Ben nods. “You can’t tell anyone, Cecelia. My grandfather would be in deep shit.”

“Why did he save it, though?”

“Keep reading.”

It’s laborious, zooming in with my fingers and nudging the small screen side to side to read, but when I reach the line he’s talking about, my blood runs cold.

Water in lungs indicates victim most likely drowned while being held down and strangled. Small puncture mark found on stomach. Elevated levels of insulin present but inconclusive.

“It was ruled death by strangulation and drowning on her death certificate,” Ben tells me. “I checked. That’s what is in all the news reports, what they said at the trial. But this…I don’t know why my grandpa hid this, but he did.”

“To make their case airtight,” I say, answering his rhetorical question, puzzling it together as I go. “Because it’s possible…probable, even, that whoever killed her injected her with insulin first.”

“So they wouldn’t have needed great strength to strangle her at all.”

“And why would a high school janitor keep insulin around for this kind of thing?” I say, perching on the edge of Maura’s desk, deflated. But then I rocket up, lightning-strike thought hitting me.

“Grace volunteered at the hospital!”

“What?”

“I saw it in the newspaper archives. Gabriel showed them to me earlier today. I searched her name, and it brought up this cheesy article about candy stripers at Seaview Memorial. She’d have had access to insulin there, no?”

“You were with Gabriel today?” Ben bristles.

“I ran into him at the police station.” I don’t acknowledge his hurt. There are more important things to discuss. Surely he gets that.

Ben leaves his chair and begins to pace. “If the police had Gabriel in for questioning, you need to be careful around him, Cecelia.” Or not. “Natalie was after him. Maybe she was blackmailing him, and he killed her over it.”

“I know that,” I snap. “The same could be said for Luke, who we know is actively lying. He said he was hooking up with Morgan, but I know she was vandalizing Natalie’s dress at the time of the murder.”

Ben’s eyes go wide. “Seriously?” And then he’s silent, anger diffused. “Shit. He’s been avoiding me all week. The guy I know, I don’t think he’s a killer, but stringing along the police, only then to flat-out lie?”

“Doesn’t look good.”

“No.” And then he’s back to pacing. Up and down Maura’s gleaming hardwoods, his sneakers squeaking as he completes each circuit. “But this whole coroner’s report thing, your Grace theory…I mean, Luke would have no reason to hurt Suzanne.”

“Nor would Gabriel.”

That earns me a look of reproach. “Unless you’re right that you were the intended victim. Anyone who doesn’t want you snooping around would have a reason to hurt you.”