“And now she’s dead?” he asked when I’d finished.

“Yeah.”

“Probably not a coincidence.”

“No.”

Out on the water, a couple of surfers were trying to make the small waves last a bit longer, bouncing and pivoting against the white water.

“How long have we been friends?” Carter asked. “A long time.”

“There’s not much I’ve ever not told you,” he said. “There’ve been some things you didn’t want to know, but other than that, I think you know more about me than any other person on the planet.”

I knew where he was heading, and I couldn’t hide from it.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Carter asked.

“I don’t know. I didn’t know how to explain it, I guess.”

“It doesn’t matter to me, Noah. Shit like that won’t ever matter to me.”

The fact that he knew exactly why I hadn’t told him made me feel worse.

“I know,” I said. “It just caught me off guard, and I didn’t know how to handle it.”

He nodded slowly. “I could’ve gone with you or something. So you didn’t have to do it alone.”

“I needed to do it alone.”

“Sure. Okay. But you still could’ve told me. Man, I knew something was off with you.”

There weren’t many people in my life who mattered enough to me to make me apologize for much. But Carter was one of them. “I should’ve told you. I’m sorry. I just wasn’t ready to tell anyone.” “You tell Liz?” he asked, glancing at me.

I didn’t say anything, wishing I could get the right thing to come out of my mouth.

“Figured,” he said, looking away.

The surfers who had been in the water were out of the ocean now, walking up the beach, the end of the day.

Carter stood, pulled his bike off the pavement, and swung a leg over the seat. “I wouldn’t have kept something like that from you, Noah. For any reason. There’s no one else I’d trust with that kind of thing.” He paused, lifting one of his massive feetonto the pedals. “We’ve never judged each other, dude. You really think I was gonna start now? Because some guy shares your DNA?” He shook his head, then shrugged. “If you want my help, let me know.”

He pedaled off.

SEVENTEEN

I hung out on the boardwalk for an hour, moping and worrying. I watched cops go in and out of my place. Occasionally, one of them would glance in my direction and give me a hard look, a silent warning that he knew what I’d done to Zanella.

I tried to look scared.

Klimes came out when they appeared to be shutting down for the night.

“Gonna have to keep you out tonight,” he said, huffing and puffing. “Should be able to let you back in tomorrow, though.” “Can I get my hands on my laptop?”

“No can do. Still gotta dust it, and the tech boys will probably have a peek at the hard drive.” “You already cleared me.”

“Not about you. Whoever offed the girl might’ve used the computer.

“Think they checked their email before shooting her?” “Or did some shopping on eBay. Who knows?” “Come on.”

He grinned. “I’m a thorough son of a bitch, Noah.”

I didn’t like it, but Klimes was being a good cop.

He asked, “What do you need it for?”

“Just wanted to run a name.”

He motioned to the alley. “Come on.”

I followed him to a brown Crown Victoria. He opened the passenger door and waved me in. He went around to the driver’s side.

He squeezed in behind the wheel and pointed to the laptop mounted on the dash. “That work for you?”

I shrugged. “I guess.”

“What are you looking for?”

“Guy named Landon Keene. Can you look him up on Google?”

“Don’t talk dirty to me,” he said, smiling and navigating on the computer. He hit a few buttons, then shifted the screen in my direction. “There you go.”

Two items popped up under the name. One was a high school football roster in Florida, listing Landon Keene as a sophomore lineman. The other had Landon Keene as a hairstylist in Alabama. I guessed that neither of those two was the Landon Keene who Russell Simington had told me about.

I swiveled the screen back to Klimes. “Thanks.”

“Anything you wanna tell me about?”

“No,” I said, not wanting to get into it. “Another thing I’m working on.”

Klimes pursed his lips. “Alright. Ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“This girl. Gill. Was she tough?”

I thought of her approaching me in the water and tailing me up the beach. “Seemed like it.”

He thought about that, focusing on something over my shoulder.

“What?” I asked.

“ME didn’t see any sign of a struggle,” he said. “You think she got surprised?”

He rubbed a hand over his sweaty face. “That or she knew the cocksucker who shot her. Waits for her to turn around in conversation, then whammo. Maybe knocks her out, then does her with the gun.”

“Somebody went to a lot of trouble, then,” I said. “Killing her like that and taking the time to bring her to my house.”

“Yep.” Klimes shifted in the seat, the vinyl screaming beneath him. “You were the only reason she came down here?”

“Far as I know. That’s what her paralegal said, too.”

“Mind another question?”

I shook my head.

“You think you’re gonna get your … this Simington off the row?”

I appreciated him not referring to him as my father, but it didn’t change anything.

“No. I think Darcy thought she could, though.”

“Doubtful,” he said, shaking his head. “Just doesn’t happen. So I’m glad you don’t have any wild ideas.” He looked at me. “And I hope that means you’ll stay out of the way.”

“She’s in my house, Klimes.”

“We’ll get her out,” he said, grinning. “I promise. But after that, I hope you’ll let us do what we are paid so shittily to do.” I laughed. “I’ll try.”

“Good,” he said, then waved me out of the car. “Zanella’s gonna be here any second. Scoot.”

I got out and shut the door.

The window slid down, and Klimes leaned over, his rotund face looking up at me. “You owe me.” “How do you figure?”

He held up three fingers. “I let you use the computer, I gave you the ‘she didn’t struggle’ info, and I flattened you before Zanella could take your head off.”

“Woulda been hard for him to take my head off while he was sitting on his ass.”

He waggled a thick finger in front of me. “Whatever, son. You owe me. That Keene name rings a bell, I expect you to ring mine.”

Klimes was sharp. He hadn’t taken my bluff. I liked him. I didn’t want to lie to him.

“Deal,” I said, doing it anyway.

EIGHTEEN

The lights on the Coronado Bridge shone brightly in the early evening. The long gone sun had forgotten to take the heat of the day with it, and the wind blowing in my window as I crossed over to the island felt like an industrial-strength hair dryer.

Liz’s house was perched on a nice little curve of street that fronted San Diego Bay. She was on the rooftop deck when I pulled up, and she waved me in the front door.

She was sitting in a beach chair, facing the lit-up buildings across the water. Her long, tan legs were stretched out in front of her, and she wore an old Chargers T-shirt and blue running shorts. She motioned with her beer to the small fridge on the corner of the deck.

“I splurged for you,” she said.

I opened the fridge and found a bunch of Red Trolley bottles. I grabbed one and sat down in the empty chair next to her. “Thanks.”

We sat in the dark for a while, drinking but not talking.

When it came to our relationship, Liz being a cop had a lot of drawbacks. But one of the things I appreciated most was that she understood silence was a necessary thing. It didn’t mean anything was wrong or one of us was mad. It was just a way to decompress. Most people didn’t understand that.

“Was it odd?” she asked as I grabbed us a couple of new beers.

I knew she was talking about Simington.

“Yes and no,” I said. “In a lot of ways, it was like going to see someone I didn’t know. Someone who wanted to hire me or something. Detached.”