Naked in Death - J. D. Robb [78]
“Jesus, where’d you come from?” She let out a long, cleansing breath as she replaced her weapon. “There’s a cat,” she added for the record, and when it blinked at her, flashing one gold and one green eye, she bent down to scoop it up.
The purring sounded like a small, well oiled engine.
Shifting him, she took out her communicator and called for a homicide team.
A short time later, Eve was in the kitchen, watching the cat sniff with delicate disdain at a bowl of food she’d unearthed when she heard the raised voices outside the apartment door.
When she went to investigate, she found the uniform she’d posted trying to restrain a frantic and very determined woman.
“What’s the problem here, officer?”
“Lieutenant.” With obvious relief, the uniform deferred to her superior. “The civilian demands entry. I was—”
“Of course I demand entry.” The woman’s dark red hair, cut in a perfect wedge, moved and settled around her face with each jerky movement. “This is my mother’s home. I want to know what you’re doing here.”
“And your mother is?” Eve prompted.
“Mrs. Castle. Mrs. Georgie Castle. Was there a break-in?” Anger turned to worry as she tried to squeeze past Eve. “Is she all right? Mom?”
“Come with me.” Eve took a firm hold of her arm and steered her inside and into the kitchen. “What’s your name?”
“Samantha Bennett.”
The cat left his bowl and walked over to curl around and through Samantha’s legs. In a gesture Eve recognized as habitual and automatic, Samantha bent to give the cat one quick scratch between the ears.
“Where’s my mother?” Now that the worry was heading toward fear, Samantha’s voice cracked.
There was no part of the job Eve dreaded more than this, no aspect of police work that scraped at her heart with such dull blades.
“I’m sorry, Ms. Bennett. “I’m very sorry. Your mother’s dead.”
Samantha said nothing. Her eyes, the same warm honey tone as her mother’s, unfocused. Before she could fold, Eve eased her into a chair. “There’s a mistake,” she managed. “There has to be a mistake. We’re going to the movies. The nine o’clock show. We always go to the movies on Tuesdays.” She stared up at Eve with desperately hopeful eyes. “She can’t be dead. She’s barely fifty, and she’s healthy. She’s strong.”
“There’s no mistake. I’m sorry.”
“There was an accident?” Those eyes filled now, flowed over. “She had an accident?”
“It wasn’t an accident.” There was no way but one to get it down. “Your mother was murdered.”
“No, that’s impossible.” The tears kept flowing. Her voice hitched over them as she continued to shake her head in denial. “Everyone liked her. Everyone. No one would hurt her. I want to see her. I want to see her now.”
“I can’t let you do that.”
“She’s my mother.” Tears plopped on her lap even as her voice rose. “I have the right. I want to see my mother.”
Eve clamped both hands on Samantha’s shoulders, forcing her back into the chair she’d sprung from. “You’re not going to see her. It wouldn’t help her. It wouldn’t help you. What you’re going to do is answer my questions, and that’s going to help me find who did this to her. Now, do you want me to get you something? Call anyone for you?”
“No. No.” Samantha fumbled in her purse for a tissue. “My husband, my children. I’ll have to tell them. My father. How can I tell them?”
“Where is your father, Samantha?”
“He lives—he lives in Westchester. They divorced about two years ago. He kept the house because she wanted to move into the city. She wanted to write books. She wanted to be a writer.”
Eve turned to the filtered water unit on the counter, glugged out a glass, pressed it on Samantha. “Do you know how your mother made her living?”
“Yes.” Samantha pressed her lips together, crushed the damp tissue in her chilled fingers. “No one could talk her out of it. She used to laugh and say it was time she did something shocking, and what wonderful research it was for her books. My mother—” Samantha broke off to drink. “She got married very young. A few years ago, she said she needed to move on, see what else there was. We couldn’t talk her out of