Taken in Death (In Death #37.5)(10)

She pulled up at the house, in front of the sweepers’ van, and drew her signaling ’link out of her pocket. She scanned the text from Roarke as she got out of the car. “Good. It’s good. We’ve got some juice in Sweden, and Roarke’s got some data on the suspect. When Mira comes through, we’ll have a clearer picture.”

“Baxter and Trueheart will put things together and head in. It’s weird working out of the crime scene.”

“We make do.” She walked in, skirted around the sweepers at work. “Go ahead and check the girl kid’s room for the toy.”

Eve did a quick walk-through of the first floor and determined that the living area, despite the blood spatter and pool, provided the best space for the work.

Still, she stepped off into the kitchen to read the data Roarke had accumulated.

“Found it!” Peabody walked in, waving the second Jamboree. “The kids’ rooms are pretty tidy.”

“Good. Feeney will have two to play with. Maj Borgstrom, incarcerated in institution for violent tendencies/criminal acts. She was treated by Dr. Dolph Edquist, deceased, and subsequently by Filip Edquist—looks like the first shrink’s son. He’s dead, too. Open case they’re calling a bungled burglary.”

“Well, the evil witch couldn’t have had anything to do with the second Edquist’s death if she was locked up.”

“She wasn’t. Two years ago she was, by the second Edquist, deemed ready and rehabilitated enough for a transfer to a halfway house. She had to wear a bracelet. Eighteen months ago, a week before Edquist was killed, she walked out of the new facility, leaving her bracelet behind in her room.”

“Well, shit.”

“Two days before his death, the recently divorced Edquist made a cash withdrawal in the amount of whatever three hundred and fifty grand in U.S. dollars is in Swedish money, and had arranged for a private shuttle to transport him and a companion to Argentina. False identification and documents listing Edquist as Artur Gruber were found on the premises. But none of the cash. Also missing were an estimated eighty-five thousand in jewelry and other easily portable valuables.”

“And another scoop of shit. She vamped the doctor.”

“That’s one way to put it.” Eve leaned back against the kitchen island. “It reads he fell for her, helped get her into a less-secure facility, and planned to run away with her to South America. So she killed him, took the money, and whatever false ID he’d had made for her, and at some point made her way here.”

“Why did she wait so long to take the kids?”

“She had to find her sister. Maybe she started the hunt while she was vamping the idiot doctor. She has to find them, scope things out, get a place she can keep them.”

“How was he killed?”

“Stabbed. Like her father—and like the father, like the nanny, she carved her little witch symbol on his chest. The cops over there haven’t been able to trace her. Edquist’s body wasn’t found for three days. He’d taken vacation time, so nobody was looking for him. She had plenty of time to get gone. Plenty of time to track Tosha and plan the rest.”

Eve took out her signaling ’link again. “Contact Jenkinson, let him and Reineke know we’re setting up here.”

“Eve.” Mira came on. “I was able to reach out to the head of the institution in Stockholm. He believes Maj Borgstrom may be responsible for the deaths of two psychiatrists, father and son, who treated her.”

“I got the second one, stabbed during burglary, with a heavy suspicion the suspect vamped—Peabody’s term—the doctor.”

“The term’s likely accurate. The senior doctor treated her for nearly eighteen years, with limited success. Though during her first few years she displayed violent behavior, had to be restrained or given sedation, she learned to control the behavior. The key is control,” Mira stressed. “And to use that control for gain. More privileges. Though she expressed remorse for her actions, the senior doctor considered this a mask. His son began to assist in her treatment about five years ago, and disagreed with his father’s analysis.”

Mira paused. “We’ll make a long story short. Less than thirty minutes after a session with the suspect—which was recorded—the senior doctor died of an apparent cardiac arrest. He was alive when she left his office, but there are a number of medications or combination of medications on site that could induce a heart attack. The suspect had spent considerable time in the infirmary, and in fact, had studied alternative medicine while confined.”

“Not enough to lay it on her.”

“No, there wasn’t enough. The younger doctor took over her case and her treatment.”

“And had her released to a halfway facility. Six months later, he’s dead, she’s gone.”

“Yes. Eve, there were two more deaths at the institution during her last ten years there. One patient, one medical. There wasn’t enough evidence to charge her.”

“Stabbings?”

“The patient, yes. The medical initially looked like an accidental overdose, but was ruled homicide.”

“And still she gets a pass to a halfway house?”

“I’ll send you the case files. In talking with the head of psychiatry, and with his permission reading some of the first Dr. Edquist’s findings, I can tell you she’s paranoid delusional. She believes her sister’s very existence diminishes her, threatens her. Where most healthy twins form a bond, she sees her sister as an opposing force. She needs to eradicate her in order to be completely whole, to reach her true potential.”