"Helpful."

He stepped over to Peabody, interfaced his PPC with the comp. "Post-Urban construction," he told Eve. "Currently an SRO primarily used by low-level LCs, transients, addicts, and petty criminals. Eight stories, twelve rooms per story. A small lobby with droid service. Cash only. Rooms by the half hour, hour, night, and week. No soundproofing, no privacy screening."

"Got it. Heat sourcing will give us occupied rooms and anyone who's alone. She won't have company. Ears may help."

She paced back and forth in front of the image. "We'll hit the droid, get verification. If she's in there, we'll get people out if possible. Single room, single window, single door."

"She may have the door booby-trapped, LT," Reineke said.

"Yeah. I would. I don't like it." She paced again. "It's not a basement, but where the hell's her out? Fire escape? She'd know we'd have the exterior covered."

"She may believe she can fight her way out," Mira put in. "She's fifteen. Indestructible, and the star of her own personal drama."

"Maybe."

But it niggled at her, niggled as she refined the op, as she prepared to move out.

"I'm with you," Roarke told her.

"Okay." Distracted, she frowned at him. "Why?"

"Is that a personal or professional question?"

"You'd be more use with EDD."

"Not necessarily. Particularly as you don't think she's where they're going."

"I don't see why he'd lie. Why he'd go through the whole agreement deal just to lie. He wants her to live, and it was the right angle, pushing the brother, her plans to do the kid, the others. I could see him take it in, see he knew she'd go there. But he wants her to live, and he wants her to get out, to know she'll only spend a few years inside."

"She's his child."

"He wasn't lying, but..."

"Take a minute."

Shaking her head, she pulled a combat knife from her drawer, slid it from the sheath, back in. "Clock's ticking," she said as she hooked it to her belt.

"And Lowenbaum is even now putting men in position to pin her down. Take a moment, and let whatever's brewing in that head of yours out."

"It's more gut."

But she stopped, sat, put her boots on her desk, stared at the board.

When Peabody started in, Roarke held up a hand to silence her.

Head, gut, instinct, sixth sense, or cop logic whatever it was, he knew it was working inside her.

They'd wait.

18.

S.

he should be on her way to Alaska but she wasn't.

She was supposed to take a bus to Columbus but she didn't.

They had a mission but she had another of her own. Hidden from her father, her teacher, her mentor.

He wants her to live. She wants to kill.

He tells her to run, stay safe, wait it out.

Running? Safety? For losers. Waiting takes too long.

She wants to kill.

"She's not going to listen to him," Eve murmured. "It's not because she's fifteen. Maybe that plays a part, but that's not the crux. It's just not. She knows she's better than he is. He's lost his physical edge, and hers is still sharp. He's weak, isn't he?"

She shoved up then, paced, her eyes on the board.

"Who accomplished that? She did. Not him. Stay safe? She doesn't want safe, she wants action. She wants the excitement, the points, the targets.

"Her targets."

"Where would she go?" Roarke asked her.

"Not to some mangy flop with whores and junkies. Not to some hole to curl up and wait until whenever. It's all now. It's all today. It's about her. She's the center. She wants the center. If she wanted safe, she'd be gone. She's not gone because it's now, and it's about what she wants. Her mission now. She'd go home."

"If she's at the apartment -" Peabody began.

"That's not home. That's HQ, her father's HQ, and that mission is done, at least for now. The townhouse. Her mother's house." She turned around, and Roarke saw it in her eyes. Instinct became knowledge.

"It's comfortable, it's hers. Clothes, food, entertainment. Again an area she knows and right now, an empty house. And better, more important, fucking vital? They'll come back. A few days, a week, but they'll come back, the three people who top her list. That's something she'll wait for."

"We sealed it."

"She'll get in. Her father would've taught her how to get around and through a seal. She can have the place to herself privacy screens down. She can watch the screen, judge when the media play eases off. Tuck up somewhere and wait. They come in, they feel safe, or safer. She just has to hole up, just wait until the house is locked up tight, until it's all quiet. Take the stepfather first, then the mother, then the kid. Then take what you want, whatever you want, and walk away. Find somewhere else to kill."

"Should I pull the op?" Peabody asked.

