Free Xo by Jeffery Deaver

altogether. Her impression was that he was surprised she hadn’t done as he’d hoped—got bored playing small-town cop and just gone away.
    No such luck.
    Dennis Harutyun regarded her solemnly and she wondered if he’dbothered to download and review the lyrics to “Your Shadow.” Probably not. He brushed his mustache with the back of a finger and returned to interviewing locals. He moved with the same calm demeanor she recalled from earlier. His personal baseline. But he was also cautious, looking around frequently as if Edwin lurked nearby, armed with a handgun.
    Which she couldn’t be sure wasn’t the case. Voyeuristic perps, like stalkers, always set you on edge, while the spying gives them comfort.
    P. K. Madigan continued, “So. You didn’t have a chance to talk to those witnesses.”
    “I did, yes. But I’m afraid it wasn’t very productive. I talked to Alicia, Kayleigh’s PA, and Tye Slocum and the rest of the crew. Darthur Morgan—”
    “Who?”
    “Her security guard.”
    “That … the big guy was there earlier?”
    “That’s right. The facility had a security guard and two other people, one was a gaffer—an electrician—and a carpenter to help out the band. They had to be present because of the union rules. I interviewed them too. Their security man said three of the doors were unlocked. But that wasn’t unusual. During the day, if there’s no show, it’s a pain to keep finding him and unlocking the doors in front, the side and back, so they usually just leave them open. Nobody spotted anyone inside they didn’t recognize, on the scaffolding or anywhere else.”
    “You got all that in three hours?”
    Eighty minutes, actually. The rest had been devoted to learning where Bobby spent time—hiking in a state park nearby (no leads there), hanging out in a guitar store and a radio station with friends (nothing helpful) and sitting in a particular diner in the Tower District, where he drank copious amounts of coffee and nothing stronger, suggesting he was in recovery (ditto, the lack of leads).
    And finally discovering where he lived.
    Hence, her presence here.
    She chose not to mention this, though. “How’d your crime scene team do at the convention center?”
    A pause. “Collected a lot of stuff. Don’t know the results yet.”
    Another Fresno-Madera Consolidated cruiser arrived—Crystal Stanning was at the wheel. She parked behind Dance’s Nissan, climbed out and joined the others. She too looked around uneasily.
    That’s the thing about a crime like this. You never quite know where the stalker is. Maybe miles away. Maybe outside your window.
    Stanning, it seemed, wanted to report to her boss about whatever her mission had been but would say nothing until Dance was elsewhere or she had the okay. The sweating Madigan was impatient. He snapped, “The phone?”
    “Service Plus Drugs in Burlingame. Cash. They don’t have any videos. Maybe that’s why he went there.”
    Dance had told them all of this information.
    But then Stanning continued, “And you were right, Chief, he bought three other phones at the same time.”
    A question Dance had not thought to have TJ Scanlon ask.
    Madigan sighed. “So this boy may have more on his plate.”
    Which was, she guessed, a backhanded acknowledgment of her “farfetched” concern.
    Four verses in “Your Shadow,” Dance reflected. Four victims? And that song might not be the only template for murder; Kayleigh had written lots of tunes.
    “I got the numbers and the ESNs.”
    You needed both the phone number and the electronic serial number of a mobile in order to trace it.
    “We should get ’em shut off,” Madigan said. “So Edwin’ll have to buy one here. Easier to trace.”
    We don’t know it’s Edwin, Dance observed, but said nothing.
    “Sure.” Detective Stanning had three studs in one ear and a single silver dangling spiral in the other lobe. A dot in her nose too, marking where a ball might perch on off hours.
    But Dance