Loyalty in Death (In Death #9)(81)

She strode out into the hall, saying nothing when Roarke slipped out of a door and shut it gently. “She’s asleep.”

“Not for long. Peabody, pull it together and listen to me. You ride with your brother. I’m going to order he be detained in an interview room, not a cage. And you’re going to talk to him and explain that he’s going to agree to truth testing and a psych and personality exam. Mira will do it. We’ll put a rush on it and get it done tomorrow. We’ll lawyer him up and get him out tonight. He may have to wear a bracelet until after testing results, but his end of the story is clean, and it’s going to hold.”

“Don’t take me off the case.”

“You were never on. Don’t push this,” she said in a fierce whisper when Peabody protested. “I’ll take care of your brother. If I let you on, it’s going to look shaky. It’s going to be tricky enough for me to hang as primary.”

She was struggling against the tears and losing fast. “You were good to him. You let him get it out on record clean, without the lawyer. You were right about that.”

Eve jammed her hands in her pockets. “For Christ’s sake, Peabody, a blind man could see the guy would trip over his own feet before he’d step on an ant. Nobody’s going to argue with self-defense here.” If they found the body. The goddamn body. “He’ll be okay.”

“I should’ve looked after him.” Now she did begin to weep, in great gulping sobs. Helpless, Eve looked at Roarke, spread her hands.

Understanding, he turned Peabody into his arms. “It’s all right, darling.” He stroked her hair, rocked, watched his wife suffer more than a little. “You let Eve look after him now. Let her take care of him.”

“I need to talk to the woman.” Eve’s stomach rolled every time a fresh sob shuddered out. “McNab will secure the scene and wait for the uniforms. Can you… handle this?”

He nodded and continued to murmur to Peabody as Eve slipped into the room where Clarissa slept.

“I’m sorry.” Peabody’s voice was muffled against Roarke’s chest.

“Don’t be. You’re entitled to a good cry.”

But she shook her head, eased back, and scrubbed at her wet face. “She wouldn’t break down.”

“Peabody.” Gently, Roarke cupped her cheek. “She breaks.”

Eve yanked all the chains she could reach, gathered strings and pulled each one. She argued, justified, debated, and came close to threatening. In the end, she was primary in the matter of the death of B. Donald Branson.

She booked two interview rooms, positioning Zeke and Clarissa in separate areas, put the fear of God into the crime scene team and sweepers, harangued the body retrieval unit that was already dragging the East River, put McNab to work on the Branson droid, and arrived at Central with a viciously brilliant headache.

But she had everything she’d wanted.

Her last step before taking statements was to contact Mira at home and arrange for both Zeke and Clarissa to be tested the following day.

She took Clarissa first. She imagined when the woman’s initial shock passed, she’d want a lawyer, and the lawyer would shut her up. Self-preservation was bound to overshadow any concern Clarissa might have for Zeke.

But when she walked into the interview room, Clarissa was sitting pale and quiet, her hands clutched around a cup of water. Eve gestured the uniform outside, closed the door.

“Is Zeke all right?”

“Yeah, he’s okay. Feeling any better?”

Clarissa turned the cup in her hands, but didn’t lift it. “It’s all like a dream. So unreal. B. D.‘s dead. He is dead, isn’t he?”

Eve walked to the table, pulled back a chair. “Tough to say at this point. We don’t have a body.”

Clarissa shuddered, squeezed her eyes tight. “It’s my fault. I don’t know what I was thinking. I guess I wasn’t thinking.”

“Now’s the time to start.” She left any sympathy out of her voice. Sympathy would only push the woman into tears again. She engaged the recorder, recited the necessary information, and leaned forward. “What happened tonight, Clarissa?”

“I called Zeke. He came. We were going to leave together. Go away.”

“You and Zeke were having an affair?”

“No.” She raised her eyes then, dark and bright and beautiful. “No, we’d never… we kissed once. We fell in love. I know it sounds ridiculous, we barely knew each other. It just happened. He was kind to me, gentle. I wanted to feel safe. I only wanted to feel safe. I called, and he came.”

“Where were you going?”

“Arizona. I think. I don’t know.” She lifted a hand to her forehead, skimmed her fingers over her skin. “Anywhere, as long as I got away. I’d packed. I’d packed a bag, and Zeke went up to get it for me. I got my coat. I was getting away, I was going away with him. Then B. D. came in. He wasn’t supposed to.”

Her voice started to hitch, her shoulders to tremble. “He wasn’t supposed to come home tonight. He was drunk, and he saw I had my coat. He knocked me down.” Her hand drifted to her cheek where the bruise was raw. “Zeke was there, and he told him to stay away from me. B. D. said awful things, and he kept pushing Zeke, shoving him, shouting. I can’t remember, exactly. Just shouting and pushing, and he grabbed my hair. B. D. grabbed my hair and yanked me up. I think I was screaming. Zeke pushed him away. He pushed him because he was hurting me. And he fell. There was a terrible sound and the blood on the hearth. Blood,” she said again and huddled over her cup of water.