He offered them coffee again, and again they both declined.

After that, Kim spent some time eliciting descriptions of the man’s life before and after his mother’s murder. In Stone’s detailed narrative, life before was better in every way. Sharon Stone had been an increasingly successful player at the top end of the second-home real-estate market. And she lived her personal life at the top end in every way, sharing that luxury freely with her son. Shortly before the brutal intervention of the Good Shepherd, she’d agreed to cosign a $3 million financing agreement to set Eric up as owner of the premier inn and restaurant in the Finger Lakes wine country.

Without her supportive signature, however, the deal collapsed. Instead of enjoying the life of an elite restaurateur and hotelier, he was at thirty-nine living in a house whose estate grounds he couldn’t begin to maintain and trying to make a living baking cookies in his late mother’s dream kitchen for local gourmet shops and B&Bs.

After an hour or so, Kim finally closed the small notebook she’d been consulting and surprised Gurney by asking if he had any questions of his own.

“Maybe a couple, if Mr. Stone doesn’t mind.”

“Mr. Stone? Please, call me Eric.”

“All right, Eric. Do you know if your mother ever had any prior business or personal contact with any of the other victims?”

He winced. “Not that I know of.”

“Any enemies you knew of?”

“Mother did not suffer fools gladly.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning she ruffled feathers, stepped on toes. Real estate, particularly at the level at which Mother operated, is a very competitive business, and she didn’t like to have her time wasted by idiots.”

“Do you remember why she bought a Mercedes?”

“Of course.” Stone grinned. “Classy. Stylish. Powerful. Agile. A major cut above the others. Just like Mother.”

“Over the past ten years, have you had any contact with anyone connected with the other victims?”

He winced again. “That word. I don’t like it.”

“What word?”

“ ‘Victim.’ I don’t think of her that way. It sounds so horribly passive, helpless, all the things that Mother wasn’t.”

“I’ll put it another way. Regarding any contact with the families—”

Stone interrupted. “The answer is yes, there was some contact at first—a kind of support group that came together after the shootings.”

“Were all the families involved?”

“Not really. The surgeon who lived in Williamstown had a son who joined us once or twice, then announced he had no interest in a grief group because he had no grief. He said he was glad his father was dead. He was quite awful. Totally hostile. Very hurtful.”

Gurney glanced at Kim.

“Jimi Brewster,” she said.

“Is that all?” asked Stone.

“Just two more quick ones. Did your mother ever mention anyone she was afraid of?”

“Never. She was the most fearless human being who ever walked the earth.”