Rapture in Death by J. D. Robb Read Free Book Online

Eve — full treatment. He’s sure he can peddle it. He’s great, Jess Barrow. He was blazing a couple years back with his own stuff. Maybe you heard of him.”
    “No.” Eve knew that, for a woman who’d lived on the streets a large portion of her life, Mavis remained stunningly naive about certain matters. “How much are you paying him?”
    “It’s not like that.” Mavis’s lips moved into a pout. “I’ve got to dish up the recording fee, sure. That’s the way it works; and if we hit, he takes sixty percent for the first three years. After that we renegotiate.”
    “I’ve heard of him,” Peabody commented. She’d unfastened her collar button — a tribute to her fondness for Mavis. “He had a couple of major hits a couple years ago, and he was hooked up with Cassandra.” At Eve’s arched brow, she shrugged. “The singer, you know.”
    “You a music lover, Peabody? You never fail to amaze me.”
    “I like to listen to tunes,” Peabody muttered into her bubbly water. “Like anyone.”
    “Well, the Cassandra connection’s dumped,” Mavis said cheerfully. “He’s been looking for a new vocalist. And that’s me.”
    Eve wondered what else he might be looking for. “What does Leonardo think?”
    “He thinks it’s mag. You’ve got to come to the studio, Eve, catch us in action. Jess is a certified genius.”
    She intended to catch them in action. The list of people Eve loved was very short. And Mavis was on it.
    She waited until she was back in the car with Peabody, heading to Cop Central. “Run a make on Jess Barrow, Peabody.”
    Without surprise, Peabody took out her diary, plugged in the order. “Mavis isn’t going to like that.”
    “She doesn’t have to know, does she.”
    Eve veered around a glide-cart offering frozen fruit on a stick, then swung onto Tenth where automated jackhammers were tearing up the street again. Overhead, an ad blimp hawked a shoppers’ special at Bloomingdale’s. Pre-season sale on winter coats in the men’s, women’s, and unisex department, twenty percent off. Such a deal.
    She spotted the man in the trench coat shambling toward a trio of girls and sighed.
    “Shit. There’s Clevis.”
    “Clevis?”
    “This is his turf,” Eve said simply as she pulled into a loading zone. “I used to do this drag when I was in uniform. He’s been around for years. Come on, Peabody, let’s spare the little children.”
    She stepped onto the sidewalk, skirting a pair of men arguing over baseball. From the smell of them, she judged they’d been standing in the heat arguing for much too long. She shouted once, but the jackhammers swallowed her voice. Resigned, she picked up her pace and intercepted Clevis before he reached the unsuspecting, pink-cheeked girls.
    “Hey, Clevis.”
    He blinked at her through the pale lenses of sunscreens. His hair was sandy blond and curly around a face as innocent as a cherub’s. He was eighty, if he was a day. “Dallas. Hey, Dallas. I haven’t seen you in a big blue moon.” He flashed big white teeth as he sized up Peabody. “Who’s this?”
    “Peabody, this is Clevis. Clevis, you aren’t going to bother those little girls, are you?”
    “No, shit, uh-uh. I wasn’t going to bother them.” He wiggled his brows. “I was just going to show ‘em, is all.”
    “You don’t want to do that, Clevis. You ought to get inside, out of this heat.”
    “I like it hot.” He wheezed out a chuckle. “There they go,” he said with a sigh, as the trio of girls ran laughing across the street. “Guess I won’t be able to show ‘em today. I’ll show you.”
    “Clevis, don’t — ” Then Eve huffed out a breath. He’d already pulled his trench coat apart. Under it, he was naked but for a bright blue bow tied celebrationally around his withered cock. “Very nice, Clevis. That’s a good color for you. Matches your eyes.” She put a companionable hand on his shoulder. “Let’s take a ride, okay?”
    “Okeedokee. Do you like blue,