Stolen in Death by J. D. Robb @jdrobbauthor @stmartinspress #InDeath #StolenInDeath

Chapter One

As she stood in skinny-heeled shoes instead of boots, a gown instead of trousers, Eve Dallas
thought whoever invented the gala should be brutally murdered.
Maybe they had been, and their body fed to wild dogs.
Since that would’ve happened decades, maybe centuries before this September night in
2061, she considered the case closed.
Regardless, the strange insFtuFon of the gala remained a part of society’s fabric. At least
it did if you happened to be a murder cop married to a billionaire.
The Marriage Rules demanded it.
The whole deal supported Sarah’s Song, a worthy charity, a naFonal network for vicFms
of domesFc abuse founded around the turn of the century. While she couldn’t argue with the
cause, she wondered why people needed to wear fancy clothes in a big, fancy ballroom, stand
or sit around making small talk, spend buckets on drinks and dinner instead of staying home,
comfortably, and sending those buckets.
But that was just her, obviously, because people packed the big-ass ballroom and the
big-ass space outside of it where various bars served various drinks.
In the rosy light and flower-drenched air of the ballroom, hardly anyone sat at the
swankily decorated tables yet. She’d learned the gala had a specific order to things.
You had your arrival Fme, where you had to walk a kind of media gauntlet while society-
type reporters took photos or videos so they could tell people who didn’t rate an invite what
you were wearing.
Then it was for-God’s-sake-get-me-a-drink Fme, where you hit one of the various bars.
Fortunately, she’d crossed both those off the list.
Now it was mill-around Fme, where you stood in those skinny heels and talked to people
you didn’t actually know, and likely wouldn’t have any further business with unless they ended
up in the morgue.
ASer mill-around Fme came sit-around Fme, while servers served some sort of salad,
and people went up onstage to thank everybody, to make their speeches.
Blah blah blah.
Then a meal, but you had to keep talking around the table, or to people who decided to
come by and talk while you were trying to eat the fancily plated whatever they served you.
She had no doubt the food and the service would be top-notch. ASer all, the ballroom
and the whole damn hotel belonged to Roarke. Which probably meant the gala people hadn’t
paid buckets for the space.
Once the servers whisked away those plates, brought out dessert, someone would make
another speech—applause, applause.
Then the entertainment. Which, since Roarke had connecFons, would be Avenue A, with
a guest appearance from Mavis.
Bright spot, she admiVed, except she’d probably have to dance, and in these damn
torture shoes. Dancing with Roarke, okay, fine, but dancing with whoever?
Marriage Rules, she reminded herself, and took another sip of very nice wine.
And even aSer all that, when it was finally socially acceptable to get the hell out, there
was departure Fme, where you had to have yet more conversaFons before the mercifully short
drive home.
Maybe the gala inventor should’ve been thrown to those wild dogs while sFll breathing.
Then Roarke, gorgeous in his tux, as comfortable in the formal wear as she imagined
he’d once been in cat-burglar black, smiled at her.
“It’s only a few hours,” he murmured with the Irish flowing through it like harp song over
green, mist-soaked hills. “And for a cause that maVers, in so many ways, to both of us.”
“You say that, but you’re not standing on sFlts.”
“Fashion’s a killer even you can’t toss in a cage, Lieutenant. You’re stunning.” He took her
free hand, kissed her fingers while those impossibly blue eyes looked into hers.
“All right now, Fme to share this beauFful woman.”
Eve recognized the man who approached and the woman at his side as the heads of
Sarah’s Song. She knew the story—he’d been eight when his widowed mother had remarried.
The abuse began shortly aSer the I do’s. Eventually, she’d taken her liVle boy and run, but not
far enough or fast enough.
Now, some sixty years later, the boy who—on his mother’s orders—had run for help that
had come too late, held out a hand to Roarke.
“It’s lovely to see you both. Eve, MarFn and Sylvia Ellison, the brains, brawn, and heart
behind Sarah’s Song.”
