Will asked, “Did anyone fire their weapons?”

“Mine wasn’t fired.”

He looked at the Band-Aids on the side of her hand. “So, you were here on the floor.” He walked to the bed, standing where she had fallen.

“That’s right.”

“You stood up and saw that Frank Wallace was on the ground. Was he facedown? On his side?”

“On his side.” Lena followed Will as he slowly walked to the front of the garage. She stepped over magazines that had scattered in the struggle. She saw a flash of an older model Mustang clinging to the side of a racetrack.

Will pointed to the jagged metal sticking out from the garage door track. “This looks dangerous.”

He opened his briefcase again. With a steady hand, he used a pair of tweezers to pull a few threads of light tan material from the sharp metal. Frank’s coat was tan, a London Fog he’d been wearing for as long as Lena had known him.

Will handed her the K-M test kit. “I’m sure you know how to do this.”

Her hands trembled as she took the kit. She went through the same procedure Will had followed, using the dropper to add the reagent. When the tip of the swab turned bright pink, Lena didn’t think either of them was too surprised.

Will turned back around and looked at the garage. She could almost hear his mind working. For Lena’s part, she had the benefit of her own involvement to paint a picture of the truth. Tommy had shoved the table toward Lena. Frank had panicked, or startled, or something—for whatever reason, he’d ended up pulling the trigger on his gun. The shot had gone wild, taking a chunk out of Lena’s hand. Frank had dropped the gun. The Glock’s recoil had probably been unexpected. Or maybe he was so drunk by then that his balance was off. He’d pitched to the side, cutting open his arm on the sharp metal that jutted out from the track for the door. He’d fallen to the floor. He was clutching his arm by the time Lena had gotten up. By then, Tommy was running down the driveway with the letter opener in his hand.

Keystone Kops. They were a fucking joke.

How many drinks had Frank had yesterday morning? He was sitting in the car with his flask while Lena was watching Allison being dragged from the lake. He’d taken three or four swigs on the drive over. What about before then? How many drinks did it take him just to get out of bed these days?

Will was silent. He took back the swab, the bottles, and put everything back in its proper place. She waited for him to say something about the scene, about what had really happened. Instead, he asked, “Where’s the bathroom?”

Lena was too confused to answer anything other than “What?”

“The bathroom.” He indicated the open space, and Lena realized that he was right. The room was just one big box. There was no bathroom. There wasn’t even a closet. The furnishings were Spartan, nothing more than a bed that looked like it had been bought from a military supply store and a folding table of the sort they used at church bake sales. There was a small television in the corner with aluminum foil on the antennae and a Playstation jacked into the front. Instead of a chest of drawers, there were metal shelves bolted to the walls. T-shirts spilled over. Jeans. Baseball hats.

Will said, “What did Tommy say about why he was wearing a ski mask?”

Lena felt like she had swallowed a handful of gravel. “He said he had it on because it was cold.”

“It’s pretty cold in here,” Will agreed. He put the kit in his briefcase. Lena flinched when he snapped the locks shut. The sound echoed like a gunshot. Or a cell door closing.

The car magazines. The dirty sheets on the bed. The lack of even the most basic facilities. There was no way Allison Spooner had lived in this desolate garage.

Tommy Braham had.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

BROCK’S FUNERAL HOME WAS HOUSED IN ONE OF THE OLDEST buildings in Grant County. The Victorian castle, complete with turrets, had been built in the early 1900s by the man in charge of maintenance at the railroad yard. That he had used funds embezzled from the railroad company was a matter later settled by the state prosecutor. The castle had eventually been auctioned on the courthouse steps to John Brock, the local mortician.

Sara had heard from her grandpa Earnshaw that everyone in town had breathed a sigh of relief when the Brocks left Main Street—especially the butcher who’d had the unfortunate luck of being their next-door tenant. The basement and first floor of the Victorian had been turned into a funeral parlor, while the top floor was reserved for the family.

Sara had grown up with Dan Brock. He’d been an awkward, serious boy, the sort of child who was more comfortable around adults than children his own age. She witnessed firsthand the relentless teasing Dan had experienced in grade school. Bullies had latched onto him like piranha and had not stopped until junior high, when Dan shot past six feet tall. As the tallest girl in her class, then the tallest person in school but for Dan, Sara had always appreciated having him around.

And yet, she still couldn’t look at him without seeing the gangly ten-year-old boy girls had screeched at on the bus for having dead people’s cooties.

A funeral was just letting out as Sara pulled into the parking lot. Death was a brisk business, even in the worst economies. The old Victorian was well cared for. The paint was fresh and there was a new tile roof. Sara watched the mourners leaving the house, preparing to make the short trek to the burial.

There was a marble headstone at the cemetery with Jeffrey’s name on it. Sara had his ashes back in Atlanta, but his mother had suddenly found her religion and insisted on a proper funeral. The church was so full during the service that the back doors were opened so the people lining the steps could hear the preacher’s voice. People walked to the cemetery rather than drive behind the hearse.

Those closest to Jeffrey had each put something in the coffin that reminded them of their friend, their boss, their mentor. There was an Auburn football program with Jeffrey on the cover supplied by his boyhood friends. Eddie had added a hammer Jeffrey used to help him build a shed in the backyard. Her mother had put in her old frying pan because she’d taught Jeffrey how to fry chicken with it. Tessa provided a postcard he had sent her from Florida. He had always loved teasing her. The postcard read, Glad you’re not here!

A few weeks before Jeffrey had been killed, Sara had given him a signed first edition of MacKinlay Kantor’s Andersonville. Sara had a hard time letting the book go, even though she knew she had to. She couldn’t let the ground cover Jeffrey’s coffin of memories without her own contribution. Dan Brock had sat with her in the living room of her house for hours until she was ready to relinquish the book. She had looked at each page, touched her fingers to the spots where Jeffrey’s hands had rested. Dan had been patient, quiet, but when the time came for him to go, he was crying as hard as Sara.

She took a tissue out of the glove compartment and wiped her eyes. She was going to end up bawling like a baby if she let her mind continue along this track. Her jacket was on the seat beside her but Sara didn’t bother to put it on. She found a clip in the pocket and pulled back her hair. She checked the frizzy mess in the mirror. She should’ve put on some makeup this morning. The freckles across her nose were more pronounced. Her skin looked pale. Sara pushed away the mirror. It was too late to do anything about it now.

The last car pulled into the funeral procession. Sara jumped out of her SUV, barely missing a deep puddle. The rain was beating down and she covered her head with her hands in futility. Brock stood in the doorway, waving to her. His hair looked a bit thinner on the top, but with his three-piece suit and lanky frame, Dan Brock looked much as he had in high school.