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prevent the DNA results from being presented in court by killing the analyst, unaware that another analyst, such as Evelyn, could read them into the record.
    The next time Evelyn testified, would a stranger tail her red Tempo all the way to Strongsville? Where her mother and daughter lived?
    Such melodrama. There must be a more mundane explanation.
    “We’ll be sure to go over all Marissa’s cases, carefully,” she promised Robert. “Have there been any problems here at the hospital? Any parents—” She stopped, unsure how to word the question she needed to ask. The man had obviously had a hard few hours.
    “Have any parents been unhappy with you? Perhaps one of your patients suffered an unexpected tragedy?”

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    “Have I killed any kids lately, is that what you’re asking?” He did not seem offended. “I lost one to pneumonia last week, but if that kid had any family, I never saw them. Parents are— Well, parents are usually the worst part of pediatric medicine. They’re never happy, no matter what I do, but I’ve never had one angry enough even to refuse to pay the bill, much less—”
    Try to kill my fiancée, he must have been about to say but couldn’t make himself form the words. Evelyn patted his arm. “I’m going to need her clothing.”
    They slipped back into the room, both tiptoeing as if Marissa could be awakened by mere footfalls. Robert pulled a plastic bag with the blue hospital logo on it from the wardrobe cabinet and handed it to her. With a last, pained look at her friend, Evelyn returned to the hallway and motioned for Robert to follow.
    He wiped his forehead with the sleeve of his lab coat. “Is there anything else? I want to stay with her.”
    She pulled a form from her camera bag. “I need to give you an evidence receipt for the clothing.”
    “Oh, hell, I don’t care. I trust you.”
    “No, Robert, it’s important. It’s to maintain the chain of custody, so that if it becomes an exhibit at trial, I can document exactly when and where I collected it.” She fumbled for a pen. “Of course, EMS and ER staff have already handled it, cut it and jum-bled it all together here in plastic, but—” She glanced up at Robert and broke off. He looked ghastly, and impossibly young, as if the cold routine of procedure had finally brought it home to him: His love had been felled not by an accident or an illness but by a de-praved and violent human being.
    EXCEPT FOR a nice coat of paint, the parking garage of the Riviere did not share in the luxury of the building it adjoined. Nor did it enjoy its tight security.

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    “There’s a million ways into this place,” Evelyn griped. “Open spots all over.”
    “It’s a parking garage, ma’am. It has to be airy. Otherwise the carbon monoxide kills people,” Frank, the building manager, explained in what he probably thought was a patient tone. He had several things to be unhappy about and had listed them earlier: getting dragged out of bed in the middle of the night, how upset the rest of the tenants would be about a second attack on the property in twenty-four hours, how upset he, personally, felt over what had happened to poor Miss Gonzalez, and that an article in the Plain Dealer had already dubbed Grace Markham’s killer “the Riviera Rapist.”
    He could only hope the public would prove unable to discern the obvious difference between the names Riviera—a cheap motel on Pearl Road—and Riviere.
    “I thought security was the selling point of this place.”
    “It is.”
    “Then why isn’t our attacker on the video?” They stood in front of the ground-floor entrance from the parking garage to the lobby.
    Overhead, a camera recorded the span of flawless automobiles. If the man had attacked Marissa at her car, his grainy black-and-white image would have been recorded. But he had waited until she stepped just underneath the camera itself, a dead zone along the interior wall. The