MarFn caught Eve’s hand in both of his. He had hair the color of old pewter that shot
out in the same kind of electric shock bush sported by her former partner and current captain
of EDD, Feeney. He had a ruddy, lived-in face and a toned-up, lightweight boxer’s build.
His deep, dark brown eyes smiled into hers as if she were the only person in the room.
Inside a streaky silver-and-white goatee, his lips curved.
“It’s wonderful to meet you at last. Sylvia and I are big fans. That’s probably not the right
word,” he said with a laugh she could only describe as jolly.
“Admirers of the work you do, and how well you do it.” Sylvia nudged at MarFn so she
could shake Eve’s hand. “Fair warning, we’ll probably ask a thousand quesFons about that work
before the night’s over.”
She smiled, a tall woman, thin as a whippet in a gown the color of her husband’s hair.
She wore her own in a cap of black curls, and had eyes of molten green.
MarFn winked. “We’ve used our status for the privilege of sharing your table. Lots of
schmoozing to do, but we’ll enjoy sharing the meal with you, Roarke, Nadine Furst, your friends
Louise and Charles, and, when they’re not performing, Jake and Mavis.”
“Not to menFon Leonardo. That’s one of his designs, I’m sure, and just gorgeous.”
Eve glanced down at the gown. Roarke had called the deep purple bleeding and blending
lighter and lighter as it rose up her body ombre. All she knew was it fit, had pockets—and a
slash up one leg nearly to her damn waist.
“Ah—
”
Roarke laid a hand on Eve’s shoulder, bare but for the skinny strap that went back to the
deep purple. “Leonardo’s not only a good friend and Mavis’s husband, but he understands just
what the lieutenant needs in wardrobe.”
“It has pockets.”
Sylvia just beamed. “Shouldn’t everything?”
“We won’t keep you now,” MarFn said. “We want you to know how much we appreciate
all you do. Dochas . . .”
He trailed off as he menFoned the women’s shelter Roarke had built, and Eve saw clearly
that some grieving lasts forever.
“It represents,” he conFnued, “what my grandmother hoped for when she founded
Sarah’s Song. Not just safety, but hands outstretched to help, to renew, to rebuild. I hope you
enjoy the evening.”
Eve gave a liVle sigh when they walked away. “They’re nice.”
“They’re exactly what they seem. Generous, intelligent, caring people. They’re also
interesFng. You won’t be bored. Let’s get you another glass of wine.
”
Because she figured it made her a moving target, she went along. It didn’t stop people
from waylaying them. She blamed it on Roarke. People recognized him. And if they didn’t, who
wouldn’t be aVracted to the tall and gorgeous? All that black silk hair, the wild blue eyes, the
mouth sculpted by a parFcularly arFsFc angel?
She saw plenty giving him a second look, a third, murmuring behind their hands as they
did.
When she said just that to him, he laughed.
“And no one noFces the long, lanky woman with the cap of deer-hide hair, the eyes like
aged whiskey that take in every detail she sees. The chin that looks like it could take a punch.
And has,” he added, brushing a finger down its shallow dent.
“There’s a group of three women at your two o’clock. Every one of them’s mind-fucked
you, a couple Fmes each.”
“Ah, is that why I feel so used yet oddly unsaFsfied?” Deliberately, he touched his lips to
hers. “There, that’s beVer.”
She had to smile, especially since one of the three women heaved a sigh and laid a hand
on her heart.
“Enough of the milling. It’s got to be sit-down Fme by now.”
“Then we’ll find our table and do just that.”
They not only found their table—aSer the gauntlet of stop, talk, go, stop, talk—but
Nadine and Mavis were already seated there.
They huddled together, giggling over something. Or Mavis giggled. Nadine, Eve
considered, had more of a snicker.
They couldn’t have looked more different, less like two women who would be not only
friends, but great, good friends.
Mavis Freestone, former griSer, current rock star, mother of one with another on the
way, had her hair in a spilling fountain of twisty curls Fnted electric blue. A Fny woman, at least
from Eve’s stance of five-ten (without the sFlts), she wore gliVery, gleaming gold that hugged
her impressive baby mountain like loving arms.
