The Perfect Crime

It was the perfect crime. The scene was immaculate. Not a single smudged fingerprint marred any of the gleaming brass doorknobs that adorned the great room's three stained oak doors. Nor was one present on the crystalline surface of the large rectangular glass table that refracted light from the big bay window, casting a thousand little rainbows all around the room. Not one smudge could be found on the white stucco walls, not a single fiber of the lush blue carpeting was out of place. No mark or stain of any kind could be found on the designer furniture ensemble that so brilliantly matched that beautiful carpet. For all intents and purposes, the room was flawless. And sterile.

The only sign that something was amiss, a tiny detail, was something that even a veteran investigator would miss.

"Do you see it, Clauson?" Inspector Asper asked.

Peter Clauson, a young cop, had only been with the force for three years. He'd just been promoted to Investigator, and was learning the ropes. That's why he'd been paired with Asper for orientation; Asper was the best the city of Lowville had ever seen.

Pete squinted, as if to see more clearly by minimizing the amount of distracting light reaching his pupils. He turned his head from left to right, taking in the whole width and breadth of the room. When he was done, he gave up with a shrug.

Asper pointed up, toward the high vaulted ceiling, where a gigantic upside-down tree made of brass, crystal, and tiny electric lights dangled ten feet over the center of the room. "Do you see?"

Pete shook his head. He hadn't given the chandelier a second glance since he'd come in. It wasn't relevant, so he'd completely forgotten it was there.

"There's dust," Asper said.

Pete hesitated, his expression showed his growing confusion. He did his best to hide it, not wanting to look dumb in front of the great Inspector Asper, but at last he gave in.

"I don't follow. So there's dust. So what?" he said.

"The other rooms in this house are very clean, but there's signs that people live here. This room, however, is positively spotless."

"Ok," Pete said, "But the body is in the dining room. What does it matter that this room is so well kept?"

Asper shook his head. "If you learn anything from me, learn this: people don't hide things unless there is something to hide. Our victim was killed in this room."

"How can you possibly figure that?"

"Maybe Mr. and Mrs. Sonomar wanted this room ultra-tidy, for whatever reason. I've known people who go so far as to cordon off their living rooms, keeping them pristine to impress guests with. But I doubt it. If that were the case, you can bet the chandelier would be just as sparkling-fresh as the rest of the room. People that compulsively vain wouldn't overlook a detail like this."

Pete shook his head. "Maybe the maid just didn't have a ladder." He realized it was a stupid thought as soon as it came out of his mouth. A rich couple, who owned a veritable mansion and had the money for a live-in maid, couldn't afford a ladder.

Asper gave him a withering glare.

"The crime scene in the dining room is staged," he said. "They did a bang-up job of it too. No one would have ever known any different, if it weren't for the one little detail here. But when people are rushed, they miss things that they ordinarily wouldn't. They make mistakes."

Asper walked over to the table and pulled it sideways. The indentations in the carpet from the table's feet sprang up almost immediately.

"That table hasn't been sitting there long," Pete said.

"Now you're catching on. And why would they have this room redone, all of a sudden, and in so much of a hurry that they forgot about the chandelier?"

"I think I see where you're going. We should have the forensics team take a look in here."

"No," Asper said, putting the table back where it was. "It wouldn't do any good."

"Why not? You can scrub the soul out of a carpet, but blood always shows up in a test."

"Do you see any sign that this carpet has been scrubbed - ever? It's new. They replaced the one that was here when Mr. Sonomar was killed."

Pete chewed on his lip, thinking. He knew Asper was right. The furniture had probably been changed too. But if the evidence was all gone, what could they do?

"So how can we prove that the murder happened in here? Or figure out what actually happened?"

"Clauson, for the second time today, you're forgetting something very important," Asper said.

"What's that?"

"It's a common enough mistake. Nobody ever thinks to look up."

Pete tilted his head all the way back and stared at the chandelier. All he could see was the shiny metal, the sparkling crystals, and the fine layer of gray dust peeking over the tops of the magnificent brass monstrosity's arms. He was about to admit defeat to his mentor, once again, when he saw it.

There was a tiny black spot, right in the middle of the central hub. It wasn't out of place; it didn't disrupt the symmetry of the design at all. But it was something that shouldn't be there. There was no reason for there to be a black spot in that particular position.

He pulled a small flashlight from his belt and shined it directly on the spot. A miniscule gleam reflected back. The black spot had glass on it.

