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“You sit down. I’ll put the rest of these together.”
As she dolloped on the whipped cream, Mira looked over at Eve. “You did exactly right. It was hard for you, hard for me to listen to. But you did exactly right.”
“Sorry, but will you just say it—that you know he was here during the aforesaid hours.”
“I absolutely do. He’s right. I did check on him every couple hours, and Gilly went to check on him just before midnight, and again around three. We thought he was sleeping.”
“You’d have started poking at me again if you’d known I was awake.”
“He’s right about that, too. Do you believe it was a woman?”
“There had to be at least two involved, and one of them was a woman. I’m sure of that, and Mr. Mira gave that some weight.”
“He’s never been a suspect,” Gillian put in.
“No. There’s no motive, no opportunity. I just needed it all spelled out on the record. It’s going to be a feeding frenzy in the media. With this on record, Mr. Mira is firmly, unquestionably a witness.”
“I just want to say something.” Peabody, eyes closed, took another sip from her mug. “This is the Holy Grail of hot chocolate. Mr. Mira, you’re a genius, but I don’t know how I’m going to settle for the sludge at Central ever again.”
“Knock it back, Peabody. We’ve got to get back to work.”
It took a little time—Peabody wanted to savor—but even with the extra, Eve felt lighter when Gillian walked them back, got their coats.
“I’m going to apologize for wanting to smack you even though I could see it was hard for you to push at him that way.”
“I want to smack people all the time. And he’s your father.”
“I love my husband, and one of the many reasons is he’d agree with me when I say my father is the best man I know. You’re a little bit in love with him.”
“Probably more than a little.”
“And you’re going to look out for him.”
“That’s a promise.”
“All right then. Bright blessings on both of you, and safe travels wherever the path takes you.”
As they hiked back to the car, Eve shoved her hands in her pockets, found her gloves again. Tugged them on. “Plot us a sensible route to hit the sidepieces.”
“Already done, and you can cross off Allyson Byson, for now anyway. She’s been in St. Lucia for the past week with her husband and several friends. It’s an annual thing. Spends six weeks there every winter.”
“Very tidy alibi. We’ll look into her otherwise.”
“We should start with Carlee MacKensie—he played with her right before he hooked up with Downing. Freelance writer.”
When they got into the car, Peabody plugged the address into the in-dash. “Then we’d go to Asha Coppola, to Lauren Canford, and finish with Charity Downing, the latest.”
“I want a conversation with the vic’s children before the end of the day.” Eve considered tactics while she negotiated traffic. “We keep it simple, get the how and when they met, how long the relationship went on, who ended it, that kind of thing. Right now, we’re just fishing.”
“How did he keep them straight?” Peabody wondered. “We’ve got five, and that’s only covering around a year. So there’s a lot more going back. How did he keep them all straight?”
“They were all the same to him, that’s my take. Just a score. He was a predator. Spot the prey, stalk it, bag it, play with it awhile. Then, when you’re bored or the prey no longer satisfies, discard it and go after fresh meat.”
She noted a second-level street spot, zipped over and grabbed it.
“We could maybe have gotten closer.”
“We could maybe not have.”
