CHAPTER 14: A Few Thoughts From Amateur Sleuth and Gun Shop Owner Tai Randolph

Look, if there's one thing I've discovered, it's that anybody can kill. We're all just dogs one meal away from turning into wolves. Of course, some people start out wolves. And maybe that's what we're looking at with our pool of suspects – a pack of ravening, bloodthirsty predators.

But . . . I doubt it. This bunch is strictly amateur hour.

In my experience, motive is the least important of the means/motive/opportunity triple threat. Motives rise and fall like the tide. And – as Seamus McCree has pointed out – all four of these suspects have good ones. Well, not good ones especially. Not the kind that reasonable people like you or I would consider good, but good enough for people like Fran and Ray Vuss and Helen and Payton.

This is the part where Trey would explain that a simple graph – or perhaps a nice series of cluster maps – would illuminate the mystery. He's probably right (he usually is). Trey and I have different ways of doing things, true enough, but there's one thing we can agree on – in most killings, it's not a matter of figuring out who could have done it; it's all about finding out who couldn't.

That's what I told Detective Ective. And that's what I'll tell you. And now if y'all will excuse me, I have to get back to the shop. There's a shipment of circa-1865 undergarments I have to sort through.

Go to FINAL CHAPTER!