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still left. And after three months of wound licking, René quit her job at the local pharmacy and with the help of Nick Mavros accepted an offer with CommCare that brought her here to Dover Falls where she now lived in a converted barn, stripped down to bare happiness. Since then, René had resolved that she didn’t need Todd—that she would embrace the split as an opportunity to find new traction in life and a chance to become a part of something good—something bigger than herself, the welfare of others. “Yes, I live alone.”

    He thanked her and handed her his card. “Just in case you think of anything that might explain what set her off or how she escaped.”
    “I’m sure you’ve already checked, but maybe the security door malfunctioned?”
    “We checked. It’s working just fine.”
    “And no family member signed her out.”
    “Nothing like that. And she didn’t put a chair through the window.”
    And there’s a bloody six-month hole I have to account for.

6
    THE STORY WAS AT THE BOTTOM of the front page. “Elderly Nursing Home Patient Slays Cobbsville CVS Manager.” It didn’t make sense.
    René bought the paper and headed to Broadview Nursing Home, an attractive complex nestled in a forest of oaks and resembling a tiny New England village. The Alzheimer’s disease unit was in the newly redone two-story wing at the rear. She parked her Honda and went inside where she waved hello to the receptionist. But instantly she sensed tension like the hush before a thunderstorm. Nurses and staff bounced off each other in trailing whispers around the lobby.
    René made her way to the Alzheimer’s disease unit and with a strange apprehension entered the four-digit code on the keypad. To the sound of the electric bolt release, the door opened onto an intersection of two corridors. Along one corridor some patients sat in wheelchairs staring straight ahead. Others shuffled along the walls. Down the other she spotted Carter Lutz, Broadview’s medical director, talking to a tall black-haired man in a monogrammed sportcoat. When they spotted her, they peeled off the walls and into a small office and closed the door.
    Unit Nurse Alice Gordon was at the desk. “Hey, hon, thought Saturday was your day off.”
    “It was. The police just left my place.”
    Alice’s smile played itself in reverse. “Then you heard,” she whispered. “They were all over here last night.”
    “What happened?”
    Alice just shrugged and looked away. “One of those things.”
    Bonnie, an assistant nurse, came by rolling the meds cart. She looked at René knowingly and shook her head. A few patients milled about the halls. One man was pushing a woman in a wheelchair, a few others sat in chairs against the wall, some asleep, others chattering to the air. René ducked into the small files room. The large three-ring folder for Clara Devine was missing. “Where’s Clara’s folder?”
    Something rippled across Alice’s face. “Well, actually it’s with Dr. Lutz.”

    “So what do we know?”
    “About what?”
    “About how she got out and killed a guy at the CVS.”
    Alice glanced at the newspaper René handed her and shook her head. “Unbelievable.” Then she turned her face to her paperwork again.
    “What’s this ‘Donny Doh tsee-tsee go’ stuff the paper reported?”
    “One of her rhymes, I guess. She had a thing for them.”
    “Was this something you’ve heard before?”
    Alice thought a moment. “I don’t know.” Then she flashed her a sharp look. “You playing Nancy Drew or something?”
    “Just trying to get some answers. It’s not the kind of publicity the home needs.”
    “I’ll say.” Alice dropped her eyes to her paperwork again.
    “Alice, why do I have this feeling that something’s going on that I don’t know about?”
    Alice straightened up. “Sorry, Sweetie. It’s that everybody’s pretty upset.”
    “Six months of her records are missing from my files.”
    “That right?” Alice said,