Eve figured she could’ve put her fist through the hoops dangling from her ears.
Beside her, Nadine Furst, ace on-camera reporter, bestselling crime writer, Oscar winner,
and cohab of Avenue A’s front man, wore a gown of smoky red. A sophisFcated hue in a
sophisFcated cut that leS one well-toned shoulder bare. She’d rolled her streaky blond hair into
some sort of twist. A couple of jeweled pins sparkled in it.
Mavis spoVed them first. Her face, already glowing, lit like the sun. “You’re here! No
dead bodies!”
“Night’s young,” Eve said, and put a hand on Mavis’s shoulder before her oldest friend
tried to haul her baby mountain out of the chair.
Roarke bent down to kiss her cheek, then Nadine’s. “Breathtaking, both of you. How
fortunate am I to share a table with three stunning women? Ah, and here’s yet another,” he
added when Louise and Charles approached the table.
Dr. DimaVo did stun, Eve supposed, in a pale lavender gown that looked delicate enough
air might tear it. And somehow added the faintest lavender Fnt to her gray eyes. Beside her, tall
and lean, Charles Monroe looked as if he’d been born in a tux.
The doctor who’d turned her wealthy upbringing on its ear by opening and running a
free clinic, and the former licensed companion, now sex therapist, made a solid couple, a solid
marriage.
So hug Fme postponed sit-down Fme.
“Get a load of us,” Mavis said with another giggle. “We’re all mag to the ex. You ever
figure it, Dallas, you and me, duded to the mega max and doing the totally uptown gala thing?”
“No.”
“And she’d sFll rather be chasing a psycho down a dark alley.”
Eve looked at Nadine, and thought it was good to have friends who knew you.
“Yes.”
“Ah, let it chill, Dallas. Lap up the moment. This is my last gig before Number Two makes
an entrance.”
“I don’t have to ask how you’re feeling,” Louise said as she took her seat. “I can see it.
Not much longer now.”
“How do you perform carFng all that around?”
Mavis’s eyes twinkled at Eve. “Wait and see. The guys’ll be here soon. Leonardo just
stepped out to tag August, make sure everything’s aces at home with Bella. He’s spending the
night because it’ll be a long one.”
Since she’d run August, the nanny, former military, solid, Eve didn’t worry there. Plus,
Peabody and McNab shared the big, rambling, sort of fascinaFng house.
“Jake’s with us,” Nadine said. “They’ve spread the band around the tables before they
take the stage.”
Leonardo swept in wearing what Eve imagined he considered a tux with a long, billowing
coat that reminded her of dusters in old western vids. His hair didn’t fountain like Mavis’s, but it
did spill in curls around his wide, copper-hued face.
He shook Roarke’s hand, bent to kiss Eve, then repeated with Charles and Louise.
“And how is the beauFful Bella?” Charles asked.
“Perfect. Just perfect. They’re having a dance party. August said Bella claimed since
Mama and Daddy went to a party, she should have one, too. So Peabody and McNab came over
and they’re having a dance party before bedFme.”
“You’ve made a happy home.”
Leonardo beamed at Charles as his big hand covered Mavis’s.
People began to take their seats at their tables when Jake came in from a door to the leS
of the stage. Then several of them jumped up again. So Eve watched as he did the walk, stop,
talk, and in his case pose for a selfie or sign the evening’s program.
A good guy, she thought. He handled it all smooth as silk, paFent and easy, but sFll
making progress. Rather than a tux, he wore rock star black—jeans, shirt, leather jacket, and
boots that suited his tall, lean frame.
No colorful streaks in the black mane tonight, she noted.
When he finally got to the table, Nadine poured him a glass of wine. “You earned it.”
“Did. Hey, everybody.” He grinned at Eve. “Hardly ever see you without the badge and
weapon.”
She tapped the evening bag—the one just big enough to hold her essenFals. “You’re sFll
not.”
