Innocent in Death

by J. D. Robb

  “How does that make you feel?” Nadine asked.

  “Like I did my job.”

  “Just that?”

  Eve shifted. What the hell. “Sometimes it gets personal. It’s not supposed to, but it does. This was personal. Mavis and I go back, and she and my partner are tight. Mavis is the one who pushed me, pushed us, to look for Tandy. She deserves a lot of credit for that, for standing up for a friend. You could say, in this case, it was friendship that ultimately connected the cases, and cleared them both. The job’s not just about clearing a case, it’s about justice. I did my job.”

  “A demanding, dangerous, high-powered job. You’re married to a man with a lot of demands on his time, who some might term dangerous, and who is certainly high-powered. How do you balance the work with your private life?”

  “Maybe by knowing it’s not always going to balance, and being married to someone who gets that. A lot of cops…There can be friction in the personal area,” she amended, “because the job means you put in long hours, inconvenient hours that mess up schedules. You miss dinners or dates or whatever.”

  “Which may seem minor,” Nadine said, “but in reality, those dinners, dates, and so on are part of what makes up a personal life.”

  “Lapping into personal life is part of it, that’s all. It’s just the job. It’s tough for a civilian to deal, day after day. In my opinion, cops are mostly a bad bet in the personal arena. But some make it work. It works, I guess, when the civilian gets it. When the civilian respects and values the job, or at least understands it. I got lucky there.”

  She shifted her gaze to where Roarke stood behind the range of cameras. “I got lucky.”

  They broke for the ads that paid the bills, and Trina marched over with a flurry of brushes.

  “Nice,” Nadine told her.

  “Is it almost over?”

  “Nearly there.” She thought, but didn’t say, what a moment it had been when Eve’s gaze had shifted away, when the emotion had swarmed into her eyes on her claim that she’d gotten lucky. Thirty-percent share? Nadine thought. Her ass. That single moment was going to blow the ratings out of the stratosphere.

  “Your current case,” Nadine began when they were back. “The shocking murder of Craig Foster, a history teacher. What can you tell us?”

  “The investigation is active and ongoing.”

  Flat voice, flat eyes, Nadine noted with satisfaction. All cop now, and the contrast was perfect. “You’ve said that to know the killer, know the victim. Tell us about Craig Foster. Who was he?”

  “He was, by all accounts, a young and dedicated teacher, a loving husband, a good son. A good man, and a creature of habit. He was frugal, responsible, and ordinary in the sense he did his work, he lived his life, and enjoyed both.”

  “What does that tell you about his killer?”

  “I know that his killer knew and understood Craig Foster’s habits, and used those habits to take his life, to take a husband, a son, a teacher. That he did so not in heat, not on impulse, but with forethought and calculation.”

  “What makes this crime particularly heinous is that it was committed in a school where children from the ages of six to thirteen walk the halls. In fact, the body was discovered by two young girls.”

  “Heinous? Murder by definition—by its nature—is a heinous crime. Where it took place, in this case, might make it more callous to some. It was also efficient.”

  Nadine leaned forward. “How so?”

  “The victim’s habits. The killer had only to observe and note the victim’s daily routine, know the schedule, and use those elements. Having students, teachers, support staff in and around the halls, in and around classrooms and other facilities, was an advantage. He took it.”

  “Your suspects. You’ve interviewed a number of people thus far. Today you brought in Reed Williams, another teacher at Sarah Child Academy, for questioning.”

  “We questioned Mr. Williams, and have charged him in another matter. He is not charged with Mr. Foster’s murder.”

  “But he is a suspect? Your prime suspect?”

  “The investigation is active and ongoing,” Eve repeated. “Until it’s closed, we’ll continue to question a number of individuals. I’m unable to tell you more at this time.”

  Nadine made a few more forays; Eve blocked her. When the director signaled the time, Nadine leaned forward again. “Tell me this, if the killer’s watching right now, what would you say to him?”

