As they walked back to the Range Rover, Dix felt her looking at him, but he couldn’t see her eyes through the opaque black lenses of her sunglasses. She huddled in her bulky black leather jacket next to him on the front seat, her purple wool scarf around her neck, and pulled her matching purple wool cap nearly to her ears. Dix noticed she was wearing her own socks, not the nice thick ones Rafe had loaned her. He turned up the heat.

CHAPTER 30

THEY GOT HOME just before six o’clock. As Dix unlocked the front door, Ruth’s cell phone rang and she turned away to answer it. After a couple of minutes, she punched off. “That was Sherlock. Things are coming together. She and Dillon are going to stay in Washington, unless, she promised me, we needed them in any way. I told her we’re fine here.”

He hurried since Brewster’s nails were scraping madly against the front door.

“Brewster, hold on! Don’t forget, Ruth, if he jumps on you, hold him away.”

“Nah, Brewster won’t pee on the person who fed him some hot dog under the kitchen table last night.”

When Dix opened the front door, Ruth grabbed Brewster before he could climb her leg. She held him close, laughing and kissing his little face. He never stopped barking or wagging his tail.

“Oh dear,” she said. “Brewster, how could you?”

Brewster looked up and licked her jaw.

“We’ll get the coat to the cleaner’s tomorrow. They’ll be able to get the smell out—I happen to know this for a fact. And the leather won’t stain.”

Ruth laughed. “You little ingrate, what did you want that I didn’t give you? A bun with your hot dog? Some mustard, maybe?”

“Well, hang it up,” Dix said, pulled her against him, Brewster between them, barking his head off, and kissed her.

Dix pulled back almost immediately and pressed his forehead to hers. “Sorry about that. I didn’t mean to—Well, yes I did.”

He pulled Brewster away from Ruth, hugged him, then set him on the floor. To his surprise, Brewster didn’t take offense. He sat looking up at them, his head cocked to one side, tail wagging.

Ruth felt a bit shell-shocked. She swallowed, cleared her throat. “Ah, I’m not sorry, either. Actually, I—”

“Dad!”

“What’s that smell? Oh, Brewster got you, Ruth?”

“Yeah, he did, Rafe. Hi, guys. What’d you make for dinner?”

Rafe and Rob looked at each other. “Well, we were sort of waiting for you.”

“Pizza,” Rob said. “I can put frozen pizza in the oven.”

“You mean,” she said slowly, looking back and forth at them, “you guys let your father do all the work?”

“Well, sometimes ladies bring us food.”

“We do laundry and clean our rooms.”

“He doesn’t have to cook so much, really. We’d be happy to eat pizza more often,” Rob said.

Dix said, “I’m going to broil some fish and bake potatoes. Rob, Rafe, finish up your homework in the next hour.”

“Oh yeah, sure, Dad.”

“I don’t have any.”

“Like I’m going to buy that one. I want you both in your rooms, studying. No TV, no earphones.”

“Dad?”

Dix heard a thread of something in Rafe’s voice he hadn’t heard in a long time. He wondered if the boys had seen him kiss Ruth. Better if they hadn’t; it was too soon. “What is it, Rafe?”

Rafe shot a look at his brother, then looked down at his sneakers. “Mrs. Benson, my math teacher, was crying today. You know, she knew all three of the murdered people.”

Dix picked up Brewster, stuffed him into his coat, zipped it halfway up, and brought both boys against him. “I know this is tough. You can bet it’s tough for Ruth and me, too. I told you straight last night—I will catch the person behind these murders, I promise you that.”

Rafe tried to smile. “By Tuesday.” He pressed his face against his father’s shoulder. “That’s what I told Mrs. Benson. She swallowed hard and said she sure hoped so since she voted for you.”

Dix said slowly, looking from one face to the other, “Is there anything else you want to talk about?”

Rafe hugged his father’s waist. Rob was slower, stepped back so he could look squarely at his father. Dix saw, to his shock, that Rob looked no more than two or three inches shorter than he. When had he shot up like this? He was filling out, too, his shoulders less bony, his chest and arms thicker. “Tell me what’s wrong, Rob.”