Salvation in Death (In Death #27)(92)

She rose to go to the bag she’d dropped on the way to the bed, and took out a photo. She laid it on the bed. “I see him when I look at that. I see my father and what I did.”

He picked it up, studied the harsh crime scene still of the man sprawled on a filthy, littered floor, swimming in his own blood. “No child did this,” Roarke said. “Even a terrified, desperate child couldn’t, not in self-defense, not alone.”

She let out a breath. It probably wasn’t the time to mention he’d make a good cop. “No, there were two attackers. They established that as the wounds were from two different knives. Different blade types and sizes, different force, different angles. I expect one of them lured him there, and the other laid in wait. They came at him from the front and from behind. The sexual mutilation was post-mortem. She probably did that. But—”

“It amazes me,” he said quietly. “It astounds me that you can look at this kind of thing, every day. You can look every day and continue to care, every day. Don’t stand there and tell me you did the same. Don’t stand there and tell me you see yourself in her.”

He let the photo fall to the bed as he rose. “She wears the tattoo?”

“Yeah.”

“With a kill mark.”

“Yeah.”

“She’s proud of it, proud she’s killed. Tell me, Eve, can you tell me you have pride in any of the lives you’ve had to take?”

She shook her head. “It made me sick—no, made me want to be sick. And I couldn’t be. Wouldn’t be. I couldn’t think about it, not really think about it, until I got home. I could think about it here, in case I fell apart. I know we’re not the same. I know it. But there’s a parallel.”

“As there is between me and your victim.” He laid his hands on her shoulders. “And yet here we are, you and me. Here we are because somewhere along the line, those parallels verged, and took markedly different paths.”

She turned, picked up the photo to put it back in her bag. She’d look again. She would look again. “Two years ago—a little more—I wouldn’t have had anyone to say these things to. Even if I’d remembered what happened when I was eight, and before. Nobody, not even Mavis, and I can tell her anything. But I couldn’t show her a photo like that, I couldn’t ask her to look at that, and see what I see. I don’t know how long I could’ve kept looking, kept caring, if I didn’t have someone to come home to who’d look with me when I needed it.”

She sat on the bed again, sighed. “Jesus, it’s been a day. Penny knows more than she’s saying, and she’s hard. She’s got layers and layers of hard on her, slapped right over mean and possibly psychotic. I have to find the way through.”

“Do you think she killed him? Martinez?”

“No, but I think she made sure she was alibied tight because she knew it was going down. I think the ass**le loved her, and she loves no one. Maybe she used that against him. I need to think. I saw López, and Mira hit the target there. Lino’s killer confessed to his priest, and there’s nothing I can do. I look at this guy, Roarke, at López and I see another victim.”

“Do you think the killer will go after him?”

“I don’t know. I put him under surveillance. I could bring him in, legally, I could bring him in and wind him up for a few days, until the lawyers cut through it. But I need to leave him out, need to hope the killer will go back to him. And I look at him and I see he’s sick in his heart. I know he’s got this fist pounding on his conscience. There’s nothing I can do,” she repeated. “Just like there’s nothing López can do. We’re stuck, both of us, stuck with our duty.”

She flopped back on the bed. “I need to clear my head, come at it again. It winds all over hell and back. Flores—why him, and where did his path cross with Lino? Where the hell is Chávez? Dead? Hiding? What was Lino waiting for? Was he killed for that, or does it go back to the past? The bombings? He did both of them, I’m damn well sure, so—”

“You’re losing me.”

She pushed up again. “Sorry. I need to lay it out, reorganize, look at the time lines, change up my board. I need to do runs on a whole shitload of people and look at all that from various angles.”

“Then we’d best get started.” He took her hand, pulled her to her feet.

“Thanks.”

“Well, I owe you one for the call from Sinead.”

“Huh?”

“What do you take me for?” he asked, looping his arm around her waist. “My aunt just happens to get in touch the same morning I’m a bit off thinking about my connections in Ireland, and what—who—I’ve lost there? It’s nice to be looked after.”

“So that would be looking after as opposed to poking in and interfering? It’s hard to tell the difference.”

“It is, isn’t it? But we’ll muddle through it.”

As they passed, one of the house screens came on. “Your guests are coming through the gate,” Summerset announced.

“What guests?” Eve demanded

“Ah . . .” Roarke raked his fingers through his hair. “Yes. A moment.” He dismissed Summerset. “I’m sorry, it slipped my mind. I can go down, take care of it. I’ll simply tell them you’re still at work, which you will be.”