“When I met you, I didn’t want you in my life. You were one big complication. Every time I looked at you, or heard your voice, or so much as thought about you, the complication got bigger... Now? You are my life.” - Dallas to Roarke, Betrayal in Death[1]
Plot Summary[]
From the Barnes & Noble Review:
It’s spring in the year 2059 when Eve Dallas arrives at the scene of a horrific murder. A young maid working in the upscale Roarke Palace Hotel has been brutally beaten, raped, and garroted. It doesn’t take long for Eve and her colleagues to identify the killer, who rented the room in his own name and made no attempt to cover his tracks: He’s Sylvester Yost, a professional hit man with a resume that covers nearly 50 years and dozens of murders. But finding Yost is another matter. That task becomes even more urgent when a second murder victim is found bearing Yost’s trademark handiwork. This time it’s a man who works for a publishing company that, like the hotel, is owned by Roarke.
When comparing the two murders, the only common denominator Eve can find, other than the killer, is Roarke. Fearing he is the killer’s ultimate target, she steps up her investigation, which brings a couple of proprietary FBI agents down on her case. As usual, Roarke manages to provide some assistance to Eve, even while he’s managing his empire and trying to coordinate a billion-dollar auction at his hotel. Also as usual, this collaboration ignites plenty of sparks between the two of them, some of them romantic, others not. Adding fuel to the fire is Roarke’s unexpected house guest, a master thief and con artist who knows Roarke from the days when they were young lads running a few savvy cons of their own. Eve is far from pleased at this reminder of Roarke’s colorful past, but she has little time to worry about it as she races against the clock and the persistently interfering feds, hoping to stop Yost before he kills again.
Map[]
Please reference the Betrayal in Death Map for locations or approximate locations of sites listed here.
Spoiler warning! This article contains plot details about an upcoming episode. |
Timeline[]
Approximate Story Start Date: May, 2059[2]
Day 1[]
Prologue[]
- Sylvester Yost kills Darlene French, a maid, at the Roarke Palace Hotel
Chapter 1[]
- Eve meets Magda Lane at pre-auction event
- Roarke and Eve are notified of homicide by hotel security
- Eve begins investigation with Roarke as aide
Chapter 2[]
- Interview with Natalie Hilo, the floor supervisor
- Eve and Roarke inform French’s mother and sister
- Feeney informs Eve of past murders by Yost, found in IRCCA
Day 2[]
Chapter 3[]
- DNA from semen confirms Yost killed French (41)
- Eve requests guest and personnel data from hotel manager, gets it immediately
- Eve and Peabody return to 4602, notice that Yost steals hotel shampoos and soaps (45)
- Eve interviews Sheila Walker, another maid, friend of Darlene’s, and Darlene’s beau’s manager, the bell captain (48-49)
- Mick Connelly arrives, tackles Roarke, and is almost killed by Eve (50)
Chapter 4[]
- Roarke invites Mick to stay at their house (58)
- Feeney and Eve come to the conclusion that whoever cleaned 4602 would have been killed, not specifically Darlene French, therefore, Roarke is the target (60)
- Eve and Mick work a truce, of sorts (67)
Chapter 5[]
- Eve begins reviewing the case files of murders attributed to Yost and discovers that he took souvenirs from almost all victims; she realizes that he took Darlene’s earrings (68)
- McNab is tracing the weapon (two-foot length of sterling silver wire, Yost’s preferred weapon)
- Dinner party at Roarke and Eve’s house, including the infamous Montcart ’49 (76)
Chapter 6[]
- Roarke stays up until after three drinking with Mick (85)
Day 3[]
- Eve tells Summerset to watch Roarke
- FBI agents Karen Stowe and James Jacoby arrive to throw their weight around (86)
Chapter 7[]
- Eve and Peabody visit Paradise Salon, confirm Yost shopped there once or twice a year, always paid cash, and took the purchases with him
