Leverage in Death: An Eve Dallas Novel (In Death #47)(117)

“I have to admit, I’d like to have seen that. You’re going to need another treatment in three hours.”

“Okay.”

Mira kissed Eve cheek. “I mean it.”

“I know it. Or you’ll rat me out to Whitney.”

“And Roarke.”

“Figured.”

She had to admit she felt better after Mira got done with her. With Baxter she walked back into Interview A with Iler. Singa remained counsel of record.

“Record on, resuming interview. So here we are again. I have to tell you—full disclosure, because why the hell not—Silverman rolled on you like a pig rolls in shit.”

“He wouldn’t do that.”

“You think he gave a rat’s ass about you?” Baxter demanded with a laugh. “You were a vehicle, a piece on the board.”

“I think he liked Lucius here okay,” Eve added. “And he admired certain skills. Like building jammers, figuring out how to get through security systems. While he built the bombs. He knows he’s done.”

She looked at Singa. “Just like your lawyer knows I’m not bullshitting. He gave us everything, like how this all started after Banks fed you some inside scoop on the merger. You and Silverman sitting around, drinking and shooting the shit, and you.” She pointed at Iler. “You come up with the idea.”

“No, I—”

“Lie, it’s done. Maybe you were just bullshitting, playing what if, but it started rolling from there. I don’t need anything from you.”

“We have a deal on the table,” Singa said.

“Yeah, I talked to APA Reo, and we agreed to go ahead with the deal. Save time and grief, just like I said before. One lie, deal’s void. Was that also made clear?”

“It was,” Singa agreed. “Lucius, you need to cooperate.”

“I said I would.”

But he sat, silently.

“Did you know he dragged the Chenowitz kid—August, six years old—up to the roof of the house, held a knife to his throat? Drew blood? He’d planned on killing the kid anyway, so no harm using him as a shield.”

“He wouldn’t do that. Ollie wouldn’t do that.”

Eve slapped both hands on the table. “You know he would. You know it. You could pretend otherwise as long as it all worked for you and you banked that profit. But you fucking knew what he was inside.”

“I would never harm a child.”

“Just terrify them.”

“I did what I could to keep them calm,” Iler countered. “I’d never have allowed Ollie to physically hurt one of the children.”

“How did you plan to stop him?”

“He’d listen to me. We’re a team. The point is, and it’s important. I never killed anyone.”

“Eighteen.”

“No, you see, those men, those two men made a choice. They had a choice. They could have gone to the police instead.”

“And had their families killed.”

“No, no, no, that was a bluff. Just a bluff.”

“‘A bluff.’” Eve opened the file, tossed out photos of both crime scenes. The charred bodies, the pieces of the dead. “A bluff.”

“They had a choice,” Iler insisted. “They could have called the bluff. I admit we bear some responsibility, but—”

“‘Some responsibility.’” She lunged up, lunged across the table. “You had him wired, had him wear a recorder so you could see—and so he could hear his wife and child screaming. You beat the women, threatened rape.”

“I never touched them. I swear it. I swear it. I agree Ollie could go too far, but I held him back.”

“Did you hold him back when he snapped Banks’s neck? Lie to me, you fuck. Please lie.”

“I—he—Jordan was blackmailing me.”

“You killed him for it.”

“Ollie did. I could never—”

“Did you help dump his body in the water? Lie to me,” she urged.

“I didn’t know what else to do.” Tears started seeping down his face. “I didn’t know.”

“Did you and Oliver Silverman break and enter into the residence of Paul Rogan, Cecily Greenspan, Melody Greenspan Rogan with the intent and purpose of imprisoning said family?”

“I . . . yes.”

“Did you or your partner physically assault both adults?”

“Yes.”

“Did you or your partner batter Cecily Greenspan and threaten to sexually assault her?”

His shoulders shook with sobs. “Yes, but—”

“Did you, over the course of time from the early hours Saturday through Monday morning threaten, assault, and coerce Mr. Rogan, keeping his child separated, causing her to cry out for him, with the purpose of making him choose to carry an explosive device into the Quantum Air headquarters, to wear said device into a scheduled meeting, to detonate said device, killing himself and others in order to save his family?”

“We were bluffing.”

“Did you threaten, repeatedly, to kill Rogan’s wife and child if he did not carry out the bombing?”

“Yes, yes, yes, but—”

“I’m going to start considering your stupid buts an evasion and negate this deal. I would love to think about you living the rest of your worthless life off-planet. Deep space, no air unless they pump it in.”