Page 100 of Concealed in Death

It nagged at her, the not knowing. Shaking her head, she tried to focus on the food, but her thoughts kept circling.

She sat up. “The dog. Where’s the dog?”

“I don’t believe we have one. We have a cat.”

“No, the toy dog. The kid’s stuffed dog. She took it with her when she left The Club. It wasn’t with any of the remains. He had to take it, like their clothes, out of the building. Did he toss it?”

“I would think.”

“Maybe he kept it. A little souvenir. He might have other things. The jewelry we didn’t find, e-stuff, backpacks. Yeah, he might have kept some of it, to remind him.”

She shoveled in more omelet. “Something else to think about.”

•••

When she walked into her home office, she frowned at the board, studied it, then muttering to herself changed the arrangement again.

She pinned Nash, Philadelphia, Shivitz on one side, with the victims in residence at The Sanctuary below—connecting them in turn to Fine, Clipperton, Bittmore, Seraphim Brigham in one group, Linh Penbroke offshooting from Shelby.

Sebastian headed the other section, the victims from his club ranged under him.

Cross-matched were victims connected to both groupings.

Too many, she thought, too many crossed, and that meant the killer had knowledge of both pools to fish in both pools.

And however she arranged it, she still came back to Shelby as a key.

Considering, she moved Montclair Jones from ancillary to the head group with his siblings.

It had to flow from there, she decided. So turn it all over, start again at the top.

She went to her desk to review the runs on all three. She picked apart little details, poked through on education, activities, relationships, medicals, and financials.

Then got more coffee, and did it all again from another angle.

Despite the early start, the extra work had eaten up the time. Rising, she went to the doorway of Roarke’s adjoining office.

“I’ve got to go in.”

He paused at his work on screen. “I’ll be leaving shortly myself.”

“This new place you’re starting when the building’s cleared. What’s the name again?”

“You inspired it. An Didean.”

“Yeah, that. It’ll be good works, socially conscious, blah, blah, but to some extent it has to be run as a business, right? Payrolls, overhead, job descriptions, supervisors, pecking orders.”

“It would.”

“Organized so people have schedules, duties, so bills get paid, supplies get bought and distributed. And like a home, too, with that kind of dynamic—chores, say. Somebody’s got to take care of laundry, cleaning, food.”

Interested, he sat back. “The concept is to have the residents take part in that. Assignments to cook and clean—to establish routine, discipline, and a sense of ownership.”

“And when you don’t have unlimited resources, you have to keep things pretty tight. You’d have a budget, and somebody has to keep a handle on that. And to keep within that budget, everybody has to pull weight, pull some extra when it comes down to it, and it’s going to come down to it pretty regularly without solid outside funding.”

“You run a department,” he pointed out. “And have a budget to work within.”

“Yeah, which got me thinking. I’m juggling all the time, or trying to mine what I have for a little extra. Shift this to open that, then you have to figure out how the hell to fill the hole you opened when you shifted. It’s a pain in the ass, but it has to be done. The Joneses had the same deal. This is what we’ve got, and we have to figure out how to make it work.”

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