Ice Blue (20 page)

Wiping her face, Kate studied Burt. The
uniformed officers had moved closer, exuding obvious and somewhat
overstated menace on Kate’s behalf, but she waved them back. Her
instincts told her Burt wouldn’t physically attack her, so she
decided to try one more tack.

“Mr. Rowland,” Kate said. “I can’t imagine
how you feel right now. I can only guess you wish you could go back
in time and protect your wife. And even now, your most powerful
impulse must be to protect her, and show loyalty toward her.”

Burt stared at her, still rigid with fury.
Slowly, his shoulders relaxed and he nodded, pressing a hand to his
mouth.

“Yes,” he said softly, voice ragged. He
squeezed his eyes shut, rubbed at them, and met Kate’s gaze with a
visible effort. “Yes,” he repeated, stronger.

“But the desire to be loyal, and to keep her
secrets, might be the very worst way to help your wife,” Kate said.
“Something she shared with you, especially in the last few days,
might help us catch the person who did this to her. Please tell us
everything. I promise, we have no interest in anything you
disclose, except as it pertains to bringing her killer to
justice.”

She’d found the right words. Something in
Burt’s bearing changed, and though he remained silent for several
more seconds, she knew he meant to cooperate, as soon as he
mastered his emotions enough to speak.

“Ginny and I have endured some financial
setbacks over the past two or three years,” he began at last. “I
think she was trying to solve things. She didn’t want me involved.
She told me …” He stopped. “For this to make sense, I need to go
back. Can I start at the beginning?”

“Please,” Kate said.

“When our problems began,” Rowland said, “I
wanted to keep the matter private and solve it by any means
necessary – sell our house, downsize our cars and vacations, and so
on. Ginny wouldn’t have it. She thought if we gave up the trappings
of wealth, and the aura of success – excess, really – we’d never
recover our credibility.” Rowland’s eyes cut to Bhar. “You came in
this house and called her a whore to her face, and she never
blinked. She had tremendous strength. She wasn’t ashamed of
anything she’d done to get ahead. The only thing that ever scared
her was the notion of sliding backward, back to the life she worked
so hard to escape.”

“I can understand that,” Kate said, mostly to
redirect Burt’s attention before his hostility toward Bhar derailed
the questioning again. “So did Ginny come up with a way to improve
your finances?”

“Her first idea was to ask Malcolm for money.
This was a few years ago, as I said, before he became so
tight-fisted, and we were all great friends. I was against it,
nonetheless, but I let her have her head. God knows, I always did.
And Malcolm laughed at her. Right in front of me, like he knew I
wouldn’t have the nerve to defend her. Malcolm laughed at Ginny and
said he never loaned money to his friends, and if anything, she
should be paying him to keep her past as an escort under wraps. I
wanted to leave then, to walk away and pretend the request never
happened, but when Ginny gets angry …” Burt stopped. “When Ginny
got angry,” he corrected himself, voice shaking, “there was no
stopping her. She told Malcolm she knew a secret about him, one
he’d pay dearly to hush up, and it would cost him half a million
pounds to seal her lips on the subject.”

“What secret?” Bhar asked, pen poised above
his notepad.

Burt cut his eyes back to Bhar as if he’d
forgotten his presence. “Jesus. Jesus, this can’t be real. I must
be dreaming,” he whispered, pressing his hands to his face. “Can I
have a drink? A whiskey?”

“Not yet, I’m afraid,” Kate said. “We can’t
allow you to consume alcohol while giving your statement. Besides,
it might make your forget something. But as soon as we’re done
speaking, you can certainly have a drink. Or we can call a doctor
to prescribe you a sedative.”

Burt nodded numbly, gaze drifting toward the
arched passage that led from the dining room to the living room,
where Ginny Rowland lay.

“Mr. Rowland,” Kate prompted. “Did Malcolm
Comfrey pay half a million pounds to silence your wife?”

Burt looked surprised. “What? No – no, of
course not. He called her bluff. At first he was angry, and
demanded to know what she’d dug up. Then, when she told him, he
laughed. Said he wouldn’t be the one to pay the price, and if Ginny
wanted to torpedo two or three other lives, she was welcome to do
so.”

“What was the secret?” Kate asked.

