Four Walls

4

THE LAST TIME DETECTIVES Stella Bonasera and Lindsay Monroe had investigated a murder in the Riverdale section of the Bronx, the victim was also a teenage girl. Then, Lindsay had bolted from the scene, as seeing a dead teenager brought back all-too-vivid memories of being the only survivor of a massacre in a Bozeman, Montana, diner ten years earlier.

Lindsay had been in the bathroom when Daniel Kadems came into the diner. He had planned on robbing the place after it was closed but before the staff locked up; however, Lindsay and her friends' exuberant gabbing had kept the diner open later than expected. Kadems panicked when he realized his robbery attempt had gone sour and shot all the witnesses.

All but the one in the bathroom. Lindsay's response to the sound of gunfire had been to curl up in a corner until it went away. Afterward, she had felt compelled, for the sake of her best friends, to do something to stop people like Kadems from hurting others. But her paralyzed reaction to the shooting meant, in her mind, that becoming a police officer was probably not the right choice for her, so she went into forensic science instead.

Eventually, the memories of her friends and their violent deaths made it too painful to stay in Bozeman, so she moved as far away as she could: to New York, to join the Crime Scene Investigators of the NYPD, under the supervision of Detective Mac Taylor.

Which was fine, as long as she didn't see any dead teenage girls. Unfortunately, one night around Christmas last year, she'd come to Riverdale to find the body of Alison Mitchum, and Lindsay hadn't been able to handle it. Stella had been the one to cover for her with Mac.

Since then, the Bozeman cops had caught up with Daniel Kadems, and he'd been tried and convicted, in part on the strength of Lindsay's own testimony. So when they got the call to join Detective Angell at a new crime scene in Riverdale, Lindsay figured she could handle it this time, as that particular demon had finally been laid to rest. At least, that was what she had told Stella.

They drove up in one of the department SUVs. The Bronx was the northernmost of the five boroughs and the only one attached to the U.S. mainland. They were making good time; this early in the morning, most of the traffic was going into Manhattan, not leaving it. The last time, they had gone up the West Side Highway, but this morning Stella chose to take the FDR on the east side. "We got a memo," she explained as they took the exit for the Third Avenue Bridge. "Apparently, the crime lab's spending too much on E-Z Pass, so they want us to avoid tolls wherever possible."

Lindsay shook her head. "All the money we spend on our crime-scene equipment, and they're worried about tolls?"

Stella shrugged, her long curls bouncing slightly. The SUV pulled onto the bridge, taking them over the Harlem River. Looking to her right, Lindsay saw Randalls Island and the Manhattan skyline through the haze of this humid morning.

"Apparently," Stella was saying, "we passed our toll allocation for the year by Memorial Day, so some bean counter got pissed. Hold on."

"Why should I-" Lindsay cut herself off when the SUV hit the end of the bridge and got back on regular paving. Or, rather, irregular paving. The road was one long series of massive potholes, and even the SUV's state-of-the-art suspension couldn't keep her from bouncing around in the passenger seat, the seat belt biting into her ribs.

After a few minutes, Stella made the left onto the entrance ramp that would put them on the Major Deegan Expressway. "That was fun," Lindsay muttered, now holding on to the handle over the SUV door for dear life. "You know, we don't even have toll bridges in Montana."

"You also can't get a decent cannoli, I bet." Stella grinned.

Lindsay grinned right back. "I wouldn't know, I've never had a cannoli."

After merging the SUV into traffic, Stella stole a shocked look at Lindsay. "You've been in New York how long now, and you've never had one of the finest Italian delicacies?"

"I thought that was pizza."

Stella shook her head. "Pizza's an American invention. Cannoli are real Italian food. The best ones I've ever had were at this place down by the courthouse in Little Italy." Stella got a momentary look of rapture on her face. Lindsay had never understood Stella's fascination with food. But then, Lindsay's idea of exotic food growing up was the Olive Garden. She'd made the mistake of saying that to Stella once, which had prompted a look of disgust on Stella's face that Lindsay had previously only seen reserved for serial killers.

