Forgotten in Death(48)

Annoyance fought a war with distress over DeWinter’s face. “Dallas—”

“He’s still a cop, head cop in some podunk town in Oklahoma.”

“Do you believe he came to New York and killed her?”

“No. I believe he broke her, mind, body, spirit, and she’d be alive today if he hadn’t. I want his badge. If her injuries occurred during the time frame of those nine years, I’ll make him pay.”

“I set aside other work to prioritize this case. You’ll have a full report in the morning.”

“I just got off the ’link with Alva’s brother.” Keep saying her name, Eve thought. Make it personal. “I had to tell him we found her, and she’s dead. Their father was a drunk, a junkie, and took off when she was twelve. Their mother went down in the Stillwater Riots when she was nineteen. Alva wanted to be a teacher, but she gave it up. Gave it all up. And when her family was settled, she married a cop.

“He broke her.”

“Damn it. Give me a minute.”

The screen went to holding blue.

“You have a way,” Roarke told her, and so deep was her focus, Eve jolted.

“Jesus, make some noise.”

“I have more for you when you’re finished badgering Garnet. I’ll tell you over pie.”

DeWinter came back. “I haven’t organized this into a report as yet.”

“Just give me the time line. The report can wait.”

“I determined that the victim was forty-six years of age at TOD. The earlier, nonfatal injuries occurred over a period of eight to nine years. The victim would have sustained these injuries after the age of twenty-four and before the age of thirty-five, with the earliest, the fractured rib, occurring at approximately age twenty-five and the severe orbital injury and the later break on the finger of the right hand at approximately age thirty-three. I have more specific data on each injury, but any and all ages will be approximate and within a small margin of error.”

“She was twenty-four when she married the son of a bitch. She’d have been twenty-five when he relocated her across the state from her family. The orbital and other facial injuries? That would come in shortly before the ID wash and replacement.”

“Then you have what you need. And you’ll know he very likely abused her before they relocated. Slaps, intimidation, shoves, and so on that wouldn’t show.”

“Yeah, I know how it works, like I know it wouldn’t show up now how many times he raped her.”

“No.” DeWinter took another small sip of wine. “It wouldn’t. I hope you’ll succeed in making him pay. I hope our work here helps you do that.”

“Get me the report. I’ll do the rest. Thanks—when he pays, you get part of that, so you earned the wine.”

“I already earned the wine by convincing my daughter that despite not having school tomorrow, she still has a bedtime. And now I’ll drink it. Good night.”

“You have what you needed,” Roarke said as he came back in. He set a slice of pie beside her before taking a seat at her auxiliary with his own.

“Yeah, I do.” She took a bite. “God. Really good pie.”

“Are we going to Oklahoma?”

“No.” Unless she had absolutely, totally, and completely no choice.

“Town chief of police, that’s an appointed position. I’ll do a run on the mayor, the town council, whoever, see if I get a sense who’d back him, who won’t. I get that started, and I contact the fuck, tell him about Alva, get him to come to me.”

“Your turf, your box.”

“Damn right. I send a copy of DeWinter’s report, which will have pictures of the injuries and be all scientific and inarguable, to whoever’s in charge back there. And I’ll let them know big, bad New York cops are going to be talking to people out there, getting the county and state boys interested in talking to people. People like the second ex-wife, neighbors, voters.”

She took another bite. Angled her head as another thought occurred. “And I’ve got a way to spread the word on him, spread it far, spread it thick. After I get the report.”

He let out a short laugh. “I believe I know how you intend to spread that word. Nadine’s on book tour, you know.”

“She’s a reporter right down to the soles of her fancy shoes. Spreading the word’s what she does.” She ate more pie. “I may not be able to nail him for Alva—think I can, but if not? Abusers like that don’t change. There’ll be plenty of others with stories to tell once the door opens. He’ll lose the badge and have civil if not criminal charges up to his ass before I’m finished.”

“I may be able to help you with that.”

“You know any muckety-mucks in Oklahoma?”

“Most likely, but I found someone who may be able to speak for Alva. I found the source of the ID.”

“That’s quick work.”

“I was nearly there, and it fell into place after a thought and another conversation I had.”

“What thought? Who’d you talk to?”

“Shelters create official IDs—quite legally, through a process. But when you look at abuse shelters, those who seek shelter there aren’t always looking for that. They may often want to disappear, just as Alva did. And so it occurred to me there might be some willing to help with that.”