Quinn fished out her driver’s license and handed it to him. Emily did the same. The officer raised an eyebrow and picked up the phone. While they waited, he spoke into the handset in a rumbling undertone. He must have gotten a green light, because he hung up and rotated a ledger book toward them. After both Emily and Quinn signed, he gave them each a blank name tag and waited while they wrote their names and pressed on the labels. Emily felt like a piece of evidence, tagged and catalogued.

“Ladies.” The deep voice came from a police officer who’d entered from behind the desk officer. “Mrs. Newell?”

“That’s me,” Quinn said in a whispery soft voice. She seemed to shrink under the short, stocky uniformed officer’s gaze.

“And?” He tilted his head in Emily’s direction.

“This is Emily . . .” Quinn’s voice trailed off and Emily realized she’d forgotten her last name.

“Emily Harlow,” Emily said, hoping she sounded confident.

“Sergeant Brian Stanley,” the officer said with a nod. “I spoke with you on the phone.”

“You found my husband’s car? And asked me to bring these.” Quinn offered him the plastic bag with the photograph and the undershirt.

He glanced at the bag and then handed it to the desk officer. Then he raised the hinged end of the countertop and ushered them through. “We have the car downstairs,” he said. Quinn shot Emily a tense look. “Let’s go take a look.”

Emily hooked Quinn’s arm and followed Stanley down two flights of stairs. The smell of car tires and cigarette smoke grew as they descended. The basement was a vast parking garage that stretched the length of the building. Their footsteps echoed on the concrete as they continued past parked police cruisers, SUVs, and vans. Past taped-off boundaries surrounding cars that surely hadn’t come in under their own steam. One was a Honda, approximately the same vintage as Emily’s, its back end accordion-pleated into the body of the car. A steering wheel poked through the shattered windshield, as if a Humvee had run into the back of it full-tilt. Fatal, had to have been. Emily had to look away.

In the farthest corner of the basement garage sat a silver sedan. The car was barely damaged. It had overlapping chrome O’s on the front grill—an Audi. The passenger-side headlight was cracked and the front fender scraped. There were no plates.

“Oh God,” Quinn said, dropping Emily’s arm. “That looks like his car.”

“It was left overnight in the parking lot at the town wharf,” Stanley said. “That lot empties out after the trains stop running. It matches a car that was reported involved in a hit-and-run.”

“Was there . . . Did you find . . .” Quinn began, but she couldn’t finish. She cleared her throat. “My husband didn’t come home last night. I’ve been so worried something happened.”