Lindsay looked out the window again as they passed Yankee Stadium, with the massive edifice of the Bronx County Courthouse looming behind it. Lindsay had been up here to testify a few times. Each borough in the city was its own county, so each had its own courthouse. While most of the time Lindsay testified in the New York County Courthouse on Centre Street in downtown Manhattan-the one near Little Italy, as Stella had said-she'd been to the ones in Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx several times, and even to Staten Island once.

The last time she was up here, Danny Messer had made noises about taking her to a game. She'd also seen the broken ground for the new Yankee Stadium that was scheduled to open in 2009-or, as Danny had called it, "the abomination." That was part of why he wanted to get her to a game; he wanted her to experience the "real" Yankee Stadium before it was gone.

Lindsay hadn't had the heart to tell Danny that she had no interest in baseball-football, yes, but not baseball. He was so cute when he started waxing rhapsodic about Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera and Reggie Jackson and Don Mattingly and how much he hated the Red Sox, not to mention his own short-lived minor-league career.

Soon they reached West 230th Street, where Stella got off and then navigated her way through some local streets that Lindsay quickly lost track of. Lindsay only did the driving when they stayed in Manhattan, with its grid-pattern streets. Once she got into the outer boroughs, she tended to get hopelessly lost.

They went up a very big, very steep hill, then pulled into an area of the street that was designated as a bus stop but in which two cars were parked-one a departmental sedan, probably Angell's, and a blue-and-white from the Fiftieth Precinct. Stella pulled in behind the blue-and-white.

Detective Jennifer Angell was standing outside the door to Belluso's Bakery, which faced the bus stop. A svelte brunette, she'd originally been temporarily promoted to take on Flack's caseload when he was injured and had been groomed to replace him if he didn't make it back. Flack did come back, but Angell did well enough during her probation that they gave her the full promotion anyhow. She'd put down a lot of good cases in the past year.

She also never got the memo about the dress code. Plainclothes cops who worked homicides were supposed to dress formally. Angell, however, mostly stuck to denim. Lindsay was surprised she hadn't gotten called on it. Today was no different: she wore a plain light-blue T-shirt and faded jeans. Her long brown hair was tied back in a ponytail in deference to the oppressive heat and humidity. Stella had actually done likewise with her curly locks, and Lindsay was starting to think she should have done the same.

Peering through the large picture window, Lindsay saw two long display cases perpendicular to each other, filled with pastries. There was a staircase in the center of the space going up to a balcony-style second floor. Around the staircase were several small round tables surrounded by three or four wooden chairs each. Two uniforms were inside, along with three young women and one older man.

"Vic's name is Maria Campagna," Angell said without preamble. "She works here part-time. She was one of the ones who closed last night. Two other girls found her when they opened this morning." She smiled. "And now you know everything I do-I only just got here."

One of the uniforms came out through the glass door. Lindsay briefly felt the enticing cool breeze from the air-conditioned interior.

The uniform's collars had "50" pins on them, indicating his home base of the five-oh, which Lindsay knew was the local precinct. He was tall, barrel-chested, crew cut, and was pale except for his nose, which was bright red with sunburn. His name tag read O'MALLEY.

"How you doin', angel face?" he said with a grin.

Angell winced. "Deej, what'd I tell you about calling me that?"

Still grinning, O'Malley said, "That you'd shoot me. But I've seen your range scores, I ain't worried."

Shaking her head, Angell said, "Detective Bonasera, Detective Monroe, this jackass is D. J. O'Malley. We were at the two-four together back in the day. Deej, these two are from the crime lab."

O'Malley nodded. "You guys work with Mac Taylor, right?"

"Yeah," Stella said. "You know him?"

"Nah, just heard about his getting reamed over that scumbucket Dobson. Glad he got off."

"Us, too," Stella said with a nod.

"So," Angell said, "who're the players?"

O'Malley didn't take out his notebook, which surprised Lindsay. "Dina and Jeanie found the bodies. Dina's the big one, Jeanie's the skinny hottie. The old fart's Sal, he owns the place, and the cute blonde's Annie-she closed with Maria last night."

Stella frowned. "These people have last names?"

"Probably." O'Malley shrugged. "Me and Bats come here all the time. I know all these people-including the vic. She was a good kid-always knew how much milk to put in my coffee." He turned to Stella and Lindsay. "Nobody touched anything, so you two're all set."

Lindsay nodded, wondering why O'Malley's partner was nicknamed "Bats."