"A camera?" Pete said, "Are you bagging me?"

He glanced at Asper, who was grinning a smug little grin. "You knew the whole time, didn't you?" Pete said, "Why didn't you just say so in the beginning?"

"You have to learn to find the clues first," Asper said, "If you start looking for shortcuts, you'll get lazy." Asper headed for the door.

"And," he said as he walked, "It was much more fun this way."

Pete followed him out into the main hall. It was a long, carpeted corridor, with six sets of doors spaced evenly between floral-patterned wall panels. The dining room was at the far end, where the hall came to a T-junction. To the right, a stairway rose to the upper floors. To the left, there was a procession of more doors and more flowery panels, over a hardwood floor so perfectly smooth that it would not be out of place in a bowling alley.

"What made you think to look for a camera?"

Asper turned his head to face Pete as they walked toward the dining room. "Simple deduction. Frankly, I'd have been surprised if the camera wasn't there."

"How do you figure?" Pete asked.

"We already know somebody who lives here is hiding something. It's pretty much a given that the something in question is a murder, so the somebody is probably the lady of the house. Follow me so far?"

"Got you. The only other resident is the maid, and she doesn't have the resources."

"Right," Asper said. "So, we focus on the wife. If this were pre-meditated, you can bet she would have done a better job. Something off-premises, to say the least."

"Ok."

Asper stopped at the door. "When one person takes the life of another, there is always a reason. It might be a spur of the moment act, or a bad decision made in the heat of a moment, but there is always a reason, an event that led to the situation where the choice was necessary."

"Where does a camera come in to the picture?"

"Mr. and Mrs. Sonomar had a fight, the kind the ends up with somebody getting dead. There was a reason behind that too, something else that the wife wanted hidden."

"Obviously," Pete said. "It's something that would make one of them angry enough to kill."

"It's an assumption, but a probable one. We can also be fairly sure that it wasn't her that started the confrontation; otherwise, it probably would have been planned out, and we would be looking at a body somewhere else right now. So we can figure that she kept whatever it was secret, but he found out and attacked her. Now, if my wife were hiding something from me that would make me that angry, how do you suppose I might go about finding out?"

"I thought you weren't married."

Asper grinned again. "I'm not. That's why I think so clearly."

Pete, himself a married man, glowered at Asper. Pretending not to notice, the Inspector went on: "Nanny-cams are fairly cheap, easy to use, and - like I said - nobody ever looks up."

"So the fact that Mr. Sonomar found out whatever secret his wife had led you to believe there might be a camera?"

Asper shoved the door open. "Got to find out somehow. Otherwise, no fight."

Pete put a hand on Asper's shoulder to keep him from going into the dining room; it was filled with crime scene specialists. "Why wouldn't she just claim self-defense?" he asked.

Asper turned back and nodded. "Good, you're thinking better already. Looking for the most rational alternative. It's a start."

He broke away and went through, into the dining room, where a team of men with latex gloves and UV lights bustled about, gathering microscopic evidence.

The pair stepped around a man who knelt over a crack in the hardwood floor with a pair of tweezers. They headed right to where the corpse lay prone on the floor. Mr. Sonomar was on his back, a tiny hole in his starched white shirt marking the precise location from which the coagulated puddle of crimson that had stained his clothing on its way to the floor had originated. His tie was flung back over his shoulder, the tops of his polished black leather shoes were flecked with spots of scarlet.

Captain Moorhead, who was personally overseeing the investigation into the death of one of the wealthiest citizens in Lewis County, joined them beside the body.

"The lady of the house says that she'd just come home and found him this way when she called 911," the Captain said.

"Of course she does," Asper said, "And I'm sure she has an alibi to prove it."

"Wal-Mart receipts," the Captain said.

"I have to hand it to her, she handled it like a pro," Asper said.

"You sure it's her?" the Captain asked.

"Yep. But to be fair, she's got a decent shot at a self-defense argument."

The Captain's eyebrows shot up. "Oh?"

Asper waved at the body. "He catches her with another man, flies into a rage. Maybe he wasn't going to hurt her, but we'll never know what he meant to do. She pops him, probably with his own gun, and has the mess cleaned up. Make it look like somebody broke in - no sign of forced entry, because no one in Lowville locks their doors - was surprised by Mr. Sonomar here, shot him, and took off."

"Wait... Now she's having an affair?" Pete asked.

