Witness in Death

by J. D. Robb

  “I think I’m neither,” she said after a moment. “I discovered myself pregnant. I was very young, very much in love, or what I perceived as love. I gave myself to Richard Draco. He was my first. He enjoyed being the first. I was not as careful with conception control as I should have been.”

  She gave a little shrug of the shoulder, settled back. “Being young and in love, when I learned I carried Richard’s child, I was thrilled, swept away with the romantic notion that we would marry. He soon turned that thrill into despair. There was no anger, no passionate quarrel, and certainly there were none of the tender words and promises I had so happily scripted for him to say to me. Instead, he looked at me with disinterest, a faint annoyance.”

  Her eyes hardened, her hand dropped once more into her lap. “I will never forget how he looked at me. He told me it was my problem, and that if I expected him to pay for a termination of the pregnancy, I should think again. I wept, of course, and pleaded. He called me a few vile names, claimed that my sexual skills had been mediocre at best, and that he was bored with me. He left me where I was, on my knees. Weeping.”

  She sipped her chocolate again with no apparent distress. “You can understand, I hope, why I don’t mourn his death. He was quite the most detestable man I’ve ever known. Unfortunately, at that point in my life, I didn’t see that so clearly. I knew he was flawed,” she continued. “But with that blind and beautiful optimism of youth, I’d believed, until that moment when he turned from me, that I could change him.”

  “Then you stopped believing it.”

  “Oh yes. I stopped believing I could change Richard Draco. But I thought I couldn’t possibly live without him. I was also very frightened. Barely eighteen, pregnant, alone. I had dreams of becoming a great actress, and these were dashed. How could I go on?”

  She paused for a moment, as if looking back. “We’re so dramatic at eighteen. Do you remember when you were eighteen, Lieutenant Dallas, how you believed, somehow, everything was acute, vital, and the world, of course, revolved around you? Ah well.”

  She shrugged again. “I tried to end my life. I fumbled that, thank God, though I might have gotten it right if Kenneth hadn’t come. If he hadn’t stopped me, gotten me help.”

  “Yet you didn’t terminate the pregnancy.”

  “No. I had time to think, to calm. I hadn’t thought of the child when I took the razor to my wrists. Only of myself. It seemed to me that I’d been given another chance, and the only way to survive now was to do what was right for the life I’d started inside me. I might not have gotten through that without Kenneth.”

  She shifted her eyes, eloquent eyes, to Eve’s. “He saved my life and the life of the child. He helped me find the clinic in Switzerland and the child placement attorney. He lent me money and a supporting arm.”

  “He’s in love with you.”

  “Yes.” Her agreement was simple, and sad. “My deepest regret is that I couldn’t, and can’t love him back, in the way he deserves. His attack on Richard all those years ago was an aberration, and one that cost Kenneth dearly.”

  “And after you placed the child?”

  “I got back to my life. I never picked up that dream of becoming an actress again. I didn’t have the heart for it any longer.”

  “As birth mother, you have the right to make regular inquiries about the child you placed.”

  “I never executed them. I had done what was best for her, best for myself. She was no longer mine. What interest could we have in each other?”

  “She had an interest in Richard Draco. Carly Landsdowne was onstage the night he was killed.”

  “Yes?” Surprise, consideration flashed over her face. “She is an actress? Here in New York? Well, how many circles run within the circle of one life? And she was in the play with Richard and Kenneth. How strange, and how apt.”

  Eve waited. Watched. “You don’t ask any questions about her.”

  “Lieutenant, you want me to pretend some connection, some spiritual bond? Your Carly Landsdowne is a stranger to me. I wish her well, of course. But the link between us, a tenuous and temporary one, was broken years ago. My only connection with those days is Kenneth.”

  “Were you acquainted with Areena Mansfield?”

  “Slightly, yes. She was very promising, even so long ago. She’s done quite well for herself, hasn’t she? I believe Richard toyed with her as well at some point. Why do you ask?”

  “She was also in the cast. Natalie Brooks?”