"Let's get out of the oven," Stella said, moving toward the bakery entrance. O'Malley jumped to grab the door and hold it open for them. Chivalry right after describing the women inside in terms of how good they looked. Lindsay sighed-but she'd been in law enforcement long enough that the contradiction didn't surprise her.

As Lindsay walked through the door O'Malley was holding, she noticed the bakery's hours stencilled on the glass. Sunday to Thursday 7 A.M. to 11 P.M., Friday and Saturday 7 A.M. to midnight.

As soon as they entered the bakery, Lindsay felt goose bumps on her flesh as the air-conditioning evaporated the sweat on her forehead and neck. She closed her eyes and enjoyed the sensation for a second as the door shut behind O'Malley.

When she opened them, O'Malley was pointing at the corner behind where the two display units met. "Body's over there."

Lindsay followed Stella around the counter facing the door. The owner, a large man with a bulbous nose, liver spots all over his skin, and thin white hair, was muttering something in an accented voice-Italian, she assumed. He was standing by the staircase, near the table at which the three young women-Dina, Jeanie, and Annie-were seated. All three had bloodshot eyes, indicating that they'd been crying, and Annie still was. She was the only one of the three not wearing makeup-the other two looked like raccoons thanks to smudged mascara. Standing next to the owner was another uniform from the five-oh with a nametag reading WAYNE, which went some way toward explaining the nickname. Lindsay wondered if his first name was Bruce.

As she passed by the young woman, she heard Annie mutter that it should've been her.

Angell spoke to the owner while Lindsay and Stella went to check the body. They came around the corner and stepped up onto a boardwalk-like set of wooden slats that put the people behind the counter a little higher up than the customers. Lindsay saw the logic: all the employees here seemed to be young women, who tended to be shorter than men, and it didn't do to serve the public when the counter only came up to your chin.

Lindsay stepped up onto the riser and looked down at the body.

Kelly lying on the floor, a stunned look on her blood-covered face…

She looked away, forcing the image out of her head.

"You okay?" Stella put a hand on her shoulder.

Nodding quickly, Lindsay said, "Yeah, yeah, I'm fine." She reached into her bag and took out her Nikon D200 digital camera, flipping the strap over her neck.

Then she looked at the body again.

This time, to her relief, she didn't see Kelly. She saw Maria Campagna, a skinny young woman with short dark hair. She was lying on the riser, legs bent, knees pointing toward the back wall, her back flat on the riser, her head turned in the opposite direction from her knees, her arms splayed on either side of her. She was wearing a white T-shirt with the words SAN FRANCISCO HERE I COME stencilled on the front, hip-hugger blue jeans, brown leather sandals, and no socks. Her fingernails and toenails were both painted purple, the polish chipped here and there, indicating that she'd applied it at least a day or two ago.

After taking a deep breath through her nose and letting it out slowly through her mouth-a method her former psychiatrist had suggested and that had allowed Lindsay to keep it together on more than one occasion-she raised the camera to her face. She set up Maria's-rather, the victim's-face in the center of the viewer and started clicking pictures. That was something Mac had told her shortly after she joined his team: that it was easier to work a scene when you thought about the victim or the body, not a name. There was time enough to think about who they were later, but when you were doing the scene, you focused on what happened, not who it happened to.

She heard Angell say, "Officer Wayne, could you please take everyone except for Mr. Belluso upstairs? I need to talk to each of you in turn, starting with Mr. Belluso."

"Sure," Wayne said. "Ladies?"

Lindsay heard the shuffle of feet up the wooden staircase at the center of the bakery, but she didn't look, focused as she was on photographing the body. She made sure to get images of the body as a whole, then from every angle, then close-ups.

Stella stood behind her, taking in the scene from a distance while Lindsay took her pictures.

After taking a close shot of the victim's eyes, Lindsay said, "Petechial hemorrhaging around the eyes."

Nodding, Stella said, "Probably strangled." She moved in closer and looked down. "Lots of scuff marks on the riser, but that's to be expected. She could've been killed here, or she could've been dragged around back here." Stella got down on her knees. "Just eyeballing it, there's trace up the ying-yang here. Good thing we brought a lot of envelopes."

