Ten minutes later, Ranger walked out of the apartment and locked the door behind him. “I can’t remember the last time I broke into so many places and found so little,” Ranger said. “Not even a computer. Just the power cord plugged into the wall. Either Rosen takes his laptop with him to work or else someone’s gone through his apartment in front of us.”

“Now what?”

“Now we wait.”

I called Morelli and told him I’d be late. I was thinking an hour maybe, but we were still waiting at nine o’clock. We were sitting on the floor outside Rosen’s apartment, backs to the wall, legs outstretched.

“My ass is asleep,” I said to Ranger.

“And you’d like me to do something about it?” Ranger asked.

“Just making conversation.”

“There are a lot of reasons why Rosen might not be home yet, but I have a bad feeling in my gut that this isn’t going to turn out good,” Ranger said.

“How much longer do you want to sit here?”

“Let’s give him until ten.”

“OKAY,” MORELLI SAID, “tell me again. You were doing what with Ranger?”

“We wanted to talk to Carl Rosen, but he never came home.” I told Morelli about the waitress at the Blue Bird and how she remembered about the flowers.

“Christ,” Morelli said. “That never came out in any of the investigation. I’ve read through the file. Carl Rosen was questioned, along with everyone else in that apartment building, but no one ever said anything about flowers.”

“I guess they didn’t think it related.”

“Tomorrow morning I’ll talk to Ollie. He was the principal on the case.”

Oh great. Blubber-butt Ollie. The Bain of my existence. The guy who once tried to arrest me for impersonating a bounty hunter.

It was late. And I was tired. I’d done nothing for hours and it had sapped my energy. Spending time with Ranger was an odd experience. I was always aware of the sexual pull, magnified by the silence that surrounded him. The attraction had changed since we’d had the one night together. We knew the power of it now. We set boundaries after that night. His were different from mine. My boundaries were physical and Ranger’s were emotional. I still knew almost nothing about him. And I suspected it would always be that way.

I had one task left before going to bed. I needed to check my email. Not a pleasant experience anymore. I knew there’d be a message from the killer. I had a terrible feeling of dread that it would be about Carl Rosen.

I tapped my code into AOL and waited for my mail to appear. A chill slid along my spine when I saw the subject line tally ho.

Dear prey, the email began, so sorry you couldn’t get to talk to Carl, but that might have ruined the hunt. Alas, it’s necessary to eliminate participants. After all, this is a survival game, isn’t it?

Morelli was reading over my shoulder. “Doesn’t sound good for Carl.”