“She had to pay.”
“She had to pay. She had to see. See me as I now saw her. The evil in her, the selfish, calculating evil in her. She used Deann Dark to destroy me. I would use Deann Dark to destroy her, and to show her, to show everyone duped by her how it should be done. How a real writer creates.”
“Starting with Rosie Kent.”
“Pryor Carridine,” Smith corrected.
“Pryor Carridine.” Eve nodded. “Tell me about her—as you wrote her.”
“I knew as soon as I saw her. Young, rebellious, foolish. Trading her body for money and thrills. There were others, and I could have rewritten them, made them work and work well. But she was so perfect. She inspired me. I watched her. I did my research. I wrote, rewrote her scenes. I perfected them.”
“Yeah, we’ve got those, too. From your computer.”
“You can see how superior my vision is. DeLano’s character grieved as she killed—grieved for the life she’d learned was a lie, for the husband who’d made that life a lie. There’s your pap. My character didn’t grieve, so she didn’t make mistakes. My hands didn’t shake like Amanda’s because I wrote them steady. My heart didn’t pound in my ears as I tightened the scarf around Pryor’s neck, because I wrote the quiet and the calm. I understood from creating Evan Quint a killing should be calm and controlled, a killer must consider all details. So I did.”
“Chanel Rylan.”
“Amelia Benson. I had to invest there. It’s expensive to go to the vids, but the investment was necessary.”
“You had an alternate.”
“Of course. I wrote several alternate scenes for each character. In this case, it involved creating the scene at a play—even more expense. I may use that alternate scene in another book. It’s good work. No work is ever wasted.”
“The reversible coat was clever.”
“Details. DeLano skimmed over them, obviously. I enjoyed designing that coat.”
“Your work, your seamstress skills,” Peabody qualified, “are exceptional.”
“It steals time from the art, but it pays the bills. When my book’s published, I’ll enjoy sewing as a hobby.”
“What was your mind-set when you jammed that ice pick into the back of Chanel Rylan’s neck?”
“I was inside my character. Justin Werth didn’t kill only from desperation, a desperate need to see his work produced. In my character there was also greed, a stronger motivator, I believe. In my version he wasn’t hired or bribed to kill. I blended him into a stronger, slyer man by merging two inferior characters.”
“The screenwriter and the boyfriend.” Eve nodded. “So the killer became, in your version, both.”
“Yes. He knew, in my version, the part his lover and Amelia Benson competed for was a star-maker. It would make her not only famous but rich, and he’d benefit. So I imbued him with a kind of glee when he killed her.”
“Which, embodying his character, you felt. You felt glee.”
“Of course.”
“And then?”
“Then, much smarter than the original character, I slipped out before Amelia’s companion returned to her seat. You know about the vet clinic.”
“Yes.”
“I liked writing that part.” She smiled a little. “It was a kind of comic relief. The cheap clone ’link, the breathless voice babbling about the injured dog. I imagined the dog as a young German shepherd mix. I don’t know why, it simply came to me. I named him Prince in my head.”
“Of course you did.”
“In any case, it went exactly as written. The recorded communication, the companion going out to take the emergency tag. When Ame-lia was dead, I slipped out, reversed the coat, put on the hat, and so forth, and sat in the back of the other theater. I knew it would let out shortly and I could, as written, just walk out with the others. It’s all written out.”
“Yeah. Indulge me. Loxie Flash.”
“I had three choices for Bliss Cather. I disliked the one who became her the most, so it was satisfying to have her come into the club, as I hoped. I did initially plan for more time, more research, but I had to write you in.”