Reunion in Death (In Death #14)(89)

"You mean, like paper?" McNab asked. "I'm EDD. We don't use paper. That would just be wrong."

"Give me your e-book." She snatched it from him, coded in a few key phrases. "Go around and knock. Try to look like a cop for a change. Pass this to Trueheart, tell him to pass it to her, then you get out again. Got that?"

"You bet." He scanned the miniscreen as he hurried out.

Shatter her fantasies

Implicate husband

Make her talk about victim-by name

Obstacle angle was good, keep using it

Watch her hands. Plays with wedding ring when she's nervous

Dallas

It made McNab grin, so he had to take a minute to set his face into serious lines before he knocked.

"From Dallas," he whispered, putting his mouth close to Trueheart's ear, and adding the little flourish of skimming a hard look over Maureen.

"I beg your pardon, Officer Peabody." Trueheart stepped to the table. "This data just came in."

He handed her the mini-unit, then stepped back to his post.

When Peabody read the note, she experienced a flood of relief, a geyser of new energy. Very carefully, she set the unit screen down on the table, folded her hands over it.

"What is that?" Maureen demanded. "What did he mean by data?"

"It's nothing to worry about," Peabody said in a tone that indicated there was a great deal to worry about. "Can you tell me, Mrs. Stibbs, when you and Mr. Stibbs began to see each other as more than friends?"

"What difference does that make?" Maureen looked down fearfully at the e-book. "If you're trying to intimate that there was anything going on before Boyd was free-"

"I'm trying to get a timeline, a picture before and after Marsha's murder. Women know when a man's interested in them. Was Boyd interested in you?"

"Boyd would never, never have betrayed his vows. Marriage isn't a convenience to him."

"The way it was with Marsha."

"She didn't fully appreciate him, but he would never have blamed her for it."

"But you did."

"That's not what I said. I simply meant that she wasn't as devoted to the marriage as it looked from the outside."

"And you, being a friend of both Boyd's and Marsha's were on the inside, and saw the flaws. Boyd was even deeper inside this relationship. The flaws must have been very apparent to him. Very distressing if he felt Marsha was careless about the marriage, about his happiness."

"She wouldn't see he was unhappy."

"But you did. You saw he was unhappy, consoled him when he talked to you about it."

"No. No. I never... he never. He-he's a very tolerant man. He never said a bad word about Marsha. Not ever. I have to get home."

"Was he tolerant enough to overlook infidelity? To do laundry, fix his own meals while his wife sneaks around having sex with another man? I didn't know there were still saints in the world. Does it ever worry you, Mrs. Stibbs, that you may be married to a man who arranged for his first wife's death?"

"Are you crazy? Boyd would never-he's incapable. You can't possibly believe he had anything to do with... with what happened. He wasn't even there."

"An out-of-town business trip's a smart alibi." Peabody eased back in her chair, nodded wisely. "Did you ever wonder if he'd suspected his wife was sleeping around? The letters were right there. The signs were all around him. He could have stewed about it for days, weeks, until he bubbled over. Until he paid someone to come in while he was gone, hit her over the head, and dump her body in the tub. Then he comes home and plays the grieving husband."

"I won't have you say that. I won't sit here and listen to you say such things." She pushed back from the table with enough force to knock over the water glass. "Boyd would never have hurt her. He'd never hurt anyone. He's a gentle man. A decent man."

"A decent man is capable of a great deal when he finds out the woman he loves is screwing another man in his bed."

"He wouldn't lay a hand on Marsha, or allow anyone else to."

"A moment of rage when he found the letters."

"How could he find them when they weren't there?"

She was wild-eyed and panting. Peabody felt a cool control settle over her.

"No, the letters weren't there, because you wrote them and you put them in her drawer after you killed her. You killed Marsha Stibbs because she was your obstacle to Boyd-a man you wanted and she didn't prize him enough to suit you. You wanted Marsha's husband and her life and her marriage, so you took them."

"No." Maureen pressed her hands to her cheeks, shook her head. "No. No."

"She didn't deserve him." Peabody had the hammer now and used it to coldly shatter Maureen with fast, hard strokes. "But you did. He needed you, someone like you to tend to him the way she wouldn't. She didn't love him, not the way you did."

"She didn't need him. She didn't need anyone."

"Did you confront her when Boyd was out of town? Did you tell her she wasn't good enough for him? He deserved better, didn't he? He deserved you."

"No. I don't want to be here anymore. I need to go home."