“The gray suit I found at Goodwill. Only cost me ten dollars.”

“You’re going to work?”

“Yes. Then I have class. Scott will have to cook dinner, and he hates that. But it’s okay. Abby says everyone has to pitch in sometimes.”

Kate leaned forward. “And what’s Abby wearing?”

Emma laughed. “That funny-colored uniform.”

I saw Kate’s shoulders relax and she almost smiled. “What else does she have on?”

“The black shoes with the thick soles. She says she’s on her feet all day. I’m lucky I don’t have to be someone’s maid.”

“She’s a maid?”

“You can tell she works really hard. Her hands are always chapped, and she looks tired, even though she’s young.”

“What else do you know about her?” Kate asked.

“She smokes, but when I sit next to her she always puts her cigarette out right away. I never ask her to. She just does. She cares about other people.”

“What color is the uniform again?”

“Turquoise. White collar. The letters on her pocket are white, too.”

“Are you close enough to see what the letters say?” Kate’s tone was even, her voice soft and soothing.

I wanted to get up, shake Emma and tell her to spit it out. This whole deal was like sucking peanut butter through a straw. But I had to give my sister props. I could never do this job.

Emma went into another long, agonizing silence before she said, “I need to get a little closer.”

“However long it takes is fine,” Kate said.

I wanted to scream, “No it’s not fine!” but I remained silent, sitting on my hands to keep them still.

At last Emma said, “Purity Maids. Those are the words embroidered on the pocket.”

I must have sighed audibly, because Kate held up her hand and gave me a look that would freeze a jaguar. I mouthed, Sorry.

Coming out of the trance was almost as slow a process as it took to get her to that pocket embroidery. Kate brought Emma back above the bus stop and allowed her all the time she wanted to return to reality. Even when she opened her eyes, she still seemed to be somewhere else.

“Turn the light back on, would you, Abby?” Kate said.

I pressed the switch at the base.

Kate said, “How are you feeling?”

“I could live in this chair.” Emma was smiling, her face content in the lamplight.

“I plan on having one like it for my new house,” Kate said.

Emma quit rocking, sat upright. “How could I have forgotten? The owner took your offer. You got the house, Kate.”

Kate grinned. “That’s great. When can I move in?” “Pending inspections and title searches, I’d say a couple weeks. Cash transactions really speed things up.”

“I think we’ve both had a good day-and Abby, too, right?” Kate looked at me.

“Yes. Do you remember what just happened, Emma?”

“Remember you in a maid uniform? I don’t think that’s an image I’ll ever forget.” She laughed. “But why didn’t I see the woman’s face, Kate?”

“The human mind will always seek to protect the psyche from harm-sometimes even in unhealthy ways-but that’s a whole other lecture.” Kate smiled. “By putting Abby’s face on this person, you felt safe enough to get close and to stay long enough in the trance to find what we needed.”

“I did it right?”

“There is no right or wrong in my office, Emma. There’s only your reality.”

Emma nodded, understanding. “Without the two of you, I-I don’t know where I’d be right now. Probably locked in a rubber room.”

“I doubt that,” I said. “Our daddy would have said you’ve got grit.”

“I have a feeling I would have liked your father,” Emma said. And then a sadness filled her eyes despite her smile.

I guessed any father at all for her would have been a bonus.

Once Emma left the office and I thanked Kate for her help, she immediately went into session with another client. I called DeShay after I emerged from the parking garage and told him we got the maid service name. He said he was glad to hear that, since they got nothing from the pimp except what a neat freak Fiona Mancuso had been and that he considered her stupid. All his girls had been stupid.

“I’m glad I wasn’t there,” I said. “You know how I shoot from the lip.”

“I’m certain you two wouldn’t have gotten along. Tell me the name.”

“Purity Maids.” I maneuvered around what had become standard fixtures on Houston city streets-orange construction cones.

“You can bet Fiona picked out a new name when she went straight. Can you work the maid angle? Try to find her?”

“Because you don’t want to scare her off?” I asked.

“Right. If you can get to her without telling anyone who you are, that would be great. We’ve already got one of Christine O’Meara’s friends in the morgue.”

“Don’t remind me,” I said.

“Quit with the guilt. You didn’t cut that guy.”

“That’s what Jeff said,” I answered.

“You probably won’t be able to reach me for a while,” he said. “We just got called out to a murder-suicide. I hate fucking Mondays. I’ve learned people are damn selfish. ‘I don’t want to go to work or pay my bills or make up with my wife, so I’ll kill myself-and maybe take someone with me so I won’t get lonely in hell.’ ”

“DeShay, come on,” I said.

“I know, I know. But suicide scenes are the worst. Usually messy, and then you got the crying relatives. Why do suicides have about ten times more relatives than other victims? That’s what I want to know.”

“Maybe that’s the reason for the suicide,” I said. “Too many relatives.”

“Yeah. There you go.” He laughed. “I gotta run. Keep in touch.” He hung up.

Ever alert for a tail, I’d driven home wishing there weren’t so many damn Ford Focuses on the road.

I sat back in my desk chair a half hour later, stroking Diva and wondering how to learn whether Fiona Mancuso still worked for Purity Maids. Seemed a safe bet, since Emma had talked to her two weeks ago. But I needed to be sure. A simple check of the yellow pages showed an ad that proclaimed Purity had been in business since I was three years old. They must be doing something right. But what if the recent publicity concerning the reality show that had come to town, not to mention the murder of her old bar buddy Jerry Joe Billings, had sent the woman running scared? If so, all I could do was try to pick up her trail.

Like DeShay said, Mancuso probably used an alias to get hired and had a fake or new social security number attached to that alias. Reputable housecleaning agencies required their employees to be bonded, and a rap sheet in your background showing multiple arrests for solicitation wouldn’t get you a job with an agency like Purity. I wouldn’t be asking about Fiona Mancuso, but rather a woman who had a very distinctive and visible tattoo.

How should I approach this? I couldn’t call up and say I was a PI. The agency would get their back up, want to know if there was a problem. I decided I’d be a customer. Since someone cleaned my place every couple weeks, I knew the drill. When I called, they’d send someone out to evaluate my house, determine exactly what I wanted done, how often and at what charge. Which would take about a week. We couldn’t afford to waste time. I needed to be a customer in a desperate hurry for a housecleaning-definitely not a stretch for me.

I dialed the Purity number, hoping I could convince them I needed help right now.

“Purity Maids, this is Randy. How may I help you?” the man answered.

“My name is Abby Rose, and your agency was recommended to me. I understand you do good work, and I’d like to get my house cleaned as soon as possible.”

“Thank you for calling, Ms. Rose. As the manager, I’m authorized to give a free cleaning to the customer who recommended us. Was it a friend or relative?”

Uh-oh. Think fast, Abby. “Um, actually, neither. A friend and I were in line at Panera Bread and I was talking about how I didn’t like my current maid service. This lady behind us mentioned Purity.”