In Death 09 - Loyalty In Death by J.D. Robb

Author:J.D. Robb [Robb, J.D.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-04-29T04:00:00+00:00

Eve's gut clenched as the words played back in her head, and the sticky fear from childhood that went with it. "You're a grown woman. Why didn't you leave?"

"And go where?" Clarissa's eyes were ripe with despair. "Where would I go that he wouldn't find me?"

"Friends, family." She'd had none, Eve thought. She had no one.

Clarissa shook her head. "I didn't have any friends, and my family's gone. What people I knew -- the ones he let me know -- think B. D. is a great man. He beat me whenever he wanted, raped me whenever he chose. You don't know what it's like. You can't know what it's like to live with that, with the not knowing what he'll do, what he'll be like when he walks through the door."

Eve rose, walked away to the two-way mirror and stared at her own face. She knew exactly what it was like, too much what it was like. And the remembering, the feeling, would only cloud her objectivity. "And now, now that he won't walk through the door again?"

"He can't hurt me anymore." She said it simply, causing Eve to turn. "And I'll have to live with knowing I caused a good man, a gentle man to be responsible for his death. Any chance Zeke and I had to be together, to be happy, died tonight, too."

She laid her head on the rough table. Her weeping, Eve thought, was the sound of a heart breaking.

Eve ended the recording and stepping out, instructed the uniform to arrange to have Clarissa taken to her health center until morning.

She found McNab by the vending machine, scowling at his choices. "The droid?"

"She did a good job with him. He followed orders. I ran his program back and forward and sideways. She inputted orders -- retrieve the body by the hearth, transport it to the car, drive to the river, and dispose. There's nothing else in there. She wiped previous memory."

"Accident or design?"

"Can't tell. She'd have been rushed, nervous. It's easy to wipe out old with new programming if you're in a hurry."

"Yeah. How many other servants in that place?"

McNab took out his notes. "Four."

"And nobody hears anything, sees anything?"

"Two in the kitchen at the time in question. Personal maid upstairs, groundskeeper tucked in his shed."

"Tucked in his shed, in this weather?"

"They're all droids. The Bransons had full droid staff. Top quality."

"Figures." She rubbed her tired eyes. She'd think about that later, go through those steps and stages later. First priority was to clear Zeke of any chance of formal charges.

"Okay, I'm going to hit Zeke again. Peabody in there with him?"

"Yeah, and the lawyer. No way around running him through again?"

She dropped her hands and her eyes were cool. "We do this by the book. We fucking write the book with this one. Every step documented. This'll hit the media by morning. 'Tool and Toy Tycoon Killed by Wife's Lover. Suspect is the brother of a police officer assigned to Homicide. Investigation snagged. Body missing.'"

"Okay, okay.

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