"Know anything else rich folks kill their spouses over?" Asper said over his shoulder. To the Captain, he said, "They move the body, clean up the scene, shoot out the window to make it look like the bullet is off in the woods somewhere. The old carpet and furniture disappear - along with Sonomar's gun - and all the while, the Mrs. is smiling for the cameras down at Wally World."

"But what about..." the Captain began, but Asper cut him off.

"The first bullet is probably lodged in the hallway floor. We can't do ballistics without a murder weapon, but I'll bet you a box of donughts that it's the same caliber as the handgun registered to Mr. Sonomar."

"There's no hole, though." Pete said.

Asper turned away from the Captain to face Pete. "Same new carpet as in the showy room - with that lovely hardwood we saw in other hall underneath? Again, people only hide things when there is something to hide. Questioning is good, Clauson; it helps you learn. But don't doubt me."

He turned back to the body. "As I was saying, Mr. Sonomar had a hidden camera that the Mrs. didn't know about. We saw it, and it probably recorded the murder. Therefore, we need the video. The maid wouldn't know where the camera feeds to, so we can presume that it's hidden too. But I believe Mr. Sonomar will be happy to tell us his little secret."

A balding man in a slacks and a windbreaker stepped into the room from the other door, the one that led to the kitchen. "I don't think he'll be telling you much of anything, Inspector," he said. He gave the corpse a once-over, walking all the way around it. The back of his jacket read "Coroner".

"He's pretty obviously dead. I'll have the boys take him down to the morgue," he said.

"Just a moment please," Asper said. He took a knee beside the victim's feet and lifted the left shoe. "What do you see?"

The three other men leaned in close. Pete was the first to answer. "There's a kind of powder in the gaps of the tread."

"Right, Clauson. See, Captain, that's why he's doing this job, and you're just supervising. What do you make of it?"

Pete stared. "Nothing's coming to mind."

"Dust," Asper said. "Where could he get dust on the bottoms of his shoes?"

"Somewhere they don't clean regularly," the Captain ventured.

"The basement or the attic," Pete said.

"Attic," Asper confirmed.

"How can you know that?" the Captain asked, "You've barely looked around the ground floor."

Asper grinned. "When you've done this job as long as I have, people's 'creativeness' ceases to be much of a surprise. And basements in older houses like this are usually too damp for electronic equipment. Now, if you'll pardon me..."

He stood and headed back the way he'd come, through the door to the hall, to where the corridor met the foot of the stair. Just on the other side of the door, he paused.

"Oh, and Captain? Would you be so kind as to place Mrs. Sonomar under arrest for me?"

Pete followed Asper up two flights of stairs, until they came to the landing at the top. Above their heads, a hatch covered the entrance to the attic.

"Clauson, have you ever wondered how people always seem to get old beds, couches, and big, heavy trunks full of grandma's clothes up into the attic, all through tiny little openings like that?"

Pete considered for a moment. "No, I never thought about it. How do they?"

"Damned if I know," Asper said, "But I've always wondered."

Asper looked around for something to stand on. With nothing handy, he climbed up Pete, stepping on the end of the banister to support his weight. He reached up and grabbed the hatch's handle.

He jumped down, pulling the hatch cover with him. When he let go, it swung back and forth, free on its hinges. There was no ladder.

"Hmmm." Asper went to the nearest door and opened it. He went in, and Pete heard him grunt, then the sound of something heavy scraping across a carpet. A few seconds later, Asper emerged, dragging a wooden dresser along with him. He placed it under the opening, and climbed up.

On top of the dresser, he could just reach the edges of the attic floor through the hatch. He grabbed the sides of the opening, and pulled himself up.

"Hope you're in good shape!" he called back down.

Pete followed suit. He really was in good shape, but there was a difference between doing a pull-up for exercise and pulling one's entire body up through a hole in a ceiling by one's fingertips. It was an effort, but he made it.

He came to his feet and looked around for Asper. The attic was huge, spanning the length of the entire manor. Dirty windows at each end let in enough dusky light to see, and little slivers of sunshine created visible beams in the dusty air and pooled here and there along the old planks that made up the floor.

Stacked along the twin columns of wooden beams that supported the immense weight of the structure, there were rows and rows of boxes, stretching from one end to the other, with only a narrow aisle left clear in the center. On the near end, there was a stack of paintings. A little farther down, towers of books threatened to topple at the slightest disturbance. Toward the far side, garment bags were hung from a rod that had been inserted between two thick supports. None of it looked like it had been touched in years.

