I stared at both photo and necklace for a long time, then I slipped them into my pocket.

After I waited on the high school line for a full ten minutes, Claire Durant finally came to the telephone. “Ryan,” she said. “What can I do for you?”

“Claire, did you know my sister in middle school?”

She seemed surprised by the question, and possibly relieved, since we hadn’t spoken since she’d given me the yearbook and I’d been plunged headfirst into family secrets.

“No,” she said, “my family moved here at the beginning of our sophomore year.”

I was disappointed. “Oh.”

“Why?”

“Well, I was hoping to talk to somebody who knew Wendy and her friend Greta...” I searched for Greta’s last name. “Harold, I think. Greta Harold. She died the summer before she was supposed to start high school, but you wouldn’t have known her.”

“No, but I knew about her. Adolescents take death especially hard. When I arrived, people were still talking about the way she drowned.”

“Is there anybody you know who’s still living in the area and might have known her? Anybody who went to school with her? With Wendy?”

“I’m going to assume you have a good reason for asking this?”

“Me, too.”

“I gave you Diana Gordon’s yearbook.”

“You had your reasons. I’m still trying to absorb them.”

I half expected her to ask me what I was absorbing, but she didn’t. Claire had told me it was her job to keep secrets.

“Diana is a physical therapist at a clinic on the outskirts of town. I think her married name is Reynolds. I can’t remember the name of the clinic, but somebody told me she’s very skilled. Why don’t you try her?”

“Thank you. And thanks for...the yearbook.”

“I’m glad to help.”

I went to my laptop. Maybe I was trying to avoid the moment when I told my mother what I’d learned. But I knew for certain I wanted to talk to Diana Gordon Reynolds before I talked to Mom that evening.

Before her death, Greta Harold wore half a heart on a chain around her neck. In the same photo, Wendy’s neck was bare. Yet now, residing in my pocket, was a necklace like Greta’s. And unless the necklace was flipped when the photo was taken, the half in my pocket was exactly like the half she had worn.

I hoped Diana, the same Diana who had badly defaced Wendy’s yearbook photo all those years ago, could explain.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

I considered multiple ways to persuade Diana to talk to me. In the end, at noon I made the trip to Mangrove Bay Physical Therapy, located at the end of a strip mall filled with exclusive shops. Once inside I asked the young receptionist who was juggling paperwork if Diana had time to see me.

The woman who came out to greet me looked nothing like her Seabank High senior photo. She was slender and attractive, with long brown hair that glowed with red highlights, and sassy black-framed glasses. She smiled warmly and held out her hand. We shook.