“What’s this round thing?”

“It’s a bubble. The M.E. says air was probably forced into an artery when he beat her, then floated out when she died. It made a blood bubble.”

I wanted to look away, but didn’t. I stared at the bubble. It had not been present in the coroner’s picture. At some point between when the two pictures were taken, it had popped. I took a deep breath and finally looked away.

“Did you read the murder book on Yvonne Bennett?”

“Told you, we had teams for each vic. I worked the album.”

“We had a hard time frame in which she was killed. Byrd was in Hollywood when this woman was killed. How could he be two places at once?”

Lindo leaned back. He seemed tired and irritated, like I was too slow to keep up.

“Here’s the short version-he wasn’t because he didn’t have to be.”

“This wasn’t something I made up, Lindo. Crimmens and his partner had the same window. There wasn’t enough time for Byrd to kill her in Silver Lake, then get to Hollywood.”

Lindo closed the book. He wasn’t going to stay much longer.

“Cole, think about it. You got a hard edge on one side of your window when the body was discovered. The other side, you have this dude who was the last person to see her alive, what was his name, Thompson?”

“Tomaso.”

“I’m not saying Tomaso lied, but shit happens. People get confused. If Tomaso was off on the time, your window was wrong.”

“It wasn’t just my window. Crimmens talked to him, too.”

“We know that, man. Marx put Crimmens on the task force to cover that evening. Crimmens thinks it flies. If Tomaso was off by even twenty minutes, Byrd had time to kill her and then get to your bar.”

“Did Crimmens talk to Tomaso about this?”

“What’s the boy going to say-he was sure? I don’t know if they talked to him or not, but either way it wouldn’t matter. Physical evidence trumps eyewitness testimony every time, and we have the evidence. That’s it, Cole. I have to go.”

“Hang on. I still have a question.”

He glanced at the door as if the entire sixth floor of Parker Center might walk in, but he stayed in the booth.

“What?”

“What about the suicide?”

“I don’t know anything about it. I worked on the book.”

“Did someone tie Byrd with the times and locations where these women were killed?”

“Other people handled the timelines. All I know is the book.”

“Jesus Christ, didn’t you people even talk about this? When Bastilla and Crimmens came to see me, they wouldn’t even tell me these pictures exist.”

Lindo’s eyebrows lurched nervously and he pulled the binder close.

“They wouldn’t?”

“They wouldn’t tell me anything, and now I meet you, and you know the book, but you don’t know a whole hell of a lot about anything else.”

“Maybe I don’t need to know, Cole.”

He tucked the binder under his arm. He was fine as long as we were lost in the science, but now he was frightened again.

“You better not tell anyone about this, Cole. This is just between us.”

“I’m good with it, man. Don’t worry about it.”

He started to say something else, but stood and walked away without looking back.

I stayed in the dark booth, still seeing the pictures. I closed my eyes to shut them out, but the pictures came to life. The blood spurted from Janice Evansfield’s throat with each beat of her heart, the stream growing weaker as her heart slowly died. The red pool expanded around Sondra Frostokovich as blood dripped from her nose, the metronome drops logging the time of her death. The bubble of blood swelled in Yvonne Bennett’s wound until it burst. Seeing the images felt like being trapped in a gallery with nightmares spiked to the wall, but I could not believe it. I told myself not to believe it.

I imagined Lionel Byrd in the chair with the album. In my mental movie, he turns the pages one by one, reliving each murder. The gun is on the chair beside his leg. If he has the gun, then he has planned his own death. He will take the gun and the album to the chair. He will reminisce about his work. Maybe he will even regret these things. Then, when he’s had enough, he will join his victims in death. I wondered if he thought about how he would shoot himself. Up through the bottom of the mouth or in the temple? Up through the mouth feels creepy. You might miss the kill shot, but blow off your mouth. Then you might wake up in the hospital, alive, charged with the murders, mouthless.

I would have gone for the temple. I thought Lionel Byrd would have gone for the temple, too.

ANGEL TOMASO had been alone when he saw Yvonne Bennett disappear into the alley. There had been no way to double-check his version of events, but he had seemed like a good kid with a steady job, and was well-liked by his co-workers. Crimmens had believed his story was solid, too. The time window was the one thing we all agreed on, but now the police didn’t seem to feel it was important. Maybe they had talked to him, and maybe he had changed his story. I decided to ask Bastilla.

I worked my way back across the city, climbed the stairs to my office, and let myself in. The message light was blinking and the counter showed four new messages. I opened a bottle of water, dropped into place at my desk, and played back the messages.

The first message was straightforward and direct. An anonymous male voice told me to fuck myself. Great. The incoming ID log registered his number as private. The second message was a hang-up, but the third was from the pest control service that sprays my house for spiders and ants. They had found a termite infestation under my deck. Could today get any better? The fourth message was similar to the first, but left by a different male caller.

“We’re going to kill you.”

He screamed “kill” as loud as he could.

This voice was younger than the earlier voice and shaking with rage. One threat would have been easy to write off as a crank, but this made three. Maybe something was going around.

I deleted the messages, then found Bastilla’s card on the edge of my desk and called her.

“Bastilla.”

“This is Elvis Cole. I have a question for you.”

“When can I have your files?”

“Take it easy, Bastilla. That isn’t why I’m calling.”

“We don’t have anything else to talk about.”

“I didn’t call to argue. I’m here in my office to get the papers together. I’m seeing Levy about it tomorrow morning. He doesn’t think there will be a problem.”

She hesitated, then sounded mollified.

“All right. What?”

“Did Angel Tomaso change his story?”

“Tomaso.”

Like she had so much on her plate she couldn’t remember.

“Tomaso was the last person to see Yvonne Bennett alive, or don’t you know that? He was Crimmens’s witness.”

“Right. We couldn’t find him.”

“Tomaso was a major element in establishing the time frame. How can you ignore him?”

“We didn’t ignore him. We just couldn’t find him. That happens. Either way, the evidence we have is overwhelming.”

“One more thing-”

“Cole, you’re not a participant in this.”

“Was Byrd a suspect in any of the seven cases?”

“Only yours.”

Mine. I now owned Yvonne Bennett.

“Besides Bennett.”

“That’s how good this guy was, Cole-there were no suspects in any of the cases except Bennett. That was the only time he fucked up. Now if you want to know anything else, you can read about it in the paper tomorrow.”

Bastilla hung up.

Bitch.

I decided to make a copy of the Lionel Byrd file. I would keep the original, but bring the copy to Levy. If he gave me the okay, I would give the copy to Bastilla.

I reread the pages and the notes as I fed them through the machine until I came to the witness list. The list showed a work number for Tomaso at the Braziliana Coffee Shop and a cell number. It had been three years, but I decided to give them a try. The cell number brought me to a bright young woman named Carly, who told me the number had been hers for almost a year. When I asked if she knew Tomaso, she told me she didn’t, but offered that I was the second call she’d received from people trying to find him. The police had called, too.