Part 2. Realm of the Righteous

Chapter Nineteen: A Little Kitten Made of Music

Chapter Twenty: Black Hole

Chapter Twenty-One: 8-Ballers

Chapter Twenty-Two: Do Tell

Chapter Twenty-Three: Rumors of Interest

Chapter Twenty-Four: The Bogie Man Says Boo

Chapter Twenty-Five: Nine Little Words

Chapter Twenty-Six: Soon to Be Swooshed

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Tink Like Shane

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Two if by Drone

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Enemies in High Places

Chapter Thirty: Avoiding the Abyss

Chapter Thirty-One: Sneakers Make the Man

Chapter Thirty-Two: Say a Little Prayer

Chapter Thirty-Three: The Smell Test

Chapter Thirty-Four: The Pretty Cool Connection

Chapter Thirty-Five: Mr. Invisible and the Hands of Iron

Chapter Thirty-Six: Sleeping Giants

Chapter Thirty-Seven: Truth & Consequences

Chapter Thirty-Eight: Back to the Shed, with Cookies

Chapter Thirty-Nine: Anything Is Possible

Chapter Forty: Walk This Way

Chapter Forty-One: Facts as We Know Them

Chapter Forty-Two: Elephants Not in the Room

Part 3. Joey

Chapter Forty-Three: Under a Veil of Leaves

Chapter Forty-Four: True Confessions

Chapter Forty-Five: Monster Man in the Electric Night

Chapter Forty-Six: When the Scurry Time Is Here

Chapter Forty-Seven: All the Way Home

Chapter Forty-Eight: God Who Made the Stars

Chapter Forty-Nine: Wicked Bad

Chapter Fifty: The Luckiest Guy in the World

Chapter Fifty-One: A Man Who Would Walk through Fire

Chapter Fifty-Two: All They Need

Chapter Fifty-Three: Too Many Guns

Chapter Fifty-Four: Into the Night

Chapter Fifty-Five: Whatever He Does for Fun

Chapter Fifty-Six: Good Enough for Alice

Chapter Fifty-Seven: Faith

Chapter Fifty-Eight: Everything She Has Ever Feared

Chapter Fifty-Nine: When the Music Stops

Chapter Sixty: Best Done Alone

Chapter Sixty-One: Almost Perfect

Part 1. The Last Kid Finder

Chapter One

The Trunk Thing

The killer came to us in the trunk of a Lincoln Town Car, and stayed just long enough to wreck the house. By that I mean the pile of brick that Naomi Nantz uses as her personal residence as well as for the business of solving unsolvable cases, assisting the helpless and generally amusing herself by being difficult, if not impossible.

My name is Alice Crane, and I serve as Ms. Nantz’s recording secretary and chief factotum. In case you don’t know—I had to look it up when she hired me—a factotum is an employee or assistant employed in a wide range of capacities. I mean, come on, this is the twenty-first century, who uses fusty old words like that anymore?

My boss, Naomi Nantz, that’s who.

The Nantz residence takes up most of a block in the Back Bay area of Boston. Don’t bother trying to find us, we’re camouflaged as two—or is it three?—typical Victorian brick town houses located somewhere between Storrow Drive to the north, Boylston Street to the south, Arlington Street to the east and Charlesgate to the west. Check your map and you’ll see that pretty much covers the neighborhood. On the outside we’re staid and rather ordinary, the kind of staid and ordinary that only money can buy. On the inside, which was gutted and rebuilt a few years before I entered the picture, it’s clean and sleek and modern, except for the Zen sand garden that takes up part of the ground floor. Boss lady often meditates in the garden, drawing what look to me like meaningless lines in the sand, saying it helps her to think.

Like several of the staff, I live in. At the time of hire, it wasn’t a choice for me because my adorable husband had suddenly vanished along with all of my money, and it was either the Nantz residence or my sister’s place in Malden. The choice was Back Bay, with twelve-foot ceilings, an exquisitely furnished suite, or Malden, a paneled basement with a cat-scented futon. Not a tough decision. There are days when boss lady drives me nuts, but my sister has the same ability, and she doesn’t pay. Whereas Naomi Nantz pays very well indeed, with benefits that include room and board, full medical and dental, as well as the occasional opportunity to right wrongs, dodge bullets, tilt at windmills and rescue kidnapped children.

I’d like to say there’s never a dull moment, but that wouldn’t be true. There are many dull moments, for which I’m thankful. Twenty-nine years on this planet have taught me that dull moments are to be savored. Dull moments fortify the soul, because without them life would just be one thing after another, blurred together like the windows on a passing subway car.

In my opinion the best dull moments occur around the kitchen table. In this case a ten-foot-long pickled-white oak table situated in the southeast corner of Mrs. Beasley’s basement kitchen. If Beasley has a first name, she’s not inclined to share it, nor any information about what might have happened to Mr. Beasley, if ever he existed. She’s not much for conversation, preferring to let her food do the talking. Her food, be assured, is eloquent on many subjects. For most people “fruit plate” suggests a cafeteria serving, but then most people have never had the experience of a Beasley Breakfast Fruit Plate. Farm fresh local strawberries dusted with one of her secret ingredients—could it be some exotic formulation of cinnamon? Perfectly ripened peaches that have doubtless been airlifted in from Georgia (Beasley has many connections) and sliced into mouth-size morsels. A single Medjool date stuffed with diced pecans. A chilled pear compote, lightly gingered. Honeyed bran muffins straight from the oven, slathered with hand-churned apricot butter that will make your eyes roll back in pleasure. And Mrs. Beasley’s famous French press coffee, which makes your favorite Starbucks taste like thin dishwater.

There are only three at the table this morning because young Teddy Boyle, our spiky-haired live-in computer guru, has not yet emerged from his dungeon. Too much late-night fun, apparently. Well, he’s of a late-night age, either twenty-one (so he says) or eighteen (so Naomi thinks) or barely sixteen (my theory). Whatever, he’s missing the muffins, so to speak.