“No, it was clean. Not a spec of the blood, cleansers, or motor oil that we found in the house.”

“Did he already have a car stowed in the garage when Tanya came home or did he bring it over later to haul away everything?”

“I have no idea,” Nan said. “That’s a mystery you’ll have to solve on your own.”

Eve spent a few more minutes walking through the crime scene, taking lots of pictures with her phone, hoping something would stick out and reveal some answers to her, but nothing did.

She walked out of the house and spotted reporter Kate Darrow and her cameraman waiting at the plain-wrap Explorer. Darrow was a familiar face on local news who wanted to be taken seriously as a journalist but had sabotaged herself by getting a boob job and dressing to accentuate her sex appeal. It was a shame, Eve thought, because Darrow was tenacious and smart and didn’t kiss anybody’s ass.

Darrow was widely disliked within the sheriff’s department. She’d interviewed the tearful families of the gang members who were beaten by sheriff’s deputies at the county jail. There was no excuse for the beatings, but Eve and most of the rank and file within the department were infuriated by Darrow depicting the victims—imprisoned for crimes ranging from rape to murder—as sweet, innocent little angels.

The scandal seemed to deepen with each passing day as new revelations emerged. A half dozen deputies were charged by the FBI with beating prisoners or staging fights among them and gambling on the outcome. Other deputies were charged with smuggling in cell phones and drugs to prisoners. And still other deputies and supervisors were charged with covering up the various crimes.

The latest revelation was that three of the deputies accused of beating prisoners had matching badge-and-skull tattoos hidden under their sleeves that suggested they were members of a secret, perhaps racist society within the department.

Given Darrow’s history covering the department, Eve knew that talking to her was taking a big risk. If Eve said the wrong thing, there could be massive blowback. But there was no way she could get to her car and avoid the reporter. So Eve went to the CSU truck, stripped off her gloves and booties and dropped them in the disposal bag, then approached Darrow like a woman on a mission.

The cameraman swung his camera her way and illuminated her with the spotlight on top. Darrow thrust a microphone in Eve’s face. The local news was at 11:00, and it was 10:15 p.m., so at least they weren’t live. That took some of the pressure off Eve.

“Detective Ronin, what can you tell me about the bloodbath in there?”

It was a question packed with land mines. “If you want a comment, you’ll rephrase the question.”

Darrow forced a smile and took a different approach. “We’ve heard from various sources that an extremely violent crime occurred in that house and that the family who lives there is missing. Is it an abduction or something worse?”