“A lecture.” Williams rolled his eyes.
“Did this lecture cause you to cease those activities?”
“I was a little more discreet, you could say. A little more choosy.” He lifted a shoulder. “No point in stirring things up.”
“But you weren’t worried about him going to Mosebly with his disapproval, or even over her head to the board?”
He smiled now, serenely. “I never figured he’d have the chops for that. He didn’t like making waves. Basically, it was a nonissue for me.”
“Well.” Eve tugged on her ear. “It may not have been one for him, especially if he was aware that you used illegal substances in some of those private activities.”
“What?”
“Street name Whore, street name Rabbit, which we found in your bedroom toy chest. Oh, didn’t I mention that with the information gathered and statements taken we were able to secure a warrant to enter and search your residence? Bad boy, Reed. Bad, bad boy.”
“This is outrageous! This is entrapment.”
“This is the warrant.” Eve slid the hard copy from the file. “We take a very dim view on the use and possession of these particular substances, no live and let live about it. So does the PA. I bet the board of Sarah Child and the teachers’ union also take dim views.
“And here’s something else,” she continued, and for the first time, he began to sweat. “It makes me, with my suspicious mind, wonder if a guy who can score those particular items might just be able to score enough poison to eliminate a threat. He put the pressure on you, didn’t he?”
She rose now to walk around behind him, lean in over his shoulder. “Interfering little bastard, shoving his puritanical views into your personal life. You have a good thing going. Coworkers, support staff, mothers, guardians, caregivers. Like plucking plums off a low branch for a guy like you. He was going to cut you off from that branch, he jeopardized your job. No, your whole career.”
“No, it wasn’t like that. No, he didn’t.”
“Sure he did. Others might have known, or suspected, but they looked the other way. No skin off theirs. But this one, he takes it on himself to do something about it. Lecture you? Asshole had no right, did he? And there he is, day after day, in your face, keeping his eye on you in case he doesn’t like what you’re up to. Sitting at his desk every day with his neatly packed lunch from home. Routine. Boring. And a sticky thorn in your side. Where’d you get the ricin, Reed?”
“I never had any ricin. I didn’t even know what the hell it was before this. I didn’t kill anyone.”
“It must’ve pissed you off that Mirri Hallywell would rather study with him than roll around on that big red bed with you. It’s a fucking insult. You had to take him down. Had to do it. So you slipped out of class while he was away from his, and you took care of it. Quick, easy. Done.”
“That’s a lie! That’s crazy. You’re crazy.”
“There are ways to soften this, Reed. Say he was blackmailing you. Stalking you. A constant threat. It was him or you. You had to protect yourself.”
“I never went near his classroom that day. I didn’t kill him, for God’s sake. I was with someone when I left my class that morning. I have a witness.”
“Who?”
He opened his mouth, shut it tight. Then he stared hard at the table. “I want a lawyer. I demand my right to speak to a lawyer. I’m not saying anything else until I have one.”
“Okay, but just FYI? You’re under arrest for possession of illegal substances and for dispensing them, we’ve got that from your naughty camera. You can contact your lawyer before you’re booked.”
Eve went through the interview in her mind, and added to her murder board. She had stills of the bottles from his sex drawer, and linked him on that board with Laina Sanchez, Allika Straffo, Eileen Ferguson, Mirri Hallywell. Who else had he approached? she wondered. Who had he succeeded with, failed with?
She needed to review all the discs from his bedroom camera. And wouldn’t that be fun? At least she had McNab picking through the building’s security discs for the last three days. Though she doubted they’d score in that area.
She got coffee, but it wasn’t working for her. She was tired to the bone, and caffeine wasn’t going to change that. She put in a request to subpoena Williams’s financials. With the illegals charge, that would be a dunk.
She checked her messages to find Nadine Furst had called twice to remind her of airtime, to wear something appropriate, to ask if she had any solid leads on the Foster case.
Nag, nag, nag.
And why hadn’t Roarke buzzed in to nag her?
Too pissed at her for flipping him off that morning, she thought. Well, she hadn’t been the one with a former playmate on her fucking pocket ’link.
She started to sit, started to sulk, and Peabody poked her head in. “Williams’s attorney is here, and guess who it is.”