"Have fun," Lindsay muttered as she continued snapping photographs. Collecting trace at a scene like this-one that had been tramped over and used a great deal-was incredibly frustrating, because ninety-nine percent of what you picked up was stuff that was supposed to be there. The crime lab's job was to find that one percent that didn't belong.

To make their job even tougher, if the killer was Mr. Belluso or anybody who worked there, they'd have left trace evidence all over the place, but none of it would be indicative of guilt in this crime.

But that part was Angell's problem. Lindsay's job right now was to document the body.

Stella had pulled out her tweezers and put on her rubber gloves, and was now bagging and tagging things she picked up off the floor. In a place like this, most of the trace was going to be organic, and Lindsay was now counting the microseconds until Stella asked her for a hand. As it was, she was thrilled that she hadn't simply been asked to do it all in the first place. As the newest member of the team, scut work like that had almost always fallen on her. She still recalled her first case, which involved digging through tiger dung looking for body parts. Took weeks to get the smell out of her hair. Lindsay viewed it as a sign of progress that Stella was no longer treating her like a rookie.

Letting the camera rest against her stomach, Lindsay slipped on her own rubber gloves and started taking a closer look at the body. Gently touching the neck and chest, she could feel that the hyoid bone felt out of place, which, along with the hemorrhaging, indicated strangulation. It could have happened right there-the position the victim was in was one she could have easily fallen into if she died standing up behind the counter.

She also saw a stray fiber on the victim's neck. Picking up the camera, Lindsay zoomed in and took a picture of that before pulling out her own set of tweezers and grabbing one of Stella's evidence bags. "It's a black fiber," she said to Stella as she plucked it off the victim's neck. "Doesn't match anything she's wearing."

"Any hand or finger indentations?"

Lindsay shook her head. "It was chilly last night-the killer could've been wearing long sleeves and wrapped his arm around her neck."

Stella nodded as she got down on all fours and pulled something out from under the display unit. Lindsay didn't want to know what it was. "When the ME gets her on the table, we'll have a better idea how it was done. Just keep collecting for now."

"Right." She checked the victim's arms and hands, hoping to find evidence of defensive wounds of some sort.

Sure enough, one of her fingernails was missing. The right forefinger's nail had been half ripped off, possibly while trying to grab at the arm around her neck. To Stella, she said, "If you see a fingernail with purple nail polish on it, let me know."

"Okay."

Lindsay looked more closely at the victim's fingers. There was material of some sort under the fingernails she had left. If she had scratched her attacker, the attacker's DNA might still be under her nails, so Lindsay grabbed another envelope and used one of the tweezer prongs to scrape it all out.

Then she turned the hands over and found abrasions on the victim's knuckles. They were only slightly discolored, and the blood was not completely dry. If she had been killed around closing time last night, eight hours earlier, this bruising was consistent with her putting up a fight.

Lindsay wasn't completely sure, though, so she took several pictures of the bruises. The ME would be able to determine whether Lindsay's suspicions were correct.

Lindsay checked over the rest of the body and found only two other abrasions of any sort: a cut on one arm that was too far along in the healing process to have happened eight hours earlier, and a minor bit of abrasion on the back of the neck that was indicative of something rubbing against the skin. She shot them both in close-up, as they could have been involved in the murder somehow. The cut could have been from some previous incident that had only now escalated into murder, and Lindsay had seen similar neck abrasions before on murder victims who wore necklaces. The abrasion came from the clasp being pushed against the neck. Robberies often went hand in hand with murder, which was why the LAPD, for example, had merged their robbery and homicide divisions into a single unit. The fact that Maria had worn a necklace long enough to form that abrasion but didn't have it on her body now meant that the theft of that necklace might have had something to do with her murder.

If it was a murder. You weren't supposed to jump to conclusions. Until the manner of death was pronounced by the medical examiner, it wasn't officially a homicide. Not that it was easy for someone to strangle herself, but it was within the realm of possibility.

Pursuant to that, Lindsay, having satisfied herself that she'd checked as much of the body as she could at the scene and recorded everything she'd need, started searching near the body for evidence of anything that could've been used for self-strangulation-or, for that matter, as a murder weapon. Of course, even the most brain-dead murderer was unlikely to leave behind the murder weapon, but it didn't hurt to look. Some murderers really were that stupid, especially if murder hadn't been the intent. She had seen it before: a fight would get out of hand, one person wound up dead, and when the adrenaline wore off, the perp ran like hell, leaving all kinds of evidence behind.

