“Be safe,” I call after her.

“You, too.”

The silence following her departure lasts a half minute before Tommy creaks down the side stairs, poking his head through the open garage door. Seeing the coast is clear, he bounds forward with a look of relief.

“Hey, it’s supposed to make landfall sometime tonight,” he says. “Got any big plans?”

“I’ve got to work.” The instructions hang limp in my hand. “You don’t happen to know how to run one of these things, do you?”

He hunches over the generator, a gleam in his eye. “Not exactly. But, hey, we can figure it out, right?”

“You figure it out. I’ll be out to check on you in a minute.”

I leave him to it, going back inside to change. The house in Charlotte’s absence takes on a still, empty air, so I shower and dress quickly, wanting to get back to the case quickly. Hedges gave me a week, which isn’t much to begin with, but if the hurricane proves as disastrous as they’re saying on the news, with massive flooding and power outages, then my week could contract into a day. So I’d better make the most of it.

Before heading downstairs, I glance inside Charlotte’s nightstand to see whether she’s taken the pills with her. The bottle rolls against the front of the drawer. I shut it, my idiot grin reflected back from the dresser mirror.

When the phone rings, I answer without checking the caller ID, expecting Charlotte since the image of her in my mind shines so vividly. The voice is male, though, and after a second I recognize it. The youth pastor, Carter Robb, who I haven’t seen since my late-night visit to his apartment, when I commissioned him with the task of finding the Dyers.

“I just thought I should touch base,” he says. “I managed to get a number from somebody at the church, but it doesn’t seem to work anymore. I do have that picture for you, though.”

“Picture?”

“Of Hannah and Evey Dyer.”

I clear my throat before speaking. “Mr. Robb, I’ve been reassigned.

I’m not working with the task force anymore.”

“Oh.”

“Have you tried calling Detective Cavallo?”

He sighs. “I have, actually. Donna asked me to, trying to get an update. She feels like, with some of the things she said on the news, there might be some bad feelings. I’ve left Detective Cavallo a couple of messages, but I was hoping – ”

“She’s got her hands full,” I say. “But I’m sure she’ll get back to you as soon as she can. And that’s nonsense about bad feelings. The lady’s daughter is missing. She can say whatever she wants.” I want to get rid of this guy, but I feel like I owe him more than a casual brush-off. “Look, what’s the best way to get in touch with you? I can make a couple of calls and let you know what I find out.”

“That would be great,” he says, giving me his mobile number as well as the number of what he calls a community outreach center. “It’s one of the places the youth group did some volunteering. A friend of mine from seminary runs it, and with the storm coming he needs some help down there getting everything secure. I’m planning to spend the night.”

“Where is this place?” I ask.

He gives an address in Montrose, just a few blocks away from the Morgan St. Café. I ask if he’s ever been to the café before, but he’s never even heard of it. It’s a small world, but not that small.

“If I find out anything, I’ll give you a call.”

“Even if you don’t,” he says. “I’d appreciate hearing something, even if it’s nothing.”

When I return to the garage, the generator is already running while Tommy stares long and hard at the electrical box, trying to figure out exactly how to achieve a link-up. Maybe he’ll electrocute himself, I think, which would solve my tenant problem. Then again, he might burn the house down, which is more solution than I’m really looking for.

“Everything all right?”

“Leave it with me,” he says. “I’ll have it going in no time.”

I study him a moment, trying to decide if what I’m seeing is confidence or foolhardiness.

“Fine.” I throw my briefcase in the car and start the engine, rolling the window down to impart some final advice. “Tommy, don’t burn the house down.”

“Not a chance.”

“And don’t electrocute yourself, either.”

Gene Fontenot answers my call in mid-apology, like he started even before pushing the talk button. “I been meaning to call you, man, really I have. It’s right here on my list of things to do.” He thumps his finger on what must be the list. “You gotta forgive me for not being quicker on this, but what can I say? We get a little busy around here. You know how it goes – ”

“Gene,” I say, cutting him off. “It’s fine. I’ve been pretty busy myself. But have you managed to track down this Dyer woman and her daughter?”

“About that…” He rustles some papers around. “Here we go. The answer to your question is yes and no. Yes, I found the lady. She got a place over in Kenner, out by the airport. That’s the good news. The bad news is, the daughter Evangeline, she don’t stay there no more. The mother says, once they moved back, the girl, she fell into her old ways. They had a lotta problems, and eventually the girl run away with some boy.”

“She ran away? When was this?”

More rustling, accompanied by some humming. “That woulda been in July sometime?” He turns the sentence up at the end, uncertain. “ ’Bout eight weeks or so ago?”

He gives me the mother’s address and phone number, which I copy into my notebook.

“Thanks, Gene. I owe you one.”

“Take care of yourself with this storm coming in,” he says. “I don’t want you turning up on my doorstep, looking for shelter.”

“This is Texas, Gene. We don’t run.”

He chuckles. “Keep telling yourself that.”

Once I get him off the phone, I give Cavallo a call. She’s surprised to hear that Robb has been leaving messages for her, confessing she’s been too busy to empty her inbox. The weary edge in her voice is enough to convince me. I’m almost reluctant to ask about new developments on the Hannah Mayhew case, but I ask anyway, and she replies with a derisive laugh.

“We were planning a big press conference today, announcing a new reward for any information, but now they’re arguing about whether to reschedule for after the hurricane blows through. People are ‘distracted,’ apparently.”

“What about the actual casework? Anything there?”

“Let me put it this way. All the tips we’ve gotten? We’re getting down to the bottom. Everything’s been followed up. We’ve interviewed over a hundred drivers of white vans like the one in the surveillance footage, even done physical searches of quite a few, and I don’t think we’re any closer to finding Hannah than we were on day one.”

I pass along the news from Gene Fontenot, which seems to irritate her. She makes me repeat everything, then asks for his number so she can call to confirm.

“Don’t worry about Robb,” I tell her. “I’ll call him back.”

“I appreciate that,” she says, her tone communicating the exact opposite. Not that I can hold it against her. She’s on a dead-end assignment, one of those cases destined to be rehashed for years to come on the unsolved-mystery shows, a future footnote for journalists writing about how media coverage negatively impacts major cases. Cavallo has a right to be difficult.

Before calling the youth pastor, I put in an hour at the typewriter before hunting down Wilcox, who’s kept clear of me since his early morning visit to my home. No cubicles for the men and women of Internal Affairs. He has a tiny glass box all to himself, with his name on a plate beside the door. I tap lightly before entering and find him busy typing away, a pair of earphones sealing him off from the outside world. To get his attention, I have to lean across the desk and yank one out.

“What do you want?”

He’s dressed in a glossy blue shirt, his tie knot thick as his throat, with his chalk-striped jacket thrown over the back of his chair. Up close, he even smells nice.