“Oh. Okay then. Feel safer already.”
They served the salad; they started the speeches. The first, fresh and preVy, the second,
mercifully short and hearfelt enough she noted several people dabbing at their eyes.
As the main course came out, Mavis sighed. “GoVa waddle.”
Eve gave her a blank look. “What?”
“Ladies’ room.”
As Leonardo helped her out of the chair, Nadine rose. Louise rose. Eve started to cut into
what looked like some sort of actual beef. And Nadine tapped her shoulder.
“What? Really?”
“You’re security. Bring your weapon bag.”
“Security my ass.” But Eve grabbed her bag and rose. “You couldn’t have had to waddle
during the speeches?”
“Number Two was sleeping, but now? SomeFmes they sit on your bladder. SomeFmes
they dance on it.” Rolling her eyes, Mavis rubbed at the mound. “Someone else is having a
dance party.”
Since Eve didn’t want that image stuck in her brain, she said nothing more. And didn’t
have to pull her weapon on the trip to the restroom.
She didn’t mind the dinner porFon, in fact enjoyed it. Maybe it wasn’t pizza and beer
with friends, but it was sFll sharing a meal with friends. And the Ellisons had stories to tell or
conversaFonal gambits that pulled stories out of others.
“I read,” Sylvia began, “that you and Lieutenant Dallas met when she arrested you. That
can’t be true.”
“Solid fact.” Mavis liSed her glass of sparkling water, toasted Eve before drinking. “I had
an off day that turned out to be the best day because Dallas busted me.”
“What did you do?” MarFn asked. “If you don’t mind telling us.”
“What’d I do, Dallas?”
“Fumbled a wallet liS. You got the wallet—some tourist—but you’d been trailing him,
and I caught the liS.”
“Caught me, too. I was beVer at the griS than the liS. Short cons, I ruled short cons back
in the ago.”
Then she put a hand over MarFn’s. “The street was beVer to me, for me, than where I
ran from. What you’re doing tonight? What you and Sylvia do, what Dallas and Roarke do? I’m
all in. AnyFme I can help.”
MarFn brought her hand to his lips. “You’re a beauFful soul. It shines right out of you.”
He gave her hand an extra squeeze before turning to Eve. “And do you oSen make lifelong
friends with former griSers and thieves?”
“Mavis was the first.”
He laughed. “And the last as well?”
Eve thought of the man signg beside her, so obviously amused. “Not exactly.”
As dessert came out, Jake turned Nadine’s face to his, kissed her. “GoVa rock.”
And rock they did.
ASer an enthusiasFc introducFon from MarFn, Avenue A took the stage to the thunder
of applause.
And with the blast of the opening riff, people poured onto the dance floor. They shook it
in their tuxes, designer gowns, sparkling jewels. Some—more than some, by Eve’s esFmate—
held up their ’links to capture the moment.
Halfway through the first set, Mavis wiggled. “GoVa waddle.”
“Again?”
“Not that way. GoVa waddle up there. Haul me up, moonpie.”
“Just how,” Eve murmured to Roarke, “is she going to do whatever she does up there
when somebody has to haul her out of a chair?”
He just smiled. “Wait and see.”
She waited, and she saw.
The drums went to a pulsing beat, like a heart quickening. Jake held his hands over his
head, clapped in a steady rhythm along with his other bandmates. And so, Eve noted, did
people on the dance floor, at tables.
“How do we rock tonight?” he shouted.
And in call and response, the ballroom shouted back, “Loud!”
“How do we rock tonight?”
“Hard!”
“How do we rock tonight?”
“Wild!”
He did something on the guitar that sounded like a primal scream. Mavis, dancing onto
the stage, managed to do the same with her voice.
The crowd roared.
As the music roared back, Mavis twirled around the bass player. The dozens of gliVery
strips that formed her skirt spun as she did.
Then she and Jake, eyes locked, moved together.
“Down went the sun, so the waiFng’s done. You and me, baby, gonna have some fun.
Rock me. Loud. Rock me. Hard. Rock me. Wild.”
