“Jewelry, money, and a twenty-two revolver. Of course, that doesn’t necessarily mean that Sullivan’s revolver is the one that was used to kill Eddie Heath, Susan, and Donahue. But I think we’re going to find that it is, because there’s no question that our guy did the Band-E.”

“Prints were recovered?”

“A number of them. The city had them, and you know how their backlog is. With all the homicides, B-and- Es aren’t a top priority. In this instance, the latents had been processed and were just sitting. Pete intercepted them right after Lucero got the call. Vander’s already run them through the system. He got a hit in exactly three seconds.”

“Waddell again.”

Wesley nodded.

“How far is Sullivan’s condo from Spring Street?”

“Within walking distance. I think we know where our guy escaped from.”

“You’re checking out recent releases?”

“Oh, sure. But we’re not going to find him in a stack of paper on somebody’s desk. The warden was too careful for that. Unfortunately, he’s also dead. I think he sent this inmate back out on the street, and the first thing he did was burglarize a condominium and probably find himself a set of wheels.”

“Why would Donahue free an inmate?”

“My theory is that the warden needed some dirty work done. So he selected an inmate to be his personal operative and set the animal loose. But Donahue made a slight tactical error. He picked the wrong guy, because the person who’s committing these killings is not going to be controlled by anyone. My suspicion, Kay, is that Donahue never intended for anyone to die, and when Jennifer Deighton turned up dead, he freaked.”

“He was probably the one who called my office and identified himself as John Deighton.”

“Could very well be. The point is that Donahue’s intention was to have Jennifer Deighton’s house ransacked because someone was looking for something perhaps communications from Waddell. But a simple burglary isn’t enough fun. The warden’s little pet likes to hurt people.”

I thought of the indentations in the carpet of Jennifer Deighton’s living room, the injuries to her neck, and the fingerprint recovered from her dining room chair.

“He may have sat her in the middle of her living room and stood behind her with his arm yoked around her neck while he interrogated her.”

“He may have done that to get her to tell him where things were. But he was being sadistic. Possibly forcing her to open her Christmas presents was also sadistic,” said Wesley.

“Would someone like this go to the trouble to disguise her death as a suicide by placing her body in her car?” I asked.