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get away with it, it was someone who wrote about it for a living. “I think we can eliminate Maureen. She’s as dumb as a box of rocks.”
    “Could be an act,” Kurt pointed out.
    Quinn laughed and shook his head. “You heard what she said about those aliens. No one’s that good an actress.”
    “She dated all three victims, and we can’t rule her out yet.” Sergeant Mitchell flipped open the top murder book to several different photos of all three victims. They all lay spread-eagle on their beds, as if they’d been posed that way, their noodles limp and pathetic, their mouths open and the dry cleaner’s bag sucked down their throats. “Maybe Kurt’s right. She could be acting, but after listening to the Rothschild tape, I think she’s the more promising. She sounds like she might be bragging. Like she knows how to kill three men and get away with it.”
    Quinn flipped a few pages to pictures of sooty fingerprint dust smearing doorways, nightstands, and telephones.
    “Maybe she got tired of just writing about murder,” Kurt added as Quinn flipped another page. Black powder covered three different bathroom sinks, toilets, and shower stalls.
    “It’s possible she wants to act out what she writes,” Quinn conceded.
    The technicians had lifted latent prints off the dry cleaner’s bags, but all of them matched prints of Westco workers. He flipped past various crime scene photos. Three dead men and no solid physical evidence that linked any one person to all three.
    “I’d like to get a look at what she might be working on now.” Quinn glanced up at the sergeant. “Maybe we should just pull her in and ask her. All we have to do is catch her in a few lies.”
    “Not yet. We can’t risk her lawyering up.” Sergeant Mitchell scratched the back of his neck. “Kurt,” he said and pointed a finger at the other detective. “Work on a couple more of those romantic e-mails from hardluvnman and send them to those two women.”
    Quinn cringed. Kurt read romance novels and watched chick flicks, and he and the sergeant thought Kurt knew what sort of mushy shit women liked to hear. He’d been married for more than twenty years, so perhaps he did. “No more shit about how hot they look in their photos,” he warned. “Or that ‘looking for a soul mate’ crap.”
    The sergeant chuckled. “Set up dates for a few cocktails this time. Get those women loose. When they e-mail back, let me know.” He turned to leave but said over his shoulder, “Oh, and we need to question the people at Westco again.”
    “Kurt and I planned to do that this afternoon,” Quinn said as he watched the sergeant disappear.
    An hour later, Kurt finished the “romantic” e-mail. “I just finished this,” he said and handed Quinn a copy. “Sergeant Mitchell thinks it looks good. Maybe my best work yet.”
    Quinn glanced at what Kurt had written, and he felt his brain squeeze. “Jesus H. Macy.”

    Dressed for work in flannel poodle-print pajamas, Lucy grabbed a mug of coffee and headed for the office. Her slippers made scuffing sounds on the tile floor as she walked from her kitchen and moved up the curved stairs. She sat at her L-shaped desk, kicked off her slippers, and propped her feet up on the side cluttered with research books. Late morning sunlight spilled across her red toenails, a stack of magazines, and a pair of Steelhead tickets she’d been given by the Writer’s League. She yawned until tears filled her eyes. After the strong coffee she’d drunk the night before, she’d come home and worked until 3:00 a.m., killing off a character she’d had to invent from past boyfriends. Using Quinn as a template hadn’t worked out. Not after he’d saved klondikemike’s life.
    She raised the mug to her lips and leaned over the arm of her chair to turn on her computer. Not that it mattered really, but Quinn had caught her in a lie. She obviously wasn’t a nurse, and she was sure she’d never hear from him again. Which was