Asper was moving along the edge, looking at the ancient beams and gables. Before Pete could catch up to him, he reached out and grabbed a wire that ran upward on the side of a beam. He traced it with his finger until it was out of reach, then followed it back down to where it vanished into the floor.

Pete might have guessed what came next. Asper knelt next to the beam and pulled a Gerber multi-tool from his belt. He popped out a flat-head screwdriver shaft, and started prying at the boards that came near the beam. Pete thought about saying something about destruction of property, but by now he knew Asper well enough to realize it wouldn't make a difference.

The Inspector worked his way around the beam, prying up planks, until he was on the side toward the hatch. There, he found a loose one. In short order, Asper had the board up. Underneath, in a hollow in the fluffy insulation, was a black rectangle with a green LED lit up next to where the wire was plugged into it.

"What is that?" Pete asked.

"External hard drive," Asper said. "The nanny-cams dump into here, and Mr. Sonomar retrieves the data through a USB connection." He put his finger on a thin opening, on the other side of the device from where the wire was connected. "Or, he used to."

"So how do we get it?"

"Easy," Asper said, "We borrow his laptop."

By 7 o'clock that evening, Mrs. Sonomar was waiting in an interrogation room when Apser and Pete came in. Apser carried the black hard drive and a large leather case. Without a word, he set them on the table and opened the case. He took out an Acer laptop, and made a show of finding somewhere to plug it in.

Once he settled on an outlet, he opened it up, produced a USB cable from the case, and attached the device. A green LED started flashing over the connection slot.

The entire time, Mrs. Sonomar's face struggled to find a shade of white more pure than the last. Pete thought that she might faint.

"Can you tell me what I have here?" Asper asked her.

She didn't answer, but only stared at him with wide, unblinking eyes.

He pressed a button, and sound issued forth from the laptop's speakers. It was a pair of voices, neither speaking, but only making noises of passion. One of the voices belonged to Mrs. Sonomar. The other was not her husband's.

"Care to tell me what that's all about?" Asper asked.

She opened her mouth, but nothing came out.

Asper pushed another key, then turned the laptop around so that she could see the image on the screen. The picture was grainy, but there was clearly a nude woman straddling a nude man, both engrossed in the act of making love.

Mrs. Sonomar's mouth opened and closed several times before she managed to coax words to come out. "Where did you get that?" she whispered.

Asper paused the video. "Want to see what happens next?"

The pupils of her eyes grew large and her complexion changed from pallid to rosy.

"I think I need a lawyer."

Asper snapped the laptop closed. "Really? I have to say, it's very good. A stunning performance. All the boys are rating it very highly, and, trust me, they've seen a lot of smut."

"You bastard!" she said, "This is a violation of my rights! You can't use that! And I want my lawyer right now!"

"As you wish," Asper said. He put away the laptop, picked up the case and hard drive, and left the room without another word.

Pete had been a party to a number of interrogations, but this was the first time he'd seen Asper in action. "Do you always try to agitate them?" he asked.

"Pretty much," Asper said. "People make mistakes when they get angry. She'll confess."

"But you made her ask for her lawyer - twice. We can't ask her any more questions without her lawyer present, or anything she says would be inadmissible."

"I know that. I want her lawyer here."

"You are insane, aren't you?"

Asper stopped to speak to one of the officers. "See that Mrs. Sonomar gets her phone call. Not too soon, of course, but don't wait too long. I'd like to wrap this up today."

"Sure thing," the officer said.

Asper turned and headed toward the office he shared with Pete. "I want her lawyer here to witness her confession."

They went into the office. Pete shut the door while Asper put the computer down on his desk.

"Look," Pete said, "I know you're good. You know you're good. Hell, everybody knows you're good. But you can't tell me that you're sure she's going to confess - especially with her lawyer present! Not to mention, the DA's going to wring your neck for letting the lawyer see the evidence before there's even an indictment!"

"Won't matter. She confesses, there won't be a trial. They'll do a plea deal."

"That's a mother of an assumption! You're going to screw up the case. Once she gets her hands on her lawyer, she'll be harder to crack open than the gates of hell."

"How hard is it to crack open the gates of hell?"

Pete gave him a look of angry confusion. "What?"

Asper waved it off. "Never mind. Remember what I said about doubting me? Don't do it. It'll be fine."

