Reunion in Death by J. D. Robb

statements from friends, relatives, people she worked with, even her husband and her replacement are valid, we work the angle that there never was a lover. So somebody had to plant the letters. Somebody had to write them, and put them in her drawer. After the murder."
    "Why after?"
    "Because a woman knows what's in her underwear drawer. She goes into it for a pair of panties, she's going to find the letters." Peabody paused. "Is this like a test?"
    "Just keep going. Play it out for me."
    "Okay, somebody with access to her apartment, somebody who was there the night she died, put the letters in her drawer. And it seems to me that the choice of drawer is female. A guy isn't as likely to pick the lingerie department to hide something. We don't know when the letters were written because there were no envelopes, no date stamps. They all could've been written the night she was killed. And if they were, that might rule out premeditation and move into covering up an impulse. Crime of passion."
    "So the theory is person or persons unknown killed Marsha Stibbs on impulse, then put her into the bathtub hoping to cover up murder as an accident. Concerned perhaps that wasn't enough, this person or persons then wrote letters from some nonexistent lover, planted them in the victim's underwear drawer so that it might then appear she was killed by said nonexistent lover during an argument."
    "Okay, it sounds a little out-there."
    "Then bring it in."
    "I'm just nervous, because this really feels like a test." Peabody cleared her throat when Eve merely sent her a stony stare. "Some of the rest of the theory is just instinct. You look at the way the two of them reacted to us. Boyd seemed sad, a little shaky initially, but was glad we were there. It could've been an act, but with no time to prepare, it just feels real as does his insistence that Marsha didn't have a lover."
    She paused, waiting for Eve's affirmation or rebuttal, and got nothing but silence. "Okay, on my own. His alibi's solid, and even if he knew or arranged the killing, it seems to me he'd have been nervous or annoyed that we'd walked into his nice new life and opened the possibility of exposing him. On the other hand, when she comes in, she's scared, she's angry, and she wants us out. Away from her nice new life with her dead pal's husband. Maybe that's a normal reaction, but it could just as easily be guilt and fear of exposure."
    "Guilt because she was-what was it?-canoodling with said dead pal's husband before said pal was dead?"
    "Maybe, but what if she wasn't?" Anxious, and just a little excited, Peabody shifted in her seat so she could see Eve's profile. "What if she just wanted to? What if she was in love with him, and here he is, just across the hall, day after day, happily married, seeing her as a friend of his wife's. She wants him for herself, but he's never going to look at her that way as long as Marsha's in the picture. It's Marsha's fault he doesn't love her. Marsha's fault she's not living that dream-nice home, great husband, maybe a couple of pretty kids down the line. Pisses her off, makes her unhappy. She's always got to be acting like the friend and neighbor and she just can't get the fantasy of what it could be like out of her head."
    "What does she do?"
    "She has a showdown with Marsha. Boyd's out of town, now's the time. She blasts Marsha for going off to work every day instead of staying home and taking care of her man. She doesn't deserve Boyd. If she was his wife, she'd be there to fix the meals, buy the groceries. She'd give him a child. She'd give him a family. They fight about it."
    She wanted to see it, as she knew Eve could see such things. But the imagery was still indistinct. "Marsha probably tells her to get the hell out. To stay away from her husband. I bet she said she was going to tell Boyd everything. That neither of them would have anything to do with her again. That's too much for Maureen. She shoves Marsha, and Marsha falls, cracks her