She didn't find anything, though-nothing except that single black fiber.

"Wanna give me a hand down here in the ick?" Stella asked from the floor.

Lindsay turned and smiled down at her. "Sure, why not?"

"I cannot believe this. You know, they shut us down two weeks ago? I remember, you people came and you did your inspection, and the man, he was very rude to my Maria."

Angell pursed her lips, her patience thinning with each digression Salvatore Belluso made. "Actually, the health inspectors aren't 'my' people, Mr. Belluso. Completely different department."

"Apf," Belluso said with a wave of his hand. "It's all the government. He was rude to my Maria, and she was rude right back to him like he deserves. Ask anybody, he deserved it, but then he shut my store down. Next day a different inspector come, and he says we pass with flying colors. I bet it was that rude man who did it."

Maybe not a digression, then. Angell made notes accordingly, though the health inspectors she knew weren't really the murdering type-unless the ability to bore you to death counted as a lethal weapon. "I'll need a copy of both inspections." He obviously had copies, as there was a photocopy of the thing on the front window, with the relevant parts of the inspection form circled with a Sharpie. Angell had thought that odd at first, but at least now it made sense. And it was a lead, however flimsy.

"When was the last time you saw Ms. Campagna, Mr. Belluso?"

"I was not here yesterday," he said. "I was at the Arthur Avenue store, making sure my girls there are okay. There were some robberies over the weekend, and I wanted to make sure all security was good." He shook his head and started twisting the wedding ring on his left hand. "Is crazy, no? So last time I see my Maria was Saturday when I brought by my wife to check on her and my Jeanie."

Idly, as she took notes, Angell wondered how the young women who worked here felt about being referred to as his all the time. She also wondered about an old man who only hired attractive young women. He had already provided a full list of his employees and, except for the man he hired to clean the place, they were all women between the ages of seventeen and twenty-five.

Belluso waved his hand again. "Apf, it had to be the inspector. He was very very rude to my Maria!"

"Thank you, Mr. Belluso, we'll look into that." She nodded to O'Malley. "Officer O'Malley will take you upstairs now. I may have more questions later. Officer, could you bring Ms. Wolfowitz down?"

Smirking obnoxiously, O'Malley said, "Sure thing, Detective."

Vowing to kill him later, she waited while he followed her instructions. As often happened when she was left alone, her brain started pinballing. If she mouthed off enough at a health inspector to get them shut down, she must've really sucked at customer service. My range scores are fine, and I can shoot that smirk right off Deej's face. Dealt with four older brothers, I can deal with him. Nothing was stolen, so not a robbery of the store. Gotta ask Stella whether anything was stolen off Campagna. Looks like I'll be doing OT on this one, so no going to the Raccoon Lodge for me tonight. Christ, I hope I can get OT, they're getting all budget-conscious again, and right in time for the heat wave that always means a bump in violent crimes. Wonder why Wolfowitz didn't close with her. I really need to get my bangs trimmed.

O'Malley brought Wolfowitz down. Her cheeks were puffy and her eyes were still bloodshot. A tear streaked down her face as she sat at the table with Angell. Her blond hair was a rat's nest. When she'd arrived, Wayne had told her that she'd been woken out of a sound sleep by Rodriguez when they'd found the body, and she'd come straight to the bakery. She was wearing a plain white T-shirt, black sweats, and sandals with little red hearts on them.

"Ms. Wolfowitz, I'm Detective Angell. I just need to ask you a few questions, okay?"

"Sure," the young woman said in a very small voice.

"You and Ms. Campagna were both working until eleven last night, right?"

She nodded.

"Then you both closed?"

"She did-she told me to go ahead, and she said she'd take care of it. I was really wrecked, y'know? I had crew, then a whole day of classes, and then work, and I just needed to crash, y'know?"

"Where do you go to school?"

"Mount St. Vincent."

"And you're on crew?"

She nodded again. "I was at Spuyten Duyvil at six this morning. We go around Manhattan, like the Circle Line, y'know? Then I had four classes, then I came here." She sniffled. "I should've stayed."

