“Then you’ll get a clearer one. You’ve been off your stride.”
“And then some. Yeah, we’ll see what a look through Straffo’s penthouse brings into focus.”
16
IT WAS MORE THAN BEING OFF HER STRIDE, EVE decided as she worked and waited for Peabody and
McNab. The case itself had no solid point, no focus.
It was the motives that were murky.
The probability scans ran dead even between her primary suspects, with Allika Straffo dropping to the base according to profile.
There was something just slightly off about the woman, something more than a stumble on the fidelity path. What did she know? Eve wondered. What did she think? What made her so vulnerable and skittish?
The death of a child. Could that, did that damage run so deep it left the foundation forever cracked and shaky? Maybe it did, how would she know? But Oliver Straffo appeared to have learned to live with the loss.
Maybe it was different for a mother.
But there was another child in the house, alive and well.
Not enough, apparently, to keep Allika steady. The kid, the successful husband, the penthouse, the au pair, none of it was quite enough. So she slipped, and Williams had been right there to catch her.
Maybe it wasn’t the first slip.
“Maybe it wasn’t,” she muttered. “And…so what? So what?”
She turned and saw Roarke in the doorway between their offices. “So what?” she repeated. “If it wasn’t the first time Allika had grabbed for a little strange, wouldn’t a man as astute as Straffo know the signs?”
“People stray from marriages every day, and not all their spouses, however astute, know. Or admit to knowing. Or for that matter,” Roarke added, “particularly care if they do know.”
“He’s got pride. He’s involved. He’d know, he’d care. And if it was the first time, is his reaction going to be to kill an innocent bystander? And where his daughter’s going to be touched by it?” Two big hitches, Eve decided as she shook her head.
“It doesn’t play straight for me,” she continued. “But if he knew, why would he agree to defend the man his wife strayed with? And, since he did agree, why would he turn around a day later and kill the son of a bitch?”
“Maybe to have the primary on the case ask herself that very question.”
“Huh. Well, it’s working.” Rolling the possibility around in her head, she tipped back in the chair. “He’s a slick one in court, always has the angles figured, knows how to twist the—Wait a minute. Wait. Here’s an angle. What if he agreed to rep Williams because he wanted to make sure he lost? He doesn’t even have to
drop the ball, he just has to make sure he doesn’t kick it through the goalposts.”
“Ah. He takes the case to ensure his client’s found guilty. Clever, and all but impossible to prove.”
“Like I said, slick guy. He tried an order to overturn the warrant, suppress the evidence. And he had to know Reo would mow that down. Starts off weak.”
Roarke picked up her coffee from the desk, helped himself to a sip. “A nice, tidy line of revenge.”
“So why kill the guy if you were going to help put him in a cage anyway?”
After setting the coffee down, he reached out, tapped his finger on the dent in her chin. “You’re circling, Lieutenant.”
“Yeah, I’m circling, because there’s something there, but I can’t see it. There’s something there.” She shoved to her feet. “I need my murder board.”
“I wondered if you’d update the one up here.” He walked to her then, slipped his arms around her. “It cost you time.” He pressed his lips to her brow, quietly pleased when her body leaned into his. “What pushed between us cost you time.”
“I’ll make it up.” They’d make it up, she corrected. That was part of the benefits of being a team. She linked her arms around his waist, watched him smile. “What do you think about the security?”
“The system’s very basic. You were right there. Easily slipped through.” Wrapped around each other, they both turned their heads to study her board. “A weapon would be more difficult, but hardly impossible. A person would cause barely a blip if they knew anything about the system.”