Faithless in Death (In Death, #52)(47)

“What’s Realignment?”

Gwen held up her hands. “I need a drink. I don’t care what fucking time it is.”

She got up, left the room. At Eve’s signal, Peabody followed her.

“I’m getting some goddamn wine, for God’s sake.” With Peabody, Gwen came back holding a half-empty bottle and a fresh glass.

She poured wine nearly to the rim, drank deep.

“It’s one of the order’s big secrets. On the island, they have a medical center, and in the medical center, they have the Realignment section. Only for blood relatives of members at a certain level or beyond. I think. That’s what I think. Mostly for kids, young adults. Gay kids. They sent me there after they found out about Jan.”

Bitterness hardened her eyes, her voice. “If I could kill anyone, it would be whoever told them.”

“What do they do in Realignment?”

“Evaluate you, physically, whether you want them to or not.”

She took a long, deep drink. The drama, the hysteria faded. Flat, bitter tones replaced it.

“They take your clothes, everything, and you wear a uniform. It says ‘Deviant’ on the back in big red letters. You wear a collar, like a dog. I’ve been told they have a section there for those who get involved—romantically—with someone of another race, or mixed race, but they keep them separate.”

She lifted her shoulders, let them fall. “I don’t know what they put on the back of their uniforms. You have a small room, only a cot, a toilet, a sink. And there are cameras, so you know they’re watching you. They play lectures on homosexuality, the evils of it, all day, all night.”

She closed her eyes, leaned her head back. “You’re not allowed to speak to anyone but your counselor. That’s what your jailer’s called. You eat in your cell—what they bring you, when they bring it. If you leave anything on the plate, no food the next day. You shower daily in the presence of your counselor. No privacy. If you complain, object, fight back? They push this button they carry, and the collar …”

She closed her eyes, and the hand holding the wineglass shook. “It’s like being set on fire from the inside.

“I learned, fast, to keep my mouth shut.” She sat up, drank more wine. “They show vids that would be laughable if they weren’t so awful and demeaning. You have daily counseling and prayer, evaluations, menial labor. And if it doesn’t take in ten days, there’s shock therapy.”

She smiled, thin and hard, as she toasted with her glass. “I escaped that by seeing the error of my deviant ways in five.”

Fury didn’t cover what Eve felt, but she kept her voice even. “You understand all of that is illegal?”

“No, really?” On a laugh, Gwen lifted her glass. “Good luck with that. They’ve got cops and judges and congresspeople, more money than God.”

“I’m sorry this happened to you,” Peabody murmured.

Gwen met sympathy with a sneer of contempt. “Screw your pity. I know how to deal with it. I was dealing with it. I had a plan and it worked. Until the two of you ruined it. And me.”

“Ariel was going to ruin it,” Eve reminded her.

“No, she wouldn’t have.” Gwen gulped more wine. “Yes, she got pissed, yes, she threatened to tell Merit, but it wasn’t the first time we’d argued about it. Maybe she was more angry this time, and it got a lot more heated. So I knew I had to end it—the relationship,” she qualified. “But I knew how to get around her, and I would have. That’s why I went back in the morning. I knew how to play her, and if she got pissy, well, she didn’t have any proof. She’d never been to my place, we never went out. I paid cash for everything when I went downtown.”

“Her calendar.”

“I didn’t know about that. I should have,” Gwen admitted. “She was a romantic. That was part of her appeal to me.”

“Text messages,” Eve added.

“She always left her ’link in the kitchen or turned off in the bedroom drawer. She didn’t like it interrupting her in bed or in the studio. If she got pissy, I’d get her ’link, get rid of it. No problem. But when I saw her like that, I didn’t think, not at first. Not about the ’link or the stupid wineglasses or the sheets or anything. I just knew I had to get out, and I had to start to protect myself.

“I didn’t kill her. She was crazy about me. You can always work somebody when they’re crazy about you.”

“You got rid of your ’link, her key card—your copy.”

“I knew damn well I shouldn’t have the card—too intimate. And yeah, the messages on my ’link.”

Eve started to tell her they’d recovered the ’link, but Gwen frowned into the distance. “I was going to get a new one anyway, I’d been meaning to. It started echoing.”

“Echoing?”

“Yeah, when somebody called, left a v-mail or voice text, their voice would echo some, and annoy me. People said my voice echoed, too. So I was going to get a new one anyway.”

“Who has access to your ’link?”

“What do you mean? It’s my ’link.”

“Who could get to it?”

“I don’t know. People.” She gestured impatiently with the wineglass. “At a party or a club, or who knows? It’s just a ’link, so I’m not paranoid about it.”