She paused before saying, “I know he took Robin on one.”

“Right. To Stratton?”

She straightened a fraction. “You know that?”

Joe shifted in his seat for emphasis. “Cheri, we’re doing our best work here. It doesn’t matter what he did for a living. We’re talking to everybody we can and looking hard. So, other than Robin, was there anyone he worked with?”

She shook her head. “No.”

“How ’bout someone he pissed off? He didn’t practice a risk-free occupation.”

“He had fights,” she allowed. “Some of the people he dealt with are dirtbags, but I don’t see anybody killing him.”

“Tell me about Robin. How did they get along?”

That caught her off guard. “Robin?” she asked. “They were good. From what he told me, she’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but nice, and she didn’t give him crap about what he did. I think she just saw it as his job, and not that interesting.”

“Did any of Don’s victims figure out who he was?”

“Not that I know. He was careful about casing places out, checking security and dogs and all that. He never aimed too high.” A hint of pride crept into her voice. “That’s what I taught him. Rich people are thinner skinned, have more to lose, bigger egos, and the junk they like is usually too hard to fence. Steal a midrange Bulova or a Seiko, not a Rolex. He paid attention.”

“He steal jewelry at all?” Joe asked.

“Sure, but not fancy. Small diamonds at most. Middle-class things—engagement rings, earrings, gold class rings. But be careful about engravings, initials, or inscriptions. I warned him about those. Keep it simple.”

Joe fantasized for a split second that he was sitting with a female Fagin, getting a crash course on picking pockets. “We know about his dealings with Corey Browne and Darren Bader,” he told her. “There have to have been others.”

“Sure,” she said. “A bunch of ’em, some legit, some not so much. I mean, if you get the right pawnbroker in the right mood, you can sell him something with a convincing bull story about a dead grandmother or whatever. That was another thing I taught him: don’t be greedy. It didn’t cost you anything to steal; don’t get uppity about the price you ask. People get suspicious.”

Her face softened. “And Donny was such a nice boy. He could really sell that to people. Make ’em believe almost anything.”

That made Joe think of the same nice boy cheating on Robin with Melissa Monfet. “How about something beyond the stealing?” he suggested. “It might’ve been a jealous husband or boyfriend. We may be barking up the wrong tree.”

She didn’t reject the notion outright, confirming a pragmatic nature. “Could’ve been,” she conceded. “I wouldn’t know about that.”

“Okay. Let’s move on. Did he have other warehouses? Seabrook is kind of far away. He have somewhere closer by?”

She reached again for her drink, which was possibly a time killer to invent a lie—a standard, almost uncontrollable bit of body language. It reminded him of when politicians respond, “I’m glad you asked that.”