  “Natalie Brooks?” A little smile curved her mouth. “There is a name I haven’t heard in many years. Yes, I remember she had a small part in the play Richard was in when he and I were lovers. She was very young, too. Pretty, fresh in a country girl sort of way. And, of course, easy prey. He seduced her when he turned from me. Perhaps even before. It’s difficult to know. Was she, too, in this play?”

  “No, but her son was Draco’s understudy.”

  “Fascinating.” Her eyes danced with amusement. “Please, you must tell me who else.”

  “Eliza Rothchild.”

  “But yes! A delightful woman. So dignified and acerbic. She had no tolerance for Richard. Of course, she was hardly his type and he took no pains to disguise that. Yes, this is fascinating. So many ghosts of the past moving like shadows on the stage. And Richard in the center, where he liked it best.

  “I no longer follow theater, but if I’d known, I might have bought a ticket. Yes, I might very well have paid to see that final performance.”

  “You’ve had no contact with any of these people in the last twenty-four years?”

  “But for Kenneth, no, as I’ve already said. I realize Kenneth told you that he hadn’t seen or spoken to me over the years, didn’t know where I was. The lie was not for himself, but for me. And now that you’ve told me all who are involved, it comes even more clear why he did so. He would have worried that these ghosts would haunt me. I assure you, and will assure him, they don’t.”

  “Did he tell you that Richard Draco and Carly Landsdowne had been lovers?”

  The cup jerked to a halt before it reached her lips. With her eyes on Eve’s, she lowered it slowly to the table. “What are you saying?”

  “That your former lover and the child you made together were intimate. They had a sexual affair that ended shortly before his death.”

  “Mother of God.” Anja squeezed her eyes shut. “Is this the payment for a small sin committed so many years ago? You’ve disturbed me, Lieutenant.” She opened her eyes again, and they were hard, glinting. “If that was your purpose, you’ve succeeded. Surely neither of them knew.”

  She rose, prowled the room. “She’s young. Attractive?” she asked with a glance back at Eve.

  “Yes. Very attractive.”

  “He would find her hard to resist. Would see no reason to resist. And he has always been able to lure women into bed.”

  “She might have lured him, knowing.”

  “What woman chooses to sleep with her own father?” Anja shot back. Her hands fisted, her body trembled once as she spun around. “Why would she have known? The files were sealed.”

  “Seals crack,” Eve said mildly. “Any and all of the parties involved can request the file. Perhaps she was curious about who made her.”

  “I would have been informed if a request was made and granted. It is the law.”

  “Laws are broken. That’s why I have a job. Draco might have opened the file himself.”

  At this, Anja merely laughed, a cold and brittle sound. “For what purpose? He had no interest whatsoever at the time. It’s unlikely he remembered a child existed after all these years.”

  “There was a resemblance, Ms. Carvell. She has his coloring, the shape of his eyes, his jaw.”

  “So.” She drew a breath, nodded, ordered herself to sit again. “He might have looked at her and seen himself. Might have,” she murmured, toying with her button again. “Might have. Then taken her to his bed for some narcissistic thrill. I can’t say. I can’t
tell you. Richard has become as much of a stranger to me as the young woman you speak of. I don’t know them.”

  “Kenneth Stiles did.”

  Eve watched the realization and the horror bloom on Anja’s face. Color rushed into her cheeks and just as quickly drained away again. “No. Whatever he knew or suspected, he wouldn’t have turned to murder. I tell you, the violence of twenty-four years ago was an impulse, a rage of the moment. You said that the affair had ended. Before Richard was killed. Kenneth wouldn’t have harbored violence. He couldn’t have maintained it.”

  “Maybe not. Maybe not without help. Where were you on the night of March twenty-fifth?”

  “Ah. I see. I see,” she repeated softly, and folded her hands. “I would have been at home. And quite alone.”

  “You saw no one, spoke to no one, during that evening?”

  “Not that I recall. I have no proof that comes to mind that I was where I say I was.”

  “Your family, Ms. Carvell?”

  “I have no one. I can only swear to you that I did not travel from Montreal to New York and conspire to cause Richard Draco’s death.” She rose. “Lieutenant, I believe at this point, I would like to consult an attorney. I have nothing more to say on any of these matters until I have done so.”

