Connections in Death (In Death, #48)- J. D. Robb Page 0,78

war drums, and that’s stupid. Because we’ll follow the beat right to him.”

“Lieutenant,” Strong began from the back seat, “I’m not going to second-guess you. I’d be one of the last who’d ever do that.”

“But?” Eve prompted.

“Lyle was mine. He deserves justice. From what I saw in the box, from what we have on him, I don’t see opening up a deal to Cohen needs to happen.”

“Three dead, Detective. Two more who might be, and Christ knows how many will be if this does escalate into a war. A deal on the federal side gives me a lever with Cohen. He understands deals.”

She flicked a glance in the rearview mirror at Strong’s hard, unhappy face.

“Peabody, in the time we’ve worked together have you ever known me to advocate, much less push, for a deal that would deny the victims justice?”

“No.” Peabody shifted, looked back at Strong. “No,” she repeated.

“I’ll run how I see the play through for you,” Eve told Strong. “I’m going to want you on board.”

She outlined her strategy as she pushed into Chinatown, wound through the traffic clogging the streets, the tourists taking advantage of a decent day to shop and take vids.

Rather than waste time looking for parking, she pulled into a no-parking zone, flipped up her On Duty light.

She saw the police barricades up ahead, and the people crowded up to it, craning necks to see something exciting.

And the very bold street thief winding through the crowd like a quiet river while nimbly picking pockets.

“For Christ’s sake,” Eve grumbled.

She pushed through the crowd, and since the thief was in the act of lifting a wallet from a back pocket, she managed to grab him by the collar before he spotted her.

He tried a spin—nimbly—managed a backfist she avoided, almost completely. Annoyed by the almost completely, she swept his legs from under him, and pinned him to the ground with her knee.

He let out a spate of what she assumed was Chinese, and one of the onlookers—female, fruity Brit accent, shouted, “Police! This woman attacked this young man. Police!”

“I am the police.” Eve dragged out her badge and applied more pressure with her knee as her captive wiggled like a worm. “Sir,” she said to the man directly in front of her. “You should put that recorder down and secure your wallet.”

He frowned, reached back. His mouth dropped open. “Margo! He was picking my pocket! Holy cow this is exciting. Could you say your name, Officer, and say something, you know, official?”

A lot of somethings she couldn’t say leaped to mind. “Peabody, get a uniform to handle this.”

“Strong already moved on that.”

As Eve slapped on restraints, the thief continued to wiggle, squirm, and protest in Chinese at the top of his lungs.

Several more people crowded in to record the moment for their social media pages and/or friends at home.

A uniformed officer strode through, ordering people to move aside. Then he looked down, shook his head. “Knock off the Mandarin, Charlie, you were born in New York. I’ve got this, Lieutenant, appreciate it. Working a crime scene, Charlie, you moron. Right down the block, sir, and to the alley on the left.”

“Looked like he connected,” Peabody said as they cleared the barricade.

“Barely.” Still, Eve wiggled her jaw side-to-side. Barely, she thought, could still hurt like a bitch.

15

Strong stepped up at the alley entrance.

“Family-owned restaurant, residence in the apartment above. Suzan Ho, female head of household, came down with some recyclables, found the body behind the container, does the screaming thing. Neighbor in the apartment across the alley—Mae-Ling Jacobs, pokes her head out the window, sees the situation, calls in the nine-one-one. Responders checked the prints, ID’d the DOB, secured the scene.”

From the mouth of the alley, Eve took a quick scan. “Ho might be a fairly common name, but it’s not going to be a coincidence the body was dumped in this particular alley. Jones kept banging about Fan Ho—Dragon leader.”

“You’d be right. I haven’t dealt with him myself, but I know the name. I’m pretty sure this is his family’s restaurant.”

They walked as they talked until Eve stopped by the body, one somebody had attempted, poorly, to conceal behind the commercial recycle unit.

On a tangled sheet of blood-smeared plastic, Aimes lay faceup, mouth open as if expressing surprise to find himself dead in a Chinatown alley. Blood from the deep gash across his throat had soaked through and dried over the grinning skull on his T-shirt.

“No spatter, no blood pool on the plastic,” Eve noted. “They