She set the coffee cup aside, folded her hands together. “It frightened me—you understand.”
“Yeah. He was physical with you?”
“Initially, yes. Rough, I suppose, and completely sure I’d be responsive. He backed off, laughed, claimed he was just testing me for his cousin. He never touched me again. But . . .”
“Spill it,” Eve demanded. “You’re not helping if you hold back.”
“I’m not, and I won’t hold back.”
She picked up the coffee again, just stared into it. “I’ve given this a great deal of thought, and concluded I’m being rational rather than reactionary. Eve, women like you and I, women who’ve suffered sexual abuse, we have a sense about predators. For us, it helps us with our work, for others it’s a survival instinct. These men were predators. I recognized it in them. I assumed they simply hunted the willing, then discarded them. But, yes, I believe these men could have formed a bond, a pact that crossed the line from the willing.”
Mira set the coffee aside again, pressed her fingers to her eyes. “And because I assumed, because I didn’t look deeply enough, it may very well be that women who were their victims have crossed the line into murder.”
“That’s bullshit.” Annoyed, Eve jabbed a finger into Mira’s shoulder. “And bullshit doesn’t help, either. Unless you’re going to tell me you’re all of a sudden a sensitive who can see into somebody’s head or the future or the past, being a smart shrink doesn’t mean you know every damn thing about every damn body. We may have a couple of victims who crossed their own line, but that’s a choice they made.”
“That’s completely unsympathetic and oddly comforting.” And comforted, Mira took the hand Eve had jabbed her with. “I can know in my head you’re right. It’s harder to get the rest of me there.”
“Here’s something that might help. The two victims?” Eve gestured toward her board and the crime scene images. “Did they have any other ‘brothers,’ any other close friends with similar ‘predilections,’ to use your fancy word?”
“I . . . Oh God.”
“Yeah.” Eve hooked her thumbs in her pockets, studied the board. “They may not be finished serving justice.”
While Mira absorbed that, Eve tossed out the next. “These three women.” She tapped a finger on MacKensie, Downing, and Su. “I’m looking hard at them. Su’s Downing’s alibi, Su went to Yale, Su went to one of those life enhancement centers—Inner Peace—and so did MacKensie. Different times, but they both end up there. And Su and Downing both did—separate—sessions in an insomnia study.”
“That many connections . . . You can’t put them together—at Inner Peace or in the studies. But—”
“Yeah, but.”
“I don’t know that organization. Inner Peace.”
“Maybe you could find out more about it.” Which would not only give Mira something tangible to do, but would save Eve the time. “Whoever’s in charge there would be more likely to talk to you than to a cop. Same with the insomnia deal. I can get you the contact, the dates of each suspect’s term.”
“Yes. Yes, let me see what I can do on those.” With a brisk nod, Mira rose, gathered up her coat and scarf. She stood a moment, studying the board. “Those three,” she murmured. “What did Edward and Jonas do that could make those women—if you’re right—murder so brutally?”
13
Eve checked out Wymann’s second wife, and crossed her off. The woman had married again, and again aimed for the older and the wealthy. She was now sitting pretty in a villa in the south of France.
Still, she poked a little more, and came up with an alibi, as wife number two had been cohosting a winter gala in Cannes at the time of Senator Mira’s abduction. The international style and society pages were full of reports and photos—and fashion critiques.
Reading them made Eve’s brain ache.
Not the wives, she thought, angling to study her board. They’d moved on. But others hadn’t.
She toggled back to Charity Downing. And Downing took her to Lydia Su, who’d attended Yale and, like MacKensie, Inner Peace. Time to talk to Downing’s alibi.
Before she did, there was something she could do from her desk. She contacted Edward Mira’s daughter.
The woman looked pale and drawn, but fully awake. “Lieutenant Dallas.”
“Sorry to disturb you this early.”
“It doesn’t matter. We’re not getting a lot of sleep around here. Have you found my father’s killer?”
“Working on it. If I ask you who are his closest friends—for now stick with his age group—who comes immediately to mind?”
“Oh, well. Jonas Wymann. They go all the way back to Yale.”
“Right. Anyone else?”
“Ah, Frederick Betz. He and my father and Mr. Wymann—and Marshall Easterday—all went to Yale together. They had a group house together. And there’s Senator Fordham. They became good friends when my father was a senator. Is that helpful?”
“Yeah, it is. Mrs. Sykes, the media reports are going to start hitting soon. Jonas Wymann was murdered early this morning, in the same manner as your father.”
“What?” Her eyes went blank. “What? I don’t . . . Why? Why is this happening?”
“I’m working on that, too. Can you think of anyone who would want to cause your father and Wymann harm? Who might link them together?”
“I don’t understand any of this. I’m sorry, I don’t understand this. He—Mr. Wymann—he used to sneak Ned and me little chocolates when we were kids. He’s dead. Murdered. Like my father?”
“I’m sorry. If you or your brother think of anything that connects them, of anyone who might have a grudge against them, let me know.”
“I need to contact Ned. I don’t want him to hear about this on screen. The others, the others you asked about. You think someone might do this to them?”
“It’s something we need to consider. I’ll be speaking with them. If anyone else comes to mind, contact me. Anytime.”
“I will. I’ll ask Ned. Thank you for telling me. I need to . . . I have to go.”
Eve pulled up addresses, started to push away from her desk when her ’link signaled. She might have ignored it, but she saw Baxter on the display.
“Dallas. What’ve you got?”
“A lot of shock from the work contacts we’ve pulled out of bed so far, and a handful of names we pried out. Ladies he’s dated in the last year or so. For an older guy, he gets a lot of touch. We’ve talked to two of them so far. More shock. Shaky alibis all around for TOD as everyone we’ve talked to claimed to have been home in bed. Some spouses or cohabs to corroborate, but that stays shaky in my books.”
“Find out if any of the sidepieces went to Yale, or has a connection to Yale. Any of them do a stint at a place called Inner Peace.”
“Can do. None of the names we’ve got cross with the ones on the senator’s list. Looks like they didn’t poach each other’s forest.”
A man who’d poach on his cousin’s fiancée would poach on a friend’s skirt, Eve thought. “We’ll see about that. Any Yale connection, any Realtors, anybody looking for inner fricking peace, tag me.”
“Got it. One more thing. We rousted his admin out of bed, and once we’d calmed her down, we got she’d spoken to him via ’link at about three in the afternoon. He was pretty broken up about his pal, taking the day at home. And she confirmed he had plans to see his grandson’s performance last night. But here’s something. He had a four o’clock on the books. She asked him if he wanted her to cancel, and he decided to go ahead with it.”
“What appointment?”