She grabbed the little pot of violets on the table, heaved them to shower glass and petals down the wall. “It’s not true.”
“It’s documented,” Eve said flatly. “Richard Draco was your birth father.”
“No. No.” Carly sprang at Eve, shoved her roughly against a table and upended a lamp. The china exploded like a bomb. Before Peabody could intervene, Eve signaled her back, and took the hard slap to the face without attempting to block.
“Take it back! Take it back!”
She shouted it, tears spurting out of her eyes. Her beauty was stark now, white face, dark eyes. She grabbed Eve’s shirt, shook, then with a moan, collapsed on her.
“Oh God. Oh my God.”
“Carly.” Michael bolted in from the kitchen. One look at his face told Eve he’d listened, he’d heard. When he rushed to Carly, tried to turn her into his own arms, she shoved away, crossed her arms defensively over her breasts.
“Don’t touch me. Don’t touch me.” Like a candle burned to wax, she slid to the floor in a shuddering puddle.
“Peabody, take Michael back into the kitchen.”
He stepped back, stared at Eve. “It was cruel what you did. Cruel.” He walked toward the kitchen with Peabody behind him.
Eve crouched. She could still feel the heat from the crack of Carly’s hand across her face. But her gut was iced over. “I’m sorry.”
“Are you?”
“Yes.”
Carly lifted her face, and her eyes were ravaged. “I don’t know who I loathe more at this moment: myself or you.”
“If you were unaware of your blood tie to him, you have nothing to loathe yourself for.”
“I had sex with him. I put my hands on him. Allowed him to put his on me. Can you conceive how that makes me feel? How dirty that makes me feel?”
Oh God, yes. She was suddenly and brutally tired. She fought off her own demons and stared into Carly’s eyes. “He was a stranger to you.”
Carly’s breath hitched. “He knew, didn’t he? It all makes such horrible sense. The way he pursued me, the way he looked at me. The things he said. We’re two of a kind, he told me, and he laughed.” She gripped Eve’s shirt again. “Did he know?”
“I can’t tell you.”
“I’m glad he’s dead. I wish I’d killed him myself. I wish to God almighty it had been my hand on the knife. I’ll never stop wishing that.”
• • •
“No comments, Peabody?”
“No, sir.” They rode down in the elevator with Peabody looking straight ahead.
There was an ache, churning, pulsing, swelling, in every part of her body. “You didn’t like the way I handled that.”
“It’s not for me to say, Lieutenant.”
“Fuck that.”
“All right. I don’t understand why you had to tell her.”
“It’s relevant,” Eve snapped. “Every connection matters.”
“You punched her in the gut with it.”
“So now it’s my method that doesn’t meet your standards.”