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“And no sloppy stuff,” she put in “I’m on duty”

TWO

The huge cat, Galahad, was draped over the back of Eve’s sleep chair like a drunk over a bar at last call Since he’d spent several hours the night before attacking boxes, fighting with ribbon, andpaper, she left him where he was so he could sleep it off

Eve set down her bag and went directly to the AutoChef for coffee “The guy we’re after is David Palmer”

“You’ve already identified the killer”

“Oh, yeah, I knoho I’m after Me and Dave, we’re old pals”

Roarke took the h the steauely familiar to me”

“You’d have heard it It was all over the o I need all ation, all data on the trial You can start by—” She broke off when he laid a hand on her arm

“David Pal back for hi What—mid-twenties?”

“Twenty-two at tiy, our Dave He considers himself a scientist, a visionary His mission is to explore and record the human mind’s tolerance to extreme duress—pain, fear, starvation, dehydration, sensory deprivation He could talk a good game, too” She sipped her coffee “He’d sit there in interview, his pretty face all lit with enthusias point, we’d be able to enhance it, to strengthen it He figured since I was a cop, I’d be particularly interested in his work Cops are under a great deal of stress, often finding ourselves in life-and-death situations where the mind is easily distracted by fear or outside stimuli The results of his work could be applied to members of the police and security forces, the military, even in business situations”

“I didn’t realize he was yours”

“Yeah, he was ed her shoulders “I was a little more low profile in those days”

Heit was partially her connection to hied that status But he remembered too much of the Palmer case to find the humor “I was under the impression that he was safely locked away”

“Not safely enough He slipped out The victi was dumped in a public area—another of Dave’s trademarks He likes us to know he’s hard at work The autopsy will have to verify, but the victiuess Dave found hie there at least a day before killing hiht Merry Christer,” she murmured

“And that would be the judge who tried his case”