  “That my partner and I stand for Craig Foster now. We have a job to do, and we’re damn good at it. He should go ahead and watch plenty of screen now because they don’t provide one in the cage he’ll be living in for the rest of his life.”

  “Thank you, Lieutenant Dallas. This is Nadine Furst,” she said to the camera. “Good night, for Now.”

  You were perfect,” Roarke said when they were finally able to get out of the station.

  “It must’ve gone okay, seeing as Nadine jumped up and did a victory dance the minute the stupid cameras went off.”

  “Perfect,” he repeated, and turning her to him, laid his mouth on hers. “Except for the misuse of a pronoun.”

  “Huh?”

  “You said ‘I got lucky.’ The correct statement, darling Eve, is ‘We got lucky.’” He kissed her again, softly. “We.”

  “I guess we did. No vehicle?” she added with a glance around the lot.

  “I had it taken back so I could drive home with my wife.”

  “In that case, you take the wheel.” She paused. “I’m glad you hung around.” When she got into the car, she stretched out her legs. Sighed. “Nadine gets off on that whole circus. Takes all kinds.”

  “It does. There are a lot of people who may be wondering how you do what it is you do, day after day. So, is this Reed Williams your man?”

  “He’s top choice right now. And get this, Oliver Straffo’s his lawyer.”

  “Straffo’s a little high-dollar for someone on a teacher’s salary.”

  “Williams does all right—private sector, tenure. But it was Straffo’s kid who found the body. This guy’s looking good for doing Foster, in his kid’s school, where his kid can slip on the blood and vomit, and he’s representing him. Yeah, takes all kinds.”

  “It’s possible Straffo believes he’s innocent.”

  “Yeah, maybe. Straffo doesn’t know that his own wife was one of the notches on Williams’s belt. Williams likes to hunt and gather among the staff and mothers. Has the morals of a rabbit, and Rabbit’s one of the things we’ve got him on. Had some in his toy box in his bedroom. It’s the illegals we charged him with so far, and that’s where Straffo answered the call. It bugs me.”

  “Lawyers do what they do, Lieutenant.”

  “Yeah, but say you had a kid and you find out one of her teachers is playing twist the pretzel in her school.” Because her current position was too comfortable, and she feared she might just drop into sleep, Eve pushed up. “That he uses illegal substances for his own sexual satisfaction. Do you figure you’d jump to defend him?”

  “It’s hard to say, but at first thought, unlikely. Then again, maybe Straffo has the morals of a rabbit, too.”

  “Bet he wouldn’t jump so fast if he knew his client had dipped into his own personal well.”

  “Do you intend to tell him?”

  Eve thought of Allika, her guilt, her fear. “Not unless it pertains to the case. If I find and can prove that Williams killed Foster because Foster knew about the affair, yeah, Straffo’s going to get some bad news.”

  “Are you sure he doesn’t already know?”

  “No, I’m not sure. And I’d be looking hard at him, too, if I could place him at or near the scene. He was in his office by eight-thirty that morning. That gives him a little squeeze time to have done it, but it’s a very tight squeeze. He was in a partners’ meeting from eight-thirty to nine, and in his office again, with his paralegal, admin, and several others in and out until he left for a lunch meeting at noon. He�
��s looking clear on this.”

  “I’m not quite sure why you would have looked at him. It wasn’t Foster doing his wife, after all. Now if Williams had been murdered…”

  “Reputation.” She shrugged. “It’s not such a stretch that Foster was killed to protect a reputation. Williams—that beeps the loudest. But I don’t think Straffo would have cared to have his wife’s infidelity made public.” She fought back a yawn. “Bad for the image.”

  “I can promise, Lieutenant, that if I were in Straffo’s position, I’d aim for you and your paramour. Not some innocent bystander.”

  “Back at you.” But because it made her think of Magdelana again, Eve shut it off. “Anyway, we’ll keep squeezing Williams, see what oozes out. Um…I’m getting poked from various directions that we—I use we as it’s going to be the only pronoun in this case—need to go see Mavis and the kid.”

