“I did,” Kate said without apology.
“She was proud of you,” Victoria said. “Proud of what you have accomplished. Which reminds me. What does the Anchorage DA have to do with reopening a thirty-year-old case?”
“Nothing,” Kate said, “I don’t work for them anymore.”
“What do you do?”
“I’m a private investigator,” Kate said, “which is where I came in. Your daughter hired me to look into your case. She doesn’t think you’re guilty of the crime for which you have been imprisoned. She wants me to reopen the investigation and find out who did it.”
“I did do it,” Victoria said. She met Kate’s eyes squarely.
“Did you?” Kate said, hiding her surprise.
“I did,” Victoria said firmly. “I won’t say I’m innocent, because I’m not. I won’t thank you for trying to get me out of here, because the judge was right to sentence me to life. I deserved it. I siphoned the gas out of my car, I splashed it all over the living room, and I set it to go off after Charlotte and I were safely at the fund-raiser at my brother’s house in town.”
“Hmmm,” Kate said. “How did you set it to go off?”
“A delayed fuse attached to a timer,” Victoria said promptly.
Exactly as had been presented by the district attorney at Victoria’s trial. “How did you learn to do that?”
“From a book,” Victoria said.
Kate gave a thoughtful nod. “You can find anything in the library, can’t you?”
Victoria blinked. “Well, yes, I suppose you can. That’s what it’s for.”
“It is indeed,” Kate said. “Why did you do it?”
“Money,” Victoria said. “I was broke.”
Kate winced and shook her head. “You had me going there, Victoria, I admit. But money as a motive?” She leaned forward, hands flat on the table. “To burn your sons alive?”
For the first time, she saw Victoria flinch. She recovered immediately, though, and met Kate’s eyes with a stony gaze.
Kate sat back. “Do you ever hear from your attorney?”
Victoria’s browed furrowed at this change of subject. “Henry?”
“Yes. Do you ever hear from him?”
Victoria was wary, but she couldn’t come up with a reason not to answer. “No.”
“When was the last time you talked to him?”
“At my sentencing.”
“No further contact after that?”
Victoria shook her head.
“How about your ex-husband?”
Victoria became very still. “Gene?”
“Yes,” Kate said, watching Victoria from beneath her eyelashes.
“I haven’t heard from Gene since our divorce.”
“Didn’t he try to see the children?”
“He had no visitation rights under the divorce decree. I had sole custody.”
That wasn’t what I asked you, Kate thought. “He was their father,” she said. “Seems odd that he wouldn’t try to work something out with you so he could spend at least some time with his children.”
“He didn’t,” Victoria said. Her elegant shoulders were looking very tense.
“Charlotte and Oliver were both underage when you went inside,” Kate said. “Who did they go to?”
Victoria stared at a point on the wall in back of Kate’s head. “My brother Erland took them in. It wasn’t for long. Charlotte was sixteen, Oliver was seventeen. They were in college and out of his house in a very short time.”
Kate nodded. “I see.” She folded her hands on the table in front of her and took a deep breath. “Ms. Muravieff-” She paused. “You kept the name,” she said.
“What?”
“You kept your husband’s name. Even after the divorce.”
Victoria’s eyes narrowed, as if she were really looking at Kate for the first time. “Why are you here, Ms. Shugak?” Despite her best efforts, something of what she was feeling must have crossed Kate’s face, because Victoria sat up straight in her chair. “Tell me at once,” she said, snapping it out like an order.
“I’m afraid I have bad news, Ms. Muravieff,” Kate said. She took another breath and said steadily, “Your daughter, Charlotte, was killed going home yesterday evening by a hit-and-run driver.”
Victoria sat very still, frozen in place. Kate couldn’t even hear her breathing.
When she spoke, her voice was frail and thready. “Yesterday? Charlotte’s been dead all day today?” “Yes. I’m so very sorry, Ms. Muravieff.” Victoria spoke again through stiff lips. “Leave me.” Kate got up at once and left the room.
14
Jim was waiting for her when she got back to the town house. “My trial was continued until tomorrow,” he said the minute he saw her.
“Oh, save it,” she snapped, and stamped upstairs to take another long hot shower. She was turning into a ritual bather. Lucky she had her own bathroom to go back to. She wished more than ever that she could go back to it right now.
She had her face turned into the spray when she heard the shower curtain being drawn back. She didn’t move, and she didn’t jump either when his hands slid around her waist to draw her against him. By unspoken agreement, they took their time, drawing it out to a point way past pleasure, something that was almost pain, and when they were done, she let her head fall back against the tiles and laughed out loud for the sheer joy of it.
He mumbled something into her neck.
“What?” she said.
He raised his head, and she was moved almost to pity by the look of despair on his face. “I don’t understand how it can keep getting better.”
She laughed again, low in her throat. “Don’t you?” No one, not even Kate’s best friends, had ever said she was a nice person, and she proved it now. She raised his hand to her face, nuzzled into his palm, and sank her teeth into the base of his thumb.
He swore, but he didn’t pull his hand away. Instead, he picked her up and carried her into the bedroom, where he tossed her onto the bed and followed her down.
“I’m going to stay in town for a while,” he said later.
“Okay,” she said.
“Maybe I could hang out here.”
“Sure.”
“It’s only until this case of yours is finished.”
“Of course.”
“I mean, somebody just took out your client.”
Kate willed away the remembered fury, the images of Kurt on the floor and Eugene with the bullet hole in his head, the footage of Charlotte’s crumpled car, the tears on Emily’s face, Victoria’s stricken expression. Not now, she told herself. Not now.
“Stands to reason whoever did it might think you know something you shouldn’t.”
“They might.”
“Seems to me they might think twice about trying something if you had a trooper hanging around.”
“You’re probably right.”
“And there’s nothing really pressing back at the post, and Tok and Cordova have promised to cover for me if something happens.”
“Good to know.”
“And I might be recalled to the stand tomorrow.”
“You might.”
There was a brief silence. “Oh fuck,” he said.
“Don’t mind if I do,” she said, and rolled over on top of him.
“I don’t want to talk to anyone.” Emily stood in the open doorway with a tear-blotched face, arms crossed, hugging herself tightly.
Every line in her brow looked deeper, her eyes seemed sunken, and her hair lay lank and lifeless upon her head.
“Is anyone else here?”
Emily shook her head miserably, and Kate shoved her way in, closing the door behind her, Jim barely making it inside. She took Emily in a firm, impersonal grip and steered her into the living room. Emily sat on the couch and stared in front on her with unseeing eyes. Kate found the kitchen and made hot, sweet tea. She took it into the living room and pressed the mug into Emily’s hands. “Drink.”
“I don’t want it,” Emily said.
“Drink,” Kate said firmly.
It took half an hour, another cup of tea, and a box of Kleenex to get Emily to where she could speak in more or less coherent sentences. Kate was unfailingly kind and patient, never at a loss for what word was needed next. Jim, observing from a neutral corner, was reminded of a rock battered by waves of emotion and incipient hysteria, only to emerge each time from the sea spray with the same unshakable face. Kate Shugak was the only person he’d ever met able to combine the qualities of the irresistible force and the immovable object at once. It was only a matter of time.