Eve pushed in; the noise level rose from library quiet to a night at the club.
Music didn’t blast, but it sure as hell pumped. Snatches of conversation—that might as well have been Ferengi—cut through it as the e-team communicated.
Machines beeped, buzzed, clacked.
And the air smelled ripe with coffee and sugar from mugs and fizzies and a not-quite-depleted box of doughnuts.
“Jesus, how can anybody think?” Eve demanded.
Callendar glanced over her shoulder. “Uh-oh, Mom’s home. Kill music. It can actually help you think,” she claimed when it dropped away. “Like the sugar rush.”
“Pulled her in,” Feeney said as he worked. “Lotta data to crack, and we want it fast.”
“I’m for that. What have you got?”
“Layered it good and proper, she did.” Roarke spoke, and as it often did when he dived deep in the work, his accent clicked up a few degrees. “And bloody buggering hell, there’s another. I’ve got it. Are you seeing this, Ian? She’s sandwiched a cross jab with a roll-down and two-step.”
“Overkill, total. Need assist?”
“No, I have it. Ah, the roll-down’s counterfeit, cozied with a triple slash and inverted ampersand. It’s clever enough, but easily … And there. I’ve got it.”
“Got what?” Eve demanded as her brain just swirled like McNab’s shirt. “What in holy hell have you got?”
“I took the files on the girls—or two and a half years of them, going back from the now. She changed the code, so Callendar’s on the next two. Feeney and McNab are dealing with her personal files.”
“Show me, show me one of them.”
He brought the first on-screen.
“I know that face. She’s on the board. Show—no, send all you’ve got to the conference room.”
“Which room?”
“We’re in one. Peabody.”
“I’m with you.”
“I need an address,” Eve snapped as she headed out. “I need a location. Run that search,” she told Peabody. “Get that started. We only need fucking one.”
“I can use McNab’s unit up here. They’re a lot juicier than what we have in Homicide. And I can have the results sent down to the conference room.”
“Do that.”
She went down alone, jogging down the glides. She swiped into the conference room, eyes on the board as she detoured to the AutoChef. The scent of her own coffee relieved her as she located the girl.
“Jaci Collinsworth, age twelve, Detroit.” She ordered the data Roarke transferred on-screen, saw the same face, the same data. Then more.
Williamson kept records on when the girl had been “admitted,” wrote up a sketchy report on physical condition, and what she called repairs. Dental work, skin and hair regimen, exercise and nutrition.
She deemed Jaci spoiled, difficult, defiant, with poor language skills that relied on swearing. Physically aggressive and requiring discipline and chemical modifications.
Also noted were the times and dates of the discipline, the method, the times and dates and doses of the drugs.
Improvement in attitude and behavior noted at seven weeks.
She’d noted down skill levels—her scale, Eve assumed—as training continued. The trainee required small, daily doses of a personalized chemical cocktail to reach her potential. She got an eight out of ten.
Williamson estimated her value at auction at six million, with a bonus for herself as matron/disciplinarian of six hundred. Her notes indicated this as a disappointment.
She read on, girl by girl, including three she added to the board.
And Mina Cabot.
“You learned fast, didn’t you?” Eve mumbled as she read Williamson’s data. “Play along and look for a way out. You went from spoiled and willful, according to this bitch, to cooperative, compliant, and eager to learn. Got a ten out of ten, and an estimated value between twelve and fifteen million. So up to fifteen hundred for your night guard, who rates you as a success.”
She read, paced, read, paced.
The child Dorian stated had killed herself, confirmed by Williamson’s notes, cost the matron a thousand dollars. Deducted from her pay. Failure.
“She rated them,” Eve began without turning around when she heard Peabody come in. “Scale of one to ten. She really didn’t like Dorian, and I’ve got over twenty incidents where she used a shock stick on her. She considered the discipline did its job, and rated her a nine out of ten, potential value at twelve million, as some buyers liked the sass.