that doesn’t fit. He’s hesitating, yeah, just for a second, studying. And now he’s moving off in the same direction. What did you see? Who did you see? Damn it.”
She turned back to Roarke. “That was the switch. The real knife’s on the courtroom set now. Waiting.”
She ordered the disc to reverse, then set her wrist unit to time, and replayed. “Okay, now he spots it.”
Behind her, Roarke rose, moved to the AutoChef and ordered her coffee. When he stepped beside her, she took the cup without realizing it, drank.
On-screen, extras moved out to their marks. The bartender took his position, techs vanished. Areena, dressed in the cheap and gaudy costume that suited a mid-twentieth-century barfly, took her seat on a stool at the end of a bar. She angled herself away from the audience.
A train whistle blew. Curtain up.
“Two minutes, twelve seconds. Time enough to stash the knife. Right in the roses, or somewhere no one would notice until it could be moved. But it’s close. Very close. And very ballsy.”
“Sex and ambition,” Roarke murmured.
“What?”
“Sex and ambition, That’s what killed Leonard Vole, and that’s what killed Richard Draco. Life imitates art.”
Peabody wouldn’t have said so, at least not if she used the animated painting she was currently trying to study. And pretend she understood. She sipped the champagne Charles had given her and struggled to look as sophisticated as the rest of the guests at the art show.
She was dressed for it, at least, she thought with some relief. Eve’s Christmas present to her had been her gorgeous undercover wardrobe designed by Mavis’s wonderful lover, Leonardo. But the shimmering sweep of blue silk couldn’t transform the Midwestern sensibility.
She couldn’t make head nor tail of the creeping movement of shape and color.
“Well, it’s really . . . something.” Since that was the best she could come up with, she drank more champagne.
Charles chuckled and gave her shoulder an affectionate rub. “You’re a sweetheart for putting up with me, Delia. You must be bored to death.”
“No, I’m not.” She glanced up at his marvelous face, smiled. “I’m just art-stupid.”
“There’s nothing stupid about you.” He bent down, gave her a light kiss.
She wanted to sigh. It was still next to impossible to believe she could be in a place like this, dressed like this, with a gorgeous man on her arm. And it galled, galled to think that she was much more suited to take-out Chinese in McNab’s pitiful apartment.
Well, she was just going to keep going to art shows, operas, and ballets until some of it rubbed off on her, even if it all made her feel as if she was acting in some classy play and didn’t quite have her lines down.
“Ready for supper?”
“I’m always ready for supper.” That line, she realized, came straight from the heart. Or the gut.
He’d reserved an intimate private room at some swank restaurant with candlelight and flowers. He was always doing something like that, Peabody mused as he pulled out her chair at a pretty table with pink roses and white candles. She let him order for both of them because he’d know just the right thing.
He seemed to know all the right things. And all the right people. She wondered if Eve ever felt so clunky and out of place when she found herself with Roarke in posh surroundings.
She couldn’t imagine her lieutenant ever feeling clunky.
Besides, Roarke loved her. No, the man adored her. Everything had to be different when you were sitting across candlelight with a man who thought you were the most vital woman in the world. The only woman in the world.
“Where have you gone?” Charles asked quietly.
She jerked herself back. “Sorry. I guess there’s a lot on my mind.” She picked up her fork to sample the saucy