"No." As she weighed percentages against instinct, Eve dragged her fingers through her hair, pulled at it. "I could be wrong. I'm not, but I could be. Let it play."

"The three of us then."

Eve nodded at Roarke. "If you're up for it."

"Personally or professionally?"

"Funny. Peabody, bring that location on screen." She pulled out her comm. "Reineke, I'm peeling off."

It was a risk, Eve thought after she'd checked out her weapons, after they'd gone down to the garage. She loaded a laser rifle, a scope, the equipment Roarke would use in her deceptively ordinary DLE. The earbud kept her in constant communication with the others teams.

If the percentages proved true, she could be with the main team in minutes. If her instincts were on target, she could pull in the main team fast.

EDD reported no heat source in the basement, none in the apartment. They continued to identify sources in the flop.

Carmichael would pose as an LC, Santiago as her mark. They'd enter the building, and deal with the droid.

"I can send backup," Lowenbaum told her. "I can send you a couple of guys."

"We've got it for now. One of us is going to be in the right place. When we know, the other gets their ass there fast."

"I hear that."

"Try not to kill her, Lowenbaum."

"Same to you."

Eve handed Peabody a visored helmet. "She'll aim for your head."

"That's comforting." Peabody slid into the backseat.

"I'll drive," Eve told Roarke. "You work the portable. She can't keep watch out the windows 24/7, but she may have cams set up to give her a view of the street, the sidewalks." She glanced at Roarke as she pulled out. "How close do you want me?"

"The boys in the van snagged the best toys, but I can make do with this. Try for within fifty feet of the building."

Eve drove, considered. Contacted Nadine on her wrist unit. "Get ready to go on with a bulletin."

"What?" Nadine shoved a hand at her hair tied back in a short tail and far from camera ready. "How hot? I got home an hour ago after doing spots on last night, on Mackie's arrest, on the manhunt for his daughter. Have you got her?"

"Just be ready when I tag you back." She cut Nadine off, whipped around a Rapid Cab. "She'll be ready."

"For what?" Peabody wondered.

"To go on with a bulletin that will pull our suspect's attention away from the street, the sidewalk."

"You're going to blow the other op," Roarke concluded.

"Not if she's there. Not if I'm wrong. And not while there's a cop unsecured. But..."

"If she's not there, you're not wrong, and the rest are secure, you'll feed Nadine the other op. As if it's going down." Roarke smiled as he fiddled with the sensor. "She'll be very annoyed with you, our Nadine."

"She'll get over it when I give her the exclusive on this op."

"This helmet's heavy. And it echoes."

Eve flicked a glance in the rearview mirror at Peabody with the black helmet and visor in place. "Take it off until you need it. You look ridiculous."

"Not at all." Roarke smiled back at her. "Sexy Stormtrooper."

"Really?"

"Stay on point," Eve warned. "I'm still figuring out how to get in without giving her time to kill us."

"I have every confidence," Roarke said, continuing his work on the portable, hoping to boost its range.

"I don't want to double park, drawing her attention when people start blasting horns and bitching. How much inside fifty feet?"

"I think I can get a read at sixty now. It's worth a try."

Eve considered the option of using a building, flashing the badge and getting Roarke set up in a neighboring house. But she spotted a curbside barely big enough for a mini. She could make it work.

Making it work meant using the DLE to nudge another vehicle up to the bumper of the one in front of it, and doing the same to the one behind. With that, and a lot of maneuvering, she squeezed in.

"This is more like sixty-five than sixty."

"If you can't do it from here, why didn't you say so before I got here?"

"I didn't say that. Just give me another minute."

She put a hand to her ear. "Yeah, go," she said to Jenkinson.

"Santiago and Carmichael are in. The check-in droid gives a negative on the suspect."

"How reliable a negative?"

"They say it's wonky, so Feeney's sending Callendar in to work on it. We got about a dozen single heat sources. Feeney's done some calculation and takes four of them out. You can't get accurate height and weight, but his calcs say those four are way too big for the suspect."

"Good enough. We're about sixty-five feet from the target location. Roarke's working on scanning for heat sources. We'll let you know."

She ended transmission, shifted to Roarke. "Well?"

"You understand this is meant to work at much closer range, which I'd already managed to increase before you added to that range, so bugger off a minute."