"What happened at eleven?"

"I actually left at a quarter of. I was just so messed up, y'know?" She palmed a tear off her cheek. "Maria said not to worry about it, she'd take care of it."

"What's the usual closing procedure?"

Wolfowitz took a deep breath, then started counting off on her fingers. "We wipe down all the tables and straighten the chairs. We sweep and mop the floors-that's usually done about an hour before closing, actually. We take all the money out of the register and put it in the safe. We turn off the cappuccino maker and the coffeemaker. We turn out all the lights, and in the summer, we turn off the AC. And then we close and lock the front door."

From what O'Malley and Wayne had said, Campagna had done everything except for the last two-and possibly even that, as Rodriguez and Rosengaus could've turned the lights and AC on when they came in before they found the body. She'd check on that when she talked to them.

"Did anybody come in after you left?"

"One guy, yeah, he came in just as I was walking out. I don't remember his name, but he's a regular." She gave a quick smile. "He's sweet, he tips well, and he's always flirting with us. But especially with Maria."

"Do you remember what he looks like?"

"Oh, sure. He's got long brown hair-he had it tied back in a ponytail. And a beard. And glasses. He had on a black sweatshirt and jeans, and he was carrying a gym bag-like usual, really. He goes to the karate school around the corner, and he usually comes in on his way home from class to get a bottle of water."

"So it wasn't unusual to see him?"

"God, no, he's always here."

Angell asked a few more questions, then asked Rodriguez to come down. Again, she asked about the closing-down procedure, and Rodriguez's description matched the one Wolfowitz gave, though Rodriguez felt the need to number the steps as she described them.

"When you got here this morning, was anything else unusual besides the unlocked door?"

Rodriguez shook her head. "The lights and AC were off, the tables were all neat, and the chairs were tidy. She must've just been ready to close up when-" Her voice caught.

"It's okay."

"Oh, one other thing I noticed-I didn't really see it until the two officers got here? But Maria wasn't wearing her necklace."

"She usually wore a necklace?"

Nodding, Rodriguez said, "Yeah, her boyfriend gave it to her. She wore it all the time. It was eighteen-karat gold, too."

Angell noted that down, as it constituted motive, although she'd learned quickly in this part of the job that motive was the least important thing in a murder investigation. For one thing, motives were usually mundane and common: jealousy, greed, or some other deadly sin. For another, learning the motive almost never actually led to an arrest. It was always a combination of the detective asking the right questions and the crime lab folks finding the right evidence.

"What's the boyfriend's name?"

"Bobby-Bobby DelVecchio."

"Don't suppose you know where he lives?"

Rodriguez shook her head again. "He came in a few times to see Maria."

She made a few more notes, including a reminder to find DelVecchio. That also added to the list of condolence calls she was going to have to make. It was her least favorite part of the job. According to Belluso, Maria's father had died a year earlier, and she lived with her mother. Historically, the two people who reacted worst to death notices were mothers and boyfriends, so of course that was what she had with this one.

Putting it in the back of her mind for now, she said, "Ms. Wolfowitz said that she saw someone come in with long hair, a beard, glasses, and a gym bag-goes to the karate school?"

"Jack," Rodriguez said without hesitating. "Dunno his last name, but he's in here all the time with his laptop. Always drinks iced coffee in the summer and hot chocolate in the winter, and usually gets a cannoli or two. He's a great guy. He really liked Maria, too."

"Did anybody else really like Maria?"

"Well, sure, lotsa people. I mean, Jack talked to her a lot, and there's this one lady who knows her mother who comes in a lot-oh, and there's Marty. He's a tech from Feldstein's, the vet across the street. He's always hitting on her, too."

She asked Rodriguez more questions, mostly relating to what happened that morning, then called Rosengaus down. She told much the same story as Rodriguez did. What she said was different enough to show that they hadn't rehearsed it, but similar enough to indicate that it was probably the truth.

"Did you notice whether or not Ms. Campagna was wearing her necklace when you found the body?"

"I do not remember," Rosengaus said in her heavily accented voice. "I just saw the dead body and I remember nothing else. I am sorry. I do remember it was very nice necklace."

"It's okay." Angell made a few notes, then asked, "Do you know a regular customer here named Jack?"

