“Yeah, it is.”

We rode the elevator up to Diandra’s as the waterfront rose, then fell away from us into an overturned bowl of black ink harbor. The apprehension that had been sitting tightly in my stomach for the last few hours expanded and eddied until I felt nauseous.

When Diandra let us in, the first thing I said was, “This Moira Kenzie, did she have a nervous habit of tucking her hair behind her right ear, even if there was nothing to tuck?”

She stared at me.

“Did she?”

“Yes, but how did you…?”

“Think. Did she make this weird, sort of laughing, sort of hiccuping sound at the ends of her sentences?”

She closed her eyes for a moment. “Yes. Yes, she did.”

I held up The News. “Is this her?”

“Yes.”

“Son of a bitch,” I said loudly.

“Moira Kenzie” was Kara Rider.

I paged Devin from Diandra’s.

“Dark hair,” I told him. “Twenty. Tall. Good build. Cleft in his chin. Usually dresses in jeans and flannel shirts.” I looked at Diandra. “Do you have a fax here?”

“Yes.”

“Devin, I’m faxing you a photo. What’s the number?”

He gave it to me. “Patrick, we’ll have a hundred guys looking for this kid.”

“You get two hundred, I’ll feel better.”

The fax machine was at the east end of the loft, by the desk. I fed it the photo Diandra had received of Jason, waited for the transmission report, walked back to Diandra and Angie in the living area.

I told Diandra we were slightly concerned because we’d received conclusive proof that neither Jack Rouse nor Kevin Hurlihy could have been involved. I told her that because Kara Rider had died shortly after impersonating Moira Kenzie, I wanted to reopen the case. I didn’t tell her that everyone who’d received a photo had had loved ones murdered.

“But he’s okay?” She sat on the couch, tucked her legs under her and searched our faces.

“As far as we know,” Angie said.

She shook her head. “You’re worried. That’s obvious. And you’re holding something back. Please tell me what. Please.”

“It’s nothing,” I said. “I just don’t like it that the girl who impersonated Moira Kenzie and got this whole thing rolling has turned up dead.”

She didn’t believe me and she leaned forward, her elbows on her knees. “Every night, no matter what, between nine and nine-thirty, Jason calls.”

I looked at my watch. Five past nine.

“Is he going to call, Mr. Kenzie?”

I looked at Angie. She was peering intently at Diandra.

Diandra closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them, she said, “Do either of you have children?”

Angie shook her head.

I thought of Mae for a moment.

“No,” I said.

“I didn’t think so.” She walked to a window, her hands on the backs of her hips. As she stood there, lights from an apartment in the building next door went out one by one and pools of darkness spread across her blond floor.