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“We’re questioning him. I’m questioning him. He denies everything. I found physical evidence in his apartment, but he still denies everything.”
Denies, she thought, while looking shocked, dislocated, terrified.
“Oh shit.” She turned her head, pressed her face into the spread. “Oh shit.”
“Come on.” He kissed the top of her head lightly. “Let’s get you undressed and into bed.”
“Don’t baby me.”
“Try to stop me.”
She started to shift, then moved quickly before she’d realized her intent or the need. She had her arms around him, her face buried against his shoulder, her eyes squeezed tight as if to block out visions.
“You’re always here. Even when you’re not.”
“We’re not alone, anymore. Either of us.” Because he thought she needed it, he lifted her onto his lap. “Talk to me. You’ve got more than murder and evidence on your mind.”
“I’m not a good person.” She blurted it out before she could stop herself. “I’m a good cop, but I’m not a good person. I can’t afford to be.”
“That’s nonsense, Eve.”
“It’s not. It’s true. You just don’t want to see it, that’s all.” She pulled back so she could look at him. “When you love somebody, you can handle the little faults, but you don’t want to see the big ones. You don’t want to admit what the person you’ve attached yourself to is capable of, so you pretend it’s not there.”
“What are you capable of that I’m blind to?”
“I beat Forte into pulp. Not physically,” she continued, dragging her hair away from her face. “That’s too easy, that’s too clean. I ripped him to pieces emotionally. I wanted to. I wanted him to tell me what he’d done so I could finish it, close it away. And when Peabody had the balls to tell me she disapproved of my interview techniques, I trounced her. I sent her off duty so I could go back in and hammer at him again.”
He was silent a moment, then rose to turn the covers down. “So let me recap. You walked in on a mutilation in progress, took the killer into custody, a killer who implicated Charles Forte in this and in other murders. This is a matter of days after you discover a mutilated body on your doorstep.”
“It can’t be personal.”
“I beg your pardon, Lieutenant, but that’s bullshit. To continue,” he said, coming around to unbutton her shirt, “you then take Charles Forte in for interview, a man you suspect with good cause is responsible for several violent deaths. You play hardball, something which your aide whom you’re training, and who, though highly competent, has considerably less experience than yourself in these matters, disapproves of. A police officer who did not walk into a room and find a woman gleefully carving a man into pieces. The news reports were quite specific,” he told her.
“And,” he added before Eve could speak, “you then reprimanded your aide when she questioned your judgment, subsequently sending her off duty so that you could resume your interrogation. Does that about sum it up?”
Frowning, she studied the top of his head as he bent to pull off her slacks. “You’re making it black and white. It’s not.”
“It never is.” He swung her legs into bed, pushed her down gently. “I’ll tell you what it makes you, Eve. It makes you a good cop, a dedicated one. And a human one.” He undressed, slipped into bed beside her. “And that being the case, it’s probably best if I divorce you and get on with my life.” He pulled her close until her head cozied into the curve of his shoulder. “Obviously, up till now, I’ve been blind to your hideous character flaws.”
“You make me sound like an idiot.”
“Good, I intended to.” He kissed her temple, ordered the lights to dim. “Now, go to sleep.”
She turned her head so that she could smell his skin on her way to sleep. “I don’t think I can let you have that divorce,” she said on a sigh.
“No?”
“Uh-uh. No way I’m giving up the coffee.”
Eve arrived at her office at eight A.M. She had already been by the lab to harass them, which had, in part, cheered her. Her ’link was beeping with an incoming when she opened the door.
And Peabody stood at attention beside her desk.
“You’re early, Peabody.” Eve moved to the ’link, coded in, and waited for the messages to dispense. “You’re not on for thirty minutes.”
“I wanted to speak to you, Lieutenant, before I came on duty.”
“All right.” Eve put the messages on hold, turned to give Peabody her full attention. “You look like hell,” she commented.
