My sister. Who’d cut my face just so, staying true to her word. Who’d not bailed on me during those hours right after the breakout when she could’ve. Who, even now, ate pizza as if she hadn’t a care in the world. She would take on another serial killer, she would protect her baby sister, because that’s what she’d promised. To our father, forty years ago. To me, just this morning.

And I realized that all these years later, I still didn’t know my sister at all, and yet, I knew her well enough. The nature of all families. The nature of each of us.

I reached across the counter. I squeezed Shana’s hand.

And for one moment, my sister squeezed it back.

“Now what?” she asked, already helping herself to a second slice.

“Now,” I said, “we wait.”

Chapter 37

WHAT DO WE KNOW about Charlie Sgarzi?” D.D. thought out loud, as Phil drove them to the reporter’s apartment. “He’s a wannabe, the so-called Great Pretender. And what do we know about the Rose Killer? His murders feel less like crimes of the heart and more like staged productions. The deaths are almost too quick, while the postmortem mutilation almost too shocking. Then there’s the champagne and roses, which have never made any sense. More window dressing. Because all these years later, Charlie is still pretending. He’s doing what he thinks a killer should do. Like a part he’s researched for a play. Or a character in a novel.”

Phil shot her a look. “He’s become a serial killer to sell a book?”

“Sure. We know the murders are not motivated by obsession, compulsion or sexual sadist fantasies. Which pretty much leaves financial gain at the top of the list. How much you wanna bet, Charlie tried to shop around a book on his cousin’s thirty-year-old murder, but no one was buying. Shana Day wasn’t sexy enough. And Harry Day, her notorious father, was just plain forgotten.”

Phil played along: “So Charlie concocts a killer operating in the style of Harry Day. Except, he can’t manage the sexual-assault part, nor, apparently, stomach the kidnapping-and-torturing-for-days part. Leaves him with one signature element, removing human skin.”

“Creepy enough to get the job done. And not being an experienced killer, he plays his odds. Ambushes sleeping women, chloroforms them to reduce any chance of struggle. Keeps it all straightforward. Because it’s not about the killing. It’s about the end game.”

“His mom.” Phil sighed heavily. “I mean, come on. Killing his own mom?”

“He had to.”

“Why?”