Salvation in Death (In Death #27)(118)

“Yeah, I bet he felt bad.”

“Bad enough so he killed Chávez. He said he tried to stop Steve from slicing and dicing the priest, and hey, it just happened. Besides, he’d enough of the screwups. He buried them out where he’d buried Ortega.”

“Where?”

“You want the where?” Penny’s eyes went sly. “I can give you the where but, the charges go away—all the way.”

“My client has valuable information,” Montoya put in. “She’s cooperating. I believe if you want further information, further cooperation, the charges must be dropped. I’m sure the families of these men want closure.”

Eve didn’t have to fake the disgusted look. “You tell me where, and the bodies of Miguel Flores, José Ortega, and Steven Chávez are recovered, the falsifying docs and resisting go away.”

“He said he buried them, all of them about fifty miles south of Vegas, in this place the native guys call Devil’s Church because there’s this rock formation thing with what looks like a cross on top. He put them in right at the base. He always had that religion thing in him, see? He liked burying them under the cross.”

Penny sneered, tipped back in the chair again. “Nice doing business with you, pu**y cop.”

Eve studied her face. That was the truth, as Penny knew it. “We’ve got more business. Now we go back, Penny, we come home and go back. The bombings in 2043.”

“That was Lino’s deal. And with no charges on record, I’m free to go. Bitch.”

“No, bitch, you’re not. You had prior knowledge regarding the bombings. You knew he intended to set both those bombs, blaming the first on the Skulls. It’s called accessory.”

“I was, like, fifteen, what the hell did I know?”

“Enough, according to my witness, to be a part of the planning and execution of the first, and to help plan the second. And push the button yourself.”

“You can’t prove that.”

“I’ve got a witness, willing and able to testify. That wraps you up in six murder charges.”

“Bullshit. Bullshit.” She slapped at Montoya when he started to speak. “I know how to handle myself here, ass**le. I was a minor. So what if I pushed the button, so the f**k what? If there’d been twice as many ass**les blown to hell when I did, it doesn’t mean dick. Clemency Order covers me.”

“You’d think, but the PA’s just chomping to challenge that, and given the fact you were neither arrested nor charged for that crime before or during the Clemency period, you’re fair game.”

“What kind of shit is this? It’s bull.” She looked to her lawyer. “It’s bull. I was a minor.”

“Just don’t say anything. Lieutenant,” Montoya began, in a tone of outrage, “my client—”

“Not done yet. You’ll also find on the menu conspiracy to murder Lino Martinez. She didn’t toss the ’link, Penny. And now that she knows your finger was on the button, she’s cooperating fully.”

“That bitch Juanita killed Lino.” Penny shoved to her feet, stabbing a finger in the air. “I never touched him. I was never in that goddamn church. Juanita Turner did Lino, and she can’t pin it on me.”

“I never said who she was,” Eve commented.

“I don’t give a shit what you said. Juanita poisoned Lino, over her kid. You can’t pin that on me. I wasn’t f**king there.”

“That’s why it’s called conspiracy to murder.”

“I want a deal. I want a deal and I’ll tell you just how she did it. Shut the f**k up!” she screamed at Montoya when he tried to silence her. “Listen, just listen.” She sat back down. “The bitch went psycho when she found out Lino was back, that he’d been back, using the priest cover.”

“How’d she find that out?”

“Look, so I let it slip one day, that’s all. I let it slip. It’s not a crime. She’s the one who did it. She used Old Man Ortiz’s funeral for cover, got the keys out of the rectory. She poisoned the wine. She did it because her son got blown to hell, and her old man offed himself.”

“Thanks for confirming it, on record—which is, again, why it’s called conspiracy to murder. There’s also accessory after the fact in the matter of the murders of Miguel Flores and José Ortega and Steven Chávez.”

“What the f**k! What the f**k! Why don’t you say something?” she demanded of the lawyer.

“I think he’s struck dumb.”

“We had a deal. On record—”

“For the fraud, for the assault with intent on a police officer. No deal on the rest.” Now it was Eve who tipped back in her chair. “I could afford to let those slide, seeing as you’ll be in for, oh, a couple lifetimes. Off-planet, concrete cage, no possibility of parole. And even though those words sing to me, that’s not everything you deserve. Detectives.”

At her word, Stuben and Kohn came in. “The charges are murder in the first,” Stuben began, “in the deaths of . . .”

He spoke all the names, all the dead from 2043. When Penny leaped up, Eve simply wrenched her arms behind her back and cuffed her.

“I thought you’d like to take her down, book her,” she said to the detectives. “On all the charges.”