“You put them out in this weather?” Sophie asked.

“The cold’s good for it – makes them crisper than the day you bought them.” Maggie hooked both hangers on one of the three coat racks that lined the living room wall.

“Watch the money change…” Gallo warned.

“Uck, where’s my head?” Sophie began, searching for a purse that wasn’t there. “I left my…”

“No harm done,” Maggie said. Even in the pixelized digital image, Gallo could see her strained grin. “Bring it by whenever. I’m not going anywhere.”

“Dammit!” Gallo shouted.

“You’re a nice person,” Sophie insisted. “You’re a nice person, and good things are going to happen for you.”

“Yeah,” Maggie said, glancing up toward the smoke detector. “I should be so lucky.”

Shutting the door behind Sophie, Maggie took a silent breath and made her way back to the window in the kitchen. Along the wall, the old radiator hiccuped with a sharp clang, but Maggie barely noticed it. She was too focused on everything else – her sons… and Gallo… and even her routine. Especially her routine.

Jamming her palms under the top of the window frame, she gave it two hard pushes and finally forced it open. A blast of cold air shoved its way inside, but again, Maggie didn’t care. With Sophie’s shirts gone, there was an open spot on the clothesline. An open spot she couldn’t wait to fill.

Grabbing the damp white sheet that was draped over the nearby ironing board, she leaned outside the window, took a clothespin from the pouch in her apron, and clipped the corner into place. Inch by inch, she scrolled the sheet out over the alley, slowly pinning more of it to the line. At the edge, she pulled the sheet taut. A gust of wind did its best to send it flying, but Maggie held it down with a tight fist. Just another normal night. All that was left was the hard part.

As the wind passed, she stuffed both hands back into the apron’s pouch. Her left hand felt around for a clothespin; her right searched for something more. Within seconds, her fingers skimmed along the edge of the note she had written earlier in the night. Careful to keep her back to the kitchen, she palmed the folded-up sheet of paper in her already shaking hand. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the faint glow in Gallo and DeSanctis’s car. It didn’t slow her down.

Fighting off tears, she clamped her jaw shut and planted her feet. Then, in one fluid motion, she leaned out the window, tucked her right hand under the sheet, and clipped the note in place. Directly across the way, the window in the building next door was dark – but Maggie could still make out the inky silhouette of Saundra Finkelstein. Hiding in the corner of her window, The Fink carefully nodded. And for the third time since yesterday – under the glare of four digital videocameras, six voice-activated microphones, two encrypted transmitters, and over fifty thousand dollars’ worth of the government’s best military-strength surveillance equipment, Maggie Caruso tugged at the two-dollar clothesline and, under a cheap, overused, wet sheet, passed a handwritten note to her next-door neighbor.

You can learn a lot about a man by going through his bathroom. A toothbrush with frazzled bristles… baking soda toothpaste… no Q-Tips anywhere. You can even learn more than you want to know. Down on my knees under the sink, I snake my arm past the rusted pipes and rummage through random, long-expired toiletries.

“What about the medicine chest?” Charlie asks, squeezing past me and hopping up on the edge of the bathtub.

“I already went through it.”

There’s a magnetic click as the medicine cabinet door opens. I lift up my head. Charlie’s picking it apart.

“I told you – I already went through it.”

“I know – just double-checking,” he says, quickly scanning the stash of brown prescription vials. “Lopressor for blood pressure, Glyburide for diabetes, Lipitor for high cholesterol, Allopurinol for gout…”

“Charlie, what’re you doing?”

“What’s it look like, Hawkeye? I want to know what medication he was on.”

“What for?”

“Just to see – I want to find out who this guy was – get into his brain – see what he’s made of…”

The rambling goes on a beat too long. I give him another look. He quickly starts putting the brown vials back in place.

“Want to tell me what you’re really doing?” I ask.

“See, now you’re smoking too many Twinkies,” he says, forcing a laugh. “I’m telling you, I’m just looking for his-”

“You forgot your medication, didn’t you?”

“What’re you-?”

“The mexiletine – you haven’t been taking it.”

He rolls his eyes like a pouty teenager. “Can you please not overreact – this isn’t General Hospital…”

“Dammit, I knew something was-” I hear a noise in the hallway and cut myself off.

“Saved by the bella,” Charlie whispers.

“What’s going on?” Gillian asks, stopping by the door.

“Nothing,” Charlie says. “Just raiding your dad’s medicine chest. Didja know he’s got tampons in there?”

“Those’re mine, Einstein.”

“That’s what I meant… I meant, those’re yours.” Dancing around me, he slides out of the bathroom – but right now, my eyes are on Gillian as she walks down the hallway.

“Careful, you’ve got some drool on your lip,” he whispers as he passes. “I mean, not that I blame you – with all that hippiechick voodoo she’s got going, I’m getting all sweaty myself.”

“We’ll talk about this later,” I growl.

“I’m sure we will,” he says. “But if I were you, I’d slow down on buying her a corsage, and focus more on the problem at hand.”

By seven o’clock, all we’ve got left are the kitchen, the garage, and the two hall closets. “I got the kitchen,” Gillian says. That leaves the final two. Charlie grins at me. I squint right back. Only a fool would take the garage.

“On three…” he challenges. “Two takes it.”

I grin this time – and tuck my right hand behind my back.

“One, two, three, shoot…” His rock beats scissors.

“Shoot…” My scissors beats paper.

“Shoot…” Rock beats scissors… again.

“Damn!” I say, annoyed.

“I’m telling you, you’re a sucker for those scissors…”

I turn my scissors into a middle finger and storm to the garage.

Smiling ear to ear, he pivots and heads up the hallway.

As I’m about to turn the corner, I spin around, ready to issue a double-or-nothing challenge. Charlie should be at the hall closets. Instead, he’s at the closed door at the far end of the hall. Duckworth’s bedroom. The only place we haven’t been. In truth, it shouldn’t matter – Gillian already said she went through it – but I know my brother better than that. I see the skulk in his walk. He stares at the door like he’s got X-ray vision. After nine hours of picking through this dead man’s life, he wants to know what’s inside.

“Where’re you going?” I ask.

He glances over his shoulder and gives me nothing but a mischievous arched eyebrow. With a twist of the doorknob, he disappears into Duckworth’s bedroom. I stop right there, well aware of his reindeer game. It may’ve worked when I was ten, but I’m not letting him goad me into this one. Turning back to the garage, I hear the bedroom door close behind me. I take a full three steps before I once again stop. Who’m I kidding? Spinning back toward the bedroom, I rush toward the closed door.

“Charlie?” I whisper, knowing he won’t answer.

Sure enough, nothing comes back. Searching over my shoulder, I check the hallway just to be safe. All clear. Trying not to make a sound, I twist the doorknob and step inside. As the door shuts behind me, the lights are off, but thanks to some cheap vertical blinds on the window, the room still gets a bath of fading dusk light.