“I don’t think he’s trying to poison us,” I said, shutting the refrigerator door.

“Are the cream puffs okay?” Gilroy asked.

“Unscathed.”

“Turner, take photos of the door and the back yard. I don’t think there’ll be prints, but give that a go, then head to the station,” Gilroy said.

“You got it, Chief.”

Turner went outside to his squad car, and I sat at the table, pondering the envelope of cash in my office. The intruder hadn’t pawed through everything in the house or he would’ve found the cash. That was a tad reassuring. His—or her—reason for breaking in was specific, targeted. He came for something, found it or saw it, then left.

“We’re installing an alarm system,” Gilroy said.

“Okay.”

The break-in was not a coincidence. It had to be connected with Laura’s and Dalton’s murders. So what did that tell me?

“And we’re reinforcing the locks.”

“Okay.” Laura, Dalton . . .

“And getting three dogs.”

“Good. Absolutely.”

No. Something had changed. Last night . . . I rose and went to the living room.

Gilroy followed me.

“James, did you move Dalton’s landscape? We left it on the coffee table.”

“I didn’t touch it. It’s not upstairs?”

I wheeled back to him. “No. It was right there, and now it’s not. That’s what the break-in was about.”

He scratched his head. “The painting?”

“Shasta and Isak really wanted it for the gallery.”

“It’s useless to them. They can’t show a stolen painting.”

“Maybe they found an outside buyer.”

Gilroy wasn’t fully on board with the idea, and neither was I. “What would a landscape like that fetch after Taylor’s death? Enough to make it worth the risk?”

I shrugged. “Ten thousand, maybe? I’ve no idea.”

“It still reminds me of something, but I can’t think of what.”

“Dalton called it a study of a study. He was embarrassed by the charm of it, I think. It was too pretty, and there mustn’t be beauty in our lives.”

“All right, I’ll file the report. Let me know if you notice anything else.”

I followed Gilroy to the kitchen, where Turner was busy trying to lift fingerprints from the back door’s frame, lock, and knobs.

“The lock’s busted,” Gilroy said. “I’ll get a locksmith out.”

I gestured at the small jar of fingerprint powder on the floor next to Turner’s knee. “Are you optimistic?”

“No,” Gilroy answered.

“Remember the last time someone used a crowbar to break into this house?”

“Thanksgiving before last,” he said. “Like I said, we’re getting an alarm system.”

After Turner left, Gilroy jiggled the door shut, and the furnace began to catch up on the heat. Then Gilroy called in a favor—he was owed many and seldom collected—and a locksmith who was also handy at door frame repairs said he’d be at the house in an hour.

We ate lunch in the kitchen and I filled Gilroy in on the latest: Dalton’s habit of purchasing gossip for his paintings and the mega-bucks he spent on his home and land—he’d already heard about the contractors—Mary’s lies, and Charlotte searching the Records Section to see if Laura Patchett had applied for assistance.

Feeling pretty satisfied with myself, I asked what he’d been up to.

“When you called the station I was at the Taylor crime scene. One of the contractors did some drywall work last summer and found two wired listening devices, one behind a light switch and another behind a baseboard.”

I almost dropped my creampuff.

“He told Taylor, and on his instructions he tore them out.”

“Someone was spying on him, and he knew. Did the contractor have any idea when the devices were installed?”

“He’d seen audio bugs before and said these looked up to date, that’s it. They were wired for power, but he didn’t know how they transmitted. Wifi probably, but it’s impossible to tell now. If Taylor kept the devices, we haven’t found them yet, and we got nothing when we searched for other devices.”

“Dalton moved into that house about a year ago.”

“Yes. Underhill’s going to go over the place again, especially the studio.”

“The home’s previous owner didn’t put those bugs in.”

“Doubtful.”

“You know Isak wired the studio for sound?”

“Yes, soon after Taylor moved in.”

“And we know Shasta had an affair with Dalton.”

“We do.”

Gilroy took his dishes to the sink, one of those wheels-turning expressions on his face.