Haunted in Death by J. D. Robb Page A

further. “What is the probability that the killer of Hopkins, Radcliff C. is linked with the first victim, Bray, Bobbie?“
    Working…
    Family member,Eve thought. Close friend, lover. Bray would be, what… Damn math, she cursed as she calculated. Bray would be around about one-oh-nine if she’d lived. People lived longer now than they did in the mid-twentieth. So a lover or tight friend isn‘t out of the realm either.
    But she couldn’t see a centenarian, even a spry one, cutting through that brick.
    Task complete. Probability is ninety-four-point-one that there is a connection between the first victim and the second killer…
    “Yeah, that’s what I think. And you know what else? Blood’s the closest connection. So who did Bobbie leave behind? Computer, list all family members of first victim. Display on wall screen one.“
    Working… Display complete.
    Parents and older brother deceased, Eve noted. A younger sister, age eighty-eight, living in Scottsdale Care Center, Arizona. Young for a care center, Eve mused, and made a note to find out what the sister’s medical condition was.
    Bobbie would have had a niece and nephew had she lived, and a couple of grandnieces and nephews.
    Worth checking into, Eve decided, and began a standard run on all living relations.
    While the computer worked, she set up a secondary task and took a closer look at Hopkins.
    “Big starter,“ she said aloud. “Little finisher.“
    There were dozens of projects begun, abandoned. Failed. Now and then he’d hit, at least enough to keep the wolves from the door, set up the next project.
    Failed marriages, ignored offspring. No criminal on any former spouse or offspring.
    But you had to start somewhere, she figured.
    She went back to the board. Diamond hair clips. Bray had worn them for her first album cover – possibly a gift from Hop. Most likely. The scene told Eve it was likely Bray had been wearing them when she’d been killed, or at least when she’d been bricked up.
    But the killer hadn’t taken them as a souvenir. Not a fan, just didn’t play. The killer had shined them up and left them behind.
    “She was a diamond,“ Eve murmured. “She shined. Is that what you’re telling me? Here’s the gun he used to kill her, and here’s where I found it. He never paid and payment needed to be made. Is that the message?“
    She circled the boards, studied the runs when the computer displayed them. There were a couple of decent possibilities among Bobbie’s descendents.
    They’d all have to be interviewed, she decided.
    One of them contacts Hopkins,she speculated. Maybe even tries to buy the building but can’t come up with the scratch. Has to get access though, to uncover the body. How was access gained?
    Money. Hopkins needed backers. Maybe charged his murderer a fee to tour Number Twelve. Get in once, you can get in again.
    How’d you find the body? How did you know?
    What did she have here? she asked herself. Younger sister in a care facility.Niece a data drone.Nephew deceased – Urban War fatality. Grandniece middle-management in sales, grandnephew an insurance salesman. Rank and file, no big successes, no big failures.
    Ordinary.
    Nothing flashy. Nobody managed to cash in on Bobbie’s fame and fortune, or her untimely death.
    Nobody, she mused, except Hopkins. That would be a pisser, wouldn’t it? Your daughter, sister, aunt is a dead cult figure, but you’ve got to do the thirty-five hours a week to get by. And the grandson of the bastard who killed her is trying to rake it in. You’re scraping by, getting old and…
    “Wait a minute, wait a minute. Serenity Bray, age eighty-eight. Twenty-two years younger than Bobbie. Not a sister. A daughter.“
    She swung to the adjoining door, shoved it open. “Bobbie had a kid. Not a sister. The timing’s right. She had a kid.“
    Roarke merely lifted an eyebrow. “Yes. Serenity Bray Massey, currently in Scottsdale in a full-care nursing facility. I’ve got