  “That’s your right. Thank you for your cooperation. Record off, Peabody.”

  “Would you be so kind as to tell me which hospital is caring for Kenneth? I’d like to contact them and inquire about his condition.”

  “He’s at Roosevelt.” Eve got to her feet. “Your attorney, when you engage one, can reach me at Cop Central.”

  “Very well.” Anja walked to the door, opened it. “Good day, Lieutenant.” She said it quietly, closed the door, engaged the locks.

  Then, covering her face with her hands, she let herself weep.

  • • •

  “Impressions, Peabody.”

  “She’s cool, sophisticated, sure of herself. She either believes Stiles is innocent or is determined to protect him. Her concern about him came off as genuine to me. She doesn’t have a lot of concern left over to spare for Carly.”

  Eve frowned through the windscreen as she slipped behind the wheel of her vehicle. “Should she?”

  “Well, it just seems to me there should be some, you know, emotional connection.”

  “Why? She conceived, gestated, delivered. That’s nine months out of her life. Where’s the emotional connection in that?”

  “Because the baby grew inside her. She felt it kick and move around, and…I don’t know, Dallas. I’ve never conceived, gestated, and delivered. I’m giving you my take, that’s all.”

  Peabody shifted uneasily, feeling out of her depth. There was a darkness in the air, swirling around Eve. She didn’t know what to make of it. She cut her eyes toward Eve, then away again. Eve was still staring out of the glass, brooding. “If she’s giving it to us straight,” Peabody ventured. “She placed the baby, then walked away. I just don’t buy it could be as cut and dried, as easy as that. I thought you were leading toward her being in on the murder.”

  “I haven’t discounted it.” But she’d let something slip because her own emotions had been rattled. “Go back in, find out when Carvell registered, if she pre-booked, and when she’s scheduled to leave.”

  “Right.” With some relief, Peabody scurried out into the fresh air.

  What sort of woman chooses to sleep with her own father?

  Eve’s stomach had been in knots since that question had been tossed at her. What if there is no choice? What then? She let her head fall back. There was another question: What sort of man chooses to sleep with his own daughter?

  That was one she had the answer to. She knew that kind of man, and he still whispered his candy breath in her ear.

  “What are you doing, little girl?”

  The breath exploded out of her lungs. She sucked it greedily back in.

  What about the mother? she asked herself and wiped her damp palms on the thighs of her trousers. What made a mother? She didn’t believe it was the bulk of life stirring in the belly. Eve angled her head, looked up toward the windows where Anja Carvell sat with her pot of chocolate and her ghosts. No, she didn’t believe it was as simple as that.

  There was more. There had to be more.

  Most rational, decent human beings would instinctively protect an infant, a helpless child. But the need to protect another adult stemmed from duty. Or love.

  She straightened in her seat as Peabody climbed back in. “She checks out. Called in yesterday, after six, requested a reservation. She got into the hotel some time just before eight. She’s scheduled to leave tomorrow, but arranged for an option to extend.”

  “Mother, father, devoted friend,” Eve murmured. “Let’s move on to child.”

  “Carly. We’re going to go right by a couple 24/7s crossing town. Maybe we could stop and get some hot chocolate.”

  “That stuff they sell in those places is swill.”

  “Yeah, but it’s chocolate swill.” Peabody tried a pitiful, pleading look. “You wouldn’t let her give us any of the good stuff.”

  “Maybe you’d like some cookies, too. Or little frosted cakes.”

  “That would be nice. Thanks for asking.”

  “That was sarcasm, Peabody.”

  “Yes, sir. I know. Responded in kind.”

  The easy laugh had the black cloud lifting. Because it did, Eve pulled over at a cross-street 24/7 and waited while Peabody ran in and loaded up.

  “You know, I’m really trying to cut down on this stuff. But…” Peabody ripped into the pack of cookies. “Thing is, weird, McNab doesn’t think I’m chubby. And when a guy sees you naked, he knows where the extra layers are.”

