Insidious

Savich said, “Whatever you said to Marsia, no matter how light your hand, no matter how dismissive you were, no matter how you skated around the truth about Delsey, it was crystal clear to her she was going to lose you, her golden goose.

“Rob, you’re not much of a poker player. Despite your intentions, I imagine you couldn’t help yourself, you overflowed with Delsey, and it slammed Marsia in the face even though you thought you were being dismissive about her. All of us at the Hoover Building on Tuesday saw both of you light up like Christmas trees when she waltzed off the elevator. Then you spent Wednesday together. Believe me, Marsia understood everything perfectly.

“When Agent Sherlock and I met with you Wednesday afternoon, Marsia, both of us realized you are focused, intelligent, and very talented. We both liked you, admired your work. Until Delsey’s near death, I didn’t believe you capable of a jealous rage.”

Marsia fanned her hands in front of her. “Agent Savich—Dillon—let me assure you, assure Rob, assure all of you, that when Rob happened to tell me about meeting this musician, I didn’t consider it of any importance. I ate my spaghetti and took him at his word. I didn’t give her another thought.

“Even if I were wrong about Rob and this Delsey, I am not a criminal. I am not a murderer. Allow me to point out that I was not even in Washington yesterday afternoon. I was delivering my sculpture representation of fecundity to the fertility center in Baltimore at the time of Ms. Freestone’s accident.”

Savich said, “I know exactly where you were.” He turned to the group. “You are wondering what the attempted murder of a stranger has to do with Venus. Be patient and you will understand. Sherlock?”

Sherlock walked to stand beside Savich. “The FBI has a sophisticated facial-recognition program. It helps us identify unknown persons involved in a crime. Another agent, Nicholas Drummond, and Dillon, have further refined the program to allow it to identify criminals even from partial or grainy views of their faces. The program analyzes bone structure, relative distances between facial features, the shape of the jaw, you get the idea.

“The person who shoved Delsey Freestone in the back in front of an oncoming limo yesterday was wearing a hoodie, sunglasses, and baggy clothes, all in all, an excellent disguise. On one traffic cam we got a portion of his jaw. We assumed it was a he. From another, we saw the nose. Not enough for us to be certain of who it was, though we had a suspicion. We inputted pictures of everyone connected to this case into the program for comparison.

“The program verified our suspicions. It wasn’t you, Marsia. It was you, Veronica.”

Veronica reared back, opened her mouth, but Savich overrode her. “Marsia called you, told you Rob had fallen for a woman and he had it bad, he was beyond smitten. He was so transparent, like all men, and of course she could tell. She was worried Rob would break it off with her and she would lose everything.

“But then I imagine Marsia got hold of herself. She had reason to be confident. She’s an attractive woman, and she’d been with Rob for months, winning him over, seeing to his every whim. She knew Rob well enough to think she might persuade him to put this Delsey behind him. She’d redouble her efforts to please him, maybe even get pregnant, to force his hand. You knew she didn’t care if he slept with Delsey as long as he came back to her. Of course she would forgive him. Marsia probably realized the two of you had no choice but to wait it out. And if talking with you calmed her down, it had the opposite effect on you, Veronica. You saw everything you’d planned falling apart around you, all because of an outsider, and you panicked. You weren’t about to let your plan fall apart because of Delsey Freestone.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Veronica shouted, contempt thick in her voice. “What plan? There is no bloody plan! Rob, a golden goose? That’s lunacy—Rob and Marsia love each other. So what?”

Savich looked from Veronica back to Marsia. “The plan the two of you came up with was that Marsia would marry Rob Rasmussen and make both of you wealthy beyond belief. You wanted the gold ring, Veronica, you wanted it all. To you, Delsey Freestone was an obvious threat, and you acted. You followed Delsey from her brother’s apartment, saw your chance. She never even gave you a look, another stranger wearing glasses, a hoodie, and she was singing, I’ll bet.

“It was easy for you to slip in behind her. One hard shove, and you melted away, your hoodie up, covering your hair and your head. You heard the screams, the screeching cars, the crashes, you must have thought you’d killed her.

“The sunglasses were a good touch, made it more difficult, but the cameras and our program nailed you, Veronica.”

Veronica was shaking her head. “Why are you doing this, Dillon? You know me, know my loyalty is to Venus and always has been. Even if I do look something like this person, that’s no proof of anything. It could have been anyone.”

“You were gone from the house most of yesterday afternoon. You drive a late-model Audi, with a GPS. I’ve already arranged for a search warrant. I have no doubt the GPS will put your near K Street.”

Rob was staring from Veronica to Marsia, a woman he’d believed he might love enough to make a commitment—until he’d met Delsey. And because of him, Delsey could have died. He couldn’t get his brain around it. He said slowly, the words painful, “Marsia and Veronica—you wanted to kill Delsey because you were afraid I’d fallen in love with her?”

Veronica looked at him, disdain clear on her face. “Can’t you see Agent Savich is making this all up?”

Marsia said, her voice cool, unruffled, “Agent Savich—this new facial-recognition program you described, couldn’t it be wrong? It wouldn’t be accepted in court, would it?”

“Maybe not, but now that I’m sure who it was—and it was Veronica—we’ll be able to prove it, you can count on that. We’ll be able to prove you and Veronica hooked up well before you met Rob. Credit card receipts, cell phone records, emails, your neighbors at your studio—there’s not going to be any hiding that, Marsia. I am wondering how long it took the two of you to plan all this.”

Marsia waved it away. “There is no plan, there has never been. That’s absurd. As for Veronica, yes, I know her. We met quite by accident at a coffee shop in Chevy Chase some time ago and discovered we liked each other. I found her stories about Mrs. Rasmussen interesting. She told me what it was like to work for her. She is, after all, a legend. And, in time, she told me about Rob.” She smiled at Rob, reached out her hand and lightly laid it on his leg. “When I needed to have my kitchen remodeled, I checked around, heard Rob could be trusted to do a good job. I recognized his name, of course, and thought, why not? And that’s how Rob and I met. There are no deep, ugly secrets here, only two adults finding each other and getting together.” She smiled up at him. “I have nothing to hide and neither does Veronica. I think your facial-recognition program is simply wrong, and you will have to deal with that.”