I opened the front door and waved at Ranger. “Visit’s over.”

“That was fast.”

“The woman who lives across the street thinks you’re a terrorist. She said she was calling the army.”

“You have plenty of time then,” Ranger said. “It’ll take the army a while to mobilize.”

RANGER DROVE ME back to Morelli’s house. We clipped Bob to his leash, I stuffed a couple plastic sandwich bags into my jeans pocket, and we ambled down the street after Bob. Me and the terrorist out for a stroll with the dog.

“I feel like I should be doing something to find the carnation killer,” I said.

“You have state and local police working on it now. They have a lot of resources and they have some good stuff to trace back. The photos, the emails, the flowers. And now they have interrelated murders. They can reexamine them and look for commonality. And they’ll go back through case histories to see if they can find other victims of the game. Your job right now is to stay alive.”

I glanced over at Ranger. He’d gone through three of the victims’ apartments. Plus Bart’s townhouse. “Have you been through Klein’s house?”

“I went through last night while the police were there.”

“The police allowed you access?”

“I have friends.”

“Morelli?”

“Juniak.”

Joe Juniak used to be police chief. He was elected mayor of Trenton and now was running for governor.

“Klein lived with his parents,” Ranger said. “His room was a typical kid’s room. Messy, posters of rock bands, small arsenal under his bed, and a personal stash of pot in his underwear drawer.”

“You think that’s a typical kid’s room?”

“It was in my neighborhood.”

“What about a computer?”

“Klein had a laptop. His parents said he took it everywhere with him. It wasn’t in his room and it wasn’t in his truck. Probably the webmaster took the computer after he shot Klein. Paressi’s computer was missing. Rosen’s computer was missing. By the time the police got to Howie’s apartment, his computer was missing.”

“Klein slipped up somehow when he took out Singh. He didn’t get Singh’s computer,” I said.

“He was probably waiting for Lu to leave, but you and Connie and Lula were in place by then.”

Bob stopped, hunched in front of old Mr. Galucci’s house, and conversation was momentarily suspended while we watched Bob poop. How embarrassing is this? Poop is not something I feel comfortable sharing with Ranger. Actually, I’m not comfortable sharing poop with anyone. I’m not even comfortable with it when I’m alone.

When Bob was done I scooped the poop up in a sandwich bag. And now the horror continued because I had a bag of poop and no place to put it.

“Babe,” Ranger said.

Hard to tell if he was horrified or impressed by my poop scooping. “I don’t suppose you have a dog in the Bat Cave?” I asked him.

“The Bat Cave is dog free.”

Bob pulled at the leash and we continued walking.