  “Peabody, do you have some delusion that I want to hear how McNab sees you naked?”

  She crunched into a cookie. “I’m just saying. Anyway, you know we have sex, so you’ve probably reached the conclusion we’re naked when we’re having it. You being an ace detective and all.”

  “Peabody, in the chain of command, you may, on rare occasions and due to my astonishing good nature, respond to sarcasm with sarcasm. You are not permitted to lead with it. Give me a damn cookie.”

  “They’re coconut crunchies. You hate coconut.”

  “Then why did you buy coconut?”

  “To piss you off.” Grinning now, Peabody pulled another pack of cookies from her bag. “Then I bought chocolate chip, just for you.”

  “Well, hand them over then.”

  “Okay, so…” Peabody ripped open the second pack, offered Eve a cookie. “Anyway, McNab’s got a little, bitty butt, and hardly any shoulders. Still—”

  “Stop. Stop right there. If I get an image of a naked McNab in my head, you’re going back to traffic detail.”

  Peabody munched, hummed, waited.

  “Damn it! There he is.”

  Hooting with laughter, Peabody polished off the last cookie. “Sorry. Dallas, I’m sorry. I couldn’t help it. Kinda cute, isn’t he?”

  And, she thought, it had bumped whatever had been troubling her lieutenant out of the way.

  “Button it up,” Eve warned, but she had to swallow a chuckle along with her cookie. “Brush the crumbs off your shirt and try to find your dignity somewhere.” She pulled to the curb in front of Carly’s building.

  The high-end neighborhood, the exclusive building, the plush lobby sent a different signal to Eve now. Anja Carvell had selected wealthy parents for the child. The kind of parents who could assure the child would grow up with privilege, security, luxuries.

  Had she taken as much care in researching the kind of people they were? Stable, loving, wise, supporting?

  “Peabody, we did the run on Carly Landsdowne’s educational history? It was private schools, right?”

  “Yes, sir, I believe so.” To verify, Peabody pulled out her PPC as they entered the lobby elevator. “Private and top rated, preschool through college. They sprang for a bunch of extras i
ncluding drama, dance, music, voice. All private tutors.”

  “What do the parents do?”

  “Father’s a doctor, micro-surgeon. Mother’s a travel agent, her own company. But she filed as professional mother from 2036 until 2056, the full twenty years allotted per child.”

  “No siblings?”

  “None.”

  “She picked winners. She was careful. It mattered,” she said to herself as she stepped out and walked to Carly’s door.

  It took two long buzzes before the door opened. Heavy-eyed, her hair sleep-tumbled, Carly gave a careless yawn. “What now?”

  “A moment of your time.”

  “At dawn?”

  “It’s after nine.”

  “I repeat, at dawn?” Then she shrugged, stepped back. “Don’t ask me anything until I get a cup of coffee. That should be added to those rights and obligations you’re so fond of spouting.”

  “Cranky,” Peabody whispered as Carly strode away.

  Eve scanned the room, listened to the beep of the AutoChef, then tried not to let her mouth water when she caught the scent of rich and real coffee.

  “I saw you at Richard’s memorial yesterday,” Carly said as she breezed back in. Her robe slipped silkily off one shoulder as she sat, crossed long, bare legs. “You do get around.”

  “Some of the matters I’m here to discuss with you are of a personal nature. You might want to ask your companion to leave.”

  “My companion?”

  “Two wineglasses,” Eve pointed out, with a nod at the low table. “Crushed pillows on the end of the sofa.” She reached under one, tugged out one sheer leg of black hose. “Undergarments in unusual places.”

  “So your clever deductive powers lead you to the correct conclusion that I had sex last night.” She shrugged and her robe slid down a little lower. “Why do you think he’s still here?”

  “Because you were having sex this morning before I so rudely interrupted. That little mating bite on your neck’s very fresh.”

  “Ah.” She sighed with a sound of amusement. “I suppose he was feeling a little frisky. Why don’t you come on out, sweetheart?” She lifted her voice and kept her eyes on Eve. “Lieutenant Dallas has spoiled the moment anyway.”