“My mother’s dead. My wife’s in prison, charged with her murder. With maybe trying to kill me. For God’s sake, how can you make it easier?”
I guess I can’t.
“I need to talk to Zana. I want to see her.”
Eve nodded. “Yeah, fine. You’re free to go down for visitation once they spring you.”
“There’ll be an explanation. You’ll see.”
You won’t, she decided. Maybe you can’t . “Good luck, Bobby.”
* * *
She went home, hating that she’d closed a case and still carried a sense of discouragement, of failure. The man would be manipulated. Maybe the system would as well.
She’d closed the case, but it wasn’t over. Sometimes, she thought, they never were.
She walked in, glanced at Summerset. “Let’s just keep this moratorium going another few hours. I’m too damn tired to screw around with you.”
She went straight to the bedroom. And there he was, stripped to the waist, pulling a T-shirt out of a drawer.
“Lieutenant. I don’t have to ask you about your day. It’s all over your face. She slipped through?”
“No, I got her. Full confession, for what it’s worth. PA’s going with Murder Two on Trudy, reckless endangerment on Bobby. She’ll go over, and for a long time.”
He pulled on the shirt as he crossed to her. “What is it?”
“I just left the hospital. Told Bobby.”
“You would do that yourself,” Roarke murmured, and touched her hair. “How horrible was it?”
“As much as it gets. He doesn’t believe it, or part of him does. You could see part of him knew I was giving it to him straight. It’s more he won’t see it, won’t accept it. He’s going to go down there, talk to her. She claimed he’d end up paying for her lawyers, and you know, she’s going to be right.”
Roarke slid his arms around her. “Love. Who can argue with it?”
“He’s a victim.” She dropped her forehead to his. “And one I can’t reach.”
“He’s a grown man, making his own decisions. Not helpless, Eve.” He tipped her face up. “You did your job.”
“I did my job. So what am I bitching about? It didn’t tie up the way I wanted. That’s the breaks. Nice that you’re here, though. Good that you’re here.”
She turned, wandered over toward the tree.
“What else?”
“She said we were alike. We’re not, I know we’re not. But there’s a piece of me like her, and that piece knows how she could pick up that sap and whale away. There’s a piece of me that understands that.”
“Eve, if you didn’t have that piece, didn’t understand why some use it and you don’t, you wouldn’t be such a damn good cop.”
Weight simply slid off her shoulders as she turned and looked at him. “Yeah. Yeah. You’re right. I knew there was a reason I kept you around.”
She walked back to him, tugged on the sleeve of his T-shirt. “What’s this for, ace?”
“I thought I’d grab a workout, but my wife got home earlier than expected.”
“I could use one myself. Burn off some of this annoyance.” She stepped back to remove her weapon harness, then angled her head. “If you found out I’d been putting on a sham, that I’d hooked you just to get to your bottomless vault of moolah, what would you do about it?”
He gave her that wicked smile, that bolt of blue from the eyes. “Why now, darling Eve, I’d kick your sorry ass, then invest a great deal of that moolah in making the rest of your life bloody hell.”
More weight lifted, and she grinned at him. “Yeah, that’s what I thought. I’m a very lucky woman.”
She tossed her weapon on the chair, dropped her badge beside it. Then she reached for his hand, linked fingers, and for a little while, put the job away.