Page 32 of Thin Ice

"None taken."

She set the old cylinder on a towel and turned it under the hall light, and something in her face shifted from bored to mildly interested.

"Whoever you had in here before was good," she said.

"How do you mean?"

"Pins are clean." She tipped it toward me like I'd know what I was looking at. "No scoring or scratches on the plug. It wasn't forced. This lock was opened, not beaten." She shrugged and set it down. "Either somebody had a key, or somebody who knew what they were doing took thirty seconds with a pick and didn't leave a mark."

For Dee, it was a comment about the ordinary world. For Elias, it was evidence.

"So a new lock fixes it?" I asked.

"Fixes it for now." She fitted the new cylinder and started setting it. "But as soon as you go handing out keys again…"

"Understood."

"Bolt's in. I'll do the back."

She gathered her roll and walked through the condo directly to the back door. That put her out of range of hearing voices in the kitchen, so Elias placed his call to Seattle.

"Okay," Michael said. "Everybody with a key, a code, or a habit of being inside that unit. Walk me through it, and don't clean it up. The list is only useful if it's ugly."

It wasn't as ugly as he wanted it to be.

"Cleaning service, twice a week. Tuesdays and Fridays, while I'm at the rink. They have a key and the alarm code."

"Company or individuals?"

"Company. The crew rotates. I know the regulars, Rosa and a guy named Vic."

"Meal service?"

"Drop-off three times a week. They don't come in. Cooler goes to the package room downstairs."

"Massage therapist. Your file says home visits."

"She's here every week during the season, but I let her in."

The building's office had keys. Michael read my list back in his flat, keyboard-clatter voice. There were nine people.

"That's it?" Michael asked.

"One more," I said. "There's a friend. She watered my plants during a road trip my first year here, and I never took the key back."

"Name?"

Dee's drill whined in the distance.

"She's not part of this."

"Nolan," Michael's voice stayed level. "Right now nobody's part of anything. I use this list to clear people, not accuse them."

"Hannah Kessler," I said. "Internal medicine at Barnes-Jewish. Clear her first. She's the one name on that list I'll vouch for."

"Noted twice," Michael said. "For what it's worth, the vouching tells me more than having the key does."

Elias had drifted into the living room while we talked. By the time Michael finished the list, he had returned.