Innocent in Death (33 page)

“What is it?”

She held out the printout from the last pages of the diary. “I think you’ll recognize the handwriting. I think you’ll know what it is. I’m showing these to you now because of her.” She gestured toward Allika. “And because I saw the pictures of your son. His face is in my head.”

That made Trevor Straffo hers, Eve acknowledged. As much as Craig Foster, even the pathetic Reed Williams, was hers.

Straffo took the pages, scanned the first line. “This is Rayleen’s handwriting. From her diary? What possible—”

“The last entry was written before she tossed it, inside its lockbox, in your kitchen recycler. Date’s right there. You’re going to want to read the whole thing.”

As he did, he went gray. As he did, his hands began to shake. “This isn’t possible.”

“Somewhere in you, you know it is. Your wife knew it was, and even in her horror and grief, she tried to protect Rayleen. So Rayleen did this to her, to protect herself, to throw suspicion on Allika, to focus you, your time, your attention, on her.”

“No.”

“There were other entries, Oliver. Details of how she killed both Foster and Williams. And a mention of a woman named Versy at the Kinley House.”

“No. No. You’re out of your mind.” He swayed like a man would when the world tipped sharply on its axis. “I’m going out of mine.”

Push
, Eve ordered herself. No choice but to push. “What isn’t in there, as the diary only goes back seven months, is how she killed your son.”

Even the gray leached out of his face. “That’s insane.”

“You both knew Rayleen had been up some time before she came in to wake you.”

“She—”

“You decided it was an accident—what parent wouldn’t? That he’d tripped and she’d gone into shock and denial. You put all the pieces of him out of sight because she got upset if she saw them. More, if she saw either you or her mother looking at them.”

“For God’s sake, for God’s sake. She was seven. You can’t believe—”

“I can. Look at your wife, Oliver. Does she deserve what was done to her? Take out the picture of your son again. Did he? She took these lives without a quibble. I have a rock-solid case, which includes her buying a go-cup with Craig’s name engraved on it.”

“What? What?” He fisted both hands in his hair, all but tore at it.

“I have a wit,” Eve continued, relentlessly. “The clerk who waited on Rayleen, and who’s already identified her photo. Cora verifies they stopped in to that particular store on that particular day at Rayleen’s request.

“I have a statement from her great-aunt, Quella Harmon, verifying she had interest in and knowledge of how ricin was made. Don’t even think of saying circumstantial to me,” she snapped.

Kick him and keep kicking him while he’s down, she thought. It’s the only way.

“In her own words, Oliver.” She leaned over to pick up the pages he’d dropped. “In her own words she writes how she decided to kill her mother, how she left Allika to die while she herself went to make a snack, to listen to music. She did this without a single twinge of regret.”

“I can’t…You can’t expect me to believe.”

“You already believe, in that place inside you. That’s what’s making you sick. But you’re going to have to suck it in, because I’m going to tell you what’s going to be done. And…look at me, Oliver. Look at me.”

His eyes were glazed over with shock and unspeakable pain when they met hers. “She wrote it down,” he said dully. “She wrote it down while Allika was…”

“That’s right. Allika was a barrier, like Trevor was.” Use their names, Eve thought. “Allika and Trev stood in the way of something she wanted, so sheremoved them.”

“She’s my daughter, she’s my child. She’s…”

“I’m going to make you a deal right here. You and me. If I don’t prove to you that everything I’ve told you is true, I won’t fight any attempt to try her as a minor instead of an adult.”

“She’s ten years old. She’s only ten.”

“Multiple premeditated murders. She gets legal adult status, unless I pull it out of the mix. That’s the deal. I prove to you that she put your wife—that she put Allika in that hospital bed, with a machine breathing for her, I prove she pushed Trevor down the stairs on fucking Christmas morning, that she did Foster and Williams and some sick old lady in a nursing home. All of it. Without a shadow of a doubt. If I don’t, you’ll have ammo to break down my case. That’s the deal. Take it, or I take her down now.”

Rayleen was in the CCU family room, drawing. When Eve stepped in, she stopped, let her eyes swim with shining tears. “My mommy—”

Eve closed the doors behind her. “I know the doctor who’s been working on her. She thinks your mother’s going to pull through this.”

She wandered over to the counter. Hospital coffee was nearly as lethal as cop coffee. But it would make a nice prop. Eve poured a cup, turned. “Not such good news for you, Ray.”

