Page 112 of Forever Dead

“And an answer about why he was so interested in Eleanor's house.”

“That, too.”

Selena studied Curtis's photograph. “Troubling history with Eleanor. Restraining orders, violence, threats. He returned to the county six weeks ago.”

“And he told me he was home alone the night Eleanor was murdered,” Connor said.

“Then there's Patricia.”

Connor turned toward her photograph.

“She worked agency shifts at the psychiatric facility while Curtis was there,” Selena continued. “We need to know whether she treated him or had any other contact with him.”

“I'll have Cheryl follow up with the facility and Patricia's nursing agency.”

“There's his slaughterhouse work, too,” Selena said. “You said he worked on the kill floor?”

“Skinning and breaking down carcasses. Got fired for being unnecessarily inhumane.”

Selena considered the note about the black fragments.

“We originally thought that material might be treated animal hide. Curtis knows how to handle animal tissue.”

“Doesn't mean he'd know how to make whatever Foss thinks we're dealing with.”

“No. But it's something we need to investigate.”

Connor opened the file.

“There's another development. Cheryl took a call from a woman named Ginnie Williams this afternoon. She says Curtis was with her on the night Eleanor was killed.”

Selena turned toward him. “Then why did he tell you he was alone?”

“Ginnie's married. She says neither of them wanted her name coming up in a murder investigation.”

“Has anyone checked her account?”

“Not yet. We need her exact timeline and something independent to back it up.”

Selena considered that.

“Even if she's telling the truth, it only accounts for the night Eleanor died.”

“I know.”

“We still need Curtis's movements on the night Patricia was killed. And we need to find out whether they knew each other.”

Connor pinned the note beneath Curtis's photograph.

“I'll have him brought back in for another interview once we've checked what Ginnie told us.”

Selena nodded.

Curtis had given them a denial and an account of his past. Neither was a substitute for establishing where he had actually been.

Selena pointed at Ray Cutler's photograph.

“And then Ray.”