“Okay.” Marge wrote the assignment in her notepad. “I’ll see how Scotty’s doing. Maybe we’ll go back to the Beverly Hills office this afternoon.”

“And what about Merv?”

She shrugged haplessly.

“And Ernesto? Did you pull out the rest of his file?”

“Yes, we did. He seemed to be making progress. So their wee-hour tryst could have been just therapy.”

“Or if Ruby’s letters are any indication, just maybe, maybe he was telling Mervin about his wife’s illegal activities.”

“Why would he do that?”

“The kid had an attack of conscience. Maybe he thought Merv had one as well. Maybe that’s why Holt popped both of them. He was tipped by Ruby, and Holt did the rest.”

“That’s so depressing.”

“Yes, it is.”

Marge yawned, then swallowed back a sour taste.

“Go home,” Decker ordered.

Marge ignored him. “You know, it would streamline things considerably if Ruby Ranger would wake up and explain everything to us in detail.”

“She is up…I mean conscious,” Decker explained. “Well, she’s not conscious at the moment, because she’s in surgery. But at some point between going on the gurney and being prepped for the OR, she became conscious. What kind of evidence of wrongdoing do we have against her?”

“Nothing,” Marge said. “She wasn’t on the Baldwin payroll as far as Scott and I could tell.”

“Swell.”

“We didn’t access all the files, so who knows? What about Erin?”

“She’s out on bail.” Decker rolled his shoulders. “Those two girls hate each other. And, while I can’t swear that either was involved with the murders, I’m sure that both were into illegal activities. Erin has a nasty jones, and Ruby is a known hacker. I bet we can play one against the other.”

“Try to get Erin to turn State’s?”

“Whoever rolls over first.”

“Erin’s a juvenile. We can get her off easier.”

“But Ruby, being an adult, has much more to lose if she doesn’t turn State’s. We’ll talk to the D.A. and see how it plays out. And maybe she can clear up what happened with Ernesto.”

No one spoke.

“Poor Ernesto,” Decker remarked. “First, Ruby messed with his head. Then, when he starts getting it together, the bastard just cut him down.”

“Holt cut Dee down as well,” Marge said. “Killed his own golden goose.”

“Holt was afraid that Dee would rat on him…that’s my take.” Decker rubbed his eyes. “I suppose we’ll know more after we’ve talked to Ruby…if we can talk to Ruby. There are lots of things we don’t know, and a scam of this magnitude with so many deaths…I hope we get everyone. More important, I pray that no more bodies pop up.”

“Amen.”