know this is a difficult time for you, Mrs. Manning," Sam Littleton said as she and McCord sat down in the living room the next morning. Shrader was in the kitchen, interviewing the housekeeper, the chauffeur, and the secretary. "We'll try to make this visit as brief as possible," Sam continued. "There are some questions we need to ask you, and some of them may seem offensive or even cruel, but I assure you they are just routine. They're the same questions we ask every spouse after a homicide."

Sam paused, waiting for some response from the pale, shattered woman across from her. "Mrs. Manning?" Sam prompted.

Leigh pulled her gaze from the large crystal starfish on the end table next to McCord's elbow. Logan had fallen in love with the beautiful crystal piece in Newport last summer, and she'd surprised him with it when they got home. "I'm sorry, I was thinking about something else. What do you want to ask me?"

"Now that you've had a few hours to adjust to the tragic news of your husband's death, can you think of any reason why someone might have wanted to kill him?"

A few hours to adjust, Leigh thought in disbelief. She was going to need a few lifetimes to adjust. "I—I stayed awake all last night, thinking about that, and the only thing that makes any sense is that it was some sort of hideous, unplanned event. Maybe some lunatic vagrant has been living up there, and he felt—believed—the place belonged to him. Then, when he saw Logan bringing things into the house and putting his car away, he got out his gun and—he killed him."

"Unfortunately, that theory isn't supported by the facts," Sam told her. "The thirty-eight-caliber revolver found on the floor of your husband's vehicle was registered to your husband." When Leigh stared at her, Sam said, "Did you know your husband owned a handgun?"

"No. I had no idea." Leigh couldn't, wouldn't believe that anyone had actually planned in advance to murder her husband, so she tried to make the new facts fit her scenario. "If there was some psychopath living in the cabin, then it's possible he followed my husband to his car, and when Logan got out the gun, there was a struggle, and the gun went off accidentally."

Detective Littleton evidently thought Leigh's theory was too far-fetched to consider because she ignored it and asked another question. "Can you think of some reason why your husband might have felt he needed to carry a gun?"

Leigh tried to think of an explanation, no matter how outlandish. After a few moments, she said slowly, "In the last few years, Logan has branched into commercial construction. I know there are labor unions involved, and from what I've read, things can get—" Leigh stopped. "No, wait—I was being stalked. That must be why Logan bought a gun."

"When did you first become aware of this stalker?"

"A couple of months ago. We filed a police report. You have the records."

Sam made a note, but she already knew the police report had been filed in September, six months after Logan Manning purchased his handgun. "How would you describe your relationship with your husband? Were you happily married?"

"Yes. Very."

"Did he confide in you?"

"Of course."

"Think carefully. Did he mention being worried about anything—business problems, for example."

"Logan's business has been doing extremely well. Particularly for the last two or three years. He didn't have any business problems."

"Has he seemed preoccupied?"

"No more than usual."

"Would you mind if we spoke to the people at his office?" The question was purely rhetorical, since McCord had already compiled the employees' names and divided them between Sam, Shrader, and himself for later questioning.

"Please speak to anyone you like," Leigh said. "Do whatever you think you need to do."

"Who else did your husband confide in, besides you?"

"No one."

"He didn't have any close friends?"

"We were each other's closest friend."

"I see. Then you don't have any close friends, either? People you confide in?"

She said it in a way deliberately designed to make Leigh feel like an antisocial loner if she couldn't come up with a single friend either of them had, and the ploy worked. "I'm in show business, and my friends are mostly in the arts and entertainment world. They tend to be people who enjoy publicity more than privacy, so they aren't very good at keeping secrets—their own or mine. I've learned not to confide things that I don't want to appear in Liz Smith's column or the Enquirer."

Detective Littleton nodded as if she completely understood, but her words proved she was frustratingly single-minded. "According to an item I read in Page Six in the Post about your birthday party, there were over three hundred people here to celebrate with you. Didn't you or your husband know any of them well enough to confide something, sometime?"

Leigh realized that if she didn't give Sam Littleton some names, the detective was likely to keep pressing her on this pointless topic until nightfall, so she mentally replayed a few minutes of her party, and gave Sam Littleton the names of the first people who came to mind: "Jason Solomon is a friend of mine."

"Personal as well as business?"

"Yes. Sybil Haywood is another friend; so is Theta Berenson…"

"The artist?"

"Yes. Oh, and Sheila Winters. Dr. Winters is a friend of mine and also of my husband's."

Sam made a note. "Dr. Winters? Did your husband have any serious health problems?"

"No. Sheila is a psychiatrist."

McCord spoke for the first time. "Were you patients of hers?"

Leigh felt uneasy about the question, as if she'd laid a trap for herself. "We saw her briefly several years ago as patients. Now she is simply a close friend of ours."

"Who needed the psychiatrist?" McCord said bluntly. "You or your husband?"

