In Death 29 - Kindred in Death

She’ll take good care.”
    “I’m going to take you up,” Whitney said. “Anna.”
    Mrs. Whitney nodded.
    Starched and intimidating, Eve thought, but she would handle a grieving mother and a devastated father.
    “You need to stay down here, Jonah. I’ll be down shortly. Lieutenant.”
    “You’re friends with the victim’s parents off the job?” Eve asked.
    “Yes. Anna and Carol serve on some committees together, and often spend time with each other. We socialize. I brought my wife as a friend of the victim’s mother.”
    “Yes, sir. I believe she’ll be a great help in that area.”
    “This is hard, Dallas.” His voice leaden, he started up the steps. “We’ve known Deena since she was a little girl. I can tell you she was the light of their hearts. A bright, lovely girl.”
    “The house has excellent security from my eyeball of it. Do you know if it was activated when the MacMasters returned this morning?”
    “The locks were. Jonah found the cameras had been deactivated, and the discs for the last two days removed. He touched nothing,” Whitney added, turning left at the top of the stairs. “Allowed Carol to touch nothing—but the girl. And he prevented his wife from moving the body or disturbing the scene. I’m sure we can all understand there were a few moments of shock.”
    “Yes, sir.” It was awkward, she thought, and uncomfortable to be thrust in the position of interviewing her commander. “Do you know what time they returned home this morning?”
    “At eight-thirty-two, precisely. I took the liberty of checking the lock log, and it confirmed Jonah’s statement to me. I’ll give you a copy of the statement from my home ’link log. He contacted me immediately, requesting you, and requesting my presence if possible. I didn’t seal the scene—her bedroom. But it is secure.”
    He gestured, stood back. “I think it best if I go down, let you proceed. When your partner arrives, I’ll send her directly up.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    He nodded again, then sighed as he looked at the open bedroom door. “Dallas . . . It’s very hard.”
    She waited until he’d turned away, started down the stairs. Alone, she stepped to the doorway and looked at the young, dead Deena MacMasters.

2
    “RECORD ON. DALLAS, LIEUTENANT EVE, AT scene, MacMasters, Deena, victim.”
    She scanned the room first as she took Seal-It from her field kit to coat her hands and boots. A large space, bright and airy with triple windows—privacy screen activated—along the park-view wall. A padded bench, mounded with colorful pillows, curved under the glass. Posters of popular musicians, actors, personalities covered walls done in a dreamy violet. A little clutch tightened Eve’s stomach as she studied one of her friend, Mavis Freestone, blue hair swirling, arms lifted in triumph, titled Motherhood Rocks!
    On it, she saw Mavis’s big, bold handwriting.
    YO, DEENA,
YOU ROCK, TOO!
MAVIS FREESTONE
    Had Deena pushed the poster at Mavis at some concert or event, and Mavis—laughing, bubbling—signed it with Deena’s purple pen? Noise, lights, color, Eve imagined, and life. And a thrilling memory for a sixteen-year-old girl who couldn’t have known she would have so little time to treasure it.
    A portion of the room was designed for studying and schoolwork with a glossy white desk, shelves, a high-end comp and com center, disc files—all ordered and tidy. A second area, suited for lounging, probably hanging out with girlfriends, also sat tidy and apparently undisturbed with plump cushions, soft throws, a scatter of stuffed animals likely collected throughout childhood.
    A hairbrush and hand mirror, a few colored bottles, a bowl of seashells, and a trio of framed photos stood on a dresser in the same glossy white as the desk.
    Thick, boldly colored rugs flashed over a gleaming wood floor. The one nearest the bed, she noted, skewed out of alignment. He’d knocked it or skidded against it, or she had.
    A pair of panties—simple, white, unadorned, lay near the rug.
    “He stripped off her underwear,” Eve said aloud, “tossed them aside.”
    The nightstands beside the bed held fancy, frilly lamps with tasseled shades. Again, one of the shades sat crooked on its base. A bump by an arm or elbow. Everything else around the bed itself showed a delight in order and precision, a love of pretty, girlish things.
    A young sixteen, to Eve’s mind, but maybe she was projecting. At sixteen she’d been counting the days