Pete clenched his jaw and shook his head. He felt his anger rising, threatening to get the best of him.

That's what he wants, he thought. I won't play his game. Instead, Pete grabbed his coat from the back of his chair and stormed out of the office.

He knew he was getting too hot over this. Asper was doing things his own way, like he always did. But there was something more here. The old man had crossed a line.

This wasn't about solving the case, not to Asper. He wasn't out to serve justice, or to see the guilty punished; he was manipulating people for his own sadistic enjoyment. He liked to make people squirm. Pete didn't much care what games Asper played with him, but screwing with the suspect would end up costing them the case. Pete just couldn't handle that thought.

But getting angry about it wouldn't help anything. Frustration doesn't fix itself, his dad used to say. Pete knew he needed to cool off if was going to think of a solution, so he stepped outside for a smoke. The department parking lot in January was just what the doctor ordered.

He lit up and took a drag. His wife would kill him if she found out he was smoking again.

He paced back and forth in front of the door to keep from freezing. Winter in Lewis County could be deadly; located on the windward side of the Adirondack Mountains in northern New York, it wasn't unusual at all to have a daytime high in the single digits. Or less.

On his fourth pass by the entrance, his cell phone rang. It was his wife.

Speak of the devil, he thought. She called him every day, once the baby went to sleep. She knew he couldn't always answer, but she always called, just in case. Jake's bedtime was about the only quiet time she ever got.

Pete was afraid his foul mood would taint the conversation, but answered anyway. He loved his wife more than anything in the world; maybe talking to her for a few minutes would cheer him up. It was worth a try.

"Hello, sweetie," he said.

"Hi honey. How's your day going?" she asked.

"Well, so-so," he said. He didn't want to lie to her, but the conversation was already heading in precisely the direction he wanted to avoid. "How's my baby - and my baby?"

"We're good. I'm worn out, but that's not exactly a news flash. This little creature of yours keeps getting friskier every day. I think he's going to hit a growth spurt soon; he's eating us out of house and home!"

She laughed. She had a wonderful laugh. Pete couldn't help but smile, despite the cold and his mood.

But that's the wonder of love, isn't it? he thought. Your spouse can always make your troubles melt away.

"Boy, you're in for it now," he said. "Once Jake gets his legs under him, you'll never know peace again."

"I seem to recall your mother saying that you were an easy child at our wedding."

"Well, I seem to recall your mother saying that you never sat still, or finished a meal without decorating the floor with it, or..."

"Alright!" she said, laughing. "I get it. So when are you going to be home tonight? We miss you."

"Well, Asper and I are working a case right now, but he said earlier that he's hoping to have it all wrapped up by tonight."

"You sound upset. What's wrong?"

How does she always know? he thought.

"I can't really say. This one's a big case. Important people, lots of money."

"You know you can always tell me anything, honey," she said.

"That's why I love you. No, it's just that Asper's gone overboard on this one. I think he's going to hurt the case."

"What? Why would he do that?"

"Well, he's not doing it on purpose. I don't think, anyway. He's just... He's doing something I think is very stupid. It's risky. And I don't think it will end very well."

"So stop him. Go tell the Captain, or something."

"I can't do that! I'm not an infant who goes running to mommy whenever something happens."

"Peter," she said, a stern note of mommy-ness in her voice, "You know better than that. Don't be so proud that you let your fear of what other people might think about you get in the way of doing what you know is right."

"I know..."

"Honey, you don't have to 'be a rat'. Just go talk to the Captain. Tell him your concerns. Making sure the case is as good as it can be is all that matters; it's much more important than Asper's ego. He'll see that."

"You're right," Pete said, tossing his cigarette into a snow bank. "Well, I'd better get in there, then. Thanks, sweetie. I love you."

"I love you too, hon. And, Peter? You'd better make sure you don't smell like smoke when you come home..."

How does she always know? he thought.

"I..." he hesitated.

She had him and she knew it. "Have a good day, baby. Bye!"

The connection ended.

Pete took a deep breath and stretched. He felt the bones in his back pop several times. He put one hand on the door handle and the other over his face.

"I really don't want to do this," he said to himself. But he knew he had to. That was the solution, take it or leave it.

He pulled the door open.

It was a quick trip up the stairs, then a short walk to Captain Moorhead's office. Without knocking, he burst in.

"Captain, we've got a problem."

