“Not too much there,” I say. “He says that everything was good between him and Lauren. No third parties involved. No money problems. And he claims that he never heard of Gregory Papamichael.”

“Who?”

“The murder weapon was registered to him,” I say. “Dead now, but a former detective over in the one six. He never reported it stolen. It’s possible it was and wound up in the murderer’s hands that way, but we think it’s more likely that Papamichael gave his gun to Lauren for protection—and then Richard used it to kill her.”

McKenney nods to confirm that he believes that this is definitely a plausible scenario.

“On the other hand,” says Gabriel, “we don’t have anything that links him to the murder scene. No evidence of motive either. On top of which, Richard is cooperating with us fully and without lawyering up, even though he’s got half a dozen high-priced sharks on speed dial.”

“The lack of evidence is evidence,” McKenney says. “Husbands don’t need motives to kill their wives.”

Gabriel doesn’t seem put off by McKenney’s tone. I’m not sure if that’s because McKenney isn’t his boss or because Gabriel doesn’t sweat anybody.

“Even so, the primary reason we’re here is to get more evidence,” Gabriel says. “Specifically, we’d like authorization to turn Lauren’s iPhone over to an outside group and see if they can open it.”

When Syed Farook made national headlines in 2015 by killing fourteen people in San Bernardino, California, he probably had no idea he’d also change law enforcement. Before the attack, Farook completely destroyed his two personal phones. No one even attempted to access the information he had stored on them because they knew it was a lost cause. But for some reason, Farook left in pristine condition the iPhone issued to him by his employer. Because the iPhone was passcode protected, the FBI had to seek a court order to compel Apple to unlock it, but Apple resisted, claiming it didn’t have that ability. Ultimately, the FBI used a third-party vendor to crack it. The FBI has never detailed publicly how they did it, but there are private security firms who claim to be able to hack their way in. For a price tag that runs into six figures, of course.

“Trofino is claiming he doesn’t know the passcode?” McKenney asks.

“That’s right,” Gabriel says.

McKenney chuckles. “Fucking Richard Trofino,” he says to neither of us in particular. I’m sure Gabriel understands, as I do, that McKenney thinks Richard is hoping her phone never gets opened. “Lauren primarily used a BlackBerry, right?” he asks, this time looking at me.

“Yes,” I confirm.

“So cracking her iPhone will cost about a hundred grand,” McKenney says, “and it’s still not likely to yield much information beyond her taste in music.”