J. Robb - Innocent In Death

“Precisely. He had to scrap the job, of course, not being sure the information he had was valid, or that he wasn’t being set up. It cost him quite a bit, on several levels.”

“But he didn’t go after her, make her pay?” She turned back again. “He didn’t do that because he was more hurt than he was angry. Did he love her?”

“He was infatuated.”

Something twisted in her. “Worse. That’s worse.”

“Agreed.” He sipped. “He tolerated a great deal from her during the time they were together. She enjoyed risks, both personal and professional. You’ve seen her, she has a light. He was attracted to it.”

“She’s smart,” Eve managed. “Educated and smart. I did a run on her.”

“Naturally. Yes, she was a very intelligent young woman.”

“He’d admire that. He’d like that, even over the physical, that would count.”

He hesitated a moment. Summerset had seen her take a hit, on full, right in this very room. But the words he had to say would do more damage. “She knew art and music, and literature. He’d always been thirsty to know, to experience the things that had been denied to him as a young boy. She had a head for figures, and an appetite for, well, glamour, you could say.”

“And she liked to steal. That would have appealed to him.”

“She enjoyed taking. If he bought her a gift, she’d bubble over it for a time, but much preferred if he’d lifted it. And always, she wanted more, and got more without directly asking. She has a way. She’ll want more now.”

“She came by my office before I left.”

“Ah.” He looked down into his glass again, drank more. “She would, sprinkle a few dark seeds under the guise of smoothing the water.”

“Something like that. She wanted to twist me up, and I knew it. But she got the dig in, she got it done. She said he’d agreed to work with her on some business stuff. If she talked him into doing another job, or even just setting up the groundwork for her-Christ.”

“You can’t allow it.”

“I don’tallow Roarke. No one does.”

“You have influence, use it. She’s a blind spot for him, and always was.”

“All I can do is ask him straight out. I can’t fight with innuendoes and wiles.” The headache was grinding in her skull, and pain was twisting her gut. “The first are insulting to both parties, and I don’t have any of the second. Not on her level, that’s for fucking sure. In the end, it’s his choice. It always was. I’ve got work.”

She started out, stepped, and made herself turn around, meet Summerset’s eyes. “She’s a manipulator. I get that. She’s also beautiful, polished, sophisticated, smart. Smart enough, I’d bet your skinny ass, to settle happily with what Roarke’s got at his fingertips now. Basically, she’s just the type I’d think you’d do a happy dance if he flipped me for.”

She had to take a breath so her voice would stay steady. “She wouldn’t track blood into the house, she’d know just what dress to wear to the next dinner party. And she wouldn’t forget therewas a goddamn dinner party because she was standing over a dead body. So, why tell me all this?”

“She would be a sparkling accent on his arm. She speaks flawless French and Italian, and has a limitless supply of charm when she wishes to dispense it. And she’ll use him. She’ll take, take more. If it was necessary, or if she simply had the whim, she’d toss him to the wolves to see who’d win.”

He finished the whiskey. “You, Lieutenant, are often crude, you are certainly rude, and have very little sense of how to be the wife-in public-of a man in Roarke’s position. And you would do anything, no matter what the personal risk, to keep him from harm. She will never love him. You will never do anything but.”

No, she thought as she walked away, she’d never do anything but. And wasn’t it strange she’d forgotten just how much fear and misery love could carry with it?

She’d never felt any of this before she’d met him. Never felt this twisting, this aching, the shaky fear of losing.

And never felt the thrill or the comfort, the stunning happiness that laid so thickly over everything else.

She went straight to her office, programmed a full pot of coffee. Before Roarke, she’d often-most often-bury herself in work. No reason she couldn’t do the same now.

More, she had a duty to honor.

A man was dead. A man, by all current evidence, who’d been a nice guy, an ordinary sort of guy who had actually had something to give to society.

She had no evidence, no reason to believe he’d hurt anyone, had wished harm on anyone. Hadn’t performed salacious acts, used or trafficked in illegal substances.

Hadn’t stolen anything, extorted anyone. Hadn’t cheated on his wife.

Having lunch wasn’t cheating, she thought as she carted her coffee to her desk. Banging another woman like a steel drum a dozen years before marriage wasn’t cheating.

Roarke wouldn’t cheat on her. She could rest easy on that point.

But would he want to? That was the sticker.

And that had nothing to do with Craig Foster.

She sat, braced her elbows on the table, and rested her head in her hands. She just had to clear her mind, that was all. Clear it out. Should probably take a blocker for the goddamn stupid headache pounding inside her skull.

Annoyed, she yanked open the top drawer, knowing Roarke had left a case in there with the little blue pills inside. She hated taking pills, but she’d never be able to think unless she popped one.

She swallowed the blocker, chased it with coffee as Galahad jogged in to get a running start for the leap to her desk. He plopped his ass down and stared at her.

“I’ve got to work.” But it was an odd comfort to run her hand over his head and have him stretch under the stroke. “I’ve got to be able to work or I’ll go crazy.”

Shifting, she inserted the data discs she wanted to run first.

“Computer, cross-reference both employee and client list, disc A with student guardians, administration, faculty, and support staff lists, disc B. Report any matches.”

Acknowledged. Working…

“Secondary task, standard data run on all names on disc C, include criminal, financial, employment, marital, education.”

Acknowledged. Working…

Maybe something would pop on one of the parents or child care providers who’d been in the building that morning.

“Subsequent task, display data on faculty, administration, and support staff of Sarah Child Academy, in alpha order, on wall screen one.”

Acknowledged. Data displayed on wall screen one…Primary task complete. No matches…

“Yeah, that would’ve been too easy. Using the same lists, cross-reference search for family relations, former spouses or cohabs.”

Acknowledged. Working…Secondary task is now complete. Choice of display?

“Display on comp screen.” Sitting back with her coffee, she studied the data.

There was nothing hot. A couple of hand slaps here and there-the ever-popular illegals possession for personal use, a four-year-old shoplifting charge. No violent crimes, no cage time for any.

Before she began on the data on her wall screen, she closed her eyes and let her mind wind back through what she knew, what she wanted to know.

Poison in the hot chocolate. Thermos unattended and accessible at several points during the morning. Habitual.

“Wait.”

She sat up, eyes narrowed, then tried another angle. She contacted Lissette Foster. “Lieutenant Dallas,” she said. “I’m sorry to disturb you. I have a couple of questions. You made the hot chocolate yourself, every morning.”

“Yes, I told you. I made it for him.”

“You ever drink it?”