Leonardo gripped Eve’s hand. She’d have sworn his irises went from round to heart
shaped. “Isn’t she . . . Isn’t she . . .”
“Yeah. She’s all that.”
During the next song, Mavis hip-bumped the keyboardist aside, and took over herself.
“When did that happen?”
Leonardo grinned at Eve. “She’s been pracFcing.”
“She’s good.” Beside Eve, Charles let out a half laugh. “She’s really good.”
“The band’s been teaching her,” Nadine said. “They’re crazy about her. Well, who isn’t?
Jake says she’s got a lot of untapped, and she’s thirsty. So he’s into helping her tap and drink it
up.”
Eve turned to Roarke. “Did you know she could do that?”
“I didn’t, no.”
“She wanted to surprise you.” Leonardo just kept beaming. “She really hoped you
wouldn’t have to work tonight so you’d be here, see her play in public for the first Fme.”
She did three numbers, the last in the set of her own composiFon. When the band took
their break, Mavis came back to the table.
She sat with a Whew!, shook back her curly fountain.
“You astound me,” Roarke told her.
“Aw.” Then she looked at Eve.
“Wow.”
“Really?”
“Serious wow, and I don’t give up my serious wows lightly. You were great.”
“I love gigging with Avenue A now and then. They’re all just mag. Just mega mag.”
Leonardo urged a glass of water on her. “Hydrate, my moon and stars.”
“Yeah. Whew.”
“Did you know,” Eve wondered, “that Number Two someFmes moves one way when you
move another?”
Now Mavis grinned. “Yeah. Number Two knows how to rock it. Loud, hard, and wild.”
“Duty calls.” Roarke took Eve’s hand.
“Did someone get dead?”
“No.” He shook his head at Mavis. “Part of the duty for me and mine tonight is
socializing.”
“Right.” Marriage Rules, Eve reminded herself. “We’ll be back.”
“You goVa. The second set slays.”
She did her duty, shook hands, made the small talk—or listened to it, when she had a
choice. She watched women, and more than a few men, look at Roarke as though they wanted
to lap him up like ice cream.
The second set slayed. She had to spend some Fme on the dance floor—part of the
duty. She didn’t mind that part when it was Roarke on a slow one.
“You’re enjoying yourself.”
“More than I figured, yeah.”
“It’s nice, darling Eve, to have an evening like this with you now and again.”
She looked at him as they swayed on the crowded dance floor, as Mavis’s bright voice
blended with Avenue A’s on lyrics about forever love.
“But unlike me, unlike Mavis, you always imagined yourself here—in a place like this.
Owning a place like this.”
“It helped me escape to believe it.” He touched his lips to hers. “I didn’t imagine you.
That was above my ken. But here we are.”
“Here we are,” she repeated, and laid her head on his shoulder.
When the music stopped, and the ballroom thinned out to staff and a few stragglers,
Mavis rubbed a hand on her belly.
“I’m not ready to call it. The bar’s open, right, Roarke?”
“It is, of course.”
“Are we up for it? I’m pulling the pregnant card. In a few weeks I won’t be up for signg
in a bar with friends aSer midnight. It’ll be rocking-chair Fme. It’s Friday night, and we’ve got an
overnight babysiVer.”
“Up for it, Lois?” Jake asked Nadine.
“Why not? It’s Friday night. We’re young, we’re beauFful.”
“Absolutely true.” Charles turned to Louise.
“Nobody says no to a pregnant woman.”
“Come on, Dallas,” Nadine urged. “If you can work half the night on a case, you can have
a drink in a bar aSer a gala.”
“The first one’s my job,” Eve began. And Mavis gave her the puppy eyes and kept circling
her hand over her belly.
Ten minutes later, it occurred to her here was something else she’d never imagined.
That she’d all but take over a fancy bar in a fancy hotel with a rock band, a pregnant rock
star, a fashion designer, a reporter with an Oscar under her fancy belt, a doctor, a former LC, and
an Irish gazillionaire who happened to be her husband.
