I hit print and soon my printer was spitting out a copy of the article. I went back to the Internet and did a search for Laurence Grasso. I immediately got a hit.

It was again from the Free Press, and it was a few weeks after the first article. It contained only one nugget of information, but it was big enough to make me sit back and take a deep breath. The article detailed where Mr. Grasso would be serving his fifteen years.

The same location Rufus Coltraine had called home.

A little place in the country called Jackson State Prison.

Chapter Thirty-One

Ellen was in her office when I arrived back at the station. Normally I would have called, seeing as how I had just been there. But I felt this new information merited a back-to-back visit. Besides, I knew my sister absolutely cherished time with her little brother. She couldn’t get enough of me. Who was I to deny her of this intense joy created by my presence?

I walked into her office, and she let out an audible groan.

“Christ, you spend more time here than I do,” she said.

I filled her in on what I’d found out about Shannon Sparrow—her early marriage and the later exploits of said hubby. I said, “Let’s dig up a photo of Mr. Laurence Grasso and see if he’s the guy I think he is.”

“Have Becky hook you up,” she said.

I went back out to the lobby and found the department’s resident computer guru. Becky Kensington was a bleached-blond, solidly built woman in her late forties. She had something like eight or nine kids, but I never knew her to look tired or frazzled. I only have two kids, and there are days where I’m looking for a noose and a strong ceiling beam.

“Chief What’s-Her-Name wants a file on this guy, Becky,” I said, handing her the sheet of info I had on Mr. Grasso.

“So how you been, John?” she said as she took the sheet of paper and led me back to the department’s tech center.

“Keepin’ busy,” I said. “You?”

“All those kids in school, all I see are upper respiratory viruses, colds, sinus infections, and the occasional strep throat,” she said. “Our house is a petri dish with a leaky roof.”

“Cupboards full of amoxicillin?”

She nodded as she typed.

I watched the screen, anxious, then sensed movement behind me and saw Ellen watching too.

“Turn around,” she said, cuffing me not so gently on the back of the head. I was never fast enough to duck those.

Becky laughed, and I said, “That’s a quick glimpse of my entire childhood.”

“The childhood that never ended,” Ellen said. We would have kept going, but the computer screen blossomed into a black-and-white mug shot of Mr. Laurence Grasso. He was a sandy-haired, slightly buck-toothed guy with high cheekbones and eyes that looked bored but that would clearly entertain the idea of violence. I compared it to the face I had seen behind the wheel of the black Nova.

“Fuckin-A,” I said.

“Spit it out,” Ellen said.

“Hello, Randy.”

•

Of course, we had no fixed address for Mr. Grasso. I supposed his nickname growing up was Asshole Grasso, which considering my experiences with him, would have been entirely appropriate. Anyway, his last place of residence was vacated. There were no known family members in the area.

The initial search was best left in the hands of the capable police, namely my sister and her counterparts at the St. Clair Shores Police Department, who were leading the Nevada Hornsby investigation.

They would use all their resources to find Grasso and they would be able to do it faster than I could. On the other hand, if they didn’t have luck right away, I would have to see what I could do.

Chapter Thirty-Two

I was by no means a cyber sleuth. I did use the Internet for business, but mostly just e-mail. Lots of e-mail. I scrolled through my mailbox and saw one e-mail, whose subject line asked me if I wanted to see hot, horny housewives in action. I deleted it without opening it.

I cursed myself once again for ordering a sexy outfit for Anna from an adult catalogue because now I was on their e-mail list. Their latest offering was a product called the Fleshlight. It was a masturbatory device for men that looked like a flashlight, but one end was actually . . . well, you get the idea. Clever, but no thanks.

There were several messages on my answering machine from potential customers. I returned their calls, left two messages, and on the third call, I set up a meeting to talk to a woman who had some “concerns” about her husband. This usually meant she was concerned that his knockwurst was making the rounds. And usually it was the right call.

That done, I put my feet up on the desk and clasped my hands behind my head. No word from my sister yet, so I let my mind wander to thoughts of Shannon Sparrow’s ex-husband Laurence Grasso. Probably Larry to his friends, though I doubted he had any.

So ol’ Mr. Grasso had found the beautiful, young, talented, driven Shannon Sparrow, seduced her, probably controlled her, and then married her. Once she got a little older and a lot smarter, she dumped his genetically shortchanged ass. Free from the steadying influence of someone with a brain, Larry was free to slide into the life of crime for which he was destined. Not too much later, he wound up at the big house—the same house where Rufus Coltraine sat, ten years into his twenty-year sentence for armed robbery and second-degree murder. Rufus was probably playing his guitar in his cell.

I also wondered what their first meeting had been like. Maybe Grasso had tried to shank him. Or Coltraine had saved Grasso from being raped by the brothers. Who knew? The house of detention could apparently make very strange bedfellows.

I picked up the phone, scanned my notes, and called my favorite Jackson State prison guard, Joe Puhy. I wasn’t sure if he would talk to me because I’d never come through on the beers I owed him. After several transfers and sitting on hold, he came to the phone. I re-introduced myself, and he remembered who I was. He didn’t seem pissed. After my apologies and reassurances that I would take him out for some refreshments, I got to the point.

“Tell me about Laurence Grasso,” I said.

There was a soft chuckle then a low whistle.

“Stay away from that one,” he said.

“What do you know about him, other than the fact that I should keep my distance?”

“He’s a bastard. Nasty. Mean. Crazy.”

“Did he know Rufus Coltraine?” I said.

“He sure did. I always wondered about them. They never seemed to fit.”

“How so?”

“Rufus was easygoing, laid back; he had his music. Larry was the opposite. A tried-and-true Detroit boy with a chip on his shoulder, something to prove, always looking for trouble,” Puhy said. “And he was a sneak too. Any little way to bend a rule, or even just plain ol’ break it, Larry was the guy.”

“So were the two of them buddies or something?” I said.

He thought about it for a moment. I could almost hear him scratching the stubble on his jaw. “I wouldn’t say they were buddies exactly,” he said. “More like guys who maybe had something in common in here, but outside, would never hang out.”

“Was Grasso into music? Did he play?”

“Not that I know of,” Puhy said. This was a mild surprise to me. “He seemed to like Coltraine’s music, but he didn’t play anything himself. ’Cept probably the skin flute.”

Prison humor—it gets me every time.

“So what the hell were they doing together?”