“One of those things I never would have
noticed. But Ginny notices – noticed everything. She could have
been a professor at University, if life had been different. She
never missed a detail. Ginny and Madge were on some committee or
other that was trying to raise awareness about blood donation.
Influential donors were supposed to demonstrate how easy and
painless giving blood can be. Ginny forced me to agree to giving
blood – I’d never done it – and Madge managed to herd in Malcolm
and Jules, too.

“I was sick and miserable throughout.
Malcolm, Madge, and Jules did better. They were sitting in their
lounge chairs, watching their blood slide down tubes and fill up
plastic bags, while a nurse made the rounds. She was marking the
bags with blood-type stickers. She marked Malcolm and Madge’s, and
had just put a sticker on Jules’s bag when Jules asked Malcolm a
question. She called him “Daddy,” and the nurse stopped what she
was doing. She looked at the sticker, then went and rechecked
Malcolm’s bag, and Madge’s. I didn’t notice, but Ginny caught it
like one of those cadaver-sniffing dogs.” Burt gave a strained
chuckle at his grotesque choice of words. “Ginny actually examined
the sticker on each blood bag. It was all she talked about on the
way home, how the nurse had looked from Jules to Malcolm, like she
wanted to ask a question but thought better of it. Then Ginny got
on the Internet and researched blood types and heredity. She woke
me up out of a sound sleep to tell me Jules Comfrey couldn’t be
Malcolm Comfrey’s daughter. Their blood types made it
impossible.”

“How could she be sure of that? Mrs. Rowland
wasn’t a doctor,” Bhar said.

“She said it was simple,” Burt replied.
“Malcolm was type O, and Madge was type O, but Jules was AB
negative. It’s impossible for two type Os to produce an AB negative
child. Therefore, either Jules was adopted – and she wasn’t – or
she was fathered by someone other than Malcolm.”

As Bhar’s pen flew over the page, Kate
considered this. Something was nagging at the back of her mind.
Some bit of information that had seemed inconsequential or silly
when she received it – like a mild joke, or a weird dream.

“And when Ginny gave this information to
Malcolm Comfrey, he laughed and refused to pay her?” Kate
asked.

Burt nodded.

“Do you think he already knew?”

“I don’t know. Malcolm always maintained
control. Even when he went for the jugular, he kept his voice
steady. Kept a bastard smile on his face. All I know is, he told
Ginny if she dropped her bombshell, as he put it, it would be Madge
and Jules – and maybe the mystery father – who suffered from the
revelation. He’d been disappointed in Jules almost since she was
born, or so he told us, and the discovery she wasn’t actually his
came as a great relief.”

“Burt!” a female voice cried. Jules Comfrey
entered, face blotchy and eyes red. “God, Burt, I’m so sorry! I
don’t understand why this is happening to us!”

Hetheridge appeared on her heels, with Madge
Comfrey just behind him. “I will allow the Comfreys to speak
briefly with Mr. Rowland,” he said, addressing Kate, Bhar, and the
uniformed officers. “This breach of procedure occurs under my
authority. However, I will not allow them to venture any deeper
into the crime scene than – Ms. Comfrey!” he snapped, as Jules
darted toward Burt Rowland with the clear intention of embracing
him. “His clothing is evidence! Do not touch him!”

Jules Comfrey stopped, drawing up just short
of Burt. Kate, only a short distance away, studied the younger
woman more carefully than ever before. Jules was of middling
height, slender, with fine-boned features that had always struck
Kate as aristocratic. She had her mother’s thick, dark hair. But
her best feature was her long-lashed, finely shaped, ice blue
eyes.

“What do you mean, evidence?” Jules cried,
rounding on Hetheridge. “Ginny’s been murdered and you’re treating
Burt like a suspect?
Burt?
How bloody
stupid are you? Is this all you know how to do, turn up at crime
scenes and accuse the family? Why the fuck aren’t you out on the
street finding the person who did this? It’s probably the same
person who killed my father!”

“That is quite enough,” Hetheridge boomed.
Jules’s mouth, open for another volley, snapped shut. No one else
spoke or moved. Silence wrapped around the room like a shroud.

Hetheridge’s gaze shifted from Madge to
Jules, then back again. What felt like several seconds ticked by
before he spoke.

“Ms. Comfrey, you and your mother have
already been indulged far beyond the norm. This ends now. I allowed
you to enter the crime scene because I have been charged with the
thankless, and apparently impossible, task of pacifying your
infantile temperaments without making it obvious you are both
suspects. But hear me now: you are each under intense scrutiny. And
this display – attempting to slip into the scene before the victim
has even been removed – does nothing to enhance your appearance of
innocence. Put another toe out of line and I’ll arrest you both
under suspicion of murder, obstruction of justice, and interference
with a crime scene.”

