Shadows in Death (In Death #51) - J.D. Robb Page 0,10

he’d get pinched, it was always someone else’s fault, you see.”

“Yours?”

“More than once.” Now the smile did reach his eyes. “And more than once he’d’ve been right about that. I knew a boy once, not a mate, just a boy I’d see, a young busker. He didn’t have much, but he had a dog. A little thing, scruffy little thing who’d do some trick to help add coins to the boy’s hat. Cobbe went after the boy for those coins once, and the little dog bit the bloody hell out of him, chased him off.”

“Good dog.”

“Well, he was until Cobbe went back for him, sliced him to pieces. Bragged on it, he did, on killing a dog that couldn’t have weighed ten pounds after a soak in the rain. The old man? He thought it a fine joke.”

“You ratted him out.”

“I did. The boy and dog were fixtures, you see, and well liked even by the Garda. So a word passed on brought the cops—those who could bother to give a fuck—down on him. He’d taken one of the dog’s ears as a trophy, so it didn’t go well for him.”

Now he shrugged. “Which is neither here nor there.”

“No, it’s here and it’s there.”

“In any case, he likes the sharps, always did, and it’s likely held true he gets some jollies watching the cops go over his handiwork. You want what I think as much as what I know, so I’m thinking he waited for the murder cops for the fun of it. That turned out to be you, and me with you. He couldn’t resist showing himself to me.”

Again, she had to agree. “And you don’t think he’ll take his fee and go?”

“He’s started the game, you see.” He came back, sat so they faced each other. “And it’s more than a game for him, as seeing me dead is a lifelong ambition. He tried for me once before—not speaking of when I was a boy, for he tried more than once then. I was building this house, and my business here in New York. Doing considerable traveling to … we’ll say enhance my business interests.”

She met those beautiful eyes straight on. “We could say that.”

“I was in the South of France on what we’ll call an art deal. As it happens, on the same night I closed the deal—and as it turned out several hours after the patriarch of a prominent family had his throat slit while on his yacht—we saw each other.”

Rising, he got a tube of water, sat, cracked it. “It was in a lively bar where I’d concluded some business and was having a drink. Now, I saw him come in, as it’s wise to keep an eye on comings and goings even after the conclusion of a deal.”

“Maybe especially.”

He smiled again. “Maybe especially. And over he walks, and doesn’t he sit right down as if we were the best of mates. He heard I was doing well for myself, so why not stand an old friend a pint.”

“I’m going to guess you weren’t in the mood to reminisce.”

“I told him to bugger off, a suggestion he didn’t take kindly. He had some unpleasant things to say, which ended with him saying while I’d been lucky, I’d always been weak, and he was Patrick Roarke’s true son. But seeing as that made us half brothers, he wouldn’t gut me with the knife he had under the table—and there he gave me a little jab with it to make his point—if I paid him five hundred thousand—pounds sterling he wanted—and admitted he was Patrick Roarke’s true son and heir by letting go of the name.”

“Is that all?” Eve said, dry as dust. “What did you do?”

“I said how that was an interesting offer, but I’d have to decline. And if he ever tried to come at me again, he’d be sorrier than he was about to be. I had a stunner under the table, and left him jittering on the floor of the bar. I can regret I didn’t switch it on full and rid the world of him, but I had just completed that deal and had a strong desire to avoid the local police.”

“Bet you did,” Eve murmured.

“I didn’t hear about the murder until I was back in my hotel. And putting two and two together, made an anonymous call, leaving a tip with his name and description. They couldn’t pin him, but I’m told he spent considerable time in the French version of