- Eve and Peabody visit luggage store, but no leads there
- Eve and Peabody visit jewelry store: encounter with Mrs.-Lieutenant-Dallas-Roarke guy yields info on John Smith alias for Yost along with leads for jewelry stores in other cities through guy’s relatives
- Eve consults with Charlotte Mira; Mira’s grandson Matthew James Mira is born
Chapter 8[]
- Jonah Talbot is murdered by Yost, girlfriend found him, body piercing missing (87)
- Mick meets Roarke at his office
Chapter 9[]
- Eve meets Stowe and Jacoby at the Down and Dirty
Chapter 10[]
- Eve tells Roarke she’ll request to have him attached to case as expert consultant, civilian
Chapter 11[]
- McNab finds “Sterling” ID for porn sites
- Eve has a nightmare involving Yost
Day 4[]
Chapter 12[]
- Mick fills in some data on the Hagues and other smugglers
- Sting on Yost’s penthouse aborted due to FBI usurping, then Yost escaped
Chapter 13[]
- Jacoby attacks Dallas at Yost’s penthouse
- Roarke finds Stowe’s connection to Winifred Cates and passes it on to Feeney anonymously (88)
Chapter 14[]
- McNab and Peabody have a tiff in the closet about Charles Monroe
Chapter 15[]
- Roarke finds Eve at the vending machine, where she tells him the candy thief has struck again (two bars taped to the back of her AutoChef)
- Eve takes Peabody out to soothe her after her fight with McNab and listens while they have ice cream
Chapter 16[]
- Eve meets Stowe at the Blue Squirrel
- Dinner at Top of New York with Magda Lane and the rest
- Roarke tells Mick that Eve is his “one thing”
Chapter 17[]
Day 5[]
Chapter 18[]
- morning briefing:
- Eve fills in on Naples-Hinrick-Gerade
- adds Yost connection and Vince Lane’s involvement
- Summerset ditches tail and encounters Yost
- Eve has to step in as peacemaker between Roarke and Summerset
Chapter 19[]
- Vince Lane confesses to the heist and gives the names of all involved but claims ignorance about the murders
- Roarke returns home and confronts Mick
Chapter 20[]
- When Mick realizes that Yost has been hired to kill to keep Roarke distracted, he lets Roarke in on the entire setup and plan for the heist
- Eve rushes home to find Mick has left. Roarke passes on all data regarding the planned heist learned from Mick
- Eve briefs her team in her home office. She breaks up a fight between Peabody and McNab
- They study Mick’s plans and go over the security details to prepare for any surprises
- Mavis and Trina arrive to give the details on the enhancements; Trina forces Eve to undergo a treatment
Day 6[]
Chapter 21[]
- The next morning Eve discovers that Trina had put a temp tattoo of a jackass on her butt
- Eve has arrangements in place to apprehend Yost at Carnegy Enhancement Supplies, where he is scheduled to pick up an order (90)
- Peabody was there as a clerk and McNab as a customer. As Yost approaches, Jacoby springs out of nowhere and tries to arrest him
- Yost takes off and Eve pursues him and brings him down in a tackle, hurting her nose in doing so
- Eve and Peabody leave for the hotel after handing over Yost to agent Stowe
- En route, they stop at the hospital to check on Vince and find that Gerade had tried to visit him
Chapter 22[]
- Eve and Roarke discuss the possibility of Naples calling off the heist. They go through the security details again and wait
- By midnight, Whitney arrives to inform Eve that Yost self-terminated in a federal facility while being booked in
Day 7[]
- Forty-five minutes before the scheduled 2 00 a.m. heist, Liza Trent does a casual stroll through the area to recon
- Roarke joins the team for the take-down; five minutes to 2 a.m., a maxibus collides with a car and swerves into the neighboring building
- As alarms go off, a delivery truck pulls into the hotel and Naples’ men jump out; Mick, who is with them, informs Roarke through signs from their childhood days about the number of men and the weapons they are carrying
- They find Gerade, too, is there with the rest of them; as the police move in, Gerade comes at Roarke with a knife
