In Death 26 - Strangers in Death

Suzanne. What time did you leave for the market?”
    “About nine-thirty.”
    “What time did you get home?”
    “It was almost noon. I had to take the bus. She dropped me at the transpo center across from the tunnel, and gave me bus fare. I had to take the bus back.”
    “How long did you wait for the bus?”
    “Only a few minutes. I got lucky. I got off and walked back to the market. Mr. Isaacs said how he thought I wasn’t coming in that day.”
    “Mr. Isaacs?”
    “He runs the market, and I always go on Mondays, before ten. He said how I looked tired, how I should try to get some rest, and he gave me pop treats for the kids. I forgot that. He gave me treats for the kids. He’s a nice man. He and his wife run the market. I went home, and I put everything away, and I thought, ‘None of this is happening. It’s not real.’ Then I got sick again, because it was. I have to tell my kids. I don’t know how.”
    “When you were at the retreat and made your bargain, where were you?”
    “In Ava’s suite. She told me to come up after the last seminar, but not to tell anyone. People get jealous. She just wanted to relax with a friend.” Tears spurted again. Eve wondered how the woman had any more in her. “She said we were friends.”
    “You had drinks. Did she order them?”
    “There was a bottle of wine and a pretty platter of fruit and cheese. Everything was so pretty.”
    “Did anyone call or come by while you were there?”
    “No. She had the Do Not Disturb on the door and the ’links. So we could relax, she said.”
    Eve pressed a little more, then judged she’d wrung Suzanne dry. For now. “You’re going to be booked, and you’re going to be remanded. The court’s going to assign an attorney to you. You’ve got the best deal you’re going to get. Don’t expect any more.”
    She rose as Baxter came back in. “Detective Baxter reentering Interview.” When she crossed to him, he spoke quietly.
    “Got the search warrant. Do you want me to take that?”
    “No. Walk her through Booking. She’s tapped out for now.”
    “I contacted the sister while I waited for the warrant to come through. She’s confused and shocked, like you’d expect. She’s making arrangements to come up for the kids. CS cleared that.”
    “You pushed some buttons.”
    “The kids are going to have it hard enough. Not their fault.”
    “Walk her through,” Eve repeated. “I’ll have Peabody and Trueheart exercise the warrant. I need a couple hours to sort through all this. We need to keep this arrest off the radar.”
    With a nod, Baxter walked to Suzanne. “You need to come with me now.”
    Eve waited until he’d led Suzanne through the door. “Interview end.” Then she dragged her hands through her hair. “Christ. Jesus Christ.”
    When she stepped out, Mira was there. “I don’t want to hear about her emotional trauma, her fear of authority figures, or her goddamn remorse. Thomas Anders died by her hand.”
    “Yes, he did. That doesn’t make her less pitiable. A year in prison, twenty years, Suzanne Custer’s life is essentially over. It was over the minute Ava Anders targeted her.”
    “Tell me this: Did Suzanne Custer know what she was doing when she put that rope around Thomas Anders’s neck? Was she legally, mentally—and I’ll even go one more—morally aware of right and wrong?”
    “Yes, she was. She is culpable for her act, and should pay for what she did. Are there extenuating circumstances, would I—or any other psychiatrist—consider diminished capacity? Yes. But she killed Thomas Anders fully aware of her actions.”
    “That’s good enough for me.”
    “Eve. You’re so angry.”
    “Damn right I am. Sorry, I don’t have time to comb through my own psyche. I’ve got work.” She turned, and pulling out her communicator, strode away.
    In her office, she hit the AutoChef for coffee before sitting down at her desk to begin the calculations for the most likely lots Ava had used, and the rest stop where she’d taken Suzanne. Little bits, she thought. Little bits and pieces. While the computer worked, she wrote her report on the interview, made notes, added to her time lines.
    When the computer spit out its most probables, she studied the map, gauged the distances, the locations, simmered them with her understanding of Ava.
    “I think we’ve got that. Yeah, I think we do,” she muttered. And only grunted at the knock on her door.
    “Hello, Lieutenant.”
    She barely glanced