“Don’t ‘now, Charlie’ me. I’m onto her, and she knows it. I thought I was just sifting through old dirt when I started asking questions about her. Except first thing I learned is that she’s got eyes and ears beyond prison walls. And now she’s using them. Got herself a little killer puppet who can do all the work out here, while Shana sits in her cell pulling the strings. Perfect alibi, right? Shana couldn’t have killed my mother; she’s already locked up! But she did it. She slaughtered my mom to get back at me, and worse, she’s laughing her ass off because she knows there’s nothing you can do about it. This is what thirty years of incarceration has taught her—how to perfect her own goddamn crime.”

“Would your mother have opened the door for a deliveryman?” Phil asked again.

“I don’t know. Probably.”

“Does she have a home security system?” D.D. spoke up.

“Yeah, the house is alarmed.”

“Cameras?”

“No. Just wired the doors and windows.”

“Name of the company?”

Sgarzi supplied it; Phil wrote it down.

“Did your mother mention noticing anyone new in the neighborhood? A stranger she’d spotted lurking around? New tenant on the block?”

“No.”

“Feeling as if she was being watched?” Phil asked.

“My mom didn’t leave the house and kept the blinds down. How the hell could anyone watch her?”

Fair enough, D.D. thought. “What about a visiting nurse, some other kind of health professional?” she spoke up.

“Yeah. Twice a week, Nurse Eliot. My mom needed more help, course, but that’s all we could afford.”

“Nurse Eliot? Male, female?”

“Older woman. Nice enough. My mom liked her.”

“And it was always the same nurse?”

“Most of the time. But if Nurse Eliot couldn’t make it, they’d send someone else. But they always called and notified us ahead of time. Besides, Nurse Eliot worked Tuesdays and Fridays, so no one was due to show up until tomorrow. Did the neighbors see anything?” Sgarzi jumped ahead. “I mean, the guy would’ve had to stand on the front porch, in full view of the street. . . .”

“We’re canvassing now,” Phil assured him, voice still soft.

“Which means you got nothing!” Sgarzi accused. “One of your plainclothes had anything good, you’d have heard it by now. Son of a bitch!”

He whirled back around, returned to staring at the fireplace.

“You said you brought food back for your mom,” D.D. said. “What about lunch?”

“She does one of those nutritional drinks for lunch. Ensure, something like that.”

D.D. eyed the reporter’s back. “What about midafternoon snack? Because there are two plates and glasses in the sink.”

“What?”

Sgarzi turned around again, eyes wide. Before they could stop him, he barreled past them, into the kitchen.

“Don’t touch anything!” Phil’s voice boomed behind him.