J. Robb - Innocent In Death

Biting back a scream, Eve dropped the cup. The red spread and pooled on the white carpet.

“Now look what you’ve done! You’ll have to pay for that.” Setting down the pot, Rayleen clapped her hands twice.

And he came in, smiling that sharp smile, looking with those sharp eyes.

“No. Please. I didn’t mean it. I’ll clean it up. Please, don’t. Please.”

“I’ve been looking for you, little girl,” her father said.

He struck her first, one quick, hard blow that sent her sprawling to the floor. Then he fell on her.

She fought, she begged, she screamed when the bone in her arm snapped like a pencil. While Rayleen stood, idly sipping from her cup.

“Only one way to stop it,” Rayleen said as he began to push and shove himself inside Eve, to tear her. “Killing takes care of everything. So kill him. Kill him. Kill him.”

Rayleen chanted it, her voice rising with excitement.

“Kill him!”

Finding the knife in her hand, Eve did.

Ssh, ssh. Stop now, Eve. Just a dream. Nothing but a dream. You need to wake up for me. Come back to me now. I have you.”

“It was blood. Pink and white and red. All the blood.”

“It’s done now. You’re awake now, with me now.” They tore at him, these nightmares, even as they tore at her. He held her, and rocked her, pressing his lips to her hair, her temples, even when she’d stopped shaking.

When she turned her face against his throat, he felt the tears.

“I’m sorry.”

“No, baby. Don’t.”

“Am I projecting, Roarke? Is that all it is? Do I look at that kid and see all I never had, never felt, never knew? Is it some sort of jealousy? Is it all just some sort of twisted envy? With Magdelana, too?”

Now he drew her back, ordered the lights on at ten percent so she could see his face, see his eyes. “It’s not, no. It could never be. You don’t have it in you for that. If I planted that there with Magdelana, the flaw was mine. You look straight, darling Eve. You see what is, even when you’d rather not. And you look at things others turn from.”

“They’d have locked me away for what I did to him.”

“You’re wrong. And if they had, even for an hour, for the smallest part of an hour, even God would have had no pity on them for it.” He stroked the tears away with his thumbs. “The cop in you knows that perfectly well.”

“Maybe. Yes. Most of the time.” Sighing, she let her head rest on his shoulder. “Thanks.”

“Part of the service. Can you sleep now?”

“Yeah.”

He lay down with her, kept his arms wrapped around her, and dimmed the lights again.

It left her draggy in the morning, as nightmares often did. But she put it away. By eight she was dressed, fueled, and ready to deal with what needed to be done.

“How are you going to approach this?” Roarke asked her.

“I expect both Mira and Whitney to contact me after they’ve read the report I sent them last night. Meanwhile, I’m hitting the best pal first. If I get lucky, there’s a diary and best pal has it for safekeeping.”

She sat on the arm of the sofa in the bedroom sitting area and drank her second cup of coffee. “Then I try for Allika. Straffo has a golf date this morning-nine-thirty tee time, then lunch at his club. The kid has a nine-o’clock deal at something called Brain Teasers, followed by a museum trip. Allika’s supposed to meet the kid and au pair at one, take over as the au pair has the rest of the day off. There’s lunch at a place called Zoology, followed by mother-daughter salon treatments this afternoon.”

“Full day.”

“Yeah, they fill ’em. I’m banking on catching Allika alone at the penthouse this morning. Depending on the results, I’ll either pick up the kid or have a sit-down with Mira and/or Whitney first. Interviewing the kid’s the tough part. Her father’s going to block me, Child Protection’s going to weigh in. I need more than theory and more than circumstantial to break it down.”

“Full day for you, too.”

“I can still manage sex and dinner.”

He laughed. “I like the order of this evening’s menu. Here, have this first.”

He walked to his closet, brought back a box wrapped in Valentine red, topped with a white silk bow.

“Oh, man.”

“I know, yes. A gift.” His lips twitched in amusement. “So annoying. Open it anyway.”

She lifted the lid, found another box inside of dull gold. Nestled in it on red velvet was a long, slim bottle.

She’d expected jewelry, it was his habit to buy her glitters. And she supposed he had as-knowing him-the stones encrusted on the bottle wouldn’t be glass. Who would buy a bottle decorated with diamonds and rubies except Roarke?

She lifted it, studied the pale gold liquid inside. “Magic potion?”

“It may be. Scent. Yours. Made it for you-your skin, your style, your preferences. Here.” He took it, lifted the ruby stopper, then dabbed some on her wrist himself. “See what you think.”

She sniffed, frowned, sniffed again. It was subtle, and it wasn’t frilly. Wasn’t what she thought of as flower juice or come-nail-me-against-the-nearest-wall musk.

“And?”

“It’s nice. More-I guess, it’s one more thing that proves you know me.” To please him, she stroked a little on her throat. “You know the bottle’s over the top, right?”

“Naturally. The diamonds are from the Forty-seventh Street heist.”

“Yeah?” The idea of it amused and delighted her. “That’s fairly frosty.” She took the bottle to her dresser, high enough that Galahad couldn’t leap with the pudge he carried. Then she came back and offered her neck for a sniff. “And?”

“Perfectly you.” He tugged on her hair to lower her face for a kiss. “My one and only Valentine.”

“Save that sloppy talk for later. I have to get moving. Peabody will be here any minute, or risk having her ass kicked.”

“Should we say dinner at eight, unless work intervenes?”

“Eight. I’ll try to make sure to wrap up whatever I can wrap up by seven-thirty.”

Though she’d read Eve’s report as ordered before she arrived, Peabody was still resistant to the idea of, as she put it, a kiddie killer.

“Okay, I know, at some of the rougher schools, teachers and other students have been threatened or attacked. Stickers, fists, hell, kitchen utensils. But those are hard-line situations and most often involve hard-line kids.”

“So because this one wears a nice uniform and lives in a penthouse, she’s immune.”

“No, but it’s a different foundation. And we’re talking about revenge crimes, impulse violence or innate violent tendencies. In this case, they’re premeditated and coolly executed without any clear-cut motive.”

“Motive will come.”

“Dallas, I went through Foster’s records. I went through Williams’s records. There were a handful of disciplinary actions and/or parental conferences due to behavior, slipping grades, chronic lateness on assignments and that sort of thing. But not one of them involved Rayleen Straffo. Her grades are stellar, her deportment evaluations the same. She’s top of the class.”

“Maybe she doctored them.”

“Man, you’ve got it in for her.” Immediately, Peabody winced. “I didn’t mean it the way it sounded. I just can’t get there with you. I just don’t see it. I sure don’t feel it.”

“Let’s follow through on these interviews today. Maybe one of us will change her mind.”

The in-dash ’link signaled as Eve pulled to the curb in front of the building where Melodie Branch lived.

“Dallas.”

“Eve, I’ve read your report.” Mira’s face was knitted with concern. “We need to discuss this. At length.”

“Figured that. This isn’t a good time. I’m about to do a follow-up with a wit.”