I nod and shuffle to my feet.

“Oh,” he calls after me, “we need the clothes you were wearing last night.” He shoots a glance at Officer Connors.

I choke out a breath. “Okay.” Does he think I had something to do with Jay’s death? The thought nearly buckles my knees.

CHAPTER 2

Rita

THE FIRST WEEK OF JANUARY, AND WE’VE ALREADY GOT A HOMICIDE. Times are definitely changing in our little Boston suburb. What a way to start a new year. And working a homicide is always an arduous task, the pinnacle of suffering and heartbreak for all involved. I blow out a breath, my hands gripping the wheel of my old van.

Simmons took the widow’s statement, and then she left to stay with her sister. The forensics team is still on scene, and my partner, Detective Chase Fuller, and I are on our way over there.

Chase has a holiday hangover, still jazzed about Christmas with his wife and young son, gushing about all the cool toys the little guy got from Santa. This makes me think of Christmases when I was a kid. There were so many of us jostling to get close to the tree. Ma would yell and try to rein us in with threats of sending us to our rooms and canceling Christmas altogether. And there were only two gifts apiece, one from Ma and Dad and one from Santa. Money was tight, and since there were nine of us kids to provide for, there wasn’t a lot to go around. But we had fun those Christmases until Ricky left for Vietnam and Jimmy got sick. That was the year everything went south for the McMahons.

“How did Sarah like the necklace?” I ask, slowing my van as we approach the Bradley residence. I pull up behind a police cruiser.

“She loved it.” He grins. “This was the first time I was able to give her something nice, you know?”

“Something without a cord?”

“Yeah.” Chase has been a detective for less than a year, and while we don’t make a buttload of money, he’s making more than he did as a patrol cop. I like working with the young detectives. It can sometimes take the edge off a difficult case because you’re in that teaching mode and you have that focus. Even after so many years, it’s easy to get lost in the pain and evil we witness.

I glance in the rearview mirror. A media van is pulling up behind us. Great. “Let’s head inside,” I say. Time to get to work.

We jump out into the cold, my boots sinking into a pile of slush at the curb, and we move quickly up the walk to an impressive two-story. The neighborhood is older, the lots bigger than most of these new subdivisions with their nearly identical houses and tiny trimmed yards. Simmons said the vic was killed in a detached garage, but we head inside the house first.

The ME is leaning on the kitchen island, writing in her notebook. She drops her pen and looks up. “Hey, Rita.”