“Overkill,” Win said again.
“Except prosecutors never question overkill,” Esperanza added.
“Because,” Myron said, “it plays into their preconceived narrative.”
Win nodded. “And again to be fair, viewing any one case in a vacuum, there would be no reason to doubt anyone’s guilt here.”
Myron walked toward the screen on the wall. “Something else is bothering me.”
Win and Esperanza waited.
Myron’s eyes moved from case to case. Then he asked, “How did the FBI put it together?”
No one replied.
“I mean, think about it. Nothing links these cases. No strands of hair. No locations. No victim type. The killer has been careful about that. Ingenious even. So what made them put it together now?”
“Greg Downing?” Esperanza asked. “Isn’t that the point? He’s the link.”
“Yes, but only in two of the cases set, what, five years apart? How do you go from that to a serial killer? Chronologically, the first murder was Kravat. Greg is linked to that murder because his girlfriend’s son was involved with the victim.”
“Pretty loose link,” Win said.
“And again, going in chronological order, the, what, third or fourth murder, is Cecelia Callister’s. Okay, that’s a big link obviously. DNA and all that. But how did the FBI link those two murders to Keating or Barry or Stone or...? Wait, hold the phone.”
Myron stopped, looked up, didn’t move.
Win leaned toward Esperanza and said sotto voce: “I think our boy has a thought. I wish he’d cry ‘Eureka’ so we could be sure.”
“Funny.” Myron suddenly took his phone out of his pocket and hit the fourth number on his speed dial. Terese answered right away.
“Hey,” she said.
“I have you on speakerphone,” Myron said. “I’m with Win and Esperanza.”
Everyone did the quick-greeting thing.
“So what’s up?” Terese asked.
“The Ronald Prine murder case.”
“What about it?”
“He was killed, what, two days ago?”
“That’s right.”
“And you said they’ve already arrested someone?”
“A woman named Jacqueline Newton,” Terese replied. Then she said, “Oh, I see where you’re going with this. I was starting to wonder the same thing.”
“Tell us.”
“Newton insists she had nothing to do with it, but the murder weapon is her father’s hunting rifle.”
“Where did they find the rifle?”
“In her closet. Right where she said it was. Newton claimed that it hadn’t been fired in years, but a quick lab test showed it’d just been used.”
“Any DNA tying her to it?”
“Not yet, but it’s really early. Prine was murdered only forty-eight hours ago.”
“Where is Newton now?” Myron asked.
“Being held overnight. Bail hearing is in the morning.”
“Do you know her lawyer?”
“Very well. A guy named Kelly Gallagher. He’s a solid public defender. He’ll do his best.”
“Any chance you can get me in to see her?”
“You mean see Jacqueline Newton?”
“I do.”
Terese thought about it. “I’ll call Kelly.”
“I love you, you know,” Myron said.
“I do too,” Win added.
“I just think you’re hot,” Esperanza called out.
“I’ll take it,” Terese said through the speakerphone. “Group hug next time we are all in the same room. Myron?”
“Yes.”
“I’m staying at the Rittenhouse Hotel, room 817. I just checked my traffic app. You can be down here in one hour and forty-eight minutes.”
“Start the timer,” Myron said.
Myron made the drive in about ninety minutes.
Terese had left a key for him at the front desk. He took the elevator up to the eighth floor. When she opened the door, Terese was drying her dirty-blonde hair with a towel. When she smiled at him, Myron felt it in his toes and forgot all about dead bodies and serial killers. For the moment anyway. She wore the hotel’s terry-cloth robe. Myron flashed back to the first time he’d seen Terese in a terry-cloth robe, when they’d met up at the Hôtel d’Aubusson on the rue Dauphine in Paris.
“Well, hello,” Myron said.
“I love how you always open with the smoothest lines.”
“It’s the ‘well’ before the ‘hello.’”
Forget your merry widows, your frilly lace, your G-strings, your baby dolls, your camisoles, your bodysuits, your whatevers. There is nothing sexier than the woman you love drying her hair in a hotel-room terry-cloth robe.
“Want to see something that will really turn you on?” she asked.
Myron managed a nod.
She moved to the side. There was an overstuffed binder on the bed.
“Are those photos of you in a terry-cloth robe?”
“Close,” Terese said. “It’s a copy of the murder file on Ronald Prine.”
“Take me now.”
“God, you’re easy. Shall we?”
They sat on the bed. Terese paged through the file and told the story. Myron listened intently and resisted the impulse to untie her terry-cloth belt. When they got to the emails Jackie Newton sent to Ronald Prine, Myron began to see a pattern. In the beginning, while the Prine Organization was stalling, Jackie Newton’s emails were professional but firm. They increased in frustration and anger in a completely organic way. For the most part, Jackie Newton was contacting a Prine vice president named Fran Shovlin and copying in Ronald Prine.
The Newtons had done the work. She offered up evidence in photographs and videos, in invoices and pay stubs. The Prines didn’t care.
“How do companies get away with stuff like this?” Myron asked.
“You’re cute when you’re naïve.”
“Am I?”
“Not really, no,” Terese said. “I wish the Newtons had come to me. I mean, as a journalist.”
“Now who’s being naïve?”
Terese considered that before nodding. “Fair.”
Still, the story arc of emails, evolving from desperation to anger to finally despair, felt natural. Then a week ago, after months of no contact, Ronald Prine received an email that police claim came from Jackie Newton’s home ISP. It simply read:
We haven’t forgotten what you did to us.
And then, two days before the murder, one final emaiclass="underline"
You think you can just destroy our lives and not pay any price. Get ready.
“Overkill,” Myron said.
“Come again?”
He explained what Win had said. “Did Jackie Newton make any statement?”
“Just that she insists she’s innocent.”
“And her father?”
“He tried to take the fall, but he doesn’t have the physical capacity to have done it.”
“That can’t be good for her,” Myron said. “The dad thinking he has to take the fall. Makes her look guilty.”
“Right. Gallagher got him to retract.”
“That’s her attorney, right? Speaking of which, can I talk to Jackie Newton tomorrow?”
“Gallagher said if you’ll sign up as part of her legal team, yes, you can speak to Jackie. First thing in the morning.” Terese checked the time. “It’s getting late. Why don’t you take a shower and we can get into bed?”
“You’re good with the ideas.”
“There’s another terry-cloth robe in the bathroom. You can put it on if you want.”
“And if I don’t want?”