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‘Sarah!’ He spotted her right away. Without a word to Ella or Ripley, he rushed past them, and dropped to his knees beside the open cruiser door.

‘Rob.’ Less a word than an exhale.

‘Jesus Christ, Sarah. There’s blood on your hand. What the f-’

‘It’s Dad. He’s… they… someone killed…’

Ella stepped back to give them space but surrendered none of her vantage point. She turned to her partner, who was eyeballing the new arrival like he’d just landed here from another planet.

‘Killed? What? Your dad?’

Sarah nodded frantically. The tears came again.

‘Jesus Christ. But why… who…?’

Ella studied the protective curl of his body around Sarah’s. The man was decently built, with a buzzcut and a chiseled jaw. Not what Ella expected from an apparent literary publisher. ‘That’s what we’re trying to figure out. You’re Sarah’s partner?’

He rose to his feet and turned to Ella for the first time. ‘Yeah. I’m Robert. What happened in there? Can I go in?’

‘Why would you want to go in?’

‘To see what the hell happened here.’

‘Off limits,’ Ella said. ‘Did Sarah call you?’

‘Yeah. I’ve been working late. Got here as fast as I could.’

Ella had burning questions, and the longer they left them unanswered, the more chance this killer had of claiming their next victim.

And now that Ella thought about it, that was the exact issue that was tormenting her.

‘Were you close with Thomas Webb?’

‘Me? I guess so. I mean, what’s close , really?’

‘Did you know him well? Know his habits, his lifestyle, his hobbies? Were you friends?’

Robert scratched his scalp, almost in frustration. ‘Then yeah, we were close.’

‘Did Thomas Webb have a computer?’

Sarah and Robert exchanged a brief look. Less than a second of shared awareness. Ella caught it and filed it away.

‘No, I don’t think so,’ Sarah said.

‘Never seen one in his house,’ added Robert. He turned back to Sarah. ‘Tom was pretty old-school, right?’

‘Very.’

The synchronized denial raised every flag in Ella’s considerable arsenal. Synchronized lies were rehearsed lies. But why lie about something so mundane? Something that would be immediately disproven by the dust patterns Ripley had just shown her?

‘Why?’ asked Robert

‘Because Ripley here thinks there used to be one on his desk.’

‘Ripley?’ Robert’s voice curled around the name like it was something fragile he’d just found in a box of memories. Not a question about who she was, but recognition.

‘Yes?’

For three excruciating seconds, Ripley and Robert locked eyes.

It was that clear that Robert knew her from somewhere, or at least her name.

The question was how, and why neither acknowledged it.

Ella cataloged the moment and filed it away beneath the growing stack of discrepancies that this case was accumulating.

Robert broke first. ‘Thomas might have had a computer and got rid of it recently. I don’t know. Does it matter?’

‘No,’ Ripley said. ‘Of course not.’

‘Do either of you know if Thomas Webb was still working on a cold case? His murder is a replica of an unsolved murder from the eighties.’

Sarah’s head came up. Tears welled in her eyes. ‘Is it?’

‘Yes. A very obscure one. Not the kind you’d stumble upon without special knowledge. And given that our other victims were obsessed with particular unsolved cases, I’m wondering if your dad fits the same pattern.’

Sarah took a deep breath. ‘No. Dad didn’t do things like that.’

‘She’s right,’ Robert added. ‘Tom once told me that thinking about old cases was like drinking poison and hoping the other guy dies. He just wanted a normal life.’

Just then, Sheriff Bauer appeared at the doorway. He ambled over to Ella and Ripley. ‘Agents, forensics found traces of something in the vic’s office. Something odd.’

‘What is it?’ Ella asked.

‘Sand,’ Bauer said, confusion evident. ‘Not much of it, but definitely present.’

The change in Sarah was instant and profound. Her body went rigid. The blood drained from her face so rapidly that for a moment, Ella thought she might faint.

‘I need to get out of here,’ Sarah cried as she jumped to her feet. ‘I can’t hear this. Rob, can you take me home?’

‘No chance,’ Ripley said before Robert could speak.

‘What? Why?’

‘Because this case involves you, somehow. We’re not letting that go.’

Robert put a hand on Sarah’s shoulder. ‘They’re right. You should go with them.’

‘I don’t want to!’

‘Tough,’ Ella said. ‘You’re with us until this ends. Sheriff, can you take Sarah to the precinct? Make sure someone looks after her. Me and Ripley just need to finish some things up here.’

The scene moved in bursts, like a film reel with missing frames. One moment, Sarah was collapsing into herself in the back of the police cruiser; the next, Bauer was guiding her into his SUV. Robert was waving goodbye, then he was back in his car and speeding off without a goodbye.

And then it was just the two of them.

Ella said, ‘We should get someone to keep an eye on him tonight. He’s connected to Sarah.’

Ripley watched the phantom space where Robert’s car had been. She seemed a million miles away. ‘Yeah.’

‘What’s up? I know that tone.’

‘Nothing. It’s just…’

‘Just what?’

‘I know that guy.’

‘How?’

Ripley shrugged. ‘No idea. But he seemed to know me too.’

‘Yeah he did. Maybe you ought to go and keep an eye on him yourself.’

‘No.’ Ripley pulled out her keys. ‘I need to get back to the precinct, because Josiah Nicholls’s got some explaining to do.’

‘You think you can get a confession of innocence out of him?’

‘Only one way to find out. What are you doing?’

Ella nodded at Thomas Webb’s house. ‘I’m going to shake that place loose and see what falls out.’

‘Good luck. Call me if you find anything.’

Sand in a dead man’s office. A missing computer.

A daughter who jumped between grief and evasion.

A boyfriend who recognized names he shouldn’t.

A suspect in custody who couldn’t possibly have committed this murder.

Occam’s razor suggested one clean answer, but this case wasn’t clean.

It was the messiest goddamn thing she’d seen in years.

One thing was painfully clear as Ella turned back toward the house where a dead man remained nailed to his furniture: she didn’t have a God damn clue what was going on here.