Celebrity in Death

zoner mixed in.”
    “She sounds like someone who didn’t care for her own reality very much.”
    “COD?”
    “Drowning. Water in the lungs. She was alive when she went in. The head wound …” He brought it up on-screen, split it with a magnified section of the pool skirt. “It was severe enough to render her unconscious, but not fatal. Without the dunk, she’d have suffered a mild concussion, required a couple of stitches, and a blocker for the headache. Carter’s reconstruction, and I concur, indicates a fall.”
    He switched data, brought up the computerized reconstruction.
    “She fell or was pushed backward, struck her head on this pebbled surface. The blow would have rendered her unconscious, as I said, for several minutes. Longer, I expect, with her BAL and the zoner.”
    “The way she hit, and where she hit. She couldn’t have fallen, bounced, rolled, fallen into the water. Not on her own.”
    “No.”
    “Could she have regained consciousness, tried to stand, and fallen in? Off her balance?”
    “If she had, I’d expect to see another injury as the water was shallow. This mildly lacerated contusion on her temple is consistent, as you see on-screen, with a roll over the coping. Also, as you noted in your on-scene, her shoes had scraping at the heels. Here—”
    He turned to the body again, moved down to the right hip. “Another slight contusion. That’s consistent with her initial fall, and with the sweeper’s report on where they found the blood.”
    “Blood that had been washed off. It wouldn’t have been, even if she’d fallen in, splashed up water. It’s not enough, and the distance doesn’t work for that.”
    “Not on Carter’s reconstruction.”
    Eve saw it clearly. “So she went down, on her own or with help. She’s out cold. And when she’s out cold somebody drags her a couple of feet to the edge, then rolled her into the pool, where she drowned.”
    “That’s our conclusion. This wasn’t an accidental death. It’s homicide.”
    “That’s all I need.” She turned as Peabody rushed in, stopped.
    “Wow. Still really weird,” she said as she stared at the body. “I think her legs are longer than mine. Why can’t my legs be longer?”
    Morris stepped around the slab, walked up to her. He took her shoulders, kissed her on the mouth.
    “Wow.” Peabody blinked several times. “Um, thanks. That was nice.”
    “It’s very good to see you,” he said, and his eyes laughed into Eve’s when he stepped away.
    “So far this is the best morning I’ve had in ever.”
    “Well, hold on to that,” Eve advised. “We’ve got homicide, a media circus, and a long list of suspects. Let’s get to work. Thanks, Morris.”
    “Anytime. And Peabody? I like your legs just as they are.”
    “The day gets better and better.” Dazzled, Peabody walked back into the tunnel with Eve.
    “Try this. You’re late. And I can see damn well from the bounce in your step you’re late due to sex, which means I have to catch you up on the ME’s findings, and this does not make my day better and better.”
    “I couldn’t help it. McNab asked me to marry him.”
    The second hard jolt of the morning stopped Eve in mid-stride. “What? Jesus. What?”
    “I’m eating fruity yogurt instead of the bagel and schmear I wanted, and he’s sitting there with his bowl of Crispy Crunchie Charms, and he asked if I wanted to get married.” The residual thrill bounced heron her pink boots. “Really, he asked if I wanted him to ask, which is even sweeter and better, and wow oh wow, I had to have sex.”
    “Okay.” How many shocks, Eve wondered, was she supposed to rebound from? “So …”
    “So we’re going to get married. One day. Not now. We don’t want to get married now.”
    “I’m confused.”
    “I think he needed me to know it’s what he wants one day, with me. And needed to know it’s what I want one day, with him. And it is.” Peabody hiked up her shoulders in a kind of self-hug. “It really is. It shook him, you know, seeing somebody who looks like me, who’s
being
me, you know. Dead.”
    “Yeah, that I get.”
    “And he needed me to know, and he needed to know, so he asked if he should ask, and we … I’m crazy about him, Dallas. But it’s more than crazy. I really absolutely love every bony inch of him.”
    “I guess you do.” Eve took a minute as they walked outside. “I may never say these words again, but you’re good together. And you’re both being smart, to