"I have photographs of her doing it. Dozens. Because I started documenting it, months ago, when I realized what was going on." She turned the phone around and held it out to Reyes, and Reyes took it. "Just swipe. You'll see."
Reyes swiped. I watched her face. She had a good face for it, a professional blank. Swipe. Swipe. Swipe.
"Ms. Haskett," she said, without looking up, "you want to respond?"
"Yes," I said. "Can I start with yesterday morning?"
"Go ahead."
I opened my laptop on the coffee table and turned it toward her. "I'm a volunteer observer for the Ohio Seasons Project, which is run by the extension office at the state university. I photograph seven trees and shrubs at fixed points twice a week, at seven in the morning, and upload them to the university's server. This is the server's public page for my observation site." I clicked. "Every image has the date and time it was taken, the GPS coordinates, and the compass bearing the camera was facing. And then here — this column — is the time the university's server received it. I can't change that. Nobody in this room can change that."
Reyes leaned in. Mulcahy came over and leaned in too, his hands on his knees.
"Yesterday, Wednesday the eighth," I said. "Point five. The spicebush, behind my back fence on the greenway. Taken at 7:14 a.m. Bearing 340 degrees. That's north-northwest. Toward the retention pond." I clicked the image open. Yellow spicebush, red berries, frost on the grass, the gray water of the pond beyond, the line of woods. "Mrs. Whitcombe's house is to the south-southeast of that point. About one hundred and twenty degrees away from where my camera was pointing. Here's the backup frame at 7:15. Same bearing. Uploaded to the university at 7:58."
"You could have taken others," Karen said. "You could have taken others and not uploaded them."
"I could have," I said. "That's why I'm glad you took pictures of me." I looked at Reyes. "Officer, in the pictures on her phone. The ones from yesterday morning. Which way am I facing?"
Reyes swiped back. She was quiet for a moment. Then she turned the phone so Mulcahy could see.