Festive in Death (In Death #39)(85)

“You could be handy,” she considered. “Money, social status—it’s her language. And if he’s there, you could lure him off to show you his golf clubs or something.”

“Now, that might screw up my day, but I’ll risk it.”

“Get your toys. I’ll meet you out front.”

By the time she got down, the vehicle was waiting. Not her deceptively bland-looking DLE, but a big, brawny, black SUV.

“Are we driving up a mountain?” she asked Roarke when he came out.

“Who can say? I did a little due diligence on Copley and Quigley when I poked into his finances, but I assume you took more time with that end. You can fill me in while we drive.”

“They’re both cheaters,” she said flatly. “Were both attached when they fooled around, then he fooled around some more, then took her off to Hawaii for an elopement he planned, using her family’s facilities.”

“You don’t like either of them.”

“Not a whole lot.”

“Which is why you sent Peabody off to the sister and brother-in-law, because you do like them.”

“I don’t like or dislike. But they strike me as pretty straight. Not squeaky. Martella thought she’d screwed Ziegler voluntarily, and paid him off to keep it secret instead of sucking it up and dealing with it. And he struck me as a little too calm about the whole thing once it came out. Quigley, Copley? They’re lying outright, but the other two hide things. Maybe they’re hiding murder.”

“It may be both of them—the Schuberts are dealing, in their own way, with the trauma of it. It’s a double blow for him. The first, learning his wife believed she’d betrayed him with another man. The second, knowing she didn’t do as she’d believed but was drugged and raped. It’s a great deal for any man to cope with.”

He’d know, Eve thought. He’d know what it was to cope.

“Maybe. Maybe they’re both just trying to find their way through it. There’s another player on their end. Catiana Dubois, the social secretary—which is a bullshit title in my world of titles.”

“For some, the social life is a kind of career or vocation, and having someone to keep order is helpful.”

“You don’t have one.”

“I have Caro and Summerset. A man needs little more.”

She couldn’t argue with that one. “They seem cozy, the three of them. Not we-have-a-threesome-every-Tuesday cozy, but cozy enough. According to Catiana, Ziegler hit on her and she blocked. He then spread the word she was a lesbian, which she let pass because she didn’t care. And he got pissed when the guy she’s seeing came into the gym and it became apparent she liked men just fine.”

“Sorry, I’m a bit distracted by the threesome every Tuesday.”

“Wipe it out of your mind. The point is, Ziegler screwed with—on various levels—all five people in those two households. What are the odds?”

“Another reason you like one of them for the murder, particularly Copley as he appears the weakest in the moral sense, and somewhat of a dick.”

“That sums it up. Plus your basic motive, means, opportunity. Because he had time. He had enough time. Any of them did, really, if one of the others covered for them.”

“How did you get McNab’s shoe size?”

“I have my ways.”

“You really do. Would you stab my dead body in the heart with a kitchen knife if I cheated on you?”

“Your mind is the most marvelous machine,” Roarke said, with a touch of wonder. “Murder to threesomes to shoe sizes to speculative murder. No.”

“You wouldn’t stab my dead body in the heart with a kitchen knife if I cheated on you?” She found herself oddly insulted.

“There wouldn’t be enough left of it to stab. I expect I’d have already cut out your cheating heart and set it on fire. This, of course, after I’d—what was your phrase—‘beaten your lover into paste,’ after which I’d have castrated him. But not with a kitchen knife, mind you. I’d have used a dull, rusty, and jagged blade, putting it to use again in the aforementioned cutting out of your heart. And I’d feed his c**k and balls to a vicious rabid dog I’d acquired for that specific purpose.”

“That should cover everything.” Now, rather than insulted, she felt well loved. “We’re violent,” she said after a moment.

“Speak for yourself.” He negotiated around a pokey tourist triple tram loaded with shivering bodies, sparkling lights, and garland. “If you hadn’t cheated on me, I would never have laid a hand on you outside of love, passion, and tenderness.”

“You cleaned Webster’s clock because he wished I’d cheat on you with him.”

“That should provide fair warning.”

“We’re violent,” she repeated. “We grew up that way. We know our own natures, mostly channel it. But our instinct would be to react with violence in this kind of situation. Or to threaten it in a way that should—and almost always would—have the opponent backing down. Then we’d own it. That’s our nature, too. These people aren’t violent—in the same way—by nature. This violence was of the moment, a control snap, and in every case if it was one of the four, a good lawyer would get them off on temp insanity, diminished capacity, extenuating circumstances. Except, that goes down the tubes with the flourish.