Free Innocent in Death by J. D. Robb Page B

were so young—in a few years, they’d start a family, and I’d be Grandmaman . That’s what he said. Do you know what this person killed? They killed that sweet boy, and that family he and Lissy would have made. They killed that joy. Do you know how this happened?”
    “We’ll need to speak with your daughter.”
    “ Bien sûr . Please sit. I’ll make coffee. They have egg substitute. At home, I have eggs from the chickens my neighbor keeps, but here…He was a sweet boy.” Her tired eyes gleamed with tears. “Such a sweet boy. This should never have happened. Please sit.”
    There was a bright blue couch with bright green pillows and two chairs covered in the same vivid colors done in wide stripes. A streamlined workstation took up one corner of the room while a small table with two chairs stood in the other. The arrangement, the order, the flashing colors gave the stingy space style and function.
    Cicely walked to the bathroom door, rapped lightly. “Mignon, the police are here. The lieutenant and detective. She’ll only be a moment,” she told Eve. “I’ll make the coffee now.”
    Lissette came out in loose pants and a sweatshirt with thick socks on her feet. She looked like a woman who was suffering from a long illness. Her color had gone pasty, her eyes were dull and swollen. She moved as if her bones hurt.
    “You know something more?” Her voice was like rusted metal. “Something about Craig?”
    Eve got to her feet. “Have a seat, Mrs. Foster.”
    “I went to see him. We went to see him. His parents and I went to that place. It wasn’t a mistake. You said it wasn’t. It broke them to pieces. His mom and dad, it broke them to pieces. What will I do now?” As if suddenly aware of her surroundings, she looked around the little apartment. “What will I do? Maman .”
    “There, my baby. Sit now.” Cicely came back, eased Lissette into a chair. “Please, can’t you tell us something? Anything? It’s so hard not knowing why, or how.”
    Eve looked into Lissette’s eyes. “Your husband was killed when he ingested a lethal amount of ricin.”
    “Ingested? Ate? Ricin? What is it?”
    “It’s poison,” Cicely murmured and her eyes were huge now, horrified now. “I know this. This is poison.”
    “Poison? But why would he…how did he…”
    “It was in the hot chocolate,” Eve told Lissette and watched the woman go gray.
    “No. No. No. That’s not right. I made it for him. I made it myself. Every morning once the weather gets cold. And when it warms again, I make him sweet cold tea. Every day. You think I hurt Craig? You think I—”
    “No, I don’t.” After more than eleven years on the job, Eve knew when to trust her gut. “But in order to clear you so that we can pursue other avenues, we’d like to look around the apartment. We’d like your permission to search it, to go through your husband’s computer, his work, his personal items.”
    “Wait. Please.” Lissette gripped her mother’s hand. “You said poison. You said Craig was poisoned. How could he have taken poison by mistake?”
    “They don’t think it was a mistake,” Cicely said. “Do you?”
    “No.”
    “But then…” Color came back into Lissette’s face, dull and red as she slowly rose to her feet. “Deliberately? Someone did this to him? For what? He hurt no one, ever. Not ever.”
    “Mrs. Foster, we believe ricin was added to your husband’s drink at some point on the morning he died.”
    “ButI made the drink. I made it.” She rushed over to the little kitchen area. “Here, right here. Every morning I make his lunch because it pleases him so much. It takes only a few minutes, and it pleases him so much, I…”
    Cicely murmured in French as she went to her daughter.
    “No, no, no. I made it just like every morning. The sandwich, the fruit, the chips he likes. And I made the chocolate like you taught me, Maman . He loves it. Right here, right here.” She spread her hands. “I made the