“No one knows where they are really.” Ellen lifted a shoulder, clearly not invested. But she’d relaxed since the conversation had moved away from her direct involvement. She probably was eager to keep them headed in this direction rather than circling back. “How they’d always been strange.”

“Strange how?” Izzy asked, because it didn’t seem odd to her that they hadn’t returned to the island where their daughter had died.

“Rumors about what they did up in that mansion.” Ellen peeked at her beneath heavy eyelashes. “With all those drifters about.”

Sex, drugs, and rock ’n’ roll, Izzy guessed. That kind of environment was bound to attract gossip like that. Again, none of it raised red flags. “Anything else?”

Ellen stared at the ground, her breathing gone a little shallow. She’d been holding herself so tight, so rigid, that she was almost shaking with the effort. People got this way around cops sometimes, even when they weren’t guilty of anything. Those people usually had a past.

“Cash Bishop.”

Ah. That name was becoming familiar.

“What about him?” Mia asked.

“He was talking to Jimmy about the Bells.”

“Jimmy Roarke?”

That name kept popping up, too. Izzy added him to her list of people of interest.

Ellen rolled her eyes. It was so unlike every other guarded moment that it was almost startling. “Is there any other Jimmy?”

“Okay,” Mia said. “They mentioned the Bells? Charles and Bix.”

“Cash had asked Jimmy to find their current address.” Ellen finally slipped the cigarette between her lips. They were going to lose her soon.

“Why’d he ask Jimmy?”

Ellen didn’t answer right away. Instead, she dropped the cigarette to the ground, where it sizzled against the snow. At their curious looks, Ellen gestured toward her hair, her clothes.

“I don’t smoke. I just need to smell like I took a cig break.”

And that was just as telling as the rest of the interview. Because normal people lying, they don’t think that deep. They tell their bosses they’re going for a smoke break and then do whatever the hell they’re trying to do for fifteen minutes before returning, smelling nothing of ash and burned lungs.

Ellen was hiding something. Ellen was scared. But even after all that, Izzy didn’t think it had anything to do with the Twist case. That was just her gut speaking, though, and what did her gut know?

“Anyway, Jimmy was there that night, you know.” Ellen started shifting toward the door. “The night at the lighthouse.”

A flicker of something crossed Mia’s face, but Izzy couldn’t read it. Her best guess was surprise.

“Did Jimmy know where they were? The Bells?”

Ellen shook her head. “Told Cash to ask that girlfriend of his.”

“And who would that be?” Mia asked.