“So you went to this meeting on Monday night?”

“I did. But it was over at eight or so, and I was home by eight-thirty. Not much later, I’m sure. Where does Nancy live? Do you know?”

“Not exactly,” Mickey said. “Somewhere out in Seacliff.”

Hess spread her hands, palms out. “I live on lower Telegraph Hill. I would have had to drive pretty fast.”

“Well, there you go. That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

She put both hands over her mouth for a moment, then lowered them so she could speak. “It’s just that I’m so lost over this. Over everything that’s happened. It just doesn’t seem possible.”

“I know,” Mickey said. “It’s hard.” He placed his coffee cup back on the desk. “While I’m here, could I trouble you to write me down a list of everybody you remember at that Monday meeting? It looks like I’m going to have a long day.”

She sighed. “All right. I’ll try to do that. But I can’t really believe it was anybody who was there. I mean, everybody loved Nancy.”

“I’m sure they did,” Mickey said. “I’m sure they did.”

Armed with his list of names, many with phone numbers, of those who’d been at the meeting, Mickey sat with Hess’s permission in one of the free cubicles in the large open staff room at the Ortega campus. Making conversation while she’d drawn up the list, he’d let drop that he didn’t have a telephone, and she’d offered him the use of theirs. Save him a lot of driving. Beyond the five he’d heard of-Turner, Hess, Neshek, and the two Sanchezes-there were seven other nonprofit professional executives.

His first call wasn’t to any of these people, though, but back to his own apartment, where he listened to the answering machine. Next he called the office and got his sister on the first ring. “Any word on Jim?” he asked.

“Still nothing.”

“Maybe I should drop by the apartment.”

“He’d pick up the phone, I think, if he were there. And I’ve called about ten times already.”

“Yeah. I just did too.”

“I’m really worried here, Mick.”

“I know. Me too.” He took a beat. “Is Wyatt still there? You think he’ll talk to me if I told you it might be important?”

“He’ll talk to you, Mick. You got something important?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. You tell me.”

He told her.

Hunt listened on the telephone as Mickey gave him the play- by-play on his interview with Lorraine Hess, such as it was. Down to the cute Battalion-member who delivered the custard-filled doughnuts, through her essentially rock-solid alibis and her son Gary’s homework load. By the time Mickey relayed Hess’s degree of her upset about being considered any kind of a suspect, her question about where Neshek had lived, and her joking comment about how fast she had to drive from there to Telegraph Hill after the Monday-night meeting, Hunt knew that Mickey was stalling and interrupted. “Not that all this isn’t fascinating, Mick, but Tam said you had something important.”

Mickey had already practiced the casual tone he wanted to use when he’d told Tamara, and now he said, “Well, I don’t really know how important it is, but I ran into Al Carter down here and asked him if he’d seen Jim at the memorial yesterday, and he told me he had. When he took Alicia outside after Mrs. Como-”

“I know all about this,” Hunt said.

“Well, maybe not.” He hesitated. “Carter told me that Alicia offered to drive Jim back home to our place.”

After some seconds of silence, Mickey said, “Wyatt? You still there?”

“You’re saying that your Alicia drove Jim home?”

“She offered to anyway. I don’t know if she actually did.”

“Have you asked her about this?”

“Then I’d know, wouldn’t I?”

“Don’t be a wiseass. Have you talked to her or not?”

“No.”

Hunt let out a breath. “You’re sure?”

Mickey didn’t respond.

More silence.

“Wyatt?”

“I’m thinking. You haven’t talked to her about anything since we left her this morning, including this?”

“I just said I didn’t.”

“I know you did. I didn’t want there to be a misunderstanding between us again.”

“Again?”

“You know. Like the last time I told you I didn’t think you should be hanging out too much with her, just to be on the safe side since she was a potential murder suspect, and the next thing you’d moved with her into my place. That kind of misunderstanding.”

“I haven’t talked to her. I called you.”

“Yes, you did. Good move. Do you think you’ll be able to keep yourself from talking to her until I get a chance to?”

“If that’s what you want.”

“That’s what I want.”

“So when are you going to do that?”

“Pretty damn soon.”

“Okay.”

“Mick?”

“Yeah.”

“Tell me the truth. I know you want to believe her. And loyalty’s a wonderful thing as far as it goes. But is this doing anything to your worldview?”

It took Mickey some moments to answer. “It’s trying to.”

Hunt paused, too, and let out a sigh. “If it does, just let it happen. Don’t fight it the way your sister did with Craig. Put it someplace you can deal with now, then bring it into the open and sort it all out later. All right? That’s my advice. We may have to do something about her sooner than the next three days. And I may need you with me for that. If it comes to it. You hear what I’m saying?”

“I think so.”

“I want you to more than think it. This is not me making stuff up. This is not anybody wanting to believe something that didn’t happen. Did she tell you about the scarf Juhle found? Her scarf?”

“Yeah. In the limo. That’s when she decided to get out of her house. She thought they might come back for her. But she’d lost that scarf a couple of weeks before.”

“That’s what she told Devin too.”

“You don’t believe that either?”

“Some things are harder to believe than others.”

“What makes that one hard?”

“Well, mainly because she left out one little teeny tiny part. You know she’s always said she didn’t have an intimate relationship with Como?”

“I do believe that. She didn’t. I’m sure she didn’t.”

“So she says. Just like she said he didn’t fire her that morning, huh? And she wasn’t intimate with anybody else out there at Sunset, either, was she?”

“There’s no sign of that, Wyatt. Like who?”

“Like anybody. But in fact I’m guessing Como, and so is Devin.”

“And what’s that got to do with her scarf?”

“This is another thing you’re not going to want to tell her, and another reason you shouldn’t talk to her at all. We’re clear there, right?”

“Right. We’ve already done that. I won’t talk to her at least until you do. Promise. But what?”

“ ‘What’ is that somebody came on that scarf, Mickey. That’s what.”

When Hunt hung up, he raised his head.

Tamara was standing in his open doorway. “Just because Alicia dropped Jim off, that doesn’t mean-” she began.

“Don’t start. I don’t know what it means or doesn’t mean. But if on top of everything else, we’re looking for Jim, too, I’m going to ask her what she knows, if only to get some kind of a timeline on him. In fact”-he checked his watch, started to push away from his desk-“enough of this. I’m going over there right now. At least find out where we stand.”

“I need to go with you.”

He shook his head. “I’m not going to let you do that, Tam.”

“If you’re really worried about her that way, Wyatt, you should just call her.”

“If I do that and spook her, which any of my questions just might do, she runs again and we’re lost, aren’t we?”

“I still really don’t think she’s going to do that. I don’t think any of that’s going to happen.”

“Good for you. But it’s my call, okay? I don’t like even the remote chance of something happening to you, not now that I’ve just got you back.” He patted her on the arm and gave her a quick buss on the cheek. “You just hold down the fort, okay? I predict the Willard White gang is going to be calling in all day needing your guidance. Meanwhile, I’ll call you the minute I know something.”