Quill’s eyebrow cocked up with her smile. “I bought a half-dozen bolts and a dozen extra barbs and I know how to bargain.”
“Can you tell me where you were last night, between nine and midnight.”
“Sure I can. I was right here. I got back from a two-week safari in Kenya day before yesterday. I’m still a little turned around with my internal clock. I stayed home, wrote—I’m writing a book on my experiences—and was in bed by eleven. I’m a suspect.” She smiled a little. “That’s so interesting. Who am I suspected of killing?”
Since the media would be running with the story, Eve relayed the basics. “Jamal Houston. He was forty-three. He had a wife and two children.”
She nodded slowly as even the ghost of a smile faded. “That’s a pity. I never married, never had children, but I loved a man once. He was killed in the Urban Wars. People hunted people then. I suppose they still do or you wouldn’t have a job, would you? Personally, I prefer animals. I’m sorry for his family.”
“Do you use a limo service?”
“Of course. Streamline.” The smile twinkled back. “It’s your husband’s, and it’s the best in the city. When I pay for something, I want the best for my money. I have a record of the bolts—all my ammo—I’ve purchased. Also a record of what I’ve used in hunts, what remains in my inventory. Would you like copies?”
Hardly necessary, Eve thought, but it never hurt to take more than you needed. “I’d appreciate that.”
“I’ve only been using that type of bolt for two years—when they first started making them. So I’ll copy from there. Otherwise you’d have reams to go through. I’ve been hunting for sixty-six years. My mother taught me.”
“Do you know anyone else who uses them, specifically? Someone you’ve hunted with or talked crossbows with?”
“Certainly. I could probably give you a list of names. Would that help?”
“It couldn’t hurt. Can I just ask you, just personal curiosity: After you kill something, what do you do with it?”
“Since I’m not interested in trophies, I donate the kill to Hunters Against Hunger. Whatever can be used from the animal is processed and distributed to those in need. HAH’s an excellent global organization.”
Eve said, “HAH.”
6
AS WITH CENTRAL, EVE FELT PLEASED TO drive through the gates of home. A different atmosphere, certainly, than her professional house, but like Central it was hers now.
Rich summer green grass spread, a luxuriant carpet for leafy trees, sumptuous blankets of flowers, and madly blooming shrubs. Through the banquet of color, of green, of cooling shade the drive wound through to Roarke’s elegant jewel.
Maybe the house was huge—so huge she wasn’t sure she’d been in all the rooms—but it had dignity and style with its stone towers and turrets, its big and generous windows and terraces. What he’d built out of guile and need and vision held both the warmth and welcome they’d both lived most of their lives without.
It could, she supposed, swallow a dozen or more Brody farmhouses, but now that she’d experienced both she understood, at the core, they offered the same.
Welcome, stability, continuity.
She parked, gathered what she needed for the night’s work, and walked past the flowers into her home.
Where Summerset materialized in the foyer like fog over a headstone. Bony in black, with the fat cat at his feet, he gave Eve the beady eye.
“Your first day back and you manage to come home without dripping blood on the floor. Shall I open champagne to commemorate?”
“Skip it, because I think about dripping blood on the floor. But it’s always yours.”
Insults exchanged, she thought as she headed upstairs with the cat padding after her. Now she was officially home.
She went to the bedroom first to strip off her jacket, change her boots for skids. Galahad wound in and out, in and out of her legs like an engorged ribbon.
“I think you gained weight.” She sat on the floor, hauled the bulk of him into her lap. “You’re a disgrace. You’re like a cat and a half in a one-cat package.” She gave him a good scratch while he stared at her with his bicolored eyes. “No point giving me the look, pal. You are officially on a diet. Maybe we’ll get you one of those pet workout things.”
“He’d just sleep on it,” Roarke said as he came in.
“We could hang food at the end, rig it so he can’t get it until he puts in the time.”
“He’s always been . . . big boned,” Roarke said with a smile.