“This Ben Abbott is just too clean, Devlin.” Falco rested his forearms on his knees and leaned forward. “No enemies, few personal involvements. Nothing but his laptop stolen from the house, as far as we can tell.”

Except the wife. No need to point that out.

“What’s your point?” she asked.

“My point is, I think we’re going at this all wrong. Maybe the vic—Ben Abbott—is dead because of something related to his past, not his present.”

“You’re suggesting we should shift our focus to some event that his family didn’t feel the need to share?” She shook her head. “I’m not really on board with that. The man is one of the wealthiest people on the planet; that alone makes him a target. If there was something in his past that might have put him in danger, his parents would have told us.” This was not necessarily true, but it was more likely than not. Still, she had to play devil’s advocate.

“Unless they didn’t know,” Falco countered.

Okay, maybe he had a point. She couldn’t argue the possibility. Ben Abbott had lived away for well over a decade. “You want a beer or something?”

He waved her off. “No thanks. I should probably get going. I just wanted to update you on Bellemont. Did you talk to Thompson’s wife or anyone else on that fundraiser list?”

“I did.” In fact, Kerri’s head was still spinning from listening to endless and meaningless gossip. “I spoke to everyone on that list, some by phone, some in person. Every last one had something to say about each other.” She made a face. “I had no idea socialites could be so heartless. But when it came to Sela Abbott, all but one recited the same old, same old. Sela Abbott is a saint, blah blah blah.”

“You want me to guess who the one was?” He smirked.

Kerri rolled her eyes. “Suzanne Thompson claims she hardly knows Sela, but she really pushed the idea that she’s a gold digger and an overall bad person. She insists that opinion is based on rumors she heard from the other women in her circle—except she’s the only one who dished the negativity. It was clear she does not like Sela Abbott. I’m thinking she dislikes her far too much not to know her.”

“You think it’s worth following up?”

“Maybe. Let me process the meeting overnight, and we’ll discuss it tomorrow.”

He stood, and Kerri held up a hand for him to hold on a second. “Almost forgot, I got a call from Gibbons too. We met at Ben Abbott’s house and did a walk-through. She didn’t notice anything missing other than the laptop she mentioned.”

“Damn, Devlin, you’ve been a busy little bee.”

Kerri pushed to her feet. “And I’m exhausted.”

“Get some rest. Tomorrow’s another day.” When he would have walked away, he hesitated. “Listen, I have a friend who keeps her thumb on the pulse of this city. She’s a cop, too, but you wouldn’t know her. She’s spent most of her career as one of those deep-cover types.” He shrugged. “Like I used to be. Anyway, she has all these killer connections. I gave her a call, and she had an interesting scrap of info about our case.”

Kerri hoped this was not some friend with whom he’d doled out details he shouldn’t have shared. “What sort of scrap?”

“She says that as recently as a few weeks ago, Abbott was digging around in something that happened a long time ago. Something that happened here—in Birmingham.”

“Did she define this something in any way?” To say the man was digging around in the past wasn’t exactly a lot of help, but it did explain how her new partner had come up with this “let’s look in the past” suggestion.

Give it a rest, Kerri. At this point she couldn’t afford to dismiss any sort of lead.

“She’s working on it. She promised to get back to me as soon as she had something concrete. She’s not the kind to play loose with theories. She wouldn’t have mentioned it if there wasn’t something there.”

Kerri took a moment, chose her words carefully. “You’re aware that we have a certain protocol when it comes to distributing information. This is particularly important in a homicide case. MID is scrutinized by all the other divisions, by the media. We can’t afford to play loose. If your friend talks about your call to anyone, there could be a backlash.”

His eyebrows reared up. “First, I didn’t distribute information, Devlin. I asked questions of a source I know from personal experience casts a wide net when trolling for information. She picks up all sorts of bits and pieces about the folks in this town.”

“Okay. As long as we’re clear.”

