“Okay.”
“Tell Daphne that I and this firm are at her disposal, and that I would like to speak with her at the earliest opportunity. As for her medical bills, those can be paid out of the estate. I can work that, and we can and will advance her what she needs for lodging and living expenses.
“Now, unless there’s more, I’d very much like to go home and have a very large whiskey.”
* * *
“He was pretty okay for a lawyer,” Peabody commented as they left. “And that was a really good latte.”
“Another check mark in the Disliked Strazza column.”
Stepping out into reception, Eve noted the woman still manned the desk. And was currently being charmed up to the eyeballs by Roarke, who leaned casually against the counter.
He turned his head, aimed that killer smile at Eve. “And here’s my cop, and our own Peabody.”
“What’s the deal?” Eve demanded.
“As I was just telling the delightful Donna, we’re closing down most of the operations for the day, and I’m here to hitch a ride with my wife.”
“I’m not going home.”
“I’ll still take the lift, wherever you’re going. You mind your step out there, Donna.”
“Oh, I will. I like the snow.”
Eve moved straight to the elevator, gave Roarke the hard eye when the doors closed. “She’s old enough to be your mother.”
“Your point?”
Eve only shook her head, ordered Level One Garage. “Did you actually track us to Wythe’s office?”
“It was easy enough. How are you, Peabody?”
“I’m all good. I like the snow, too. I’m thinking of hitting the market when I get home, getting the makings for a pot of soup, maybe some beer bread ’cause it’s quick.”
“Beer bread?” Roarke asked, apparently fascinated.
As Peabody explained—God knew why—the details of making beer bread, Eve ignored the conversation, considered what she knew, didn’t know.
And what came next.
“Go home,” Eve said as they reached their level. “Make the soup and bread of beer.”
“Seriously?”
“Write up what you have on the bartender, write up the interview we just had with Wythe. Check with Santiago and Carmichael on the rest of the guest list, and get me that, and for the thorough, confirm Wythe’s alibi for Saturday night through Sunday morning.”
“Can do.”
“I can get a car to drive you home,” Roarke said.
“Thanks. I’d take it, but I can catch a subway a couple minutes from here, and get downtown without the crazy drivers. I can stick, Dallas.”
“I’m going to work from home myself. It’s desk work for now anyway. We’ve covered the field for today.”
“I’ll cover my list. See you tomorrow. Snow day!” she added, almost dancing away.
“You drive,” Eve told Roarke. “I need to check a couple things.”
As Roarke worked through miserable traffic, she checked her incomings, read the lab report.
“All the blood on the DB and the surviving victim was his and hers. No blood from the assailant. None of his blood in the room, so if Strazza got in a shot, he didn’t draw blood, or none ended up on the crime scene.”
“What does that tell you?”
“Potentially … Strazza breaks out of the chair, charges. He’s probably still tangled up some, and he’s hurting from the beating. Killer grabs the heavy object, spilling water and flowers as he bashes Strazza with it. She may still be restrained and/or unconscious. Maybe just dazed, in shock, but I lean toward restrained or out as Morris estimates about fifteen minutes between the initial blow to the head and the killing blows.”
“That’s quite a gap.”
“Yeah.” Fifteen minutes could equal a lifetime, she thought. “Potentially. Killer thinks Strazza’s dead or dying, Daphne is out of it or restrained. He leaves the room to clear out the safes, select what he wants, clean up. He’d have blood on him. Or he took the time to rape the female again. Potentially, one more time, he comes back to get his zip ties, his rope, his tape, his light, whatever else.”
Everything into the case, she thought. The case he’d carried in with him, in front of witnesses.
“Now Daphne’s unrestrained—he released the other vics, so pattern indicates he’d release her. But Strazza comes to, not dead, starts to get up. Killer bashes him again and again. Daphne tries to stop him, or to just run. He gives her a knock, hard enough so she cracks her head on the footboard, and she’s out. She crawled through some of the blood—Strazza’s, her own. It was on her hands, on her knees. We’ve got smears of it on the floors from her feet where she walked through it.”
She left it there, checked something else, stared out at the snow.
“He abused her in the will. Even dead he’s slapping at her.”
“What do you mean?”
“The lawyer had to circle, use hypothetical, but was a lot more cooperative than I expected. He didn’t like Strazza.”
“Did anyone?”
“Not so far. In any case, Strazza left the bulk of his estate to the hospital—with strings. They use it for whatever purpose he designated, and name it after him.”
“What of his wife?”
“She gets the house, her clothes, her jewelry—which was stolen—and whatever’s left in the house he didn’t earmark to be sold to go to the hospital. No financial trusts or whatever toward her maintaining the house, or paying it off. I got the impression he didn’t own it free and clear. And since you showed up, you could check on that.”