Shrew carefully re-read the new column, making sure there were no typos or misspellings she might have missed. She fine-tuned the format as she wondered where on earth the Boss had gotten all this highly personal information she had flagged with the familiar NBS in red. Never-before- seen information was the most coveted. With rare exception, it and all gossip came from anecdotes, sightings, rumors, and fabrications sent in by fans, which were sifted through by Shrew and moved to an electronic research file accessed by the Boss. But none of the NBS information about Dr. Scarpetta was anything Shrew had sorted through or selected.

So where had the Boss gotten it?

Apparently, assuming this was true, Dr. Kay Scarpetta had grown up in a poor, uneducated Italian family: a sister who was screwing boys before puberty, a dumb cow of a mother, and a blue-collar father just off the boat, whom little Kay helped in the small family grocery store. She played the role of doctor for many years while he died of cancer in his bedroom, thus explaining her eventual addiction to death. Her priest felt sorry for her and arranged for a scholarship at a Miami parochial school, where she was the resident nerd, a whiner, and a tattletale. For good reason, the other girls hated her.

At this point in the column, the Boss switched to story mode, which was always when the writing was strongest.

… On this particular afternoon, little Florida cracker Kay was alone in the chemistry lab, working on a project for extra credit, when Sister Polly suddenly appeared. She flowed across the empty room in her black scapular, her wimple and veil, and nailed her severe little pious eyes onto little Kay.

“What does our Father instruct us about forgiveness, Kay?” Sister Polly demanded, her hands on her virgin hips.

“That we should forgive others as He forgives us.”

“And did you obey His word? What do you say?”

“I didn’t obey.”

“Because you tattled.”

“I was working on a math problem and had my pencils on my desk, Sister Polly, and Sarah broke them in half. I had to buy more, and she knows my family is poor …”

“And now you’ve just tattled again.” Sister Polly reached into a pocket and said, “God believes in restitution.” She pressed a quarter into the palm of little Kay’s hand before slapping her across the face.

Sister Polly told her to pray for her enemies and to forgive them. She severely reprimanded little Kay for being a sinner with a wagging tongue, and said she clearly needed reminding that God didn’t look kindly upon tattlers.

In the bathroom across the hall, Sister Polly locked the door and took off her black leather cincture as she ordered little Kay to remove her plaid tunic and Peter Pan collar blouse and everything under it, and bend over and hold her knees… .

Satisfied that the column was ready to go live, Shrew typed her system administrator password to get into the website programming. She posted the column, but not without misgiving.