“As entertaining as that invariably is, no. This would make it worth the trip.”

He grabbed her-she should’ve seen it coming-and his mouth covered hers. The instant blast of heat slammed right through such matters as late winter freezes and windchill factors. The sudden power and punch of the kiss rocked her back on her heels, and made her wonder if little beams of sunlight were shooting out of her fingertips.

He caught her chin in his hand, smiled down at her. “Definitely worth it.”

“Cut it out.”

“Nice work, stud.”

They both glanced over at the sidewalk sleeper huddled in a nearby doorway. The woman-or Eve thought it was a woman as she was bundled in so many mixing layers she resembled a small, patchwork mountain-offered a grin and a thumbs-up.

Eve jammed a finger into Roarke’s chest to dismiss any notion of an encore. “Go away now.”

“Absolutely worth the trip. Good hunting, Lieutenant.”

He strolled off, and she peeled away to the entrance of the morgue. But when she couldn’t resist a glance back at him, she saw him stop and crouch down to speak to the sidewalk sleeper. Curious, she slowed her pace to keep him in view a moment longer, and wasn’t surprised to see him dig something out of his pocket and pass it over.

Credits, she supposed, and probably more than the sleeper generally pulled in over the course of a week. She’d probably buy brew with it instead of a bed out of the cold, Eve thought. He had to know that, and still…

And still, she thought, pleased to love a man who’d toss a handful of credits into the void, just in case. Thinking of that, she walked into the house where death always had a room.

IN A ROOM OF WHITE TILE AND BRIGHT STEEL, Chief Medical Examiner Morris stood unruffled and stylish over Thomas Anders’s corpse. He’d teamed a rust-colored shirt with a dull gold shirt, and mirrored those tones with the thin rope worked through his long, dark braid. His clever face with its long eyes and hard planes was half covered with goggles while his skilled fingers gently lifted out the liver Anders no longer had any use for.

He set the organ aside on the scale, then offered Eve a welcoming smile. “A traveler stops by a farmhouse to ask for shelter for the night.”

“Why?”

Morris wagged a bloody finger. “The farmer tells the traveler he can share a room with the farmer’s daughter, if he keeps his hands to himself. The traveler agrees, goes into the room, and in the dark slips into bed beside the farmer’s daughter. And, of course, breaks his word. In the morning, guilty, the traveler offers to pay the farmer for the hospitality, but the farmer waves this off. So the traveler says he hopes he didn’t disturb the daughter in the night. ‘Unlikely,’ the farmer replies, ‘as we’re burying her today.’”

Eve let out a snort. “Sick death humor.”

“A specialty of the house. And it seemed apt under the circumstances.” He gestured toward Anders’s stubborn erection.

“Yeah, how about that?”

“Somehow sad and enviable at the same time. I’m running tox, but unless your dead is a medical marvel, we can presuppose he was loaded with happy cock aids. Then after he achieved liftoff, the strategically placed rings trapped the blood supply at the-sticking point.”

“Gee, Morris, I’m just a cop. You’re confusing me with all these complicated medical terms.”

He laughed, then removed a thin section of the liver. “We see death erections fairly routinely, particularly in stranglings or hangings, as the blood in the torso tries to obey the laws of gravity and travels down. The erectile tissue fills with it, and expands. But once the body’s moved, as our friend’s here was, it dissipates.”

“Yeah, and people noticed guys got boners when they were publicly hanged, back in the good old days, and thought: Hey, maybe if I choke myself during sex I’ll make really good wood. People are really stupid.”

“Difficult to argue that point, as you and I often see them at their most terminally stupid. So, as to our current guest: Erotic-or auto-erotic if you’re going solo-asphyxiation decreases oxygen, and pumps up the endorphins to heighten sexual pleasure. It’s responsible for a considerable number of accidental deaths annually, and many deaths that are officially termed suicide.”

“This wasn’t suicide.”

“No, indeed.” Morris looked down on Anders. “I believe it took him between fifteen and twenty minutes to die, slowly choking. Yet, there’s no bruising on his wrists or ankles. However cushioned the rope, when a man slowly chokes to death he’ll fight, he’ll struggle, and velvet restraints or not, there would be ligature marks. Even here.” He gestured again, then offered Eve a pair of microgoggles. “Here, where the rope tightened, cut in, cut off his oxygen, there’s no evidence he fought against it, writhed, strained. The bruising here is almost uniform.”

“So he just lay there and died.”

“Essentially.”

“Even if a guy wants to self-terminate, the body fights it.”

“Exactly so. Unless-”

“It can’t. How long for the tox?”

“I flagged it. But I can give you something now. Look here.”

She bent over Anders again, scanning the bruising under the right ear until she saw it. The faint, circular mark was nearly obscured by the more traumatic bruising. “Pressure syringe.”

“Yes, my bright young student. An odd place for self-medicating-especially by a right-hander-which he was.”

Shoving up the goggles, Eve put herself back in Anders’s bedroom. “Killer comes in, crosses to the bed. Sealed up, all sealed up, booties over the feet to muffle any sound. Lots of thick carpet anyway. Tranqs Anders while he’s sleeping. Quick, clean. Guy could’ve slept right through that-even if he started to wake up, a good tranq would take him under in seconds. Then you truss him up, set the scene, walk out, and leave him to die. Pick up the security discs. You’ve already shut down the system, but you take the discs. You’re either anal or hoping we’re just incredibly stupid and that’ll throw us off and make us think it was an accident.”

“Incredibly stupid we aren’t.”

“Either way, he’s dead.” She paced away, among the steel and comps, back again. “If you’re going there to do the guy, why just tranq him? Why not load him up so he ODs? Okay, you don’t slit his throat or beat him to death with a bat because maybe you’re squeamish, or you prefer more passive methods. But why the elaborate and demeaning when a lethal dose of barbs or poison or any number of substances would’ve done the job?”

“It was too personal for that.”

She nodded, appreciating a like mind, and her grin was fierce. “See? Incredibly stupid we aren’t. As soon as you get the tox back, Morris.”

“As soon as.”

When she strode into the Homicide bullpen at Cop Central, Eve saw Peabody sucking down something from a mug the size of the Indian Ocean while she worked at her desk. It reminded Eve that she was probably about a quart low on coffee. She signaled her partner, jerked a thumb toward her office, and turning, nearly plowed into one of her detectives.

“Make a hole, Baxter.”

“Need a sec.”

“Then fall in line.” She moved through to her office with its single, stingy window, battered desk, and sagging visitor’s chair. And hit the AutoChef for coffee.

Taking the first slug, she studied Baxter over the rim. He was slick, savvy, and smart enough to wait to have his say until she’d kicked in some caffeine. “What’s your deal?”

“Case I caught about a couple months ago, it’s stalled.”

“Refresh me.”

“Guy gets his throat slashed and his works sliced off in a rent-by-the-hour flop down on Avenue D.”

“Yeah.” She flipped through the files in her head. “Came in with a woman nobody remembers, and nobody remembers seeing said woman leaving.”