“About what?”

“Societal shifts.”

“What?”

“Never mind. You’re hopeless.”

Gif interceded. “Drex, I think what Mike is clumsily and stupidly—”

“Hey!”

“—trying to get out of you is your sense of Jasper Ford’s wife.”

“I just told you,” Drex said. “For a woman her age—”

“She’s thirty-four.”

Mike and his research. He would know her birthday, too. “Okay, then. She’s accomplished a hell of a lot in her thirty-four years.”

“She attractive?”

“You could say so, sure. All his victims have been. I thought you were looking for Shafer Travel ads from back before she sold it. No luck?”

“Found the ads,” Mike said, “but they featured a family crest–looking logo, no photos of her. I did find some pictures of her on Google, but none that good or that recent. The business has social media accounts, but they’re also under the logo. If she has personal accounts, they’re private.” After a portentous pause, he continued. “I did scare up a slick business journal that did a feature article on her shortly after she sold out. There was a picture. Close-up. Professional photographer. The piece was published a few years ago, but I doubt she’s gone to seed since then.”

Gif said, “Come on, Drex, level with us. One could say that she’s several notches above ‘attractive.’ Or was that magazine photo airbrushed?”

“I doubt it was,” Drex mumbled. A trickle of sweat slid down over his ribs. “She’s a looker, okay? What of it?”

“What of it is, you like to look,” Gif said.

“I confess. But this lady is married, remember?”

“Gif and I remember fine,” Mike said. “Question is, do you?”

No one said anything. Drex wasn’t about to defend himself when he hadn’t done anything inappropriate. Unless lusting counted.

It was Gif, in his mediating role, who asked, “What are they like together, as a couple?”

“Comfortable. For all the attention he showered on Elaine, he was solicitous to Talia.”

“Were they affectionate?”

“A kiss on her cheek. His hands were on her shoulders when he gave her a turn at the wheel. She kissed the back of his hand when he served her chocolate mousse. I think she must be a chocoholic. She eats Nutella straight from the jar.”

“So do I,” Mike said.

“Yeah, but I doubt she finishes the jar in one sitting,” Drex said. He knew sure as hell that Mike wouldn’t look like Talia licking the spoon clean. Which Drex had fantasized. In detail. In slow motion. With sound effects.

Gif asked, “You didn’t get a sense that she was afraid of him?”

“Not in the slightest.”

There had been that moment when she’d looked down at her wedding band and turned it around her finger. And here I am. She’d spoken so softly, the words were almost inaudible above the wind. Her expression had been, what? Not fearful. Not wary. Wistful?

Maybe. Or maybe that was the emotion Drex had wanted to see. His pals would probably conclude that, so he didn’t mention it. Instead, he pitched his idea. “I don’t know if or when I’ll be with them again to observe. Elaine mentioned another get-together soon, but that could mean tomorrow or a month from now. The only way I’ll learn what they’re like alone together is if I plant a bug.”

“I’m a freaking genius,” Mike said around a groan. “I knew you were going to say that.”

“Drex, you can’t,” Gif said. “Rudkowski would shit.”

“It’ll be good for him. I’ll bet he’s been backed up for years.”

“This is nothing to joke about.”

“You’re telling me. Rudkowski has known about the discovery of Marian Harris’s remains for three months. Did he inform me? No.”

“For your own good.”

“I’ll decide what’s for my own good. And what would be for my own good right now would be to eavesdrop on the couple next door.”

Mike harrumphed, his way of saying that it was a foregone conclusion that Drex would break the rules and do it, and that trying to dissuade him was pointless.

Gif wasn’t ready to give in. “If you’re caught—”

“I’ll take my chances. It’s worth the risk. It was before. But now, knowing what he did to Marian Harris? Yeah. It’s worth the risk.”

“Are you sure, Drex?”

He said, “If it’s him—”

“Big if.”

“—and if we nail him—”

“An even bigger if,” Mike said.

“—then it’ll be more than worth it.”

“No matter the personal cost to you?” Gif said.

“No matter the personal cost to me.” In the ensuing silence, he felt the weight of their disapproval. “Guys, he has victimized eight women. Eight that we know of. My mother may not have been his first. Don’t think about the consequences to me. Think about those women. Think about Marian Harris trying to claw her way out of that crate.”

“We get it, Drex,” Gif said. “But you’ll be breaking the law.”

“I’m aware. But you won’t be. If I’m caught, I’ll take full responsibility. You have my word on it.”

“That’s not what concerns me,” Gif said.

“Well, it concerns me big time,” Drex said. “I won’t let you two be blamed. Not by Rudkowski or anyone.”

After a lengthy silence, Mike heaved a heavy sigh and asked Drex if he needed any equipment shipped to him.

“No. I brought it with me.”

“So this idea didn’t just pop into your head.”

Drex didn’t respond.

“How do you plan to plant it?” Gif asked. “Where inside the house? When?”

“All TBD. I’ll keep you posted.”

He hung up before they could try further to talk him out of it.

The eyeglasses Drex wore were a prop. So was the ream of typing paper on the kitchen table next to his computer. Alongside the stack of blank sheets were the couple hundred pages of rubber-banded manuscript that had been typed by a woman in his office. Her name was Pam something. The text had been taken directly from a historical paperback novel set during the Civil War.

When he approached Pam with the request, she’d regarded him dubiously. “What do you want it for?”

“Something I’m working on.”

She quirked an eyebrow. “You can’t share?”

“Not yet.”

She’d thumbed through the yellowed pages of the paperback. “What about typos? Does it have to be perfect?”

“No. In fact, a mistake here or there would be good. I’ll be marking it up.”

The single mother of two had a deadbeat ex. She’d agreed to do the transcription for three dollars a page. When she delivered it, Drex had given her a hug and a fifty-dollar bonus.

He marked up the pages with red pencil, dog-eared some of the sheets, dripped coffee over several, left puckered water rings on others.