Backfire

“Do you even know who the buyers are?”

Cindy rose straight up, slammed her fist on the table, rattling her chains. “You bitch! I do the planning, I do everything, do you hear me?” Clive grabbed her hand. She shut up, even managed a twisted smile at Eve.

Nice start, Savich thought. Cindy Cahill looked like she very much wanted to kill Eve. The investigative training the marshals were given at the marshals’ academy at Glenco looked to be good; either that or Eve had learned a few things growing up with a marshal as a father. Probably both.

Eve said, “Was it Clive who targeted Mark Lindy for you? Or did some foreign agent set you up with Lindy? Did you know, Cindy, that those top-secret materials were headed for a foreign government?”

Cindy Cahill didn’t leap to the bait this time, but she couldn’t keep the rage from her eyes. She tried on a sneer for size, but she couldn’t mask the mad. “You’re making up a story. The same story that ridiculous CIA operations officer told, too. Do all of you read off the same script?

“Listen up, little girl. What I mean is that Clive is my husband, my partner.” She gave Clive Cahill an adoring look and patted his hand, making the chains rattle again. “He’s my sweetie pie, not my boss, never my boss.”

Eve arched an eyebrow, gave her a yeah, right look. “Your sweetie pie didn’t mind you sleeping with Mark Lindy so long as there was a big payoff? Sorry, Cindy, but come on, now—that was your only role, wasn’t it? That is, until something went wrong. What happened? Did Mark Lindy realize what you were doing and threaten to call the police? And so you gave him the last cocktail of his life?”

Cindy gave Eve a girl-to-girl smile. “In my experience, guys usually prefer beer.”

Eve sat back in her chair. “That wasn’t a bad comeback, Cindy, but maybe Clive could give you a cooler line, since he’s smarter. Hmm, I wonder what your folks would think about how you’ve grown up, what you’ve finally done.”

Cindy Cahill never looked away from Eve’s face. “Since dear old Dad started coming to my bedroom when I was eleven years old, I don’t think he’d care one way or the other.”

Interesting, Savich thought. Did the shrinks know she’d been abused? He started to rein it back, since he didn’t want the Cahills to demand their lawyer, but he wanted to see what Eve would say next. He gave her a small nod.

Eve said, “Clive, if it wasn’t you running the show, what were you doing, anyway? Did Cindy have you fetch her coffee, slide her slippers on her dainty feet, make up her schedule of seduction for her?”

Clive was shaking his head, looking from his wife to Savich, then finally back at Eve.

Eve continued. “Then what is she doing with you, Clive? You’re nearly old enough to be her father, aren’t you, nearly as old as her father who abused her? Tell me the truth, now, Clive, I know it must be tucked in the back of your brain. You’re afraid of her, aren’t you? Afraid she’ll tire of you, afraid she’ll start seeing a guy who’s younger than you? Afraid she’ll take her chances and talk to us, leave you here by yourself on death row?”

Clive’s pale face turned red. He yelled, heaving, he was so mad, “I am not afraid of her! She’s my wife. She’d never do anything to hurt me! I’m the one who found her, who taught her everything—”

“Did you teach her how to kill? Probably not, since the scene at that murder was a mess, not well done of you at all. Poison doesn’t always make a person just fall over and die. No, Mark Lindy fought when he realized what you’d done to him. He tried to take you down, but the poison got to him first, and it wasn’t at all pretty, was it, Cindy? And that, Clive, led the police to both of you.”

Cindy Cahill squeezed Clive’s hand hard. “Don’t you get all bent out of shape about anything, Clive. She’s only trying to play you.” She shook her head at them. “Aren’t you two the cool team? How long have you worked this routine together? Have you ever had any luck with it?”

Eve sat forward now, clasped her hands in front of her. “Do you know, Cindy, one thing I’d never do is kill someone by poison. It’s so—mean-spirited, cowardly, really, you know what I mean? And it’s so tacky. So low-class. Give me a knife any day and let me face down the person I’m going to kill.”

“I am not tacky!”

“No? Then what do you call using your body whenever Clive wants you to? Without the money, without the trappings, who would think you’re worth any more than a fast in and out with a streetwalker against a wall in an alley?”