The Captain looked up from his desk full of paperwork. "I'll call you back in a minute, Jim," he said, then pressed a button on his phone's earpiece.

"Why, Investigator Clauson! Good to see you! No, I'm not busy. Why don't you come in?"

"Captain, Asper's gone off the deep end. He's harassed Mrs. Sonomar into demanding her lawyer, and he plans to show the lawyer the damned evidence!"

The Captain hung his head with a sigh. "Peter, look. Craig Asper is odd. He has an odd way of doing things. He has an odd manner about him. He doesn't think like you and I do. But he never bungles an investigation."

"Well, there's a first time for everything," Pete said. "The DA won't be able to prosecute this case after the mess he's making."

The Captain locked eyes with Pete. "You think we can prosecute the case now? With nothing but suspicions and a grainy voyeur video? You have heard of reasonable doubt, haven't you, Clauson?"

"Captain, the video shows her take the gun away from her husband and shoot him with it. What more could we need?"

"Anybody can alter one of those videos. And her lawyer will know that. It doesn't matter that we haven't; the possibility is there. And he'll make sure the jury knows it. On top of that, the picture isn't clear enough to get a definite I.D.; she could always say it was the maid in the video, or something."

The Captain waved a hand at his stack of papers. "We have no weapon, and a motive that's speculative at best. The video is enough to go to trial, but it isn't enough to win. Not by a long shot."

Pete couldn't believe what he was hearing. "What about the bullet? Did we find it in the hall, like Asper said?"

The Captain shook his head. "Wasn't there. I have no idea why they put the new carpet in the hall too - maybe just to throw us off a little more. But, as of this moment, we've got nothing. If Asper can get a confession, God bless him, because that's our only hope."

"He's not looking at things that way, though. He might have gotten a confession, but instead he all but called her lawyer in himself! We won't get one more word out of her without that guy going into a rant about the Fifth Amendment."

"Maybe. But I trust Asper. And I know Asper. He's got an ace up his sleeve. Hell, he's got a whole deck of them."

"So you're not going to do anything," Pete said.

"What would you like me to do? Convince Mrs. Sonomar that she doesn't need a lawyer? She's a smart woman, and she'll change her tactics as she needs to. She isn't playing the victim any more. Now she's on the defensive."

"So we've already lost. She's going to get away with it."

The Captain smiled. "If you only knew how many times I worried myself sick over exactly that feeling. But I've learned something in the ten years I've sat behind this desk."

"What's that?"

"Never bet against Craig Asper."

By the time Pete got back to the interrogation room, Asper had already started. Pete looked on through the two-way mirror, and saw the laptop was open. The lawyer, an attorney that Pete hadn't seen before, had curly brown hair, and was dressed in a grey suit.

Pete watched as his face went through every shade of red until it came to rest on a hue that would best be described as 'fire truck'. He half-expected steam to start blowing out of the man's ears.

The lawyer slammed his fists on the table. "Enough!" he yelled. "This doesn't show my client, and you couldn't prove it if it did! All you're doing is harassing her!"

Asper snorted. He was being The Inspector now, and showing just a hint of his grin. Without a word, he reached into the leather case and produced a single piece of paper. He slid it across the table to the red-faced attorney.

He gave the man a moment to absorb the information on the sheet. Then, he said, "Would you like to be read your rights as well, and be arraigned first? Or can we talk now?"

The lawyer's face lost its color in a hurry. He looked over to Mrs. Sonomar, then back at the paper. At last, he looked up at Asper.

"Alright," he said. "What do you have in mind?"

"Just justice," Asper said. "You both plead guilty. There won't be a trial, and we'll keep the whole proceeding quiet. You'll get the minimum and be out in a third of the time, with good behavior, and that's that."

The lawyer looked confused. "You're not fishing for a bribe?"

Asper seemed genuinely hurt. "Are you serious? There's a camera in this room."

Already, the lawyer was regaining his composure. "Mrs. Sonomar hasn't done anything wrong. Even your video shows that she acted in self-defense."

"Ah," Asper said, leaning over the table with one finger raised high in the air. "But to make that case, you'd have to admit that it is, in fact, her shown in the video. And then there's the matter of your role in trying to cover all this up."

"I don't see..." the lawyer began.

"You're a lawyer, for God's sake," Asper said. "You knew you could have just called the cops and claimed self-defense right then and there. But you didn't. Do you really want me to start looking into why that might be?"

