Interestingly enough, the daughters had disclosed for the first time when they were seven and nine, but when the police followed up, they’d found no evidence of abuse. The girls tried again when they were twelve and fourteen, but by then, given their penchant for micro minis and tube tops, not even their own mother had found them credible.

The video, on the other hand, had done the trick. So the mother had filleted the husband, then promptly sunk deep into depression after her court-appointed attorney got her off. As for the two girls, victims of incest from the time they were four and six, with full video footage of the repeated attacks so broadly disseminated on the Internet it could never be called back … Once again, it wasn’t like either girl was gonna grow up to be President, now, was she?

D.D. and Miller pulled up to the address Colleen Pickler had provided for Aidan Brewster. D.D. was already practicing deep breathing exercises and trying to keep her fingers from forming an automatic fist. The PO had advised them to play nice.

“Most sex offenders are inherently spineless, with low self-esteem—that’s why they prey on children, or, as a nineteen-year-old, feel most comfortable with a fourteen-year-old girlfriend,” she’d counseled. “You come down on Aidan like a ton of bricks, and he won’t be able to take it. He’ll shut down and you’ll be left spinning your wheels on the road to nowhere. Become his friend first. Then screw him over.”

The whole friend thing was never gonna work for D.D., so by tacit agreement, Miller would be taking the lead. He got out of the car first, and she followed him up the walk to the modest, 1950s home. Miller knocked. No answer.

They’d expected as much. They’d already learned from the two uniformed officers that Sandra Jones had her car serviced at the same garage where Aidan Brewster worked. Colleen Pickler had called them just an hour later to say she’d been informed by the garage owner, Vito Marcello, that he’d terminated Aidan Brewster’s employment.

Mutual feeling was that Aidan was feeling spooked. Better to grab him now, before the guy bolted into the wind.

Miller knocked again, then pressed his shield against the side window.

“Aidan Brewster,” he called out. “Boston PD. Open up, buddy. We just want to talk.”

D.D. raised a brow, and huffed impatiently. Breaking down the door would feel so much better, in her opinion, even if judges frowned on that sort of thing.

Just when she was thinking she might get her wish, there came the sound of a bolt lock drawing back. Then the creak of the front door cracking open.