“What?”
“You know Marlo and Matthew found K.T.’s body on the roof.”
“Yes.” He shook his head as if coming out of a dream. “God. God! It’s horrible. I don’t know what to do.”
“You’re doing it right now by talking to us. Were you up on the roof tonight, Julian?”
“No—I mean, yes.” He sent Eve a pitiful look. “I’m confused. I had too much to drink. I shouldn’t have, but I was upset after that scene at dinner. I want you to know I wasn’t—I’d never try to, ah, start something with you, and right in front of you,” he said, appealing to Roarke.
“But you would in back of me?”
Julian actually went a shade paler. “I didn’t mean—”
“Just winding you up, mate,” Roarke said, smile very, very cool.
“Oh. Okay, I wouldn’t want you to think I’d hit on your wife. She’s fascinating—I mean to say I’m kind of fascinated, and playing you, it gets intense with Marlo. But I—and Marlo and I aren’t—not really. Just for work, for show. It’s just part of the deal. I mean, I would—they’re both beautiful women, but—”
“Is that a requirement?” Eve asked. “Being beautiful.”
“All women are beautiful,” he said and smiled for the first time.
“Including K.T.?”
“Sure. Well, she could be.”
“And did the two of you start something?”
“Not recently.”
“What would be ‘not recently’?”
“Oh, well, a couple of years ago, I guess. We had a little fun. And a couple months ago. She was feeling down, so I cheered her up.”
“Did she want more cheering up?”
He shifted, stared hard at his coffee. “The thing is, she didn’t really want that. She really wanted to complain about Marlo, or to get me to complain about her—Marlo, I mean—to Roundtree.”
He looked up then, met Eve’s eyes with his own dull, bloodshot blue. “I wasn’t going to do that. She got bent over it, really hammered at me. I finally went to Joel and asked him to get her off my back. I didn’t like to do it, but she was really putting me off, and screwing with my focus. I guess it just bent her more. I don’t know why she has to be that way.”
He looked away again, shook his head. “I don’t understand why people can’t just be nice, have a good time.”
“Why did you go up to the roof tonight?”
His gaze dropped again. “The view’s mag.”
“Were you alone with the mag view?”
He said nothing for a long moment. Peabody reached over, touched his arm, spoke gently. “Julian?”
He looked at her. “She didn’t really look like you when she wasn’t made up. You have a prettier mouth, and your eyes are nicer. I like your eyes better.”
“Thanks.”
Though Eve saw Peabody’s color come up, her partner maintained.
“Who was on the roof with you tonight?” Peabody asked him.
“When I went up, she—K.T. was there. I didn’t want to talk to her, not when she was in that mood. We’d both been drinking. I didn’t want to talk to her.”