Mind Games Read Online Free Page B

and straight blonde
hair were certainly irrelevant here, yet Cathy’s fairness and fragility were clear in her mind; and with them, overriding the youthful femininity, the absence of character-defining features
that had troubled Grace briefly when she’d met the teenager. She knew from photographs that her own face, even as a young child, had already testified to her personality, and it had taken her
years of practice to learn to mask private feelings or reactions that were better kept within. Cathy Robbins’ face was a little like a poorly executed portrait; pretty but too blank. Grace
thought it might be symptomatic of the effects of her desolation, like an empty wasteland left by a bomb strike, but it was much too soon to be sure of that.
    ‘The window,’ she said abruptly, bringing herself back to the police findings. ‘Do you really think it might be an inside job?’
    ‘We have to consider it.’ Becket was careful again.
    ‘The housekeeper?’
    ‘With her mother and children until she left for work. We’re checking.’
    ‘Who else has keys to the house?’
    ‘The aunt – Mrs Dean.’
    Grace was sceptical. ‘Marie Robbins’ sister?’
    ‘She knew about the surgical instruments,’ Becket said.
    Grace thought about the bereft woman. ‘I don’t think so.’
    Becket waited a moment. ‘What about the girl?’ he asked, quietly.
    Grace’s head went up sharply. ‘What about her?’
    ‘What were your first impressions of her? Generally.’
    The surge of anger she felt startled Grace. ‘No way,’ she said. ‘No
way
.’
    ‘It’s another possibility,’ Becket said, remaining quiet. ‘The instruments belong to her.’
    ‘Only because they were left to her.’ Grace reminded herself that it was obvious that Cathy would need to be ruled out as a suspect, and that the detective was just doing his job.
‘If I’m any judge,’ she said, trying to stay calm, ‘Cathy’s involvement is purely as victim, nothing more sinister.’ There was a knot tightening in her stomach.
‘She’s a traumatized, grieving adolescent, Detective Becket, not a killer.’
    ‘Do you know how many killings are attributed to fourteen-year-old girls in this country these days, especially stabbings?’ Becket wasn’t scoring points. He looked the way he
felt. Sad. Sick at heart.
    Anger and dismay gave way to sudden suspicion. ‘When did you learn about the window?’ Grace enquired.
    Becket understood her meaning instantly. ‘After I asked you to meet with Cathy, Dr Lucca.’
    Grace had no choice but to accept what he said, but felt compelled to go on in the teenager’s defence. ‘She’s very fragile.’
    ‘Emotionally, of course.’
    ‘Meaning?’
    ‘I noticed a number of school trophies in the house. For running.’ The detective paused. ‘Not that physical strength necessarily played a great part in these killings. Marie
and Arnold Robbins both took sleeping tablets before they retired on Thursday night – they’d have been in no condition to fight.’
    ‘Oh God.’ Grace tried not to picture the possible scene.
    ‘If it’s any consolation,’ Becket told her, ‘my own instincts are with yours.’
    ‘You don’t believe Cathy did it either.’
    Becket shrugged. ‘One of my problems is I never want to suspect a young person – especially not a kid as patently vulnerable as this. But you must have come across your share of
violent adolescents, doctor – you know as well as I do that kids can kill.’
    ‘Of course I know,’ Grace said, more heatedly than she meant to. ‘On the streets, with knives and guns and broken bottles and stolen cars.’ She fought to sound logical.
‘But with a
scalpel
? Have you ever come across a fourteen-year-old girl who’s taken a surgical instrument and sliced her parents’ throats?’ She looked across at the
detective, trying to read him again, to imagine the paternal influences of David Becket, wise, kindly paediatrician, on this powerful-looking street cop.