Peabody reached down, took Rudy’s uninjured hand. “You couldn’t know.”
“He wasn’t acting right, he wasn’t, but he came out just before nine and he stopped, and he looked right at me. He told me I did good work, and how I was an asset to him, to the company. It felt good, you know? He always made sure to tell us when we did a good job. He went to the conference room, and I finished up some other work before I went into his office to put a file on his desk. I saw his tablet. He hadn’t taken his tablet to the meeting, and he’d need it. I grabbed it, and I ran because he’d need it. I got to the doors, or maybe I opened the door. I can’t remember. Something exploded and everything was hot and loud, and it felt like I was flying. Then I don’t remember until I heard screaming, and somebody was dragging me. I think. It’s all mixed up after.”
“It’s all right. Did Mr. Rogan get any contacts at work—appointments, correspondence, tags, that seemed unusual, that concerned you?”
“No, ma’am, I swear. Paul wouldn’t do what they’re saying. He’d never do this.”
Because he was hurt, and grieving, she let the ma’am go. “Did anyone in the company have an issue with him?”
“No, ma’am. I mean there are disagreements sometimes, debates, and things got tense a few times during the campaign and the negotiations. But nothing harsh. I loved working for him. Is he really dead?”
“I’m sorry.”
“Maybe it wasn’t him,” Rudy mumbled, looking away, looking at the wall. “Maybe it was somebody who looked like him. Like a clone. I’m really tired.”
“If you think of anything else, contact me.” Eve signaled for Peabody to leave a card on the table beside the bed.
“Do you have anyone who can come hang with you?” Peabody asked him.
“My mom’s flying in, and my brother.” The misery in his eyes lessened when a woman came to the door. “Kimmi.”
Though she’d obviously been crying, she carried a cheerful clutch of flowers.
“NYPSD,” Eve told her.
“Oh. I can come back.”
“No need. We’re wrapping up. Relative?”
“No, I work with Rudy.”
“Peabody, why don’t you take the flowers, stay with Rudy. Can we talk outside for a few minutes?” Though she had asked Kimmi, Eve simply took her arm, led her out.
The petite brunette with the sad doe eyes twisted her fingers together. “I wasn’t even there,” she said before Eve could speak. “I mean, I was at my desk when . . . I heard the explosion, only it didn’t sound like I thought an explosion sounds. I guess because I wasn’t close to the conference room. But then I heard shouting and screaming, and people started running, and alarms were going off.”
“Did you see Mr. Rogan this morning?”
“For a second, when he walked by my desk. He didn’t say anything. He always says something, but he didn’t.”
“How much did you interact with him at work?”
“Paul interacted with everybody. It was his leadership style.”
“Personally?”
“I’ve only been with Quantum a little over a year, but I went to the party he has at his house for the holidays. None of this makes sense.”
“What’s your position at Quantum?”
“I’m Lia Berkell’s assistant.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “Was. She—she died in the explosion. They told me she died. She was the digital marketing manager. She was in the meeting. Um, she and Rudy and I worked tight with Paul on this campaign. But it wasn’t just work.”
She brushed a tear away. “We were really a team. You had to be there for each other. Like, when my apartment got broken into, Lia let me stay at her house until my roommate got back in town, so I wouldn’t be alone.”
“When did that happen?”
“Last December. My roommate was on a business trip, and I went on a date. I got home and somebody’d broken in.”
“What was taken?”
“My comp, spare ’link, my tablet, my wall screen, the wrist unit my parents got me when I got my MBA, my emergency cash. The police said it was probably somebody looking for a quick score, but they messed up my place, and scared me. It doesn’t matter now.”
“Did you have work on the comp?”
“Sure, but it was passcoded and fail-safed. And I always backed up on disc, and I take the disc with me if I go out. Just habit. So I had everything backed up.”
“You had data on the Econo deal on the comp? Office e-mails regarding it, that sort of thing?”
“Yes. It’s why I had the fail-safe.”
Nothing, Eve thought, was fail-safe.
She filled Peabody in as they went up to ICU to try another check on Karson.
“December again.”
“December eighteen—just after Kelly had her wallet and ’link lifted. We’ll want that incident report.”
“I’ll get both. The best I can get—until I get more—is negotiations between Quantum and Econo started wrapping up the end of November, or close enough they had the deal pretty much nailed down. Rogan’s domestic has her wallet and ’link lifted in December, and now one of Rogan’s team gets her comp and e’s taken in December. Coincidences are bollocks, right?”
“As rain,” Eve agreed. “Though I don’t know what the hell makes rain so right. It’s going to be about the deal, not the people. Blow up the deal—and follow the money. Who benefits, who loses, that’s the first line.”
They stepped into the ICU lobby. The guard dog nurse at the desk shot them a hard and suspicious look. A scattering of people sat in chairs. All looked weary. One had the shine of burn gel down his left cheek, a walking cast on his right ankle, and his right arm in a sling.
Eve walked to the guard dog, palmed her badge. “What’s Willimina Karson’s condition?”
“I’m going to verify that ID.”
“Go ahead.”
The nurse scanned it. Her stony expression clicked down to stern. “I had some media types try to get past me before. Ms. Karson’s critical. If you want more, if you want specifics, you’ll have to speak to her doctor, and you’ll have to wait. It’s been a hell of a morning.”
“All around. I’d appreciate being informed about any change in her status.”
“I’ll note it down.”
“How many up here from this morning’s incident?”
“Two now, including Ms. Karson. There were three, but she didn’t make it.”
Twelve dead, Eve thought, turning her attention back to the man with the sling and cast.
Middle sixties, she thought, with a lean, distinguished look despite the sweatpants and the I F059 NEW YORK sweatshirt. Both of which looked fresh off the rack and incongruous with the black dress shoes.
“Let’s check him out,” she said to Peabody.
She crossed to him, showed her badge. “Do you have someone in ICU?”
He eyed her carefully, though the left eye was shot with blood. “I do. I’m legal counsel for EconoLift and Willimina Karson’s adviser.”
“You were in the meeting. I’m primary on the investigation. My partner, Detective Peabody.”
“I know who you are. An easy case for New York’s top murder cop, isn’t it, as you already have the killer. Or what’s left of the son of a bitch.” His good hand fisted on his knee, rapped twice. “I wish to God he’d lived through it so I could think of him rotting in a cell for the rest of his life.”
“Peabody, see if there’s a more comfortable, more private place we can talk to—Your name, sir?”
“Loren Able. I won’t leave Willimina.”
“No, sir, but I need to speak with you, and I need to give you some facts.”
Peabody managed to secure a small break room—a single table, four chairs, a pair of vending machines, and an AutoChef that looked older than Noah. And somehow, being Peabody, she’d come up with a small pillow.
“Mr. Able, the nurse told me you should have your foot elevated.” She set the pillow on the fourth chair, angled it.
He sighed. “That’s kind of you.” He lifted his leg with his hands, set his foot carefully on the pillow.
“Can I get you some water, some tea?”
“I would give you my first born, if I had one, for some decent black coffee.”