“All of a sudden, I’m really interested in all the other kids. Who’s doing what, who’s holding what, who’s wearing, what, what their hands are doing, what’s in their pockets. It’s like I’m patting them all down from across the street.”

Byrne sipped his coffee, threw a glance at the corner. Still empty.

“So she’s holding her own with these older boys, smiling, yakking away in sign language, flipping her hair,” he continued. “And I’m thinking: Jesus Christ. She’s flirting. My little girl is flirting with these boys. My little girl who, just a few weeks ago, climbed into her Big Wheel and went pedaling down the street wearing her little yellow i had a wild time in wildwood T-shirt is flirting with boys. I wanted to cap the horny little pricks right there.

“And then I watched one of them light a joint, and my fucking heart stops. I actually heard it wind down in my chest like a cheap watch. I’m ready to get out of the car with my cuffs in my hand when I realized what it would to do to Colleen, so I just watch.

“They pass it around, casual, right on the corner, like it’s legal, right? I’m waiting, watching. Then one of the kids offers the joint to Colleen and I knew, I knew she was going to take it and smoke it. I knew she would grab it and take a long, slow hit off this blunt, and I suddenly saw the next five years of her life. Pot and booze and coke and rehab and Sylvan to get her grades back up and more drugs and the pill and then... then the most incredible thing happened.”

Jessica realized she was staring at Byrne, rapt, waiting for him to finish. She snapped out of it, prodded. “Okay. What happened?”

“She just... shook her head,” Byrne said. “Just like that. No thanks.I doubted her at that moment, I completely broke faith with my little girl, and I wanted to tear my eyes out of my head. I was given the opportunity to trust her, completely unobserved, and I failed. I failed. Not her.”

Jessica nodded, trying not to think about the fact that she was going to have to deal with a moment like that with Sophie in about ten years, not looking forward to it at all.

“And it suddenly occurred to me,” Byrne said, “after all these years of worry, all these years of treating her as if she were fragile, all these years of walking on the street side of the sidewalk, all these years of staring down the idiots watching her sign in public and thinking she was a freak, all of it was unnecessary. She’s ten times tougher than I am. She could kick my ass.”

“Kids will surprise you.” Jessica realized how inadequate it sounded when she said it, how completely uninformed she was on this subject.

“I mean, of all the things you fear for your kid: diabetes, leukemia, rheumatoid arthritis, cancer—my little girl was deaf. That’s it. Other than that, she’s perfect in every way. Heart, lungs, eyes, limbs, mind. Perfect. She can run like the wind, jump high.And she has this smile... this smile that could melt the glaciers. All this time I thought she was handicapped because she couldn’t hear. It was me. I’m the one who needs a freakin’ telethon. I didn’t realize how lucky we are.”

Jessica didn’t know what to say. She had mistakenly summed up Kevin Byrne as a streetwise guy who muscled his way through his life and his job, a guy who ran on instinct instead of intellect. There was quite a bit more at work here than she realized. She suddenly felt like she had won the lottery in being partnered with him.

Before Jessica could respond, two teenaged girls approached the corner, umbrellas up and open against the drizzle.

“There they are,” Byrne said.

Jessica capped her coffee, buttoned her raincoat.

“This is more your turf.” Byrne nodded toward the girls, lighting a cigarette, hunkering down in the comfortable—read: dry—seat. “You should handle the questions.”

Right, Jessica thought. I suppose it has nothing to do with standing in the rain at seven o’clock in the morning. She waited for a break in the traffic, got out of the car, crossed the street.

On the corner were two girls in Nazarene school uniforms. One was a tall, dark-skinned black girl with the most elaborate network of cornrowed hair Jessica had ever seen. She was at least six feet tall and stunningly beautiful. The other girl was white, petite, and small-boned. They both carried umbrellas in one hand, wadded-up tissues in the other. Both had red, puffy eyes. Obviously, they had already heard about Tessa.

Jessica approached, showed them her badge, told them she was investigating Tessa’s death. They agreed to talk to her. Their names were Patrice Regan and Ashia Whitman. Ashia was Somali.

“Did you see Tessa at all on Friday?” Jessica asked.

They shook their heads in unison.

“She didn’t come to the bus stop?”

“No,” Patrice said.

“Did she miss a lot of days?”

“Not a lot,” Ashia said between sniffles. “Once in a while.”

“Was she the type to bag school?” Jessica asked.

“Tessa?” Patrice asked, incredulous. “No way. Like, never.”

“What did you think when she didn’t show?”

“We just figured she wasn’t feeling good or something,” Patrice said. “Or it had something to do with her dad. Her dad’s pretty sick, you know. Sometimes she has to take him to the hospital.”

“Did you call her or talk to her during the day?” Jessica asked.

“No.”

“Do you know anybody who might have talked to her?”

“No,” Patrice said. “Not that I know of.”

“What about drugs? Was she into the drug scene?”

“God, no,” Patrice said. “She was like Sister Mary Narc.”

“Last year, when she took off three weeks, did you talk to her much?”

Patrice glanced at Ashia. There were secrets entombed in that look. “Not really.”

Jessica decided not to push. She consulted her notes. “Do you guys know a boy named Sean Brennan?”

“Yeah,” Patrice said. “I do. I don’t think Ashia ever met him.”

Jessica looked at Ashia. She shrugged.

“How long were they seeing each other?” Jessica asked.

“Not sure,” Patrice said. “Maybe a couple of months or so.”

“Was Tessa still seeing him?”

“No,” Patrice said. “His family moved away.”

“Where to?”

“Denver, I think.”