“What?”

“Just you and me, Ray. Door’s shut.” Eve pulled off her jacket, turned. I’m not wearing a wire. Here’s my recorder.” She unpinned it, set it down. “Turned off. Haven’t read you your rights. Your father’s a lawyer, and you’re smart, so you know I can’t use anything you say to me.”

Eve sat down, stretched out her legs, sipped at the coffee. Maybe hospital coffee was, actually, worse than cop coffee. “I’ve come across some tricky ones, but I have to say, you’re the trickiest. Even if your mother comes out of it, she’s not going to point the finger at you. Still, it must’ve pissed you off when Cora came back and found her before it was finished.”

“I don’t want to talk to you.” The tears spilled out now. “You’re so mean.”

“Oh, come on. I don’t scare you. You know I’ve got zip. I’ll give you better.” Eve shrugged, chanced another sip. “My commander and the house shrink think I’m full of it. Maybe tipping over the edge myself because I tried to sell them on you. I value my career, kid. I’m not going to toss it away on this. I’m done. The investigation will remain open for a while, then we’ll move it to inactive. Then to cold.”

She leaned forward. “I’m not having the brass and the shrinks looking over my shoulder because of you, screwing up my very excellent chances for promotion over you. I’m riding a wave right now. Icove, the black-market baby bust. Big, juicy cases I closed. I can afford to let this one slide.”

Rayleen tilted her head. “You can lie in an interview with a suspect.”

“Yeah. But I can’t even hold an interview with a minor suspect without parental permission. So, officially, I’m not even here.”

Rayleen went back to drawing. “Why are you here? I can go to my daddy right now, and you’ll be in trouble.”

“Shit. I just came in to see how you were doing, no reason for him to think otherwise. If you make a stink about it, he’s going to wonder why I’d hassle you. Yeah.” Eve smiled, set the hideous coffee aside. “Why don’t you do that, Ray? He might start thinking how your mother wouldn’t have done herself with you alone with her in the apartment. Go ahead and get him. Last I saw him he was sitting beside your mother’s bed.”

“He shouldn’t have left me alone. He should be with me. When she dies—”

“If. It’s still
if
. ” Playfully, Eve wagged a finger. “Don’t count your chickens, kid. I could hang the two murders on her, and maybe make it stick. But I’m not quite as practical as you are. I like to close cases, but doing that would stick in my craw. So…it goes cold.”

“You’re just giving up?”

“It’s what we call ‘knowing when to fold.’ A couple of teachers aren’t going to get much more screen play anyway.” Casually, Eve crossed her ankles. “I can figure out how you did your mother. Can’t prove it, but I can get how you played it. You made the tea, you put in the pills. Did she know?”

Rayleen shrugged. “My mother tried to kill herself, and it’s terrible. I could be scarred for life. Daddy and I are going to need to go on a long trip, just the two of us, so I can adjust.”

“Then why’d she call you home first? Why did your mother call you back instead of just taking the pills while she was alone?”

“I guess she wanted to say good-bye.” Rayleen lifted her gaze, fluttered her lashes. And was smiling just a little as she worked up a tear. “She loved me more than anything.”

Already using past tense, Eve noted. Allika was gone in Rayleen’s mind. “That could work,” Eve agreed. “Come on, Ray, it must be infuriating for a smart girl like you not to be able to share what you can do with anyone else. I know about taking a life from both sides of it. You’ve got me cold, tied my hands. You win; I lose. But goddamn it, I’m curious.”

“You use very bad language. In my house, we don’t approve of bad language.”

“Screw that,” Eve said, and made Rayleen giggle. “Why’d you do Foster? I can, again, work out the how. You got the ricin from somewhere. Can’t track that, either, but you got it, dumped it in his thermos.”

“It’s called a go-cup,” Rayleen said primly.

“Right. You walked in when he had the outside class upstairs, doctored the drink. Then you got your friend to go down to class a few minutes early, so you could find him. Slick.”

“If you were right, you still wouldn’t beall right. You don’t know everything.”

“No, you got me. Why would you kill him? Did he try to hurt you? Did he try some sort of abuse? Touch you?”

“Please. That’s disgusting.”

“I’m not going to buy it was just a whim. You went to too much trouble, planned it out too well.”

