Adam Yates read over her shoulder. It all seemed pretty normal.

"You see anything?" she asked.

"No."

"Me neither."

"This could be a dead end."

"Probably is."

Another sheet came in. They both started reading it.

Yates pointed midway down the right-hand column. "What's this over here?"

There was check mark in the middle of the body description.

Loren read it out loud: "No ovaries, testes hidden, probable AIS."

"AIS?"

"It stands for Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome," Loren said. "I had a friend in college who had it."

"What's the relevance of that?" Yates asked.

"I'm not sure. AIS women look and feel like typical females and for all practical purposes, they're considered female. They can legally marry and adopt." She stopped, tried to think it through.

"But?"

"But in short it means that Candace Potter was genetically male. She had testes and XY chromosomes."

He made a face. "You mean she was, what, a transsexual?"

"No."

"Then, what, she was a guy?"

"Genetically, yes. But probably not in any other way. Oftentimes an AIS woman doesn't know she's any different until she reaches puberty and doesn't menstruate. It's not that uncommon. There was a Miss Teen USA a few years back who was AIS. Many believe Queen Elizabeth I and Joan of Arc and a slew of supermodels and actresses have it, but that's really nothing more than speculation. Either way you can lead a perfectly normal life. In fact, if Candace Potter was a prostitute, perverse as this sounds, it may even have benefited her."

"Benefited her how?"

Loren looked up at him. "Women with AIS can't get pregnant."

Chapter 46

MATT DROVE AWAY. Sonya McGrath headed back inside. Their relationship, if there had ever been one, was over. It felt odd and yet, despite the honesty and raw emotion, anything built on such misery was bound to cave. It was all too fragile. They were simply two people needing something that neither could ever get.

He wondered if Sonya would call the police. He wondered if it mattered.

God, he'd been stupid to come here.

He was hurting badly. He needed to rest. But there was no time. He'd have to push through. He checked the gas gauge. It was near empty. He stopped at a nearby Shell station and used the rest of his money to fill the tank.

During his ride, he thought about the bombshell Olivia had just dropped on him. At the end of the day, as weird or naïve as this might sound, he wondered what it really changed. He still loved Olivia. He loved the way she frowned when she checked herself in the mirror, that little smile she made when she was thinking of something funny, the way she rolled her eyes when he made a clumsy double entendre, the way she tucked her feet under when she read, the way she took deep, almost cartoon breaths when she was irritated, the way her eyes welled up with tears when they made love, the way his heart pumped a little faster when she laughed, the way he'd catch her studying him when she thought he wouldn't notice, the soft way her eyes closed when she listened to a favorite song on the radio, the way her hand would just take his at any time without hesitation or embarrassment, the way her skin felt, the charge at her touch, the way she'd drape a leg over him on the lazy mornings, the way her chest felt pressed against his back when they slept, the way when she slipped out of bed in the early morning she'd kiss his cheek and make sure the blankets still covered him.

What about any of that was different now?

The truth was not always freeing. Your past was your past. He had not, for example, told her about his stint in prison to illuminate the "real Matt" or "take their relationship to the next level"- he told her because she would undoubtedly find out anyway. It didn't mean a thing. If he hadn't told her, wouldn't their relationship be equally strong?

Or was this all a giant rationalization?

He stopped at an ATM near Sonya's house. He had no choice now. He needed money. If she called the police, well, they'd know he'd been in this area anyway. If they traced it down, he'd be long gone by the time they arrived. He didn't want to use the credit card at a gas station. They might get his license plate number that way. As it was, if he could get the money and put distance between himself and this ATM, he figured that he'd be all right.

The ATM had a max of a thousand dollars. He took it.

Then he started thinking of a way to get to Reno.

Loren drove. Adam Yates sat in the passenger seat.

"Explain this to me again," he said.

"I have a source. A man named Len Friedman. A year ago we found two dead women in a hooker alley, both young, both black, both had their hands cut off so that we couldn't get an ID off fingerprints. But one of the girls had a strange tattoo, a logo from Princeton University, on her inner thigh."

"Princeton?"

"Yes."

He shook his head.

"Anyway, we put that in the papers. The only person who came forward was this Len Friedman. He asked if she also had a rose petal tattoo on her right foot. That hadn't been released. So our interest, to put it mildly, was piqued."

"You figured he was the perp."

"Sure, why not? But it turns out that both women were strippers- or as Friedman calls them, erotic dancers- at a dump called the Honey Bunny in Newark. Friedman is an expert on all things stripper. It's his hobby. He collects posters, bios, personal information, real names, tattoos, birthmarks, scars, I mean everything. A full database. And not just on the local trade. I assume you've walked the Vegas Strip?"

"Sure."

"You know how they pass out cards advertising strippers and prostitutes and whatever."

"Hey, I live there, remember?"

She nodded. "Well, Len Friedman collects them. Like baseball cards. He gathers information on them. He travels for weeks at a time visiting these places. He writes what some consider academic essays on the subject. He also collects historical material. He has a brassiere belonging to Gypsy Rose Lee. He has stuff that dates back more than a century."

Yates made a face. "He must be a lot of fun at parties."

Loren smiled. "You have no idea."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You'll see."

They fell into silence.

Yates said, "I'm really sorry again. About what I said before."

She waved him off. "How many kids do you have anyway?"

"Three."

"Boys, girls?"

"Two girls, one boy."

"Ages?"

"My daughters are seventeen and sixteen. Sam is fourteen."

"Seventeen- and sixteen-year-old girls," Loren said. "Yikes."

Yates smiled. "You have no idea."

"You have pictures?"

"I never carry pictures."

"Oh?"

Yates shifted in his seat. Loren glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. His posture was suddenly rigid. "About six years ago," he began, "I had my wallet stolen. I know, I'm head of an FBI field office and I'm dumb enough to get pickpocketed. Sue me. Anyway, I went nuts. Not because of the money or the credit cards. But all I kept thinking about was, some slimeball has pictures of my kids. My kids. He probably just took the cash and dumped the wallet in the garbage. But suppose he didn't. Suppose he kept the pictures. You know, for his own amusement. Maybe he, I don't know, stared at the pictures longingly. Maybe he even put his fingers on their faces, caressed them."

Loren frowned. "Talk about being a lot of fun at parties."

Yates chuckled without humor. "Anyway, that's why I never carry pictures."

They turned off of Northfield Avenue in West Orange. It was a nicely aging town. Most of the newer burbs had landscapes that looked somehow phony, like a recent hair transplant. West Orange had lush lawns and ivy on the walls. The trees were tall and thick. The houses were not cookie-cutter- there were Tudors, next to capes, next to Mediterranean style. They were all a little past due, not in prime condition, but it all seemed to work.