“I know who he is,” he snapped.

“Have you talked to him already?” she asked.

“He wasn’t home when I called,” Malloy said sourly.

“That’s good. You probably needed to know this information before you question him.”

“What information?”

“That Emilia was thinking about showing Ugo how beautiful she looked,” Sarah said, amazed he couldn’t figure that out. “It’s a normal, feminine reaction. She’s feeling confident and irresistible, so she seeks out the man who rejected her.”

“Why? So he’ll take her back and beat her up again?”

He really was in a bad mood. She couldn’t help wondering how much of it was due to Richard Dennis. “I’m sure she wasn’t thinking about him beating her up. She was probably thinking about him falling in love with her and wanting her back. Then she could reject him and have her revenge.”

“Italians get real excited over revenge,” he observed, taking a sip of his coffee.

“I don’t think you’re taking this seriously, Malloy.”

“Okay, let’s think about this seriously,” he suggested. “The girl gets all dressed up, looks in the mirror, and decides she wants her old lover to see her and regret throwing her out. Even though she hasn’t seen him in months, she goes straight down to City Hall Park, where she meets up with him. They have a fight, he pulls out a stiletto and shoves it in her neck. Then he walks away. Is that about how you figured it happened?”

When he said it like that, it didn’t sound very convincing, but Sarah wasn’t going to give in without a fight. “I hadn’t thought about it. Maybe she’d seen him around before that day. Or maybe someone had told her he’d be in the park that morning. She’d probably known about the clothes since Sunday, when I dropped them off. Why did she wait to go out looking for work? Maybe she’d arranged to meet him that morning and only told Mrs. Wells she’d be looking for work so she wouldn’t get suspicious.”