He shrugged. “Somewhere on the coast, I think.”

“Is there any way to find out?” I asked. “I’d like to talk to her and your sister if possible.”

He sighed. “I don’t know, man.”

I couldn’t tell whether his indifference was more about me or more about having been abandoned by his mother. Probably a little of both.

“Okay,” I said. “How about this? Did you and your sister go to school somewhere around here?”

A smile tried to force its way onto his face. “When I actually went to school, yeah.”

“I mean elementary school. When you were younger.”

The smile gave up. “Yeah. Couple blocks from here. Hawkins.”

“Public school?”

“Do I look like a private-school kid?” He shook his head, irritated that I even asked the question. “Yeah. Shitty public elementary school. And, no, I don’t remember the names of her teachers.”

“She went there the entire time you lived here?”

“Yep.”

A wave of icy air breezed up my back. “You really don’t know the name of the place in Florida?”

“Look, man, I have zero interest in talking to my mom, alright?”

“I understand. I’m not asking you to talk to her. I’m just looking for anything that leads to my daughter and talking to your sister is the best connection I’ve ever had to her.”

He sighed again and his eyes shifted to the ground. “Yeah, but if you go poking around and tell them how you found them, she’s gonna start asking about me.”

“You don’t talk to her at all?”

“Nope.”

“Do you want to?”

“No, I really don’t,” he said, looking at me. “I don’t need her. And I don’t want her to start calling me and asking me how I am. I don’t want any of that crap. And if you go talking to her, I guarantee she’ll start bugging me.”

“Okay,” I said. “I won’t tell her I talked to you.”

He grunted. “Yeah, right.”

“You don’t believe me?”

He squinted at me. “Not really.”

The wind blew up my back again and I pulled my coat tighter around me. Jacob made no move to invite me in.

“Look, the only thing I care about is finding my daughter,” I said. “That’s it. Your business is your business and I’m not sticking my nose in it. You don’t tell me where they live, I’ll probably find it anyway. Just take me longer. But I have no interest in getting involved with you or your mom or any other member of your family. I just want to find my daughter.”

He stood there, skepticism oozing out of every inch of him. It was hard to blame him. He may not have wanted anything to do with his mother but it was clear he still harbored a ton of anger. And it sounded like maybe it was warranted. It didn’t seem as if Jacob Detwiler had been dealt a great hand in the parenting cards.

“Thanks for the name of the school,” I finally said. “I appreciate it.”

I stepped down off the porch and headed for the car.

“Vero,” he said.

I turned around.

“Vero Beach,” he said. He frowned at me. “That’s where they moved. Somewhere around there. But I don’t know if they still live there. But she always liked the beach. My mom.”

“Okay,” I said. “Thanks.”

He pulled himself off the doorframe and shoved his hands in his pockets. “Her last name is Madison now. And if you talk to my sister…” He thought for a long moment. “Just tell her I said hi.”

He shut the door before I could tell him that I would.

FIFTEEN

I plugged the name of the elementary school into the GPS and I was there four minutes later.

It was empty. I knew it would be. It was late in the afternoon and, as full of life as a school was during the day, it became a ghost town just as quickly.

But I wanted to see it.

The car idled at the curb, the heat buzzing softly, as I took it in.

Rectangle brick building. Asphalt parking lot filled with small potholes and cracks. A lonely swing set on a snow-covered blacktop. Monkey bars lined with more snow.

If I stared hard enough, I could see Elizabeth. Bundled up in a coat too big for her, a hat pulled down over her long blond hair, running around with bright red cheeks, smiling and laughing.

My heart ached and I knew if I sat there long enough, I’d never be able to leave. I’d get out and walk the playground and look for signs of her, no matter how illogical that was. I’d convince myself that I could find something that would lead me to her, find her, give her back to me.

And then when I couldn’t, I’d be paralyzed with fear and hurt and frustration.

It would be like losing her all over again.

My cell chirped and snapped me out of my reverie. I saw the name on the screen and grabbed it.

“Hey, Mike,” I said.

“Joe,” Mike Lorenzo said on the other end. “You in Minnesota?”

“I am.”

“You were fast.”

“No point in waiting, right?”

The question was rhetorical. Mike taught me everything good about being a cop. He’d taken it personally when Elizabeth disappeared and had spent nearly as much time searching for her as I had.

And he’d given me the picture.

“Any luck?” he asked.

I recounted what I’d learned in the short time I’d been in Minneapolis.

“I can start running names in Florida,” he said.

“That’d be great.”

“I assume that’ll be your next stop?”

“I’m gonna poke around here first,” I said. “I wanna see what else I can turn up. But yeah, eventually I’d like to go talk to the Detwiler girl.”

“Okay,” he said. “Makes sense.”

“The note you gave me with the picture,” I said. “Said you found it in a file. I assume it wasn’t in Elizabeth’s?”

“No.”

“Where was it, then?” I asked.

There was a pause. “I can’t recall specifics. I’ve got it around here somewhere. I’ll need to go pull it. Can’t remember off the top of my head what the case name was. Old age setting in, I guess.”

I bit back a smile. He was as sharp as ever, but a backload of work could fry anyone’s brain. “Whenever you get a chance.”

“Will do.”

He didn’t say anything and the silence was odd.

“You just checking in with me? Or something else?” I asked.

The line buzzed for a moment and he lowered his voice. “Something else.”

My heart sped up and my hand tightened on the phone.

“Things are a little weird around here,” he said.

“Where? Coronado?”

“No,” he said. “Well, yeah. At the station, I mean. The department.”

“Weird how?”

“Bazer brought you up the other day,” Mike said. “Wanted to know if I’d talked to you.”

Lieutenant Bazer was my old boss. The one who’d essentially forced me out and subtly cast suspicion in my direction to protect his department. I didn’t miss him.

“Why?” I asked. “He have something he needed to blame on me?”

Mike chuckled. “No. At least not that he said. He asked if I’d spoken to you. I was vague. He pressed.”

“So you told him I was up here?”

“Fuck no,” he said, chuckling again. “Told him I hadn’t talked to you.”

I smiled.

“He tried to play it off like he was just curious, but it had a weird feel, you know?” Mike said. “Just didn’t feel right. But then he didn’t follow up or anything, so I didn’t think much of it.”

“Okay.”

“So this morning, I go to his office. Needed to ask him something about a case. He’s not at his desk,” he said. “I go to leave him a note because he still won’t use email.”

I nodded, remembering his resistance to computers and technology.

“And your file was on his desk,” Mike said.

“Maybe he misses me.”

“We both know that’s not true,” Mike said. “It was just weird. Yesterday he asks me if I talked to you, then today I see the file on his desk. Clearly, he’s got you on the brain.”

Small snowflakes dotted the windshield and the heater continued to hum. I shifted in my seat.

“Maybe he’s just doing some maintenance,” I said. “Cleaning up old files, that kind of crap.”

“Maybe,” Mike said. “But then he wouldn’t have needed to ask me if I’d talked to you. Unless he really missed you.”