Drake Sisters 03 - Oceans of Fire

have known he felt guilty because of his daughter’s death, not that he was guilty. I shouldn’t have had any preconceived notions when I went into that room. Everyone sounded so certain he’d murdered her, that he was the one who was killing those children, but I shouldn’t have let that influence me. You were Generated by ABC Amber LIT Conv erter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
    asking him so many questions, firing them at him over and over, and the other cops were doing the same.
    He acted guilty. He wanted to confess something. Anything. When I asked if he was guilty and he said yes, I felt it was wrong, but I was so busy listening to the officers, to you.” She broke off and covered her face again. “I betrayed my own gift. I asked the wrong questions and he confessed his guilt, just as I led him to do. And then he reached for the gun that stupid officer had sitting there so conspicuously.”
    “If we drove him to commit suicide we were all to blame, not you,” he said.
    “ If? If ? There is no if. He was made to believe he was guilty for the loss of his child. No one comforted him. No one counseled him. He felt guilty because he was watching her while his wife was away and he fell asleep. He took a nap.”
    “He was drinking. He drank too much and he went to sleep in the afternoon.”
    “Does that absolve what we did to him? He wasn’t the killer, but you suspected he wasn’t. You suspected it even when you brought him in for questioning, didn’t you?”
    “We always look at the parents first.”
    “But you didn’t tell me your suspicions. You already had a suspect.”
    “I had no evidence, Abbey. I had to follow procedure. I brought the parents in and questioned him just as I would any other suspect.”
    “But you didn’t believe he was guilty. Everyone was hammering away at him and I just joined in.” Abbey bit at her knuckles in agitation. Night after night she saw the man’s face and her own hands covered in his blood. “I helped kill him.”
    “Damn it, Abbey. He shot himself. We question suspects all the time. They don’t kill themselves.”
    “You can absolve yourself of all responsibility, Aleksandr, but I can’t. And what you did to me afterward is inexcusable, and it isn’t the actions of a man in love. You may want to sleep with me, but I’m not willing to settle for that.”
    “Far more was going on in that room than either of us knew.” He pushed a hand through the dark waves of his hair. “I had risen through the ranks fast and solved cases and had come to the attention of my superiors quickly. I had a background in…” He hesitated. “I was a very successful operative before I was a police officer. I became a detective when others had worked many years to get there. I also had people in high places owing me favors. I knew how to get through red tape and move around power struggles. When that happens, you step on toes and make enemies you aren’t always aware of.”
    Abigail struggled to breathe, to think beyond that traumatic moment when the young father had reached for the gun. She hadn’t been able to stop time or slow it down or relive the minutes before he had pulled the trigger.
    “That officer, the one who let him near his gun, was waiting for his opportunity. He worked for a man named Leonid Ignatev. My career had surpassed Ignatev’s and he took advantage of every mistake I made and every vulnerability I had to sabotage my career. I knew he was dirty. I suppose we all are to some extent, we have to work deals all the time to get anywhere, but Ignatev was in bed with the mafia.
    He had his plant on my team and when things were chaotic, as they often are in an interrogation, his man allowed the suspect to take his gun. I should have known what was going on when he wasn’t arrested Generated by ABC Amber LIT Conv erter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
    immediately too, but I was focused on you. I was certain my name would keep you safe, but Ignatev had his men working on you.”
    Abigail took a deep breath and looked at him. “And then it stopped, very abruptly after two days, and the new men were very subdued and I could smell their fear. That was even more frightening. You did that, didn’t you?” Her heart was pounding now, so hard her chest hurt. She didn’t want the truth because she couldn’t face that part of him. She knew he was ruthless, but she didn’t know if she could look at how deep that trait ran in him. The men