He held up his hands. “We’re clear. You don’t trust me. I get it.”

Well, hell. “We’ve worked together for two days, Falco. It’s not that I don’t trust you. I just need a little time to get a feel for your methods.”

“Yeah. Okay. See you tomorrow.”

Feeling like a real shit, Kerri watched him drive away. She turned and trudged up the steps to where another of the humans who wasn’t happy with her could be found. She unlocked the door and opened it. “I’m home,” she called out. “If anyone cares,” she muttered.

She walked into the kitchen and checked the fridge. She wasn’t really hungry, but she knew she should eat. She grabbed a snack pack that included nuts and cheese and dried cranberries. Close enough, she decided. On second thought, she snagged a beer too. She went to her office and dropped into the chair at her desk.

With her feet propped on her desk and her beer handy, she surveyed the board she’d created last night. Two victims—probably four, counting the missing wife and the child she carried. Nothing stolen beyond the laptop, which could contain proprietary information. Kerri frowned. Didn’t seem like the sort of mistake a software guru would make, so maybe not. No ransom demand. No indication of trouble personally or professionally—outside the disagreement over the Whisper Lake Circle property.

But there had to be something. People rarely ended up dead for no reason.

Setting her beer aside, she got up and walked over to the board. Despite her misgivings, she made a note of what Falco had told her. If something in Abbott’s past had come back to haunt him, it had to be personal, and it had to be big. She added gold digger beneath Sela’s photo and put a question mark.

They needed to look into the family’s history here and then the victim’s history in the other places he had lived the past ten or so years. The wife’s and mother-in-law’s as well.

She stared at the photo of Sela Abbott. “Where the hell are you?”

Kerri’s gut told her the woman was probably dead, but deep in her chest she wanted to believe she was still out there, breathing, maybe running for her life.

Plenty of calls were coming in to the hotlines, particularly considering the sizable reward involved. None had proven useful. The two officers following up on those leads were keeping Kerri apprised.

There was always tomorrow, she reminded herself. Each case unfolded in its own time. They’d barely begun on this one.

Kerri climbed the stairs and paused at her daughter’s door and listened. Tori’s favorite pop song played softly on the other side. Until a few months ago, Kerri would have opened the door and gone inside to discuss Tori’s day.

Now she wasn’t wanted.

Rather than slide into that pity party, she headed to her room, hung up her jacket, and put her service weapon in the lockbox on her bedside table. Then she went back downstairs to make dinner and let the details of the case percolate.

Maybe her brain would spit out some brilliant scenario that would make all the difference.

The doorbell rang, and Kerri set the frozen lasagna entrée aside. Whenever she was deep in a case, frozen entrées and takeout were the mainstay of their meals. Tori had never complained before, but now Kerri couldn’t help feeling like a bad mother.

She sighed and checked the security peephole. Jen and Diana waved madly. Smiling despite the exhaustion, Kerri opened the door. “What’re you guys up to?”

Jen brandished the six-pack in her hand. “Since you’re too busy to manage a girls’ night, we decided to bring girls’ night to you—sort of.”

Kerri should have expected this. Both Diana and Jen had been after her for days to go out to dinner with them. But there never seemed to be time, and with her working so many hours, she needed to spend every free moment with her daughter.

Diana grabbed Kerri for a hug. “Tori told me how hard you’re working on this awful, awful case.”

“Really?” Kerri drew back. “My daughter is worried about me?”

Diana’s expression warned that worry wasn’t exactly the motive for the comment. “Of course. Didn’t we always worry about our folks?”

Kerri laughed. “Sure. Come in, guys. I was just about to throw frozen lasagna in the oven. I’d love for you two to join us.”

Jen plopped the six-pack onto the dining table. “Forget the frozen stuff. We have pizza coming.”

Kerri had no sooner closed the door when the bell rang again. She opened it to find a delivery guy with his big red bag on her porch. “Kerri Devlin?”