Blood Trust - Eric van Lustbader [20]
“Henry, I imagine there is a backlog of calls impatiently awaiting your attention.”
Carson grunted, rose, and, crossing the carpet, went out the door, closing it softly behind him.
Jenkins took a deep breath, then turned to Alli. “Now, my dear, what is it you wish to say?” Seeing her quick glance at the closed door, he added, “Anything you tell me is privileged information … even from your uncle.”
Alli worried her lower lip before she put her elbows on her knees. “Someone is framing me. I mean there’s no way I dosed my roommate or killed Billy. God!”
He nodded sagely.
“You don’t believe me.”
“What makes you say that?”
Alli ran a hand through her hair. “This is a nightmare.” She cleared her throat. “Everyone thinks I’m suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome.”
Jenkins waited a moment. “That’s it?”
“Yes.”
“So it’s your contention that you’re fine.”
“I didn’t poison anyone, I didn’t kill anyone.”
He slid back in his chair and pursed his lips. “I’ll take that into consideration.”
“I’d like to speak to Jack.”
“Would you now?” Jenkins had a way of saying no without actually saying the word. “It is your uncle’s opinion that you have formed a … how shall I put it?… an unnatural attachment to Jack McClure.”
She stared at him, wide-eyed. “And you believe that?”
“It doesn’t matter what I believe. I work for your uncle.”
She stared out the one window at the snaking gravel driveway. All of a sudden, she took up a poker from the fireplace and slammed it against the window. It bounced off, as if the pane was made of rubber. Alli swung again and again, grunting with each swing, without even a single crack to show for her effort.
She whirled on Jenkins just as the door burst open and a man with the massive sloping shoulders and raw, red face of a weightlifter rushed in.
Jenkins raised a placating hand. “It’s all right, Rudy. No harm done.”
As if to prove his words, he crossed to where Alli stood and took the poker from her. Rudy relieved him of it, and, with a last look at Alli, went out of the study, closing the door behind him.
“The windows are both bulletproof and alarmed,” Jenkins said.
Alli turned to the attorney. “I used to come here when I was a kid. I broke that window once. When did that happen?”
“Five years ago,” Jenkins said. “Maybe six.”
“So I’m a prisoner in my uncle’s house.”
“I’m afraid so.”
His words hung in the room for some time. A phone rang distantly and then stopped. A dog began to bark somewhere outside, its excitement rising.
“You’re both mental as anything.” Her voice was thin and ragged with despair. She felt herself crawl back into the shell she had created for herself when she had been kidnapped.
Jenkins appeared to be aware of this, because he said in his most soothing voice, “The most absurd aspect of the accusation is, of course, the torture. Scientific study tells us that the female of the species, though she can be as cold-blooded and capable of murder as a male, rarely has the stomach for torture. On the other hand, it is the torture of William Warren, so disturbing by its very nature, that is dictating this rush to judgment, at least in my estimation. It’s also the largest question mark. What did his killer or killers want from him? What information did he possess that they needed to go to such extreme lengths to get from him?”
He regarded her steadily. Clearly, he was looking for an answer from her. She shook her head. “I can’t say. I really didn’t know him that well.”
“Come on, Alli, you two were carrying on a love affair for five months.”
“That’s just it,” Alli said, “it wasn’t a love affair.”
“No, what was it then?”
“I was…” Her eyes darted away for a moment. “I was trying to regain a sense of myself, to, I don’t know, feel my body again, to be in control of it again.”
Jenkins sat studying her for a while, or perhaps he was pondering her words. At last, he said, “Did you care about Mr. Warren?”
“Of course I did.” She hesitated, but it was clear she had more to say. “But not … just not in the way you think.”
“What do you think I meant?”
“We weren