“You don’t want to be on my bad side, Work. I can promise you that.”

“That’s what Douglas told me.”

Emotion tugged at the corner of Mills’s mouth. “Douglas was out of line.”

“He just told me to cooperate.” Mills crossed her arms. “Are we going to be straight with each other?” I asked. “No crap?”

“No problem,” she said.

“I’ll be as honest with you as you are with me. Fair?” She nodded. “Am I a suspect?” I asked her.

“No.” She didn’t hesitate, and I knew she was lying. I almost laughed, she was so transparent, but it would have been an ugly laugh, an “I can’t believe this shit is happening” laugh.

“Do you have any suspects?”

“Yes.”

“Anybody I know?”

“Everybody,” she said, parroting the district attorney. I thought of Jean and prayed that she had not gotten that far in her interview with Clarence Hambly.

“Have you looked into his business dealings? Ex-clients?”

“I can’t talk about the investigation.”

“I know you talked to Hambly,” I told her, watching closely for a reaction, getting none, just the same unbending mouth and eyes I couldn’t see. “I know that you know about the will. Seems to me there are fifteen million reasons why you should be looking at me for the murder.”

“That Hambly. He’s a pompous windbag. He should learn to keep his mouth shut.” Watching her, I finally understood why she hated lawyers so much. She couldn’t intimidate them, and it killed her.

“So,” I prodded. “I’m not a suspect?”

“Douglas says to lay off you. He says there’s no way you killed your father, not for money. I can’t find any other motive.”

“But you’ve looked.”

“I’ve looked.”

“And you’re going along with that?”

“As long as you’re straight with me, I’ll give Douglas his say. For now. But in the end, it’s my investigation. Jerk me off and I’ll come down on you so hard, your friends will bleed. Is that clear?”

“Crystal,” I told her. “What else did you learn from Hambly?” I tried not to show how desperate I was for this information.

Mills shrugged again. “That your father was stinking rich and that if you didn’t kill him, you’re one lucky bastard.”

“It’s just money,” I said.

“That’s good,” she told me. “Just money.”

“Are we going to do this?” I asked.

“Yeah. Fine. About time.”

“Then let’s drive,” I said. “Barbara will probably be home soon and I don’t need her involved in this.”

“Oh, I’ll talk to Barbara,” Mills said pointedly, making it clear that she was still the cop.

“But later, okay? Come on. You drive.”

She took off her jacket and tossed it in the backseat. Her car smelled of the same overripe peach perfume I remembered from the hospital. She had the usual cop radios and a shotgun locked to the dash. Voices chattered on the radio and she turned it down as she backed down my driveway. I studied her from the corner of my eye, took in the cuffs, mace, and spare clip on her belt, the way her shirt gapped open, showing a pale lace bra that didn’t go with the rest of her. Muscles stood out in her jaw, and I suspected that she would much rather have me in custody than be squiring me around town on the city’s nickel. I thought about what a good cop she was, reminded myself to be careful of what I said. She was looking for an excuse.

Once on the street, she turned right, past the park. We drove to Main Street in silence; then she pointed the car out of town, toward the long, impossibly narrow roads so typical of the county. “So talk,” she said. “And don’t leave anything out. I want to know everything that happened on the night your father disappeared. Don’t edit. Don’t choose. Give me everything.”

So we drove, and I tried to speak with great care.

“Why were you there, at his house?”

“My mother’s idea. Dinner. Trying to make peace, I guess.”

Mills turned fractionally, cut her eyes away from the road. “Peace between…?”

“Jean and my father.”

“What were they fighting about?” she asked.

“Fighting is too strong a word. There was just a distance there. One of those father-daughter things.”

“Specifically what?”

I wanted to lie, to protect Jean completely, but I feared that Mills would find the truth elsewhere. A lie now would only make it seem more important. That was the problem with talking to cops. You never knew what they knew. In the end, that’s how they nailed you.

“I think it was about Alex.”

“Your sister’s girlfriend?”

“Yes.”

“Your father didn’t approve?”

“No, but it was an old argument. We’d been there before.”

“Your sister was not mentioned in your father’s will.”

“She was never in the will,” I said, lying. “My father had old-fashioned views about women.”

“And why did your mother intervene?”

“She just got worried. It was a loud argument.”

Mills kept her eyes on the road. “Did your father beat Jean?” she asked.

“No.”

She looked at me. “Did he beat your mother?”

“No.”

“Who was it again that called?”

“I don’t know.”

“But you were there when the call came in.”

“I didn’t answer it.”

“Tell me exactly what your father said.”

I thought back. “‘I’ll be there in ten minutes.’ That’s what he said. He answered the phone. He listened. Then he said he’d be there in ten minutes.”

“He didn’t say where?”

“No.”

“He didn’t tell you where he was going?”

“No.”

“Who had called?”

“No. Nothing. He just left.”

“How long was he on the phone?”

I thought about it. “Thirty seconds.”

“Thirty seconds is a long time.”

“It can be,” I said.

“So someone had a lot to say.”

“What about phone records?” I asked. “Lugs, PIN numbers, anything like that?”

“No luck,” Mills said before she caught herself discussing the case and quickly changed the subject. “There had to be something else. Did he take anything with him? Say anything? How did his face look? Was he angry, sad, thoughtful? What direction did he drive?”

I thought about it, really thought about it. That was something I’d never done. How had he looked? What was in his face? Something. Resolution, perhaps. Determination. Yes. And anger. But something else, too. Smugness, I thought. The bastard looked smug.

“He looked sad,” I told Mills. “His wife had just died and he looked sad.”

“What else?” Mills pushed. “Did he take anything? Did he stop between the phone and the door going out? Think.”

“He stopped for his keys,” I said. “Just for his keys.” And then I thought, My God-his keys. Ezra kept his keys on a hook board by the kitchen door. One set for his car, one set for his office. I saw it happen like it had been this morning. He moved past me, into the kitchen, his hand reached out-and he took both sets of keys. I saw it. He was planning to go to the office! But why? And had he made it before he was killed?

“There were no keys on his body,” Mills said.

“Any sign of his car yet?” I asked, eager to distract her. I didn’t want to talk about the keys. Not until I knew what it all meant. Why would Ezra go to the office? I thought about his missing gun, and I thought about his safe. It had to be opened.

“I can’t talk about that. Did you ever hear from him again?”

“No.”

“Phone calls? Letters?”

“Nothing.”

“Why didn’t you report him missing?” she asked.

“I did.”

“Six weeks later,” Mills reminded me. “A long time. That troubles me.”

“We assumed he was in mourning somewhere, getting away from it all. He’s a grown man.”

“Was a grown man.”

“What’s your point?”

“My point is that he didn’t even show up for the funeral, and still you didn’t report him missing. That’s just suspicious. No other word for it.”

How to explain that? My father was not at the funeral because he killed her. He knocked her down the stairs and broke her neck! I’d figured that the guilt was destroying him. That he knew better than to face Jean and me with empty words and crocodile tears. Because not even Ezra could eulogize about what a fine person he’d killed. I’d guessed he was dead drunk or at the bottom of a high bridge. To me, that made sense. A lot of sense.