Intimate Relations, Rebecca Forster [best ereader for manga .txt] 📗

go to dinner," Finn said. "I've a real stomach that needs real food."

"Actually," Thomas said as he helped Cori on with her jacket. "There is one more thing. Why this specific girl?"

"I know the answer to that because Roxana backed up all the messages she got from Ding Xiang before she opened them." Cori reached for her purse. "The very first time he contacted her, he proclaimed his love and it never let up. The poor guy was totally awkward but he was smitten. They were a perfect match. Neither of them worked in the real world. Crazy, huh?"

"Crazy complicated and simple all at the same time. He loves her, she loves money, the Cucas love a challenge, and then Emi Cuca ruins everything because her husband fell in love with the thing he created," Finn said.

"Can we all say Frankenstein," Cori drawled as she put the top on the evidence box.

"That woman must have freaked when she realized her mistake." Thomas put out his hand and Cori went ahead. Finn fell in step behind the lawyer.

"Emi was a nut bag too," Cori said. "I think she was so fixated on that doll that the murder registered as a messy mistake. She said she had no idea what she was going to do with the body, she just wanted the companion gone."

"Don't give her too much sympathy, Cori. She was smart enough to clean her hands and face and to put that smock over her bloody clothes," Finn said. "Not to mention the fact that she was very smart about the murder weapon."

"Which was what?" Lapinski said as they funneled into the hall.

"A metal femur. Emi sealed it into the leg of a companion after she did the deed," Cori said. "That's why we didn't find blood after that one point in the workroom. We would have never found it in that doll unless she told us where it was."

"And after all that, the Roxana companion was still in the house," Finn said. "The body had no face, so Officers Hunter and Douglas didn't know that they were looking at a duplicate of the victim when they opened that closet. If they had, this investigation would have been over before it was begun."

"And good old Enver can't keep his hands off the thing, so Emi goes off the rails," Cori said. "Do you guys think Enver knew his wife killed the real Roxana?"

"I don't know." Finn sighed. He shook his head. "He hated Ding Xiang so much, he probably thought he'd done it. "

"But there would be no reason," Lapinski said.

"Is there reason to any of this? It's the D.A.'s problem now, thank goodness."

Finn stepped out of the way to let an officer pass in the hall. That's when he heard Captain Smith call to them. Lapinski went on alone as the detectives detoured into the captain's office. She spoke without preamble.

"The mayor wants to know when you'll complete The Brewery file."

"All of it is going off tomorrow," Finn said. "The lawyers will have their work cut out for them."

"Not really. The D.A. is planning to plead Emi Cuca out if only to keep a whole lot of important people from being dragged into this," Captain Smith said. "A public trial is in no one's best interest, and the circumstances make a murder conviction iffy. The woman's attorney would argue that her intent was to destroy property not take a life. Intent is what the law is all about."

"Inventive defense," Cori said.

"And a true one," Finn added.

"And none of our concern," the captain said. "We did our jobs. Let's move on. Dismissed and good work."

The detectives took their leave, allowing themselves a fist bump on the way out of the building. Lapinski was leaning on the hood of his car. He pushed off and met them half way.

"Problems?"

"A pat on the back," Finn said.

"Well deserved." Lapinski grinned and took Cori's arm to guide her to the curb.

"We couldn't have done it without you, Lapinski." Cori kissed him on the cheek when he opened the door for her.

Finn added 'many thanks' as he zipped up his jacket. L.A. was finally feeling a bit of a chill. He said, "You know, there is something about this that all those rich men will never understand."

"What's that?" Lapinski asked.

"If they had thrown in with Ding Xiang, money would flow into their pockets and they would have perfect sex with perfect, ageless women. Yet for all their grand plans of populating the world with manufactured people, all they did was expose the raw power of humanity. Love, jealousy, the protective instinct," he said. "It was all those real things in Emi Cuca's heart that brought them down."

"Ain't love fantastic." Cori chuckled and swung her legs into the car.

"It could be," Thomas said. Cori rolled her eyes as he closed the door. Finn put a hand on the attorney's shoulder.

"Sure, she'll come around," he said.

"Darn right. Thomas Lapinski never loses a case. See you at Mick's."

Finn walked to his car. When Cori and Thomas drove past, he raised a hand. Traffic was light in East L.A. What there was of it rolled leisurely past the small houses and sad strip malls. A mother pushed a stroller down the sidewalk while two small children skipped beside her. The sun was going down. The day was ending. People would eat, and make love, and kiss their children, and sleep. They would wake up and do it all over again the next day and the day after that. Most people would never know that living among them were men who dressed up like goats and treated women like animals. They could never imagine anyone wanting to substitute metal and rubber for the warmth of a living, breathing human being.

As he got behind the wheel of his car and started the engine, Finn thought of Gretchen. There was nothing more exciting than a woman who spoke her own mind and moved by virtue of her own free