“You wouldn’t…” Madge began.

“I will and I shall, if you test me,”
Hetheridge cut across her. “You’ve already gone above my head at
the Yard and gotten nowhere. Your influence is limited, and now at
its end. I have no fear of you, Madge.”

Madge stared at Hetheridge with an expression
Kate could only interpret as rage. It seemed genuine, pure as
platinum. Then it was gone, replaced by pain, hurt, and the warmth
that knows it will be rejected.

“No fear,” Madge said. “Nor any love either,
it seems.”

“Mrs. Comfrey,” Hetheridge said. He allowed
her name to hang between them. “I am here in my professional
capacity to seek justice on behalf of Malcolm Comfrey. And now
Ginny Rowland. No other reason.” He turned back to Jules Comfrey.
“You demanded to see Burt Rowland. You’ve seen him. And now, rather
than contaminate this scene further, I’d like you and your mother
to accompany me to New Scotland Yard. There we can revisit your
testimonies and be certain no detail has been overlooked.”

* * *

After Hetheridge departed with the Comfreys
in tow, Burt Rowland asked for a break. It was his third since his
discovery of Ginny’s body, but no one complained. A uniformed
officer matter-of-factly escorted Burt to the lavatory. Violent
death, as Kate herself had recently learned, led to a full-body
purge – not just for the corpse, but for those left behind, too. It
was not uncommon for even an admitted murderer to have his or her
confession interrupted by a weak bladder, loose bowels, or a
violent case of the dry heaves.

“I’ve never seen Hetheridge so angry,” Kate
said to Bhar, too low for the other officers to hear.

“That wasn’t anger. That was a performance,”
Bhar returned from the side of his mouth.

“What do you mean?”

“Think about it. Hetheridge wasn’t chosen as
the Yard’s liaison to the wealthy and powerful because he licks
them up the legs. He was chosen because he strokes them with one
hand and smacks them with the other. There are dozens of detectives
willing to French kiss privileged arse from here to the Isle of
Wight, without a pause for floss or Chap Stick. But the old man’s
the only one who’s willing to put the strap to their bums when the
occasion demands it.”

“Makes sense,” Kate said, again impressed by
Bhar’s insight. “I thought he was about to lose it.”

“Something none of us will ever see, I
suspect.”

“Why?”

Bhar turned his grin on Kate. “Because of the
blue blood in his veins. His sort doesn’t reveal their emotions.
I’ve always figured if you trace the Chief’s paternity back to the
first Baron of Wellegrave, you’ll find a right bastard fully in
touch with his need to bonk and his need to kill. But every baron
thereafter was a little paler, a little politer, and a little more
concerned with which fork to use. Maybe our lord is a throwback to
that first ruthless son of a bitch. But he’s constrained by the
emotional equivalent of Japanese foot-binding. Put Hetheridge in a
situation that requires courage without sentiment, and he’s your
man. Put him in a situation that requires him to express an actual
feeling, and he’ll probably end up saying nothing at all.”

“I’m sorry.” Burt reappeared in the dining
room, his uniformed officer-escort trailing behind. Burt’s face was
white; his eyes were red-rimmed. He had clearly used his lavatory
trip to break down for what Kate suspected would be the first of
many times, and his deep voice trembled when he spoke again.

“I’m all right now. Ready to tell you
anything. Anything to help Ginny.”

“You mentioned how your wife tried to
blackmail Malcolm Comfrey with the news his presumed daughter
wasn’t actually his,” Kate said. “You went on to say he called her
bluff, as you put it, and refused to pay to suppress the
information. Can I assume Ginny let the matter drop when she
realized there was no profit in revealing her deduction?”

“Of course.” Burt dropped back into the
high-backed chair he’d occupied before, knees touching and hands
clasped in his lap, like a forlorn child. “Ginny loved Jules. She
thought she was a mixed-up kid, and downright foolish when it came
to men, but Ginny loved her all the same. Her relationship to Madge
was a bit more … grown up. They were friends, but there was some
female rivalry there, too. Ginny might have told Madge she knew the
truth about Jules. I don’t know. Ginny only confided one thought in
ten to me.”