She and Sellitto both asked questions, learning the unsurprising news that Samantha Levine had no enemies that they’d ever heard of. She was a businesswoman and had never been in trouble with the law. No problems with former boyfriends.

Another random death. In some ways this was the most tragic of all crimes: the happenstance victim.

And in many ways the most difficult to solve.

It was then that a man in an expensive suit – no overcoat – came hurrying up to them, oblivious to the sleet and cold. He was in his fifties, tanned, hair carefully cut. He wasn’t tall but was quite handsome and well proportioned.

‘Mr Clevenger!’ one of the women cried and hugged him. Samantha’s co-worker. He gripped her hard and greeted the others in Samantha’s party with a somber nod.

‘Louise! Is it true? I just heard. I just got a call. Is she, Samantha? Is she gone?’ He stepped back and the woman he’d been embracing said, ‘Yes, I can’t believe it. She’s … I mean, she’s dead.’

The newcomer turned to Sachs, who asked, ‘So you knew Ms Levine?’

‘Yes, yes. She works for me. She was … I was talking to her a few hours ago. We had a meeting … just a few hours ago.’ He nodded at the glossy building beside the restaurant. ‘There. I’m Todd Clevenger.’ He handed her a card. International Fiber Optic Networks. He was the company’s president and CEO.

Sellitto asked, ‘Was there any reason anybody would want to hurt her? Anything about her job that was sensitive? That might’ve exposed her to threats?’

‘Can’t imagine it. All we do is lay fiber optic for broadband Internet … just communications. Anyway, she never said anything, like she was in danger. I can’t imagine. She was the sweetest person in the world. Smart. Really smart.’

The woman named Louise said to Sachs, ‘I was thinking about something. There was that woman killed the other day. In SoHo. Is this the same psycho?’

‘I can’t really comment. It’s an ongoing investigation.’

‘But that woman was killed underground too. Right? In a tunnel. It was on the news.’

The scrawny young artistic-looking man, who’d identified himself as Raoul, Samantha’s roommate, said, ‘That’s right. It was the same thing. The, you know, MO.’

Sachs again demurred. She and Sellitto asked a few more questions but it was soon clear there was nothing more these people could help them with.

Wrong place, wrong time.

A happenstance victim …

Ultimately, in cases where the victim had been alone with the perpetrator, no witnesses, the truth would have to be revealed through the evidence.

And this was what Sachs and the other Crime Scene officers now packed carefully into the trunk of her Torino.