"Alright, alright! I'll talk to the D.A."

"No need," Asper said. Again, he reached into his case. This time, he produced two forms. He set one in front of each of his two interrogatees.

"These are your plea deals. Mrs. Sonomar, for you we have a lovely platter of manslaughter with two years on the side. Mr. Wieren, you'll be dining on obstruction of justice in a delightful five month sentence, with probation to follow. These are, of course, the reduced-fat charges."

The lawyer, Mr. Wieren, picked his up and read it. He tossed it back onto the table. "This just isn't acceptable. I'll lose my license; my client's reputation will be ruined. You need to come up with something better."

Asper cocked an eyebrow. "Mr. Sonomar lost his life. I don't hear him complaining about a bad deal. Take it... or face a jury."

The two men stared into each other eyes, both trying to glare the other down. Wieren cracked first.

"Damn you," he said. He took a pen from his briefcase and held it over the paper for a moment. He looked up at Asper, who was still leaning over the table, as if to say 'See? I'm signing it.' Then he stabbed the paper, scribbling so hard that Pete got the impression of a savage trying to engrave his name into the tabletop.

Wieren passed the pen to Mrs. Sonomar. She merely looked at it and sat motionless.

"I'm not signing anything," she said.

Asper and Wieren both shot her a look. "What?" they said in unison.

"I haven't done anything wrong, so I won't confess to any wrongdoing." She shoved the paper and pen away.

"Minda, you can't..." Wieren began.

"Shut up, Harry. You're supposed to be the lawyer here, and you caved in. He manipulated you. He couldn't prove anything until you gave him an admission that he even told you was being recorded. You're fired."

"Minda, you killed your husband! You have to take the deal, or they'll hang you."

"You'll testify against me? Fine," she said. Turning to Asper, she spoke again. "Yes, I shot my husband, after he caught me having sex with Harry here. He came in with a gun, raving and psychotic. Under those circumstances, I was completely justified. I committed no crime."

Asper shook his head. "You lied in your statement. The information you gave then shows you had direct knowledge of the clean up of the murder scene. At best, you're complicit in a conspiracy. At worst..."

Like a switch had been flipped, she changed from stone faced to sorrowful in an instant. Tears flowed free down her cheeks and great heaving sobs shook her whole body.

"My husband is dead!" she shrieked. "I loved him, and now he's gone! Don't you understand?"

Asper took a seat and leaned back. He ran a hand over his jaw. "I understand just fine, Mrs. Sonomar. You're so self-centered that you really can't comprehend the idea that your actions have consequences, can you? You're so used to getting what you want when you want it, you just expect it to happen. Well, I'm not your husband; your theatrics, though exceptional, have no power over me. You killed the only man that cared enough about you to put up with them, after you took advantage of his kindness and pushed him too far."

"How dare you?" she said, still crying. "You have no idea what I'm going through, or how hard this has been. I'm a widow, for Christ's sake! Have you no shame?"

"You're asking me?" He turned to Wieren and said, "Did I get that right? Really? Isn't that the proverbial pot calling the kettle black? And you willingly had an affair with this woman? You put your career on the line to save her sorry ass?"

The lawyer shrugged. Asper shook his head. "That's what you get," he said. "There's your reward for your loyalty. She fired you. She let you hang, with not so much as a thank-you."

Asper faced Mrs. Sonomar, watching her stream tears for a moment. "How would you like to testify against her?" Both faces looked up in shock.

He turned back to the lawyer. "I'll have your charges dismissed, of course."

Mrs. Sonomar glanced back and forth between them with open-mouthed horror. "You can't do this," she said.

"I believe I just did. Mr. Wieren, please see the officer outside; he's ready to take your deposition. Once you're done, you're free to go."

The lawyer rose and started towards the door.

"Harry," she said, "you can't do this to me. Please? I loved you! We can be together now."

Wieren didn't even look back. He opened the door.

"You said you loved me!" she screamed. "You filthy liar! I hate you! Get out! You disgust me!"

The door closed behind him. She laid her head in her arms on the table. This time, she was crying for real.

"I can see why you're so popular with the men," Asper said.

"You did this to me," she wailed. "Are you happy? You've ruined my life!"

"You know you have only yourself to blame, Mrs. Sonomar. Whether you can bring yourself to accept it or not."