Leigh was on the verge of telling him to mind his own business, and she would have if Sam Littleton hadn't quickly said, "You don't have to answer that question, Mrs. Manning, if it will make you feel at all uncomfortable. Lieutenant McCord and I haven't worked together before, but from the sound of his question, he's one of those men who prides himself on letting a cold turn into pneumonia rather than seeing a doctor. He probably changes the oil in his own car and pulls his own tooth, rather than going to a dentist." She smiled warmly at Leigh. "Unlike the lieutenant, I know that intelligent, busy people who can afford it usually prefer to save time and effort by consulting with specialists in every field, whether it's auto mechanics, computer technology, or"—she transferred her smile to the man beside her—"medicine."

Leigh was so much in agreement with Sam that she felt compelled to prove Detective Littleton's theory to the man who outranked her, and she explained the minor reason Logan and she had consulted with Sheila. "Logan didn't know how to slow down and enjoy life. Sheila helped him realize very quickly that he was missing out on some of the best things in life by driving himself so hard."

Detective Littleton leaned forward eagerly. "Is it possible that your husband might have confided in Dr. Winters—as his friend—that he'd bought a weapon, and why he bought it?"

"I don't know. I doubt it. Sheila and Logan had lunch now and then, but it was purely social. They came from the same background and knew a lot of the same people. I called Sheila this morning and told her about Logan. She would have told me this morning if he'd ever mentioned buying a gun."

"Maybe she didn't feel that she could or should. Do you mind if we talk to her? "

Leigh shook her head. "No, but I'm sure Logan bought the gun because of the stalker."

Detective Littleton's expression turned somber. "I had hoped to spare you this knowledge, Mrs. Manning, but your husband purchased that gun in March—six months before your stalker entered the picture." While Leigh was still reeling from that information, Detective Littleton said, "Now do you see why it's important we talk to Dr. Winters? If your husband was afraid for his life, he might have—even inadvertently—given her some idea of why he was afraid… or who he was afraid of."

"Then, by all means, talk to her."

"We'll need your written permission, and I'm sure Dr. Winters will require it also, before she feels entitled to breach doctor-patient privilege. Would you be willing to give us that permission?"

"Yes, if you promise to keep the information confidential."

"We will be very, very discreet," Detective Littleton promised as she tore a small sheet of paper out of her notebook and handed it to Leigh, along with her pen. "Just write something out that says you authorize her to give us information about your husband."

Leigh did it automatically, following wherever she was led… or pushed. When she handed the paper back to Sam Littleton, she said, "I keep thinking about the person who ran me off the road that night. Maybe that's who murdered my husband."

"We're looking for him, and we've redoubled our efforts since finding your husband yesterday. We'd like your permission to not only talk to your husband's employees, but also to remove and inspect any records we think might be pertinent to this case. We'll see that they aren't lost. Is that all right with you? "

"Yes."

Sam closed her notebook and looked at McCord. "Do you have any other questions, Lieutenant?"

McCord shook his head and stood up. "I'm sorry about my reaction to the mention of Dr. Winters. Detective Littleton has me pegged right—I still change the oil in my own vehicle, and my computer at home hasn't worked in two years because I won't let someone else fix it. The only dentist I know is the one I'm investigating right now."

Leigh accepted his apology, but she was startled by his humble tone because it seemed at odds with his cold gaze and perfunctory smile. "The medical examiner should be ready to release your husband's body tomorrow," he added. "Let us know about the funeral arrangements. With your permission, we'd like to have our people at the funeral services."

Leigh grasped the back of the sofa for support, shuddering at the casual, unfeeling way he referred to her "husband's body" and "funeral arrangements." Logan was dead. He would never smile at her again, never pull her close to his body in bed when he slept. His body was in a morgue. She hadn't given a thought to funeral arrangements yet, although Brenna had gently brought up the subject that morning when Trish Lefkowitz called to offer her help. "Why do you want your people there?" she asked when she could trust her voice.

"As a precaution, that's all. You had a stalker, and your husband's been murdered."

"Do whatever you think is necessary."

McCord looked over his shoulder toward the kitchen. "I'll see if Detective Shrader is finished."

Detective Shrader was not only finished, he was enjoying a cup of coffee and a homemade biscuit while the chauffeur chatted with him about football.

The three detectives rode down in the elevator in silence. For security purposes all visitors to the Mannings' building were required to register in a large book when they arrived and to sign out when they departed. The keeper of the visitors' register was an elderly uniformed doorman, whose name tag identified him as "Horace." He was seated at a curved, black marble desk in the center of the lobby. "Such a shame about Mr. Manning," Horace said, handing Shrader a pen so that he could sign all three of them out in the big leather-bound book he'd signed them in on earlier.

Instead of taking the pen, Shrader took the book and handed the doorman a folded subpoena. "This subpoena allows us to take this item into evidence," he told the startled doorman. "Do you have another book that you can use?"

"Well, yes—but we aren't supposed to start using it until January, and this is only December."

"Start using the new one right away," Shrader ordered. "And if anyone asks what happened to this one, just say someone spilled something on it. Can you do that?"

"Yes, but my boss—"

Shrader handed him his card. "Have your boss call me."