An interrogation is often like creating a sculpture from a block of stone, as each bit gets whittled away, a shape takes form. Sometimes it’s brilliant, unexpected, and other times it amounts to nothing more than sheer crap. Gavin narrowed his eyes. Was Adam a handful that Gabrielle had a hard time parenting? “I have to be honest, Mr. Payne, we’ve heard he was a good kid who did what he was told.”

Scott laughed. “Yes, he was a good kid. But he had grown to the age where he didn’t always want to do what his mother told him to do. Gabrielle struggled. There were fights, slammed doors, comic books and video games taken away. Unsuccessful time outs… I still remember Gabrielle telling me that he demanded his own smartphone. She refused, of course: he was eight. The result was a temper tantrum that lasted for days. Parenting a young child in this day and age is hard. I don’t know how anyone does it anymore.”

“I hear you, man. My five-year-old wants a phone,” Warren said. “But let me ask this. Could Adam have been rebelling because he wasn’t feeling well? Sick kids can be very irritable too,” he suggested.

“Detective, I’m not a doctor and I don’t have any children of my own, but that sounds…” Scott shrugged, “plausible.”

“We heard Gabrielle was private and somewhat protective of her son,” Gavin said.

“Yes, she was. Maybe overly protective would be correct.” Scott had a faint, knowing smile.

“You seem to know a lot about them,” Gavin said, reclining casually in his chair. “Seems a strong association, and you were what… just her boss.” Gavin slid out photos from his envelope, but kept them out of Scott’s view.

“Yes,” Scott said slowly, glancing at what Gavin had in his hands.

“Mr. Payne, you were the one to report Gabrielle and Adam missing. You submitted photos to the police.” Gavin handed Scott the photos. “Were these taken from your phone?”

Scott nodded. He didn’t seem bothered by the question. “Yes, I took those.”

“I had the crime lab blow up the images to produce these.” Gavin pulled out another set from the envelope and handed them to Scott.

Scott took them and shrugged. “Looks pixelated to me. Why would you want to use these, detective?”

“These are not to use in any report. It’s for us to know a little more about the photo itself. To study its contents.” Gavin pointed to a spot on the image. “It’s what’s in the far right-hand side that I’m concerned with. Can you see this, sir?”

Scott did, because his face went white.

Gavin continued, “That’s Gabrielle’s refrigerator. This was taken in her kitchen. In her home. Can you tell me how this came about?”