He slid the pen and paper back in front of her. "Two years, Mrs. Sonomar. Harry was a lawyer, and you saw how I manipulated him. Do you doubt for a second that I can do the same to a jury? You're good, but I'm better. Two years, or, I promise you, it'll be 25 to life for murder two."

Several minutes went by, with Asper sitting in silence and Pete looking on while Mrs. Sonomar cried her guilt away. At last, her breathing slowed, the sobbing subsided, and she raised her head.

"I swear," she said, picking up the pen and signing the form, "I will make you pay for this, Mr. Asper. You will regret the day you were born."

"Whatever makes you happy, darling," he said. The instant she was finished, he snatched the paper away and immediately walked out of the room. The laptop remained, playing the video of Mr. Sonomar's death over and over.

Pete watched as she cradled her face in her hands and started screaming. He shook his head and left.

He caught up with Asper just a few steps short of the stairs. "What the hell was that?" he said.

Asper stopped. He turned around, his expression blank. Without a word, he handed a sheet to Pete. On it was a photograph of a hardwood floor section, from the hallway at the Sonomar house. A bright purple handprint stood out in the center. Each of the fingertips had a green box around it. At the bottom of the sheet was written:

Identification positive - Harold Wieren.

"What's this?" Pete asked, looking up.

Asper was grinning again. "Photoshop. Neat trick, huh?"

"You faked evidence?"

"No..." Asper said. "That would be illegal. It isn't evidence; it's just a picture. Whatever Mr. Wiernen believed it was isn't my problem."

"This..." Pete said, "goes beyond unethical."

"It's just a picture." Asper shrugged. "And it served its purpose. He thought it was real, which means that he did something - I'm not saying what - that very well could have left a real handprint on the hall floor under all that fluffy new carpeting."

Pete handed the paper back. "How did you know he was the accomplice?"

"It was elementary, my dear Watson. I checked on who she called. Wieren is a divorce lawyer; he only knows the barest basics of criminal law, just enough to pass the BAR exam. Why call him? ...Unless he was involved?"

"So..." Pete began.

"And," Asper said, "he has a concealed carry permit. His fingerprints are in the database. And on the front door knob."

"Why didn't you say so before?"

Asper turned and started up the stairs. "Two reasons. First, you were gone when they came in, and you were angry, so I thought I'd let you be for a while. Second, you needed to learn to trust me. If you don't trust me, you can't learn from me."

They reached the top and headed for the Captain's door.

"Wait," Pete said, "if they came in while I was gone, then you couldn't have planned for them before I left. What were you going to do if there were no prints?"

Asper put his hand on the latch. "I'd probably just play the audio from those home movies. There's one where she calls out his name and screams something about taking care of his client."

Pete hauled off and slugged him.

Laughing, Asper went through the door. Inside the office, Captain Moorhead had been joined by Jim Tenner, the Lewis County district attorney. He was a lanky man with short grey hair. He wore a suit that hung off his bones, and his overall appearance gave Pete the impression that he had all the physical prowess of a wet bologna sandwich. But, from what Pete had heard, he was a bear in the courtroom.

"Evening Captain," Asper said, "Jim."

"What have you got for us?" the Captain asked.

Asper handed a sheet to the D.A. "She'll plead manslaughter."

Tenner's eyebrows shot up. "You got manslaughter out of her?"

He glanced over at the Captain. "Hope I never have to run against him; he has more convictions than I do."

"You're safe, Jim," the Captain said, "Asper is allergic to lawyers. If he's around them too long, he comes down with a terrible case of Tourettes."

"How's that?" the D.A. asked. "I thought Tourettes was genetic or something."

"It is," Asper said. "It's part of my DNA. When I'm in contact with a lawyer for a prolonged period, I loose control of the words that come out of my mouth. And who can say what my arms might do? It goes away once I'm removed from the aggitant, though."

Pete thought Tenner looked nervous. "Well, then," he said, "I'll just go get this filed. Good night, gentlemen."

Once the D.A. had gone, the Captain's composure gave way. At first, he cracked a smile. But once the dam was breached, there was no stopping the flood. A torrent of laughter erupted from all three of them.

As they got themselves back under control, the Captain said, "Asper, I'm glad you're on our team. Lord knows, if you'd decided to be a criminal mastermind instead of a cop, I don't think anybody could stop you."

Asper grinned. "That would be a problem. If I did, then I'd have to stop me. And I'm not sure how well that would work out. It would be the perfect crime, after all."