The Man Behind The Badge. Dawn Stewardson

and number. Again, it’s only for the record.”

      “Her name is Rhonda Stirling. And her number is 555-1623.”

      Hank jotted that down, then closed his notebook and thanked Flores for her time.

      Travis added his own thanks, gave her his card and asked her to call if she thought of anything that might help them.

      “Anything at all,” he added before she closed the door.

      “What do you think?” he said as he and Hank started down the hall.

      “Same as you. Our wit put the blonde in the hall around ten. M.E.’s estimated time of death is between nine and midnight. Flores was watching her video the entire time.”

      “You know that’s not what I meant. Do you think she was lying?”

      Hank shrugged. “Always a possibility.”

      “I’ve got a feeling that either she was or there’s something she held back. And she knew Rhonda Stirling’s number without looking it up. Which probably means they’re pretty good friends.”

      “You’re saying good enough that Rhonda might give her a phony alibi?”

      “It wouldn’t be a first.”

      “Yeah, well, we’ll check it out. But at this point Flores is a whole lot lower on my list than Parker’s sister.”

      Travis frowned. He and Hank rarely had different gut reactions to people, and he’d be a whole lot happier if they’d read Celeste Langley the same way. As in, innocent.

      They reached the elevators and silently waited—until Hank caught his gaze and said, “I was right last night, wasn’t I. Something about that woman got to you.”

      He shook his head. “I told you, I just felt sorry for her.”

      Hank eyed him, clearly not buying that. But when he spoke again he simply said, “Good. ’Cuz I’d hate you to start feeling anything more, then discover she’s our perp.”

      * * *

      A LITTLE BEFORE TEN, Travis and Hank called it a night and started uptown, heading for Manhattan North Homicide so Hank could pick up his truck and get home to Jersey.

      He had a house on a couple of acres, not far from Madison. It was a bit of a commute, but he’d bought there because his ex-wife had wanted to live in the “country.” They weren’t there long, though, before Jane left him. Like so many cops’ wives, she just hadn’t been able to take the night work and impossible hours.

      They made marriage a risky proposition for a cop, and one Travis intended to continue avoiding—despite his mother’s hints that thirty-three was more than old enough to be settling down.

      Turning his thoughts back to their newest case, he began mentally reviewing the evening.

      They’d made six stops after leaving Jill Flores and had caught five more people at home. Three of Parker’s friends and two of his long-term patients.

      All had professed shock at hearing he’d been murdered. Each had seemed sincerely upset. None had told them anything helpful.

      Of course he’d given them all his card, so there was a chance that one of them would think of something useful and get back to him. Or maybe a detail neither he nor Hank had picked up on immediately would fall into place later.

      That often happened. One person you questioned said something that eventually came together with what another one told you.

      Adding up bits and pieces was how you usually solved homicide cases.

      He turned onto East 119th, and as they neared the parking garage, he asked Hank, “What do you want to do in the morning?”

      “Sleep in.”

      Travis grinned. “I can live with that. How about I see you here at ten?”

      “I could probably manage nine-thirty. That would let us talk to a few more people on our Parker list, then spend the afternoon playing catch-up.”

      “Sounds like a plan.”

      Despite the pictures Hollywood painted, big-city homicide detectives didn’t have the luxury of devoting all their time to a single case. He and Hank routinely had more of them on the go than they could reasonably juggle.

      They reached the garage and his partner climbed out, then turned to give Travis a tired wave. As he disappeared into the garage, Travis started back downtown.

      One of the good things about both living and working in Manhattan was you were never very far from where you were going. Which meant that in mere minutes, barring a traffic crunch, he’d be home.

      Just as he was debating whether the first thing he’d have when he got there was a hot shower or a cold beer, his phone rang.

      Hoping it wasn’t someone calling about a fresh homicide, he dug the phone from his pocket and answered it.

      “Detective Quinn, it’s Celeste Langley again.”

      Instantly, he felt the edges of his brain growing fuzzy.

      “I’m so sorry to phone this late, but—”

      “Don’t worry about it. I barely finished working,” he said, thinking she sounded upset. “In fact, I’m still on my way home.”

      “That’s a very long day.”

      “Yeah, it is.”

      “I...Detective, I just had a call from a man who told me he was one of Steve’s patients.”

      Travis felt an icy numbness at the base of his spine, the sensation he always felt when he knew he was hearing something not good.

      “He said that you and Detective Ballantyne had been to see him, and—”

      “What was his name?”

      “Evan Reese.”

      Definitely not good. Reese had been seeing Steve Parker five days a week for the past three years, but he was clearly a long way from being cured of whatever his problem was.

      Not that Travis figured he was any expert in the field of psychiatry, but it didn’t take Sigmund Freud to recognize a mentally unbalanced person. And his read on Reese was that the man might be dangerous.

      “We talked to him a couple of hours ago,” he said, keeping his voice calm. “Why did he phone you?”

      “He said he wanted to offer his condolences. But...well, the thing is, the conversation got weird enough to make me nervous.”

      Weird. Crap. They were well beyond not good.

      “Even so, I wouldn’t be calling except that I simply couldn’t figure out why you’d tell him about me, let alone give him my number. So I decided that if I bothered you for just long enough to get an explanation, I’d sleep a lot better.”

      “Ms. Langley...did he say we gave him your number? Or are you only assuming—”

      “No. He said you happened to mention Steve had a sister, and that when he told you he’d like to offer me his sympathies you gave him the number.”

      “Well, he lied.”

      “You mean about your giving him my number? Or do you mean you didn’t even mention me?”

      “Not a word.”

      “Oh,” she murmured.

      Her tone told him he’d just upped her anxiety level.

      “Then how did he even know I existed?” she asked.

      “Your brother must have talked about you.”

      “No, that can’t be it.”

      “He wouldn’t have had to say much.”

      “But