Less hair than two years ago, the blond tint was peroxide, and he’d put on weight in all the predictable places. But this was the man not thrilled to pose with his mother.

Milo told me to wait there and went up to greet him. The glint of the gold shield caused Tony Mancusi’s head to retract, as if he’d been slapped.

Milo said something.

Mancusi clapped both sides of his own head.

His mouth opened and the mewling that emerged filled my head with an image: animals shackled in the slaughterhouse.

The end of hope.

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER
6

Tony Mancusi’s hands shook as he fought to get his key into the lock. When he dropped it the second time, I took over. Once we were inside the grimy little room he called home, he braced himself against a wall and wailed.

Milo watched him, impassive as a garden gnome.

Some detectives put a lot of stock in people’s initial reactions to bad news, suspecting the too-stoic loved one, as well as the scenery-chewing hysteric.

I reserve judgment because I’ve seen rape victims blasé to the point of flippancy, innocent bystanders twitching with what had to be guilt, psychopaths offering renditions of shock and grief so convincing you wanted to cuddle them and feed them soup.

But it was hard not to be impressed with the heaving of Mancusi’s rounded shoulders and the racking squalls that nearly lifted him off a threadbare ottoman. Behind him was a wall fitted with a Murphy bed.

Ella Mancusi had baked her own birthday cake. Maybe her son was remembering.

When he stopped for breath, Milo said, “We’re sorry for your loss, sir.”

Mancusi worked himself to his feet. The change in his complexion was sudden and convincing.

From indoor pallor to green around the edges.

He hurtled six feet to a shabby kitchenette and vomited into the sink.

When the heaves stopped, he splashed water onto his face, returned to the ottoman with raw eyes and strands of pale hair plastered to a greasy forehead. A fleck of vomit had landed on his shirt, just beneath a wrinkled collar.

Milo said, “I know this is a hard time to talk, but if there’s anything you can tell us—”

“What could I tell you!”

“Is there anyone — anyone at all — who’d want to hurt your mother?”

“Who?”

“That’s what we’re—”

“She was a teacher!” said Mancusi.

“She retired—”

“They gave her an award! She was tough, but fair, everyone loved her.” He wagged a finger. “Want the grade? Do your work! That was her motto.”

I wondered how that had meshed with a son who lived on disability and borrowed rent money.

C student, if he applied himself.

Milo said, “So there’s no one you can think of.”

“No. This is… this is insane.”

The vomit fleck fell to the carpet, inches from Milo’s desert boot.