Page 16 of The Perfect Deception (Jessie Hunt #40)

Jessie would have been impressed if she wasn’t so irritated.

Elise Prager seemed perfectly at ease as she sat in the hard metal chair in interrogation room 2. Ryan had offered to conduct their interview in the conference room, which annoyed Jessie. She wanted the woman to be a little uncomfortable. But Prager seemed to be intrigued by the idea of chatting in the room where cop.

“busted heads and forced confessions,”

as she snarkily put it.

Jessie, despite all her time away working on her anger, had a fleeting desire to grant Prager's wish and bust her head, but decided to hold off for now. Instead, she decided to focus on the most pressing question at hand: who exactly was Elise Prager, and how did she know Michael Dominik?

Jessie already knew part of the answer to the first question. On the way back here from the Cordelia Hotel, she’d texted Jamil, asking for everything he could get them on the woman. By the time they arrived at the station, he’d created a whole file.

It seemed that Elise Prager was a rich socialite who spent most of her time and energy organizing and hosting big-ticket charity events attended by the city’s elite. She divorced her oil executive husband nearly a decade ago and never looked back. According to Jamil, the settlement and alimony together put her net worth in the $30 million range, certainly enough for her to both lead the good life and cosplay as Mother Teresa.

Beth and Hannah had helped dig up the connections between her and the dead women. Not only did she live just a few neighborhoods over from both the Maplewoods and the Dominiks, in the Wilton Historic District, but each of those couples had also donated generously to multiple charities that Prager was involved with. Hannah found photos showing the pairs at multiple gala fundraisers in recent years.

But none of that explained why Michael Dominik had been engaged in an animated, borderline-heated conversation with the woman. It was hard to imagine that in the immediate wake of his wife’s murder, he’d be fixated on an issue involving a donation. Jessie and Ryan agreed that there had to be more to it.

That’s what she intended to determine as she settled into one of the interrogation room chairs opposite Prager. Ryan took the other. Just before they’d entered, he made one request of her.

“Please don’t go at her so hard this time. Until we know more, let’s try to treat this as an informational conversation rather than a flat-out grilling.”

Jessie wasn’t inclined to heed the request. She got the distinct feeling that unless Prager was knocked off her pedestal a little, the woman would be a tough nut to crack. But this wasn’t just her partner—and technically, her immediate supervisor—asking, it was also her husband. And after over eight weeks separated by an ocean, she didn’t want their first 24 hours back together to get overly contentious.

“I’ll do my best,”

she promised.

Now, seated across from Prager, she decided the best way to live up to the promise was to let him take the lead. She gave him her standar.

“this is your show”

look and he took it from there.

“Thanks for taking the time, Ms. Prager,” he said.

“I didn’t get the sense that I had much choice.”

“Be that as it may, we’re glad you’re here. We’d like to start by understanding a little better how well you knew the Dominiks.”

“You don’t have to be coy, Detective,”

she purred.

“In addition to what happened to Cassandra, Michael told me about Olivia Maplewood’s murder. I know that each wife was found in the other one’s bed. So, I assume you want to know how I knew both couples?”

He looked surprised by her directness. Jessie hoped he’d follow suit. He did.

“Yes, but not just with your charity connections. Mr. Dominik seemed particularly agitated when you met and we’re wondering if there’s a reason for that. I can’t imagine that, in the wake of Cassandra’s death, he was thinking about charity galas.”

“You’re quite right,”

she said.

“I met both couples through my charity work but that’s not how I know them best. Michael was upset because he fears his wife’s death is somehow connected to another arrangement we have.”

Jessie’s mind immediately filled with a variety of potential scenarios. Was Dominik having an affair with Prager? Were they involved in some kind of financial mismanagement? Did they all engage in neighborhood drug-fueled key parties that had left bruised feelings? She bit her lip, waiting for the answer.

“What arrangement is that?”

Ryan was showing much more restraint than Jessie would have.

Prager grinned. When she leaned across the table, her words came out in a delighted whisper.

“It’s quite scandalous.