Kayleigh blinked and then looked down, realizing she was still holding the goofy stuffed redwood tree. She started to throw it out angrily but changed her mind and set it aside, on a shelf.

Suellyn went into the den to get her daughter and the toys Kayleigh had bought her.

At that moment Dance’s phone rang; Dennis Harutyun was calling. She asked, “So you’ve identified the vic?”

“That’s right.”

“Is there any connection with Kayleigh?” she asked.

“Yes and no. You better come see.”

Chapter 29

THE STENCH WAS bad, but so much rubber and plastic and oil had burned that at least the smell of human flesh and hair was largely obscured. The wind helped too.

Not that Dance didn’t need all her willpower to keep from gagging, if not worse.

Love is fire, Love is flame …

The scene was a broad dusty field, a cracked and crumbling parking lot, a long-closed gas station collapsed in on itself and the burned shed, of which there wasn’t much left. The smoke was still rising in furious plumes. The heat you could feel from the shoulder of the road. Not far away was the gray-brown strip of low river that had inspired this location for the killing.

The CSU team was still at work, though the firefighters outnumbered the police. Fire was a much greater risk to the population of Fresno than a single crazed stalker.

Harutyun, the senior detective on the scene, explained what they’d found, which wasn’t much. The shell casings, the CDs, the money—the altar to Kayleigh. But even the twenty-dollar bill seemed to have been washed—literally laundered. And the fire had been such a serious threat that the men and women had charged onto the grounds with hoses to contain the flames, surely contaminating the scene worse.

Besides, Dance guessed, if Edwin was behind the killing he wouldn’t have left much evidence. He was too clever for that.

Harutyun continued the explanation he’d begun over the phone.

The victim had indeed known Kayleigh—and about a thousand other performers.

His name was Frederick Blanton. “He’s a crook,” Harutyun summarized. “Was a crook.”

Dance thought of the CDs, the altar … and what she knew of the music business. “Into illegal file sharing?”

“That’s very good, Kathryn. Yes.”

“What’s the story?”

“There were close to ten thousand computers on the network. People would download songs, music videos too. Kayleigh’s were among the most popular.”

“How’d you ID him?” Dance glanced inside. “Obviously, no prints.”

“Weren’t hardly even any hands or feet. One hand must’ve burned down to ash, gone completely. We’ll have to confirm with DNA but we found his wallet in a part of the shed that didn’t burn so bad. We checked his address—he lived in the Tower District, about seven, eight miles from here. A team’s going through his house now. They found his door kicked and it was a mess—all his computers were wrecked. We figured the perp probably forced him to destroy the file-sharing servers then made him get into the trunk of his car. If it’s Edwin he’s got plenty of room in that Buick of his. Drove him here, shot him and set the fire.”