Rayleen’s lips twitched. “If you were really smart, you’d know everything.”

“Got me there.”

“Maybe—and this is just like pretending I’m talking to you about it—maybe he was stupid and mean and made a really dumb mistake and wouldn’t listen even when I gave him a chance to fix it.”

“What kind of mistake? Since we’re pretending.”

“He gave me an A minus on my oral report. Aminus. I always get an A or an A plus. He had no business giving me a minus, just because he thought my presentation needed more work. I practiced and practiced. I was thebest in the whole class, and getting less than a solid A means I could drop to second instead of first.”

“You poisoned him because he gave you an A minus on a presentation?” Eve repeated.

“Itold him I needed him to change it to an A, at least. That I didn’t want to drop to second in the class, and how hard I’d worked. Do you know what he said?”

“I’m riveted.”

“He said the grade wasn’t as important as thelearning and the experience. Can you believe anything that base? That stupid?”

“Boggling.”

“And
he
gave Melodie an A, and now we’re almost
tied
for first in the class. I fixed her, too.”

It was all in the diary, Eve thought, all these details. But it was fascinating, and horrible, to hear them out of the girl’s mouth. “By making sure she saw what happened to Mr. Foster?”

“She has nightmares.” Rayleen laughed. “And her attendance record’s blown! She’s such a big baby.”

“What about Williams?”

Now Rayleen rolled her eyes. “If you’re not totally stupid, you know why.”

“So I’d think he killed Mr. Foster? But—”

“That’s so lame-o.”

Rayleen got up to go to the little pay AutoChef, digging credits from the pocket of her pink jeans. She plugged them in and ordered herself a lemon fizzy.

“Why’s it lame-o?”

Rayleen got a straw from the counter, and her lips curved around it as she sucked up the drink. “You were supposed to think Principal Mosebly killed them both. Because of having sex. That’s disgusting, too, and she should pay for it. Anyway, she’s too strict, and I was getting tired of it.”

“I looked at her,” Eve agreed, and spoke conversationally. “I thought, initially, that Williams did Foster to cover the fact that he was a pervert, then Mosebly killed Williams because he tried to blackmail her. But the timing kept hanging me up, and every time I ran it through, it pulled out to the same killer for both. I couldn’t pin Foster on Mosebly. Didn’t fit.”

“You could if you wanted. He had the dumb cup in his ugly old briefcase in the class all the time, so she could’ve. Now, I guess you won’t ever arrest anyone.”

“It’s looking that way.” Eve picked up the dreadful coffee again. Just a couple of girls, she thought, having a drink and talking shop. “Where’d you get the drug you used on Williams? It was damn good thinking to get him in the pool. We nearly missed the drug since you used such a small amount. Timing worked against you that time.”

“Stupid Mr. Williams. The stuff is supposed to be absorbed and be pretty much undetectable after a couple hours. I got it from the old, ugly people’s home where I have to go volunteer and pretend not to want to puke. I sing for them, and dance and read and listen to their
booor
-ing stories. And I can go anywhere I want because everyone knows me. They keep it locked up, but it’s easy to distract the nurse or the orderly for a few minutes.”

She studied Eve’s weapon. “Did you ever kill anyone with that?”

“Yes.”

“How did it feel?”

“Powerful.”

“Uh-huh. But it doesn’t last very long. It’s like eating ice cream, and then the bowl’s empty.” Rayleen set the fizzy aside, did a series of pirouettes. “You can tell everybody in the whole galaxy what I said to you, and not one single person will believe you.”

“That’s pretty much it. Who’d believe me if I said you’d killed two people, and tried—maybe succeeded—in killing a third. And her own mother. At ten years old.”

Rayleen executed a graceful plié. “That’s not all.” She sang it.

“What else?”

“Maybe I’ll tell, maybe I won’t. People would lock you up in a looney box if you said I did it.”

“You don’t want to tell, fine. It’s getting late anyway, and it’s my day off.” Eve got to her feet. “I’ve spent enough of my time on all this.”

On tiptoe, arms curved overhead, Rayleen danced a circle around Eve. “You’ll never, never, never guess.”

“I’m too old for games, kid. And as things stand, the sooner I forget about you, the better it is for me.”

With a little thump, Rayleen dropped down to the flats of her feet. “You don’t just walk away from me! I’m not finished. I’m the one who beat you. I won! You’re being a poor sport.”