“Neville makes her some bullshit necklace out of beads for her birthday, and she makes like it’s the crown jewels. I gave her a ring, something real, told her what I felt, how it should be. She wouldn’t even take it. She tells me I’m confused. How I’m sweet, and she’s flattered, and more bullshit about how I’m going to find the perfect girl one day.”
“How old were you?”
“I was fifteen, and already more of a man than that Brit pussy she married. She humiliated me.”
“You don’t strike me as the kind of man who takes no for an answer so easy. You don’t take the pussy way.”
“I waited. Figured I needed some experience under my belt.” He smiled, patted himself. “Get me?”
“Oh, yeah. Some of that experience was with…” Eve pulled another photo out of the file.
Kyle studied it, shrugged. “Doesn’t ring a bell.”
“You were eighteen when she accused you of sexual assault, recanted after your father gave her a cool million. Does that ring the bell?”
“That one?” He leaned forward, jabbed a finger in the eye of the photo. “She wanted it, then got all whiny when I gave her what she wanted. She cost me three months in some fucking rehab center. I lost my whole goddamn summer break.”
“That’s tough. But you gave Astra another chance, didn’t you?”
“Right after my twenty-first birthday, I went to London on my own, booked the best suite in the best hotel. I asked her to come.”
“How’d you get her there? You had to be subtle about it, right?”
“Wanted to take her to dinner. The asshole’s off on location, and Neville’s still at university. I’m in town, let me take you to dinner. Drinks and dinner, fancy and elegant.”
“And she bought it.”
“She knew what I was saying. I was just giving her cover. I had champagne and flowers, her favorite foods, everything all set up. She wore a blue dress.” He closed her eyes, lips curved. And when he opened them, the rage came back. “And she pretended to be shocked when I kissed her. Shocked and angry. She slapped me. Slapped me and stormed away before I could…”
“She humiliated you again.”
“I should’ve shown her, that was my mistake. I should have shown her. I apologized. I shed tears.” He tapped his cheeks, grinning. “You have to think of the long view.”
Eve nodded. “You have to have vision.”
“Exactamundo. I could wait. Plenty of substitutes. She’d see how successful I was, how important I was. How I could have any woman I wanted, and she’d come to me.”
“But you couldn’t have any woman you wanted. You couldn’t have Rosa.”
“I saw her first!” His voice rang with sheer and sincere outrage. “You think I could let them get away with that, doing the same thing to me? You think I could let that bitch brush me off, give me the same line as Astra—I’m confused, she’s with Neville?”
“Playing the same game.” Eve expelled a long breath that signaled perfect agreement. “Teasing you, daring you. Holding out on you to stir you up. But you know how to wear the mask, right? The loving cousin, the solid business partner, the loyal friend.”
“There’s nothing I can’t do.”
“Because you learn, you don’t make the same mistakes. With Rosa, you didn’t make the same mistakes you’d made with Astra. You needed to show her, and you did.” Eve tipped back in the chair. “If she wanted to stay in that rut—with Neville—that was her loss, but she’d have a taste of a real man first. The Dracula bit, that was genius. Symbolic. The vampire—the king of vamps—he takes the woman he wants, takes her over, body, mind, soul, right?”
He smiled, shrugged, looked away.
“Come on, Kyle, take the credit. You earned it. The planning, down to the last detail. Using the robbery as cover—it worked. And beating the crap out of both of them. Especially Neville.”
“He deserved it. I saw her first.”
“But you thought of Astra when you raped Rosa.” Eve took Rosa’s photo out of a file, laid it beside Astra’s. “Look at them. Rosa could be Astra’s daughter.”
“You see that, too.”
“Sure. Just like I see she was meant to be yours. Both of them are. First Neville’s father’s in your way, and now Neville, after all you’ve done for him. I’m surprised you let him live.”
“Thought about killing him, but we’re family. And it was about making them live with it. About watching them try to live with it.”
“Oh, I get that. You were in a little bit of a hurry with Rosa and Neville. I get that, too. It had all built up, and you needed to have her, show her, make her admit she wanted it. You ripped her clothes. With the others, you had them strip. So much more seductive. And more humiliating for the man.”
When he said nothing, she shook her head. “We’ve got the evidence, Kyle. You’re not stupid, you know what we found in your loft. So we’ve got what we need. I’m just … well, I’ve got to admit, I’m pretty fascinated by how you played all this.”
“His lawyer’s going to fix it,” Peabody added. “He can afford a damn platoon of high-priced lawyers.”
Now Eve shrugged. “That’s not our problem. We did our job. I just like hearing how anybody could plan all this out, time after time. The precision, the planning, the smallest details. Well, it’s exquisite actually. Did you really decide on the woman at that gala? The ah, yeah, here it is. The Celebrate Art Gala? What pulled that trigger?”