“The story Kelly’s telling her is she’s fed up with me because I keep stonewalling her so she’s decided to go over my head. If Maria gives her the okay, no problem. If Maria tells her no, she’ll publish a follow-up piece on the park murders, anyway. To my great apparent chagrin.”

I said, “Impressively devious.”

“When in Nome, do as the Ice Queen does. Meanwhile, no cult link to Wedd but I have learned a few things about him, most of it disappointing. Not only does he lack a criminal record, according to his landlord he’s a model tenant, pays on time, never complains. As opposed to Surf-Boy Sommers who’s chronically late with his rent and bitches about everything and who the landlord sees as a druggie. So I’m not sure he’s gonna work as a witness. I also found out that an A.C. company was in Wedd’s place to install new thermostats two weeks ago, landlord let them in, the place was neat, clean, nothing out of the ordinary.”

“Landlords have to notify tenants about service calls, so Wedd would’ve had time to clean up.”

“In this case the landlord got phone authorization from Wedd the same day. He did say from the look of the place Wedd didn’t seem to use it much. Which backs up the dual-crib theory. I was able to get Wedd’s cell number and email, as well as the work history Wedd listed on his application.”

He pulled out his pad. “Steadily and gainfully employed for over three years at a company called CAPD, Inc. The intriguing factoid in this whole data storm is CAPD has no listed address. The ‘PD’ part made me wonder if they’re trying to sound police-like, a hush-hush private security outfit. But there are no business listings in the county under that name and when I called the number Wedd listed I was automatically transferred to a company of the same name on Grand Cayman Island and their answer was an electronic beep that then cut off midsentence. And when I searched for an island address, there was none.”

I said, “The Caymans are big on offshore banking.”

“That was hypothesis two, some shady financial scam, and Qeesha being a naughty girl mighta had a history with them. So I called Ray Lhermitte in New Orleans but CAPD meant nothing to him.”

“Wedd told Sommers he worked in the industry. I just fielded my own bit of intrigue, based on that.”

I told him about my agency calls, the evasive response at Gold Standard.

“Maybe he just didn’t like the sound of my voice but my gut says he was hiding something.”

A cop across the room flashed a thumbs-up. Milo growled, “Rank conformist.” To me: “Gold Standard. Why not Platinum? Okay, let’s ditch these bandwagon-jumpers and see what Gold Standard’s all about.”