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with flashing lights. Except for the yellow police tape around the house, and one officer standing on the porch, you’d never guess that a person was gunned down here so recently.
    The cop had received instructions through Richard’s office to let us enter, and we do so. It doesn’t take a trained detective to tell where Danny was standing when he was shot: there is a large blood-stain about twelve feet from the front door.
    “Do we know whether he was shot in the back?” I ask.
    “No, he took two bullets in the chest. Pete mentioned that the other night.”
    “So it’s likely he wasn’t running away. He probably let the killer in, otherwise he would have been shot nearer to the door.”
    “Ricky was up there in his room,” she says, pointing. “At some point we might have to ask him what he heard.”
    “That can be your job.”
    “What did Pete say about what he saw when he arrived?”
    “He said the door was slightly ajar. He pushed it open and saw Danny lying there. He started to back out of the house to call for backup, then realized Ricky might be inside. So he went back in, and heard Ricky upstairs, crying. He called for backup after that.”
    “Did he search the house?” she asks.
    “He did, but didn’t find anyone. He thinks the shooter might have gone out the back door.”
    We walk to the back of the house, and see telltale fingerprint powder all over the door and windows. If they lifted any prints that didn’t belong to Danny or Ricky, we’ll find out when we get the discovery.
    We go out the back door. There’s a small backyard, which borders on the equally small backyard of the house behind it, on Thirty-second Street. At night it would have been easy for somebody to get away undetected, especially since no one would have been looking for them.
    On the way home, I ask Laurie what therapeutic advice Rosie Benson gave her. The thrust of it is that Ricky’s reaction will not be entirely predictable; he could bury the trauma for a length of time, only for it to suddenly present itself. Or it could just be a slow process. Either way, we are to be loving and welcoming and sensitive, none of which are qualities for which I am particularly well known.
    “What if he asks me questions about what happened?” I ask.
    “It’s important you be honest with him, Andy. Be gentle and supportive and loving, but tell the truth.”
    “The truth?” I ask, trying not to moan.
    She nods. “But make sure you really hear the question; people sometimes have a tendency to expand their answers to include things that the child hasn’t asked about. Be very specific.”
    “Expanding the answer will not be my problem,” I say. “Did you find out if he has other family anywhere?”
    “He does not, except for his stepmother, whose whereabouts are unknown. Andy, for the moment we are all he has.”
    Hike is waiting for us when we get home, and fortunately he is not with Ricky. Compared to Hike, exposing Ricky to Marcus and Vince is like letting him hang out with Mr. Rogers and Captain Kangaroo.
    Hike has brought the initial discovery documents, which Richard Wallace had sent to our office. There isn’t that much, just one boxful, and that amount of paper will increase dramatically as the weeks go by. Every time there is a significant murder case, a forest dies.
    Evidence takes time to get processed in, and this case is literally unfolding in the moment. But what is here is not good.
    Danny had indeed been a police informant, although the activities he was informing on are not in these documents. Apparently, he had implicated Pete with one of his reports, just before he died.
    Danny had expressed concerns for his own safety, explicitly revealing a fear that Pete was a threat to exact revenge on him. While the prosecution does not have to prove motive, the jury likes to hear it, and this very definitely fills the bill.
    There is also a neighbor’s statement in which he claims that Pete was on the scene shortly after