“And he makes the point that the more violent or perverse the crime, the more severe the disorder seems to be. And how environment, difficult home life, and other stressors might trigger criminal events.”

“Give the guy a Nobel Prize,” I say.

Lauren looks up, grins. Her unruly brown hair, despite its braid, has sprouted little curls around her face, which is youthful, fresh-scrubbed, and sans makeup. Lauren is a no-nonsense girl in the beauty department.

“Sorry. I’m sure Dr. Bradley had some new theories to add to that particular subject.” I lean back in my chair, prop my feet on a wooden slat that runs under my desk. “He name anybody in particular?”

“No. You think one of his patients killed him? I can’t see that he really rocked anybody’s boat in his book so far. There’s nothing really damning. He doesn’t name names. And the perp probably would’ve taken the computer if he was worried about that.”

“Hard to tell at this point. We’ve got one more friend to interview. A guy he had lunch with a couple days before he died. Maybe he can throw some light on all this.” I hope so. We need something.

Lauren bites her bottom lip and clicks the keys on her computer. I flip the pages of my notebook, which lies open on my desk, settling on the interview with Dr. Westmore in her office. I can’t resist adding some bubbles to the sketch of the blue fish.

Lauren peeps over her laptop screen. “Why do you draw in your notebook, Rita?” she asks quietly, as though I might bite her head off. I don’t know why these young cops think I’m so intimidating. I’ve explained a time or two over the years when someone’s asked. No big deal.

“It helps me think when I’m questioning a subject. Slows me down. And it seems to unnerve some of them, which can be helpful.” I chuckle.

“Did you always draw?”

I take a deep breath. “Yeah. Since grade school, I guess. Didn’t win any art contests or anything, but it helps me make sense of things sometimes.”

When I was a kid, I was a tomboy, climbing trees, running around the neighborhood, getting into fistfights with the local kids. When Ma called us in for supper, I was often sporting a split lip or scraped knees. She would look at me with a soul-weary expression, turn and whisper under her breath, “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, I don’t want to know.” After raising eight other rambunctious kids, I guess she hoped that I, number nine and the last of the McMahon children (she’d had a hysterectomy after I was born, just to make sure) wouldn’t drive her to an early grave. My third-grade teacher, Miss Hanson, suggested I needed a hobby. A quiet hobby. I was a little too rambunctious in school too. She sat me down in a corner of the classroom one day while the rest of the kids were silent reading, which I never could quite take to, and plunked down a piece of sketch paper and a handful of colored pencils and told me to draw a tree. That was the start. I could do that. Drawing was active but quiet. It took concentration, and I found I liked the process. I continued to draw at home, at school, on the bus, anywhere I needed to slow down and be quiet for a while. I never got great at it. No one was going to suggest I go to art school or think about a career in it, but I was pretty good, just the same. It’s carried into my work in law enforcement, complementing my notes, giving me time to think and pauses for interviewees to stew, if need be.