  “All right.”

  “That’s it? Just all right?”

  “It’ll be fine. We survived the birth. A baby all wrapped up in a pink blanket should be a welcome relief after that ordeal.”

  “I guess. Peabody says we need to take a gift. A teddy bear or something.”

  “That should be simple enough.”

  “Good. You do that part. I don’t get the bear thing. Aren’t bears something people generally try to avoid so as not to be mauled?”

  When he laughed, she glanced over. And just looking at him, seeing the laugh in his eyes when he looked at her, had everything inside her going warm.

  She laid her hand over his as he drove through the gates of home. “Let’s try for that balance Nadine was asking about,” she said. “And for a while, no case, no work, no obligations. Just you. Just me.”

  “My favorite combination.”

  She made the move, wrapping her arms around him, rubbing her lips to his when they were out of the car. And the warmth that had bloomed inside her spread like spring. Every doubt, every hurt, every fear, every question drained away in it.

  Just you, she thought again as they glided into the house. Just me.

  By tacit agreement they made their way to the elevator. The stairs would take too long. Once inside, riding up, he nudged her coat off her shoulders, and she his. But the gestures weren’t hurried, weren’t frantic. Instead they were smooth and easy, with the knowledge they’d reclaimed something that had slipped, just for a moment, a finger’s span out of reach.

  In the bedroom there was a glimmer of moonshine, soft and blue through the windows, through the skylight over the bed. They undressed each other, distracted each other with long, lingering kisses, long, lingering strokes.

  Her heart felt as if it were back, exactly where it belonged, and beating fast and thickly against his.

  “I missed you,” she said, holding tight. “I missed us.”

  “A ghra,” he murmured, and thrilled her.

  She was his again, completely his again. His strong, complicated, and endlessly fascinating wife. Close and his, with nothing between them. The taste of her filled him, the long, lean lines of her enticed him.

  Here was the balance Nadine had questioned, and that no one who didn’t feel it, didn’t know it, didn’t have could ever fully understand. They simply fit, all the complex and ragged edges of both of them, simply fit. One to the other, to make each whole.

  When they lay on the bed she wrapped around him, and she sighed again. A sound he knew meant they were home, at last. Needing to give, he used his lips, his hands, his body, until the sigh became a moan.

  No one else, she thought, could ever reach her as he did. And, feeling him quiver at her touch, knew for him it was the same.

  As she rolled over that first liquid crest, she cupped his face in her hands. She brought his lips to hers once more for a kiss of shattering tenderness.

  “My love,” he repeated in Irish. My only. My heart. She heard his voice as he slipped inside her, saw his eyes as they moved together.

  Slow and lovely and real. And every brutal thing that belonged to the world was separate from this. Then fingers twined, mouths meeting, they slipped away together.

  Later, curled against him, content and drifting, she murmured, “Lucky us,” and she heard him chuckle in the dark before she slid into sleep.

  12

  HE WAS INCENSED. HE COULDN’T BELIEVE SHE was going to go through with it. Bluffing, he decided. She was bluffing.

  Reed Williams cut through the water with hard, angry strokes. He’d tried sweet talk, he’d tried temper, he’d tried threats. But that damn Arnette was being hardnosed about this—the principal standing on principle.

  Or professing to be. Hypocritical bitch.

  Bluffing, he thought again as he kicked off the wall of the pool and streaked his way to another lap. He’d just do another five laps, let her stew a little.

  He’d been sure she’d stand by him, or if she wavered, she’d value her own position enough to secure his.

  It was that fucking cop, he decided. Had to be a dyke—she and that brown-eyed partner of hers. Real bitches.

  Most women were, you just had to know how to handle them.

  And if he knew anything, he knew how to handle women.

  Knew how to handle himself. Knew how to handle whatever came along.

  He’d handled Craig, hadn’t he? Poor bastard.

  No way they were going to hang the poor bastard’s murder on him, especially with Oliver Straffo in his corner.

