The In Death Collection Books 21-25 - J. D. Robb [3]
“AutoChef in her bedroom, another in the living area, one in each guest room, one in her home office, one in her home gym.”
Eve wandered to one of the banks of windows. She preferred the dull, rainy day outside to the perky pink of the waiting area. Fall of 2059 had, so far, proved cold and mean.
“Everyone we’ve managed to interview stated that Ten had dumped Bryhern Speegal.”
“They were completely the couple over the summer,” Peabody put in. “You couldn’t watch a celeb report on-screen or pick up a gossip mag without . . . not that I spend all my time on celebrity watch or anything.”
“Right. She dumps Speegal last week, according to informed sources. But she’s entertaining him in her kitchen at two in the morning. Both of them are wearing robes, and there is evidence of intimate behavior in the bedroom.”
“Reconciliation that didn’t work?”
“According to the doorman, her security discs, and her domestic droid, Speegal arrived at twenty-three fourteen. He was admitted, and the household droid was dismissed to its quarters—but left on-call.”
Wineglasses in the living area, she thought. Shoes—his, hers. Shirt, hers. His was on the wide curve of the stairs leading to the second level. Her bra had been draped over the rail at the top.
It hadn’t taken a bloodhound to follow the trail, or to sniff out the activity.
“He comes over, he comes in, they have a couple of drinks downstairs, sex comes into it. No evidence it wasn’t consensual. No signs of struggle, and if the guy was going to rape her, he wouldn’t bother to drag her up a flight of steps and take off her clothes.”
She forgot her image of the chair long enough to sit. “So they go up, slap the mattress. They end up downstairs, bloody in the kitchen. Droid hears a disturbance, comes out, finds her unconscious, him dead, calls for medical and police assistance.”
The kitchen had looked like a war zone. Everything white and silver, acres of room, and most of it splashed and splattered with blood. Speegal, the hunk of the year, had been facedown, swimming in it.
Maybe it had reminded her, just a little too horribly, of the way her father had looked. Of course, the room in Dallas hadn’t been so shiny, but the blood, the rivers of blood, had been just as thick, just as wet after she’d finished hacking the little knife into him.
“Sometimes there’s no other way,” Peabody said quietly. “There’s no other way to stay alive.”
“No.” Edgy? Eve thought. More like losing her edge if her partner could see into her head that easily. “Sometimes there’s not.”
She rose, relieved when the doctor stepped into the room.
She’d done her homework on Wilfred B. Icove, Jr. He’d stepped competently into his father’s footsteps, oversaw the myriad arms of the Icove Center. And was known as the sculptor to the stars.
He was reputed to be discreet as a priest, skilled as a magician, and rich as Roarke—or nearly. At forty-four, he was handsome as a vid star with eyes of light, crystalline blue in a face of high, slashing cheekbones, square jaw, carved lips, narrow nose. His hair was full, swept back from his forehead in gilded wings.
He had maybe an inch on Eve’s five-ten, and his body looked trim and fit, even elegant in a slate gray suit with pearly chalk stripes. He wore a shirt the color of the stripes, and a silver medallion on a hair-thin chain.
He offered Eve his hand, and an apologetic smile that showed perfect teeth. “I’m so sorry. I know you’ve been waiting. I’m Dr. Icove. Lee-Lee—Ms. Ten,” he corrected, “is under my care.”
“Lieutenant Dallas, NYPSD. Detective Peabody. We need to speak with her.”
“Yes, I know. I know you’ve tried to speak with her before, and again, my apologies.” His voice and manner were as groomed as the rest of him. “Her attorney’s with her now. She’s awake and stable. She’s a strong woman, Lieutenant, but she’s suffered severe trauma, physically and emotionally. I hope you can keep this brief.”
“That’d be nice for all of us, wouldn’t it?”
He smiled again, just a twinkle of humor, then gestured. “She’s on medication,” he continued as they walked