Or that she’d have fun doing it.
Maybe it was the wine—damn good wine—or the bar snacks, the spicy liVle nuts, the fat
olives, the crunchy something or other.
But no, she had to admit, it came down to the company.
Nadine shiSed to her. “Jake and I got the full tour of the house.”
“It’s something.”
“It is. It’s so frigging happy. Not just the colors, the things, the style. It’s in the damn air.
Peabody and McNab’s secFon, so different from Mavis and Leonardo’s, but the same vibe.
Happy-as-shit vibe. That blown-glass chandelier Peabody’s mother made? Jesus! I want one for
my own. Mavis says they’re coming to the housewarming. I’m going to try to talk her into
making me something.”
Nadine reached for some crunchy stuff while Mavis had the band doubling over with
laughter.
“Don’t call me crazy.”
“I don’t think I ever have. Called you a lot of other things.”
“True. Jake and I are looking to buy a vacaFon place. Together.”
“Okay.”
“It’s not crazy?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. Where’s crazy?”
“Tropical, that’s what we want. Beaches, privacy. We’re going to talk to Roarke about
where. Why not tap somebody who knows about all of it?”
“Okay.” So she turned to Roarke. “Best place for Nadine and Jake to buy a vacaFon
home. Tropical, beaches, privacy.”
He leaned around Eve to speak to Nadine. “Investment property or a second home?”
“Second home.”
“Villa or condo?”
“Villa. We want a house. Ah, something big enough to have guests when we want. With
a pool, beach access, close enough, but not too close to restaurants and shops, some nightlife.
He’d need a music space, I’d need an office space. We’d want at least four bedrooms, maybe a
guesthouse. It’s crazy.”
“Not at all. You might want to explore Saint Lucia or Turks and Caicos.”
“We’ve been looking at both of those. And Saint Bart’s. And, well, too many others. It
gets overwhelming.”
“Why don’t I send you a list of what I think may suit you?”
“Really? I’d appreciate that so much. We’re both turning in circles about it. You found my
condo, and it’s exactly right. Then when we did the tour of the new house, saw how right it is
for all of them, I thought, well, maybe Roarke can find what’s right for us on this wild idea.”
“I’ll send a list, but you’ll be the judge of it.”
“Jake? I’m going to kiss Roarke.”
“Okay.”
Nadine nudged Eve back, leaned over, gave Roarke a smacking kiss.
Louise let out a peal of laughter and rubbed Mavis’s baby mountain. Charles signaled for
another round.
And Eve’s communicator sounded.
“Uh-oh,” Nadine said.
Eve pulled it out of her purse. “Dallas.”
Dispatch, Dallas, Lieutenant Eve. See the officers at 1120 York Avenue. Possible homicide.
“Acknowledged. Contact Peabody, DetecFve Delia. I’m on my way. Dallas out.”
ConversaFon had stopped, and eyes had turned to her.
Mavis liSed her shoulders, gave Eve a sympatheFc smile.
“Well, hey, at least they waited to kill somebody unFl aSer we got to party.”
“Yeah, some murderers are considerate that way. GoVa go.”
“Drinks on the house,” Roarke said as he rose. “Stay as long as you like.”
Nadine looked up from her ’link. “That’s the Barrister House. Owned unFl his death last
winter by Henry J. Barrister, founder of Zip—global and off-planet shipping. Current residents
his son, Nathan—current head of Zip—and his spouse, Aileen, two college-age daughters.
Nathan has a sister, also in New York, divorced, no kids.”
“Only you, Lois,” Jake murmured.
“Good to know. Later. I would be dressed like this,” Eve muVered as they walked out.
“We can stop at home on the way.”
She wanted to, but . . . “BeVer to get there. Swing back aSer, change, get my ride if I
have to go into Central. Except I’ll need a field kit.”
“In the car.”
She glanced up at him. “You’re always handy. Anyway, this is more my version of Friday
night anyway.”
“It is, but, Lieutenant, it’s now Saturday morning.”