  And wasn’t that lovely, lovely irony? Not that Straffo’s wife had been a particularly exciting lay. But all that guilt and misery had given a certain flavor to the quick bump at the holiday party, and the single nooner at his place.

  But God knew, he’d had better.

  He wasn’t going to resign over a little sex, that was for damn sure. And if Arnette followed through and began termination procedures, well, he’d warned her. He wouldn’t go down alone.

  Once he reminded her of that—again—she’d settle down.

  A little winded, he finished his final lap, gripped the edge of the pool as he began to remove his goggles.

  He felt a little prick, a little buzz just below the crown of his head. He lifted a hand to swat at it, as if it were a mosquito. His fingers tingled.

  His heart began to thud, his throat to close. As his vision blurred he blinked, saw someone. He tried to call out, but his voice was a croak. He tried to pull his body from the pool, but his hands, his arms were already numb. He lost his grip, hit his jaw on the edge.

  He felt no pain.

  Gasping, he struggled to keep his head above water. He choked, and flailed, ordered himself to float. Just to float until he could think again.

  “I’ll help you,” his killer said. And with the long pole of the pool net reached out. Pressing it lightly on his shoulder, pushed him down, held him down with no real effort at all.

  Until his struggles stopped.

  Eve stepped out of the shower feeling reborn. She’d been off her stride, she admitted, off her feed, and just plain off for a few days. But that was done.

  She was grateful only a few people knew she’d let herself obsess over and get turned inside out about some smug, manipulative blonde. Magdelana Percell, she promised herself as the warm air of the drying tube swirled, was officially history.

  She snagged a robe and decided she was hungry enough to eat what Roarke called a full Irish. Once she had that and some coffee under her belt, she was heading straight down to Central.

  She was going back to the beginning of the Foster investigation with her mind clear. Maybe the personal blur had caused her to miss something.

  She stepped out, and Roarke was there, sipping coffee, scanning the last of the financials while the cat bumped his head against Roarke’s arm. As if to say, “Aren’t you going to eat? Where’s breakfast?”

  “You feed that lard-ass yet?” she asked.

  “I did, yes, though he’ll call me a liar. I, however, was waiting for you.”

  “I guess I could choke
something down. Some eggs and whatever.”

  “You need some whatever.” He rose, cutting her off before she reached her closet, and gave her ass a deliberate squeeze. “You’ve lost a couple pounds in the last few days.”

  “Maybe.”

  “My gauge has pinpoint accuracy when it comes to you.” He kissed her between the eyes. “A full Irish is in order, I’m thinking.”

  “That’s plenty of whatever.” She went to her closet with a smile on her face. It was good to be back in synch.

  “If I’m clear and you can manage it,” she began as she grabbed clothes, “maybe we could bop by Mavis and Leonardo’s. I can tag her later, see if they’re up for it.”

  “Suits me.” He switched to the morning news before going to the AutoChef. “A teddy bear, was it?”

  “Peabody said. Or something in that realm.”

  “I think we both might leave that one up to Caro. No doubt she’ll know just the thing. Just let either her or me know if I should come down to Central or meet you at their place.”

  She was strapping on her weapon harness when he turned. “It’s a pity you couldn’t have appeared on Nadine’s show like that. The shirtsleeves, the weapon at your side. Sexy and dangerous.”

  Eve only snorted, then sat to put on her boots.

  He crossed over to set down their plates, and after one steely warning look at Galahad, pulled Eve to her feet. “Sexy,” he repeated, “dangerous. And mine.”

  “Better back off, ace. I’m armed.”

  “Just the way I like you. What do you say we do the obvious and clichéd for Valentine’s Day? A romantic dinner for two, a great deal of champagne, dancing, and incredible amounts of inventive sex.”

  “I might be available for that.” When the hell was Valentine’s Day again?

  He laughed, reading her perfectly. “The fourteenth, my sentimental fool. Which would be the day after tomorrow. If work interferes, we’ll just have a very late dinner for two, and so forth.”