“Well… more like a trick. You ever see a magician put someone in a closet and make them disappear?”

Tamara nodded. “On a cartoon.”

“That’s what you have to do. You have to imagine all your itchiness going in a closet and you pushhh the door cloooosed.” She pushed with her hands, demonstrating. “Then your itch is trapped in the closet and not on you anymore. A girl smart enough to spell ‘shot’ should be able to trick the itch into the closet.”

“I’ll try.”

“You might have to try a few times. The itch won’t want to go in the closet. You have to concentrate.” She sounded as if she spoke from experience. “And keep your fingers out of your eyes. That’s important, too.”

“Thank you,” the mother said when Alex stood up.

“It was nothing. She’s a smart girl.” But she’d eased the mother’s mind, and Daniel thought that was a great deal more than nothing. Plus, in helping the woman she’d put her own fear aside. “Sister, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Sister Anne nodded. “I’ll be here. I’m always here.”

Dutton, Monday, January 29, 10:00 p.m.

The carousel horses were beautiful in the moonlight. He’d always enjoyed this park as a child. But he was no longer a child and the innocence of the park now mocked him as he sat on the bench, reeling from the twisted direction his life had taken.

The bench on which he sat jiggled, then settled with the weight of another. “You’re a fool,” he whispered, keeping his eyes fixed on the carousel horses. “It was one thing to call me this morning, but meeting here like this. If somebody sees us…”

“Dammit.” It was a frightened hiss. “I got a key.”

He sat up straighter. “A real one?”

“No. A drawing. But it looks like it could match.”

It did. He’d laid his key on the drawing. It matched perfectly. “So someone knows.”

“We’ll be ruined.” His whisper was shrill. “We’ll go to prison. I can’t go to prison.”

Like any of them could? I’ll die first. But he injected calm certainty into his voice. “Nobody’s going to prison. We’ll be fine. He probably just wants money.”

“We need to talk to the others. Come up with a plan.”

“No. Say nothing to the others. Keep your head down and your mouth shut and we’ll get through this.” Talking was unhealthy. One of them had talked and that one had been stopped. Permanently. It could and would be done again. “For now, stay calm, stay quiet, and stay away from me. If you freak out, we’re all dead.”

Chapter Six

Atlanta , Monday, January 29, 10:15 p.m.

Vartanian brought his car to a stop in his driveway. “Are you all right?” His voice was deep and calm in the darkness of his car. “You’ve been very quiet.”

She had, in fact, been silent as she struggled to process all the thoughts and fears that warred in her mind. “I’m fine. I’ve just been thinking.” She remembered her manners. “Thank you for going with me tonight,” she said. “You’ve been very kind.”

His jaw was tight as he came around to open her door. She followed him up to his house and waited while he disarmed the alarm. “Come in. I’ll get your jacket.”

“And my satchel.”

His smile was grim. “I didn’t think you’d forgotten about it.”

Riley sat up, yawning again. He padded across the room and plopped down at Alex’s feet. Vartanian’s lips twitched. “And you’re not even a pork chop,” he murmured.

Alex bent over to scratch Riley’s ears. “Did you say ‘pork chop’?”

“It’s a private joke, mine and Riley’s. I’ll get your coat.” He sighed. “And satchel.”

Alex watched him go, shaking her head. Men were not creatures she’d ever fully understood. Not that she’d had much practice. Richard had been her first, if she didn’t count Wade, which she never did. So that would be… one. And wasn’t Richard a sterling example of her finesse with members of the opposite sex? That would be… no.

Thoughts of Richard always depressed her. She’d failed at their marriage. She’d never been able to be what he needed or the kind of wife she’d wanted to be.

But she wouldn’t fail Hope. If nothing else, Bailey’s child would have a good life, with or without Bailey. Now both depressed and terrified, she looked around Vartanian’s living room for a distraction and found it in the painting over his bar. It made her smile.

“What?” he asked, holding her jacket draped over one arm like a maître d’.

“Your painting.”

He grinned, making him look younger. “Hey, Dogs Playing Poker is a classic.”

“I don’t know. Somehow I took you for a man with more sophisticated taste in art.”

His grin dimmed. “I don’t take art too seriously.”

“Because of Simon,” she said quietly. Vartanian’s brother had been a painter.

What was left of his grin disappeared, leaving him sober and haunted. “You know.”

“I read the articles online.” She’d read about the people Simon had killed, including Daniel’s parents. She’d read how Daniel assisted in Simon’s capture and death.

I’ll see you in hell, Simon. She needed to tell him. “Agent Vartanian, I have information you need to know. When I left the morgue today, I drove to Bailey’s house. While I was there I met a man. A reverend. And a soldier, too, I guess.”

He sat on a bar stool, dropping her jacket and satchel to the bar and focusing his piercing blue eyes on her face. “A reverend and a soldier came to Bailey’s house?”

“No. The reverend was a soldier, an army chaplain. Bailey had an older brother. His name was Wade. He died a month ago in Iraq.”

“I’m sorry.”

She frowned. “I’m not sure I am. I guess you think that’s pretty rotten of me.”

Something moved in his eyes. “No. I don’t, actually. What did the chaplain say?”

“Reverend Beardsley was with Wade when he died. He heard Wade’s last confession and wrote three letters Wade dictated, to me, his father, and Bailey. Beardsley mailed Bailey’s and her father’s to the old house where Bailey’s still living. He didn’t mail mine because he didn’t have my address, so he gave it to me today.”

“Bailey would have received the letters a few weeks ago. The timing is interesting.”

“I told Beardsley that Bailey was missing, but he wouldn’t divulge what Wade had said in his last confession. I begged him for anything that could help me find Bailey, anything that wasn’t privileged. Before he died, Wade said, ‘I’ll see you in hell, Simon.’ ”

She blew out a breath and watched as Vartanian paled. “Wade knew Simon?”

“Apparently so. Just like you know something you haven’t told me, Agent Vartanian. I can see it in your face. And I want to know what it is.”

“I killed my brother a week ago. If nothing showed on my face, I wouldn’t be human.”

Alex frowned. “You didn’t kill him. The article said that other detective did.”

His eyes flickered. “We both fired. The other guy just got lucky.”

“So you’re not going to tell me.”

“There’s nothing to tell. Why are you so sure I know something?”

Alex narrowed her eyes. “Because you’ve been way too nice to me.”

“And a man always has an ulterior motive.” He said it darkly.

She shrugged out of his letter jacket. “In my experience, yes.”

He slid off the stool and stood toe-to-toe with her, forcing her to look way up. “I’ve been nice to you because I thought you needed a friend.”

She rolled her eyes. “Right. I must have ‘stupid’ tattooed on my forehead.”

His blue eyes flashed. “Fine. I was nice to you because I think you’re right-Bailey’s disappearance is connected to that woman we found yesterday and I’m ashamed at how the Dutton sheriff, who I thought was my friend, hasn’t lifted a goddamn finger to help either of us. That’s the truth, Alex, whether you can accept it or not.”

You can’t take the truth. As it had that morning, the taunt sprang from nowhere and Alex closed her eyes, quelling the panic. She opened her eyes to find him still staring, every bit as intently as before. “All right,” she murmured. “That I can believe.”