“Oh,” he said belatedly. “Um, Olivia Hayes, did you hire someone to kill or harm Edward Como?”

Olivia made a motion with her hand, which he took to mean no. She was using her left hand to flip through her picture book. Toppi came closer, leaning over her shoulder as Libby tapped on one picture, flipped several more pages, then tapped on two more pictures.

“She's pointing out Jillian, Carol and Meg,” Toppi said. She looked at Libby. “The Survivors Club?”

Libby tapped once, flipped through the book, tapped again.

“The number one,” Toppi said. “The Survivors Group, plus one?”

Single tap.

“That means yes,” Toppi translated for the group. She knelt down. “I don't know what that means, Libby. Do you mean the other victim? Sylvia Blaire?”

No response.

“Do you mean the Survivors Club should be four people?”

Libby frowned, then tapped once. This tap was clearly reluctant, however. The statement still wasn't quite right.

“Why four people?” Meg asked.

“It can't be an open-ended question,” Jillian spoke up. “She knows what she wants to say, but you have to help her find it by using yes or no questions.”

She was studying her mother now as well. It was hard to read the look on her face. Some compassion, some yearning, some resignation. Then Libby looked at her as well. The softening of her features was immediate and obvious. A mother looking at her daughter. A mother, looking at the only daughter she had left.

“Yes or no question,” Tom muttered.

“Four people, four people,” Vinnie was saying.

“A bigger Survivors Club,” Meg mused.

Then all of sudden, Jillian's eyes grew wide. “I know what she means. Oh my God, why didn't we think of it before?”

In her wheelchair, Libby leaned toward her daughter, waited for her daughter to speak the words from Libby's head.

“Sergeant Griffin asked all of us if we were involved in Eddie's death, because we're Eddie Como's victims. We have the best motive.”

Tap, tap, tap.

Jillian turned toward Griffin now. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes dazed. “But what's the other major statistic in rape cases, Griffin? That rape is a largely unreported crime. That in fact, something like only one in every four rapes is ever brought to the attention of the police.”

Griffin closed his eyes. He understood now as well. “Ah, no.”

And in her wheelchair, Libby went tap, tap, tap.

“Ah, yes,” Jillian said softly. “Meg, Carol and I are the women who came forward, the women who called the police. But that doesn't mean we were the College Hill Rapist's only victims. It is quite feasible, it's very probable, that there's at least one other woman out there. Another woman, another family, and a whole host of other people who wanted Eddie Como dead.”

Chapter 27

BY 6:30, THERE WAS STILL NO WORD ON CAROL, BUT Griffin had to go. Waters was waiting for him, plus he had work to do. He left the subdued group inhabiting one corner of the waiting room, an odd sort of family. Dan had started off slightly apart, but then Jillian, of all people, had moved to the seat beside him. Maybe Dan was grateful. It was hard to tell. He should be, Griffin thought. He gave Jillian one last glance, then headed out the door.

In the parking lot, he was immediately assaulted by the gathered press.

“Any word on Carol Rosen's condition?”

“Are you prepared to make an arrest?”

“Is Carol Rosen's attempted suicide connected with Eddie Como's murder?”

Griffin ignored them all and climbed into his car. In all honesty, there weren't as many reporters present as he would've thought. Then he turned on the radio and found out why.

Tawnya Clemente was holding a press conference in downtown Providence. At a law firm. Where her new attorney was announcing the fifty-million-dollar wrongful-death suit he was planning to bring against the city of Providence and the Providence Police Department on behalf of the Como family.

“As recent evidence indicates,” the lawyer boomed, “Edward Como never should have been arrested by the Providence Police Department. Indeed, the premature and irresponsible indictment of Edward Como as a serial rapist set in motion the events leading to the tragic death of this young man, shot down in front of the very courthouse where he would've shortly been found innocent. Yesterday was a dark, dark day in the halls of justice. The city of Providence turned on one of its very own sons. Now the city must make restitution. The city must make amends.”

On cue, Griffin's cell phone rang.

“Are you listening to this?” Fitz yelled into his ear. “Holy mother of God, I am having a heart attack. My heart is literally fucking exploding in my chest. I'm gonna die on this thankless, shitty, fucking nuts job, and then my wife is gonna sue this city for seventy-five million just so she can stay ahead of the Comos. Jesus H. Christ. I should've arrested Tawnya when I had the chance.”

“You have a wife?” Griffin said.

“Eat my shorts, Sergeant!”

“I take it you had another lovely afternoon.”

“Blockbuster,” Fitz moaned. “Goddamn kid seems legit. Showed us the computer records of Eddie's transaction, then practically cried as he told us how he'd been too scared to come forward earlier. His sister goes to Providence College and he was so sure Eddie was guilty, he didn't want to do anything that might set the College Hill Rapist free.”

“So on the one hand, the kid from Blockbuster did see Eddie that night, but even he's still convinced that Eddie is guilty?”

“The DNA. Some people really do believe in that stuff. Why the hell aren't any of them ever on juries?”

Griffin had turned onto the highway. The lack of sleep the night before was starting to catch up with him. So much information, and he couldn't seem to get his brain to process half of it.

“Is this kid the basis of Tawnya's claim?”

“Maybe. I'm guessing, though, her lawyer's mostly focusing on last night's assault on Sylvia Blaire. That case is consistent with the College Hill Rapist attacks and since that happened after Eddie was dead, Eddie couldn't have done it, meaning he couldn't have done any of them.”

“Meaning the heat is on to resolve what happened to Sylvia Blaire.”

“Would you believe the mayor just gave us carte blanche on the Blaire case?”

“Oh, you big boy you.”

“Yeah, apparently you can spend a small fortune on manpower and high-priority forensic tests without coming close to the expense of a fifty-million-dollar lawsuit.”

“I take it you're fast-tracking the tests on the DNA sample?”

“Oh yeah. We're trying to get results by first thing tomorrow morning. Please let it be an ex-boyfriend. About the only thing that will save our asses now is for it to be an ex-boyfriend. Oh, and when we pick him up, he's gotta confess that it was a copycat crime and he learned all the details from reading some Internet site, www.IWannaBeARapist.com, or something like that. Ex-boyfriend. Confession. Yeah, that's about what it's going to take to salvage my career.”

“I think you stood a better chance of having the heart attack,” Griffin said.

“Probably.” Fitz sighed again. He still hadn't gotten any sleep and it showed in his voice. “Hey, Griffin, did Carol Rosen really try to commit suicide?”

“We found her passed out with an empty bottle of prescription sleeping pills. I understand that she'd probably been drinking as well.”

“Ah, shit.”

“I'm sorry, Fitz.”

“It's the Blaire case, isn't it? Has everyone wigged out. Press is going nuts, people are phoning nine-one-one if the bush outside their house moves… It's a copycat. How hard is that for people to grasp? Sometimes you get copycats.” Fitz sounded desperate. He knew it, too. He sighed again, then said gruffly, “It's not her fault, you know. Whatever happened, whatever mistakes we may or may not have made… It's not her fault, not Jillian's fault, not Meg's fault. We're big boys over here. We handled the case the way we handled the case.”