J Robb - Imitation in Death

“One of the best reasons to be off patrol,” Peabody agreed, with feeling. “What I’m saying is I’ve seen what it can be like, and it’s toughest on the kids.”

“Everything’s always toughest on the kids. Some get over it, under it, through it. Others don’t. And another theory on Smith is he feeds on the female adulation in one part of his life-and revels in it. Meanwhile he considers them whores and bitches-and he kills them in the most vicious and theatrical way he can devise.”

“I guess that’s a pretty decent theory.”

“Either way, he’s not going to like me throwing his background up in his face. So be ready.”

Taking Eve at her word, Peabody rested a hand on her stunner as they walked from the vehicle to Smith’s front door. “Not that ready, Peabody. Let’s try to play nice first.”

They were admitted by the same woman, and walked into the same music. At least Eve thought it was the same. How could you tell, she wondered, when everything the guy sang had the same sugar rush to it?

Before they could be led into the room with floor cushions and the fluffy white kitten, Eve laid a hand on the woman’s arm. “Any place in here have actual chairs?”

Li’s mouth turned down in disapproval, but she nodded. “Of course. Come this way, please.”

She showed them into a room with wide, deep chairs done in pale gold, accented with tables of clear glass. On one table was a small fountain where blue water burbled over smooth white rocks. Another held a white box filled with white sand where some linear patterns had been drawn with, Eve assumed, the little rake that lay beside it.

The curtains were closed, but when they entered the room the rim of the tables illuminated.

“Please be comfortable.” Li gestured to the chairs. “Carmichael will be with you in just a moment.”

Ignoring her, Eve studied a mood screen. Soft pastels dripped down in this one, melting from pinks into blues into golds into pinks again. Smith’s voice crooned in the background.

“I already feel queasy,” Eve muttered. “I should’ve pressed to have him come into Central, where things are normal.”

“I heard you dislocated some mope’s jaw yesterday.” Peabody kept her face sober. “Some people don’t consider that actually normal in the day-to-day.”

“Some people don’t know diddly.” She turned back as Smith made his entrance.

“How nice to see you both again.” He made a flowing movement with his arms to indicate chairs. It had the wide sleeves of his shirt fluttering. “We’re having something cool and citrus. I hope you’ll enjoy it.”

He arranged himself in a chair as one of his staff placed a tray on a long glass table. “I’m told you’ve been trying to get in touch,” he continued as he poured liquid from pitcher to glasses. “I can’t imagine why, but must apologize for being unavailable.”

“Your rep called my commander,” Eve said. “So I imagine you have some idea.”

“Another apology forthcoming.” He picked up one of the glasses, held it in both of his handsome hands. “My agent is overprotective, which, naturally, is his job. Just the idea that the media could get wind that I’d spoken to you regarding such a terrible matter worries him. I told him I trusted you to be absolutely discreet, but…” He shrugged elegantly, sipped.

“I’m not looking for publicity, I’m looking for a murderer.”

“You won’t find one here. This is a place of peace and tranquility.”

“Peace and tranquility.” Eve nodded, watching his face. “I’d guess that sort of thing’s important to you.”

“Vital, as it should be to everyone. The world is a canvas, and on it is painted great beauty. All we have to do is look.”

“Peace and tranquility and beauty are more vital to someone who grew up without them. To a man who was systematically and regularly abused as a child. Battered and beaten. Do you pay your mother to keep quiet about it, or just to keep her away?”

The glass in Smith’s hand shattered, and a thin line of blood dripped down his palm.

Shards of glass hitting the floor had, in Eve’s opinion, a more interesting musical note than the continued coo of Smith’s recorded voice.

She doubted any of his fans would recognize him now, with all the negative energy twisting his face. His bloody hand still clenched the shattered drinking glass.

She could hear his labored breaths before he sprang to his feet. She got to her own, slowly, and prepared to deflect any assault.

But he simply threw his head back, like a great dog about to bay, and howled out for Li.

She came on the run, bare feet slapping the floor and filmy robes flapping the air.

“Oh.Carmichael! Oh, you poor thing. You’re bleeding. Should I call the doctor? Should I call an ambulance?” She patted her own cheeks in rapid tat-tats.

While tears welled in his eyes, he held out his bleeding hand. “Do something.”

“Jesus.”Eve stepped forward, grabbed his injured hand, twisted it over to take a look at the cut. “Get a towel, some water, antiseptic, bandages. It’s not deep enough to worry the MTs.”

“But his hands, his beautiful hands.Carmichael is an artist.”

“Yeah, well, he’s an artist with a cut across his palm. No puncture.Peabody? Got a handkerchief?”

“Right here, Lieutenant.”

Taking it,Eve wrapped the cut while Li raced off, probably to call up a cosmetic surgeon.

“Sit down,Carmichael. You’re barely scratched.”

“You have no right, no right to come into my home and upset me this way. No right, no decency. You can’t come here, upset the balance. Threaten me.”

“I don’t recall threatening you, and I’ve got a pretty good memory for that kind of thing.OfficerPeabody, did I threatenMr.Smith?”

“No, sir, you did not.”

“You think because I live an ordered and privileged life I don’t know the darker corners.” His lips curled now, and he held his injured hand to his heart in a loose fist. “You want to extort money from me, payment to keep quiet about matters that are none of your business. Women like you always want to be paid.”

“Women like me?”

“You think you’re better than men. You use your wiles or your sex to control them, to suck them dry. You’re nothing but animals. Bitches and cunts. You deserve to…”

“Deserve to what?”Eve prompted when he stopped himself, when she watched the war for composure rage over his face. “To suffer, to die, to pay?”

“You won’t put words in my mouth.” He collapsed in the chair again, holding his hand by the wrist and rocking as if for comfort.

Li rushed back in carrying a fluffy white towel, a bottle of water, and what looked to be enough bandage to wrap an entire squadron after a bloody battle.

“Let my aide take care of it,”Eve told him. “She’s just going to mess it up, and hurt you considerably while she’s at it.”

Smithnodded curtly, and turned his head away fromPeabody and the blood.

“Li, please go out now. Close the door.”

“But,Carmichael…”

“I want you to go.”

She blinked at the slap in his voice and fled.

“How did you learn about… her?” he askedEve.

“It’s my job to learn about things.”

“It could ruin me, you know. My audience doesn’t want to know about that sort of… They don’t want the unseemly, the unattractive. They come to me for beauty, for romantic fantasy, not for the ugliness of reality.”

“I’m not interested in your audience or in making any information public, until and unless it applies to my case. I told you, I’m not interested in publicity.”

“Everyone is,” he retorted.

“Think what you like, it doesn’t change why I’m here. Your mother was an LC. She was abusive to you.”