Purity in Death

"You think she'll roll on him?"

"She might, if she's scared enough. She's not a player, but she knows Dukes-his schedule, his habits. How else could she tailor the household to suit him? And if he thinks we're pushing her, he might get pissed enough to slip up. He's got a hot button."

Eve hunted up a parking spot, then jaywalked diagonally across the street toward the Dukes's residence. The first thing she noticed were the wilted flowers by the door.

"They're gone."

Peabody followed the direction of Eve's cold stare. "Maybe she forgot to water them."

"No, she wouldn't forget. Probably has a daily duty list. Damn it. Damn it." She rang the buzzer anyway, waited, rang again.

"Curtains are still at the windows." Peabody craned her neck to see inside. "Furniture's still in there."

"They left it. Got out fast. They were probably packed and gone within twenty-four hours of our first visit."

She started working the street, knocking on doors until one opened for her. She offered her badge to a snowy-haired woman in a pink tracksuit.

"Is something wrong? Has there been an accident? My husband-"

"No, ma'am. Nothing's wrong. I'm sorry to alarm you. I'm looking for some of your neighbors. The Dukes. They don't answer their door."

"The Dukes." She patted her hair as if to stir her thoughts. "I'm not sure I… oh, of course. Of course. I saw the story on the media report. Oh dear, you're the policewoman they're going to sue."

"I don't believe any legal action has been taken as yet. Do you know where they are?"

"Goodness. I don't really know them. Pretty young woman. I'd see her walking to the market every Monday and Thursday. Nine-thirty. You could set your wrist unit by her. But now that you mention it, I don't know the last time… They lost their older son, didn't they? They only moved in two years ago. I never knew a thing about it. They didn't really talk to any of the neighbors. Some people never do. It's a terrible, terrible thing to lose a child."

"Yes, ma'am."

"I'd see him come and go now and then. Didn't look like a very kind sort of man. On Sundays they'd all go out together. Ten o'clock sharp. To church, I imagine from the way they were dressed. Back by twelve-thirty. You never saw the boy playing outside, with other children. I never saw another child go into that house."

She sighed, staring across the street now. "I suppose they kept him close, afraid something would happen to him, too. Hold on, there's Nita coming out. My jogging partner."

She waved wildly at the woman who came out of a building directly across the street. She, too, wore a track-suit. In powder blue.

"Nita doesn't miss a trick," the other woman said out of the corner of her mouth. "You ask her about them."

"Getting yourself arrested?" Nita said cheerfully when she joined them. "Better lock her up tight, Officer. Sal's a slippery one."

"We'll talk about slippery later," Sal told her. "They're asking about the Dukes. Two doors down from you."

"They went on a trip a couple days ago. Loaded up the car with suitcases. Wife wasn't too happy about it, if you ask me. She'd been crying. That would've been… let me think. Wednesday. Wednesday morning, bright and early. I was out front watering my pots when I saw them loading up."

"Did you notice anyone visiting them prior to that?"

"Saw you," Nita said with a grin. "The morning before. Got the commandant pretty stirred up from what I saw on-screen later."

"Nita."

"Oh, stop fussing, Sal. I didn't like the man and I'm not afraid to say so out loud."

She waved a hand and settled herself in as if for a nice, friendly chat. "I had an old cocker spaniel, old Frankie. Died last year. A few months before I was out walking him like I did every day, twice a day. Stopped in front of the Dukes place for a minute to talk to a neighbor who was out walking, too. And well, old Frankie did his business there on the edge of their property while I wasn't watching."

She sighed, one long expulsion of air. "Old Frankie. Now I'd've cleaned it up. I cleaned up behind that dog for sixteen years. But the commandant comes to the door and gives me what-for, says he's going to report me. Carries on so you'd think he'd never seen a little poop before. Well, I gave him what-for right back. I don't take that kind of thing from anybody."

She huffed out a breath, obviously still outraged. "He slams the door, I pick up the poop, finish walking old Frankie, and go home. Few minutes later, the beat cop's at my door. Young woman, looked mortified, told me Dukes had called in a complaint. Can you imagine that? Since I'd already flushed away the evidence, nothing came of it. The cop just wanted to let me know he was seeing red, said she'd cooled him off, but maybe it would be best all around if I made sure to keep the dog away from his property."

"Is that the only dealing you had with him?"

"Never spoke another word to the man, nor he to me."

"They lost a child," Sal reminded her. "It can sour a person."

"Some are born sour." Nita nodded to the house across the street. "I'd say that man was."

Eve conducted the first three interviews on Greene's list in the privacy of each subject's home or office. In each case there were varying degrees of denial, outrage, embarrassment, and pleading.

And in the case of Judge Vera Archer, a cold acceptance.

"I'd prefer to continue this discussion without the presence of your uniform, Lieutenant Dallas."

"Peabody, wait outside."

Archer folded her hands on her desk. Her chambers was a streamlined, organized space that suited her image. She was a tall, sternly attractive, rail-thin woman of sixty-three, with short, straight dark hair. She had a reputation for delivering swift and thorough decisions that rarely failed to hold up on appeal.

She brooked no theatrics in her courtroom.

Apparently, Eve thought, she enjoyed them in private. On disc she'd worn a pink ballgown, and had performed a rather glamorous striptease-down to g-string and pasties-for two well-muscled men as a prelude to a very athletic menage a trois.

"I assumed I'd be dealing with this when I heard Nick Greene had been killed. My private life isn't up for discussion. No laws were broken by me, other than those of common sense."

"Yet you paid Nick Greene seventy-five hundred dollars a month."

"I did. It's not illegal to pay such a fee. And if we determine it was blackmail, the crime was his in extorting such a fee. I'm not going to explain the contents of the disc, nor the motivation behind those contents. I'm entitled to my privacy."

"Yes, Your Honor, and you certainly paid enough for it. However, the contents of that disc, and your payments, are now part of a homicide investigation."

Archer's gaze never wavered. "I was better off with him alive. I could afford the money a great deal more than I can afford the publicity from exposure. The embarrassment to my robes, my husband. I made full disclosure of this matter to my husband nearly a year ago. You can verify that if you deem it necessary, but it is, again, a private matter. I will tell you we agreed to continue the payments."

"You're aware of the circumstances of Nick Greene's death?"

"I am."

"While I sympathize with your desire for privacy, Your Honor, that sympathy doesn't extend over my pursuit of the terrorists who are responsible for his death, and the death of six others to date."

"And how will exposing the contents of that disc aid your pursuit? I must have the respect of my courtroom when I'm on the bench. You pursue, you arrest, but then it's up to the courts to complete the cycle of justice. How can I do that if I'm a laughingstock, an embarrassment?"