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he asked, pencil in hand.
    “Try Madonna,” she said, pushing through the glass interior door.
    “It works!” He looked up. “We’ve been getting a lot of calls on those girls you found. Community’s pretty upset. Even had to send a unit down to the high school to deal with the students.”
    “Bummer. Don’t know why we aren’t putting more people on the case; I’m trying to get on the investigation but Stevens is holding out for more detectives.”
    “Good luck with that.” He went back to the crossword as the door swung shut behind her with a muffled clunk.
    Lei picked up some coffee and headed for the back room with a box of various-sized evidence bags and a pair of latex gloves. Pono had sent her a text message that the baby kept him up all night and now they were all sick. He didn’t like it when she took chances, so she wasn’t surprised he’d left her holding the proverbial trash bag.
    “You the one brung the rubbish in there last night?” Sherlyn, the veteran evidence clerk, was at her station outside the door. “It can’t stay here. It’s stinkin’ up the place.”
    “I know, that’s why I’m here early,” Lei fumbled on the gloves. “I’ll try to work fast.”
    “What case is this for?” Sherlyn shoved the sign-in sheet at Lei.
    “Uhm . . . the Roosevelt case.” Lei named the owner of the lot with the abandoned cars on it and filled it in on the check-in sheet.
    “Never heard of it. You get that rubbish out of my evidence room today.”
    “I’m on it.” Lei took the key from her and opened the door. She wrinkled her nose at the smell. “You’re right, Sherlyn, it’s nasty in here. I’m going to turn on the AC unit, air it out.”
    “Just turn it off when you finish.” Sherlyn went back to her computer.
    Lei closed the door behind her, facing the three bags of trash arranged in a row. Her heart picked up speed and she felt a bubble of excitement clogging her throat. Truth was, she was thrilled not to be slowed down by Pono’s nit-picking or Stevens’ patronizing.
    She plunked her coffee mug down on the small steel table inside the door and turned on the outside-vented AC unit.
    She dragged the first bag toward her, sat on the metal chair, ripped open the transparent evidence bag and tore into the black liner underneath, filling her gloved hands with garbage. She dumped it in carefully explored handfuls into the steel trash container by the table. Most of it was the usual: coffee grounds, ripped up bill envelopes, a pile of crumpled, stained schoolwork, orange peels, and globs of what looked like a tuna casserole.
    She was just sorting through a browning bunch of carnations when the door swung open so hard it banged into the steel trash can. Lei started, dropping some of the carnations. She kept her eyes down, but could see that the man who’d come in was long legged, wore jeans, and his shoes were muddy. Michael Stevens. Damn.
    “What are you doing?”
    She looked up into blue eyes slanted into hard triangles.
    “What do you mean?”
    “You’re investigating my crime.”
    “Stevens, this is just a little research.”
    “The Roosevelt case? I don’t think so.” He folded his arms. “Primary crime scene? Ring a bell? It should, you were there most of yesterday.”
    “Okay, yeah. This is not trash from that site.” She threw the handful of carnations into the discard can.
    “You got that right. If you want trash to sort, we’ve got plenty! What the hell are you up to?”
    “I’m following a hunch.” She stood up, but it didn’t make her feel any taller. She glared back at him and refused to look away.
    “What hunch?” he said, and she exhaled.
    “Kelly Andrade’s stepdad. This is his publicly discarded trash, right there for anyone to take.”
    “We interviewed him. Alibi seems solid.”
    “I don’t know anything about that. I just decided to grab the trash while it was available and see what’s there. I’ll turn anything I find over to you.”
    “No