“You can’t possibly think it’s Heidi, can you?” I asked. “She’s been begging me to stay on the case, not off.”

“Nope. It’s not the kid. Like I told you, we’ve had a tail on her for days. She didn’t come anywhere near here today. And we tested the wig in her closet. Didn’t match any of the hairs we found in SueEllen’s bathroom.”

Thank heavens. For the first time since we met, it looked like he thought Heidi might be innocent.

“I’m going to question some of the neighbors myself,” he said. “You sit tight.”

Which is exactly what I did. Me, and my third glass of chardonnay.

An hour later, the prints were dusted and the neighbors were questioned. Nobody saw anyone breaking into my building.

But one old man walking his dog did see a woman heading up the front path to my apartment. He didn’t pay much attention to her. All he could remember was that she was a blonde.

Officers Mason and Schmitt packed up their dusting kit, and headed back to the police station. I could tell they thought the whole thing had been a waste of time. But that didn’t stop them from bowing and scraping to Lt. Webb on their way out.

Webb stowed the hair dryer in one of those plastic evidence bags. Maybe some day it would be Exhibit “A” in the SueEllen Kingsley murder trial.

He looked at me with steely gray eyes.

“Take my advice, Jaine. Lay off the case. Whoever killed SueEllen won’t have any qualms about killing you.”

Maybe he was right. Maybe it was time for me to mind my own business, and let the cops handle things. Finding that dryer in the tub had put the fear of God in me. But what if it was too late? What if I’d gone too far?

“What if the killer comes back tonight?” I asked.

“Don’t worry,” Webb assured me. “That probably won’t happen.”

I didn’t like the way he said “probably.”

I spent the rest of the night barricaded in my bedroom with Prozac, who, as she always does in my times of need, demanded a belly rub. After which, she jumped off the bed and curled up on my dresser. I’d serviced her, and now she had no further use for me.

“One of these days,” I threatened, “I’m going to get a loveable poodle who’ll steal my heart and eat your cat food.”

She just yawned and licked her privates. Sometimes I think that cat has the cleanest genitalia in feline history.

Sleep was impossible. I tried watching TV, but that was a bust.

Have you ever noticed how every time you’re worried about something and you try and watch TV to escape, the thing you’re worried about inevitably shows up on the screen? Like if you’ve just had a pap smear, and you’re worried about the results, and then you turn on the TV, and there on the news is a story about a pap smear lab that got all the test results mixed up.