WHILE WAITING FOR McAdams to make an appearance, Decker downloaded the photographs from Jenny’s camera to the station-house computer. She’d done a thorough job, taking dozens of pictures from all different perspectives. It gave Decker a chance to really study the body without distraction and noise since the place was basically deserted. Then he started going down the phone numbers. He picked out a few with out-of-town prefixes that were frequently called.

The first number kicked into a male voice: Leave your name and number and I’ll call you back if I feel like it.

Obviously not her parents. After the beep, Decker said, “This is Detective Peter Decker from Greenbury Police. Call me back as soon as you can.”

The next number also went to a voice mail, but this woman on the message was soft-spoken and sounded older. Decker tried to be as gentle as he could. “This is Peter Decker from Greenbury Police. If someone could please call me back as soon as possible, I’d appreciate it. Thank you very much.”

He hung up the phone and thought about the case. He had to give kudos to Mike. The captain wasn’t territorial. He wanted a quick resolution: to do justice for the victim, to put the town at ease, and to do a good job.

Decker picked up the receiver to make a third call just as McAdams walked into the station house. The two of them exchanged looks. Tyler sat down at his desk and said nothing, fiddling with paperwork while wearing a hound dog face. The kid wasn’t much older than Hannah and something about Tyler’s expression brought out the parent in him. He hung up the phone and tried to keep his face neutral. “You okay?”

McAdams looked up and then he looked down. “Yeah, fine. What do you need?”

Decker crossed his arms and regarded him until the kid looked up again. “Tyler, first times are the hardest. Almost everyone gets a little sick when you see something like that. Nothing wrong or embarrassing about it. But should something like this happen in the future—which is very unlikely here—this is what you do. You grab a nearby bag and place it over your nose and mouth to try to slow down your breathing. Sometimes that works. If not, and you have to throw up, you throw up in the bag, not in the toilet because there might be forensic evidence in there and you don’t want to contaminate anything. Then afterward, you wash your face with cold water and go back and do your job. No one will say anything because we’ve all been there, okay?”

“Yeah . . . yeah, you’re right. Sorry.”

“No problem. So take out a notebook and let me bring you up to speed. Let me get everything out before you ask your questions.”