"Yes. He is sweet. Sometimes he compliments me. It is nice. He likes all the girls."

"Did you notice that he liked Maria more than the others?"

"Not that I noticed, no. Besides, Maria has boyfriend."

"Bobby DelVecchio? The one who gave her the necklace?"

"Yes. I think he came into store a few times."

"You think?"

Rosengaus shrugged. "She never introduced me. We were not very close."

"What about a man named Marty?"

"I know Marty, yes. He works in the vet across the street."

Once she was done with Rosengaus, she turned to see Bonasera and Monroe come out from behind the counter. Monroe looked a bit disheveled, but Bonasera still looked bright and shiny after poking around behind a bakery counter for an hour. It was a skill Angell envied. After just being at a crime scene, Angell wanted nothing more than to shower for a week, but Bonasera-who dug much deeper into a crime scene than she did-always stayed pristine.

Plus, she had that fifty-megawatt smile. Angell had never been able to make her smiles seem like anything but smirks-which was handy when she was being hit on by the less civilized members of humanity, a number that included most of her suspects and her coworkers.

As the two crime scene techs came over, Angell got up and said, "Let's step outside." She didn't particularly want to go out into the heat and humidity, but she also didn't want the foursome upstairs to hear their conversation about the crime scene.

They quickly filled each other in. Palming sweat from her forehead, Angell said, "Last person to see our vic was a guy named Jack something."

Monroe's eyes widened. "Do we know what he was wearing?"

Angell double-checked her notes. "Black sweatshirt and jeans. Why?"

"We found a black fiber on the vic's neck," Bonasera said. "We need to find this guy."

"Need a last name first. Also, apparently our vic had an eighteen-karat necklace that was missing."

"We found a small abrasion that's consistent with a necklace," Monroe said, "but the necklace is gone. We checked all around the body-plenty of garbage and crumbs and hairs, but no jewelry."

"There's one possible motive," Bonasera said.

Nodding, Angell said, "We also only have Wolfowitz's word for the fact that she left early-and, for that matter, that this Jack guy came in at all."

Bonasera folded her arms. "We'll get reference samples from everyone upstairs. And we should get ones from everyone else who works here. This way if any of the hairs we found don't match someone who's supposed to be there, we've got a lead."

"Want me to do it?" Monroe asked.

Shaking her head, Bonasera said, "Nah, you should get our big pile of trace back to the lab. It'll take ages to process it. Get Adam to help out." She grinned. "Besides, if I stick around, I can have one of those cannoli."

Monroe laughed. "You'll be okay getting back?"

"I'll give you a ride," Angell said.

O'Malley opened the door, holding a piece of paper. "Hey, angel face, Sal said to give this to you." He held out the sheet.

Taking it, Angell saw a copy of the inspection form, which matched the one hanging in the window, except without anything circled with a Sharpie. "Here's another potential motive. Our vic apparently got into a shouting match with"-she peered at the sheet-"Gomer Wilson from the Health Department."

"His name's really Gomer?" Bonasera asked.

O'Malley shrugged. "Don't look at me, I busted a guy last week whose name is George Washington. People don't think when they name their kids, I'm telling you." Then his face lit up. "Oh, hey, almost forgot, that hippie guy the girls were talking about? I know him."

"Who, Jack?" Bonasera asked.

"Yeah." O'Malley started digging around in his pockets. Finally he found what he was looking for-a pile of business cards and receipts. He liberated one of the former. "Here it is-Jack Morgenstern. He's a web designer. Gave me his card a while back. I'm thinking about making me a website."

"For what?"

"Never mind," O'Malley said quickly.

Angell smirked, making a mental note to find out what kind of plans O'Malley had for a website. She suspected that information would be enough to get him to stop calling her "angel face." "Anyhow, here's his address," O'Malley said. He handed Bonasera the card. "He's freelance, so he's probably home now."

"He's local," Bonasera said. "Lives on Cambridge Avenue and 235th." She looked at Angell and handed her the card.

"Tell you what," Angell said as she snatched the rectangular bit of bond paper from Bonasera's hand, "I need to notify the family. Why don't you do your vampire thing with the people inside while I do that, then we'll meet back here and talk to our suspect, okay?"

Out came Bonasera's fifty-megawatt smile. "Sounds like a plan."