Portrait in Death (In Death #16)(94)

"He's got a soft spot for me."

"That he does. We're told you're in the middle of a difficult case now."

"They're all difficult, because someone's dead who shouldn't be."

"Of course, you're right." Intrigued, Sinead watched her as meat sizzled in the pan. "And you solve the thing."

"No. You never solve anything, because someone's dead who shouldn't be," Eve repeated. "They can't get up out of the grave, so it can't be solved. All you can do is close the case, and trust the system for justice."

"And is there justice?"

"If you keep at it long enough."

"You closed this one quickly," Roarke began, then stopped when he saw her face. "You didn't close it."

"Not yet."

For a moment, there was only the sound of the meat frying in the skillet. "Lieutenant, I wouldn't have pulled you away from your work."

"You didn't. I pulled myself away."

"Eve-"

"Why are you badgering the girl, and here she's not even had her breakfast." To settle a matter that looked to her would heat up as quickly as the bacon, Sinead heaped food on plates, set them down. "If she's as brilliant as you say, she ought to know what she's about."

"Thanks." Eve picked up a fork, exchanged her first comfortable look with Sinead. "Looks great."

"I'll leave you to it then, as I've some things to see to upstairs. Don't worry about the dishes when you're done."

"I think I like her," Eve commented when they were alone, then poked a fat sausage with her fork. "Is this from Pig?"

"Most likely. Eve, I want to be sorry you felt it necessary to leave in the middle of an investigation, but I'm so bloody glad you're here. I haven't been able to find my balance, haven't been able to settle myself since I found out about my mother. I've handled the entire business badly. Bungled it, top to bottom."

"Guess you did." She tried a bite of sausage, approved. "It's nice to know you can screw up now and again, like the rest of us mortals."

"I couldn't find my balance," he repeated, "until I stood out there in the mist of the morning and saw you. Simple as that for me, it seems. There she is, so my life's where it should be, whatever's going on around it. You know the worst of me, but you came. I think what's here, though I don't understand it all yet, haven't taken it all in, may be the best of me. I want you to be part of that."

"You went to Dallas with me. You saw me through that, even though it was about as rough on you as it was on me. You've shuffled your work and your schedule around more times than I can count to help me out-even when I didn't want you to."

He smiled now. "Especially when you didn't."

"You're part of my life, even the parts I wanted you clear of. So, same goes, Roarke. For better or worse, or all the crap that's in between, I love you." She scooped up eggs. "We straight on that?"

"As an arrow."

"Good." And so were the eggs, she discovered. "Why don't you tell me about these people?"

"There's a lot of them to start. There's Sinead, who was my mother's twin. Her husband, Robbie, who works the farm here with Sinead's brother Ned. Sinead and Robbie have three grown children, who would be my cousins, and between them, there are five more children, and two more on the way."

"Good God."

"Haven't even gotten started," he said with a laugh. "Ned, he's married to Mary Katherine, or maybe it's Ailish. I'm good at names, you know, but all these names and faces and bodies were coming down like a flood. They've four children, cousins of mine, and they've managed to make five-no I think it might be six more. Then there's Sinead's younger brother, that's Fergus, who lives in Ennis and works in his wife's family's restaurant business. I think her name's Meghan, but I'm not entirely sure."

"Doesn't matter." Already feeling crowded, Eve waved her fork.

"But there's so many more." He grinned now, and ate as he hadn't been able to do for days. "My grandparents. Imagine having grandparents."

"I can't," she said after a moment.

"Neither can I, though I appear to have them. They've been married nearly sixty years now, and they're hearty. They live now in a cottage over the hill to the west. They didn't want the big house, I'm told, when their children were grown and married, so it came to Sinead as she was the one who wanted it most."

He paused, and she said nothing. Just waited for him to finish.

"They don't want anything from me." Still puzzled by it, he broke a slice of toasted brown bread in two. "Nothing that I expected them to want. There's none of this, 'Well now, we could use a bit of the ready since you've so much and we're in the way of being family.' Or 'You owe us for all the years that've gone by.' Not even the 'Who the hell do you think you are, coming around here, you son of a murdering bastard.' I'd expected any of those things, would have understood that. Instead it's 'Ah, there you are, it's Siobhan's boy. We're glad to see you.'"