- Mick jumps in and takes the knife in his belly, saving Roarke; he dies in Roarke’s arms, though he and Eve try to stop the bleeding
Day 8[]
- Eve returns home as dawn was breaking to find Roarke awake and troubled; she tells him that Michel Gerade has been charged with first degree murder and that she can get him to roll on the Napleses
- But Roarke thinks they would have disappeared under the radar; he thanks Eve for doing her best for his friend in the end
- Eve tells him the NYPSD is honoring Mick with a posthumous citation and has Roarke bursting out in laughter; Roarke contends that getting a citation from the cops would have Mick rolling in his grave and laughing his head off, wherever he was
Character List[]
List of Main Characters Appearing in this Book[]
List of Secondary Characters Appearing in this Book[]
- Ryan Feeney
- Mavis Freestone
- Nadine Furst
- Galahad
- Ian McNab
- Charlotte Mira
- Delia Peabody
- Lawrence Summerset
- Troy Trueheart
- Jack Whitney
List of Recurring Characters Appearing or Mentioned in this Book[]
List of Minor Characters Appearing in this Book[]
- Anton
- John Brigham
- Ms. Clydesboro
- Michael Connelly
- Dana
- Denise
- Natalie Hilo
- James Jacoby
- Magda Lane
- Vince Lane
- Letta
- Martin
- Carlton Mince
- Minnie Mince
- Karen Stowe
- Liza Trent
- Sheila Walker
- Sylvester Yost
List of Peripheral Characters Appearing or Mentioned in this Book[]
- Augusta
- Marlo Barrons
- Bee-Sting
- Judge Beesley
- Billick
- Jack Bodine
- Bridgett
- John Cates
- Winifred Cates
- Barry Collins
- Chase Conner
- Tim Farrell
- DS Fortique
- Francolini
- Darlene French
- Harry D. French
- Sherry Tides French
- Michel Gerade
- Britt Hague
- Joseph Hague
- Hinrick
- Honroe
- Franz Hornbecker
- Jacques
- Kilcher
- LaFarge
- Six-Fingers Logan
- Nigel Luca
- Lieutenant Marks
- Anthony Mira
- Deborah Mira
- Matthew James Mira
- Dominic Naples
- Dominic Naples II
- Freda Newman
- Mollie Newman
- Nina
- Bobby Pike
- James Priory
- Monique Rue
- Assistant Director Sooner
- Jonah Talbot
- Mrs. Talbot
- Richard Troy
- Mont Tyler
- Thomas Werner
Deaths[]
Victim | Cause of Death | Weapon | Perpetrator |
---|---|---|---|
Justice Thomas Werner (prebook) | raped, beaten & strangled | two-foot sterling silver wire | Sylvester Yost |
Monique Rue (prebook) | |||
Nigel Luca (prebook) | |||
Britt Hague (prebook) | |||
Joseph Hague (prebook) | |||
Winifred Cates (prebook) | |||
Darlene French | |||
Jonah Talbot | |||
Sylvester Yost | slashed across throat | mug shard | suicide |
Michael “Mick” Connelly | stabbed in stomach | knife | Michel Gerade |
Trivia[]
- Eve has recently gotten her ears pierced!
- We learn quite a bit about Roarke’s early life in Dublin with his friends.
- Roarke was officially attached to the investigation as “an expert consultant, civilian” for the first time (Chapter 10)
Other Covers[]
Additional covers here
US neon edition cover | UK edition cover | German edition cover | German Book Club edition cover | Japanese edition cover | |
US neon edition cover | UK edition cover | German edition cover | German Book Club edition cover | Japanese edition cover | Brilliance Audio unabridged edition cover |
YANNIs[]
- In chapter 11, Eve asked Roarke how long it would take to drive from London to Cornwall. He replied, “If I were going that far north, I’d likely save time and take the jet-copter from one of my offices.” Cornwall is not north of London, it’s west-southwest.
- Crack’s Nickname:
- Roarke was spelled Rourke in Chapter 2.
Footnotes[]
- ↑ Betrayal in Death, Chapter 17
- ↑ Peabody mentions that it’s “coming up on Mother’s Day,” also, Sylvester Yost also did most of his preparatory shopping on May 3, so we can assume that the story begins at least a few days after that
- ↑ Glory in Death (ISBN 0-425-15098-4), p. 37; Visions in Death (ISBN 978-0-425-20300-2), p. 188; Promises in Death (ISBN 978-0-425-22894-4) pp. 112-113
- ↑ Betrayal in Death (ISBN 978-0-425-17857-7), p. 139