“Before flight 1324 crashed.”

“Definitely before the crash, because she heard about the accident at the hospital.” Wanda took in a deep breath and let it out. “When she got home that night, it was all over the condo that Roseanne had died. Everyone felt absolutely sick about it.”

“Did she know Roseanne?”

“Casual acquaintance. You know, they saw each other in the Jacuzzi or the gym or the laundry room. It’s always awful when someone you know dies unnaturally.”

“Yes, it is.”

“I asked her, ‘Are you sure you’re remembering the correct day?’ And she said, ‘Absolutely, positively.’ And then she told me the story. When she got to the part about the car being a BMW, I was holding my breath. I asked her to describe the car and that’s when she remembered she wrote down the license plate.”

“And she still had the number?”

“In the glove compartment, right where she left it. When I asked to see it, she asked me why. I told her I’d tell her as soon as I got off the phone with DMV. When the license plate matched, I told her that Roseanne drove a black BMW. The poor girl just about fainted. She started crying and carrying on, because she told me that it was probably Roseanne rushing to make her flight. And she said some real nasty things to the driver. In some respects, she said she wished the car would have crashed into her because then Roseanne would have stopped and missed the plane.”

Decker nodded. “If it was closer to seven, maybe it was Roseanne rushing off to work. If it was closer to eight, there is no way Roseanne could have made the doomed flight. Can she narrow down the time a little more?”

“No, sir, I tried that. She doesn’t remember beyond sometime between seven and eight.” Wanda raised her eyebrows and licked her pink glossy lips. “And we got one other major problem. It was Roseanne’s car; that is definite because the number she wrote down matched Roseanne’s plates.”

“But she couldn’t see who was driving the car.”

Wanda nodded. “It happened real fast. She was in a rush and she was flustered. And the Beemer was in a rush.”

“Could she tell you something about the driver?”

“She said it happened so fast, she couldn’t even see if it was a man or a woman. She thinks there was only one person in the car, but she won’t even swear to that.”

EVEN WITH JUST a skeleton crew in the squad room, Hannah’s batch of forty-eight cookies was gone. Decker had resorted to picking the crumbs left behind.

“Those were good,” Wanda Bontemps said. “Ask your daughter for the recipe.”

“I think I’m in sugar narcosis,” Marge said. “Can I adopt your daughter?”

“You’ve never seen her before a trig test.”

“I’ve seen my own daughter before a particle-physics test. She can’t be any worse.” Marge’s cell phone rang. She looked at her watch. “Speaking of which…It’s eight o’clock, it must be Vega. Excuse me for a moment.”

Oliver said, “I’m making more coffee. Any takers?”

Four hands went up. Marge covered the cell’s mouthpiece and shouted, “Count me in.” She talked to her daughter for a moment longer then rejoined the group. They had decided to talk in the squad room because the common tables provided more space than Decker’s office. “What did I miss?”

“As it stands right now, the Loo was just saying that it’s unlikely that a judge is going to issue a warrant for the Beemer unless we can implicate the car in a crime.”

“We’re out of luck.” Oliver had returned, balancing coffee cups, cream, and sweetener. “There are no outstanding wants or warrants on the car. Ivan may be a murderer, but he obeys traffic signs.”

Wanda helped him with the coffee. “Are we still thinking about Ivan as his wife’s murderer?”

“What do you mean?”

The newest detective said, “If we get a match for Raymond Holmes as Belize Hernandez, isn’t it likely that Hernandez was Roseanne’s killer? He did it once to his sister-in-law. Why couldn’t he do it again?”

Oliver said, “He could, but something’s still not making sense with that.”

Marge broke in. “Scott and I were talking about this. Why is the man we call Raymond Holmes hanging around, knowing full well that we found his sister-in-law’s body?”

Wang sipped coffee. “Maybe he thinks we can’t identify the body.”

“Maybe, but I know what Scott and Marge are getting at,” Decker said. “There’s something out there that we’re missing and it has something to do with Manny Hernandez. The old man told me that as far as he knows, Manny’s still missing. According to him, Raymond Holmes is Belize, but Martin’s eighty and a con, so everything is suspect until we have evidence to back it up. Until we have a positive on the prints, we don’t know if Ray is Belize or if Ray is Manny.”

“Who’s doing the print comparison?”

“I asked for Zach Spector,” Decker said. “He’ll be in tomorrow at ten. I’ve already contacted Roswell Correctional. A copy of his prints on file should be arriving here by ten-thirty in the morning, providing that FedEx is on time. In the meantime, if we want to speculate, let’s go back to the Roseanne Dresden case. What are we thinking? That her husband stashed her in the trunk while still alive-because she didn’t die in the condo-then carted her off and killed and buried her somewhere?”

“That crossed my mind when Hermione told me the story,” Wanda said. “But why would he do it in daylight? Why not just wait for the cover of night?”

“Ivan is not a cool cookie,” Marge said. “Suppose they got into an argument. Ivan admits that they fought the day before. Maybe she came home early in the morning and they fought again. This time, he got really mad and pushed her. We found her cell under the couch. Maybe she fell backward and hit her head. She gets knocked out cold and he just panicked.”

Wang said, “People fall and hit their head, but usually they don’t die right away. Do you honestly see the guy throwing her in the trunk and then killing her and burying her?”

“Like I said, maybe he panicked. Ivan accidentally or on purpose knocks her out. He wraps her in a blanket, takes her out to her car, and stuffs her in the trunk. He goes out and gets rid of the body. Then, on the way back, he hears about the plane crash and figures he’ll blame her disappearance on the accident. But then people might ask why her car is parked in the condo parking complex and not at the airport. So Ivan drives the Beemer to the airport, leaves it there, takes a cab back to the condo, drives to work, then turns on the faucet, and tells everyone that Roseanne died in the crash.”

The group nodded. Decker was the first one to speak. “It’s logical, but wasn’t Ivan at work by eight-thirty or nine? If the man was racing out at seven in the morning, he doesn’t have enough time to find a spot, bury her, take her car to the airport, then find a ride back to his condo so he can pick up his own car and be at work by nine.”

Wang said, “Maybe the witness got her times mixed up.”

Decker said, “Killing someone in a car in broad daylight is very chancy. So is dragging a body and shoving it into the trunk. There’s also a real possibility that her car was speeding because she was rushing to make the doomed flight.”

Marge said, “Erika Lessing, the flight attendant who worked the counter for WestAir, distinctly remembers not seeing Roseanne.”

“A positive witness is better than a negative one,” Decker said. “Roseanne could have slipped in without Erika noticing her.”

“Of course,” Marge answered, “but the bigger issue is that Roseanne’s remains haven’t been found at the crash sight.”

Decker said, “That, together with a witness who saw the car speeding off, is what we’re going to use to get a warrant to search the car. If Roseanne was violently murdered inside her vehicle or in the trunk, we would probably find more blood than would be expected, a reasonable amount even if Ivan cleaned the car.