“Actually, she made the initial contact. She wrote me a letter.”

“When?”

“A long time ago, Detective.”

“So . . . she does pursue some relationships?”

“Given that lone example over a span of three decades . . .”

“But she’s into you, Adeline. Anyone can see that. If you suddenly stopped visiting, ceased all contact, do you think she’d simply accept your absence, sit quietly in her cell?”

The phone line was silent for a long time now. “No,” Adeline said finally. “Shana would do something. Act out, most likely, in an egregious manner until I returned again.”

“She’s manipulative. She can leave you, but you can’t leave her?”

“Exactly. It’s a matter of power. As the older sister, she considers herself the alpha in our relationship. She would not permit me to walk away without her permission. That would be perceived as a slap in the face.”

“I don’t suppose, three months ago, you threatened to stop visiting?”

“No. I don’t make such threats to my sister, Detective. That would only reduce myself to her level. We have our . . . squabbles. But I try to keep us on a more typical sisterly level of engagement, and not disintegrate into needless power plays.”

D.D. nodded. “So Shana needs to be the alpha in a relationship. Meaning if she has a relationship with someone beyond prison walls, she’s the one calling the shots. But how? She’s living in solitary confinement. How does she keep the other party in line, ensure the person is following her orders, etcetera?”

More silence. “She would have to have something the other party wants. Something she could hold over him or her. The threat of exposing the relationship. Or maybe just plain threats. My sister can be very scary. It’s possible, this other person, the Rose Killer, is in her sway. She’s doing what she promised to do because Shana both frightens and fascinates her that much.”

“Your sister is Charles Manson,” D.D. filled in.

“Heaven help us all.” Adeline sighed. “But no. Shana is not charismatic. Far from it. But that doesn’t preclude, in the way love works, that one person out there isn’t entranced by her. And one is all it would take.”

D.D. nodded, digesting.

“I’ve made progress,” Adeline continued now, “on the number one hundred fifty-three. I went through Harry Day’s file. According to the coroner’s report, all told in his collection of mason jars, he had harvested one hundred and fifty-three strips of human flesh.”

D.D.’s eyes widened. “That’s our connection? Harry Day once collected one hundred fifty-three strips of skin and that’s your sister’s new favorite number? How do you think she learned that number? Looked it up, or maybe got it from some reporter researching her father years ago?”