“We’ll find it. Thank you for talking to me and for helping us to figure out what happened to Willie.”

“Do you think you will arrest the person who killed him?”

Under normal circumstances, Sam felt confident giving some assurance that the perpetrator most likely would be caught. In this case, however, she couldn’t say for certain. “I hope so. We’re doing everything we can. I promise.”

“Thank you.”

* * *

Sam and Hill were quiet on the elevator ride to the lobby. They’d left Carmen in the care of her family, and Eduardo had thankfully kept his distance as they said their goodbyes.

“The brother is a bit of a thug,” Hill said.

“I think he’s used to getting his way and didn’t like having us tell him what to do.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right about that.”

“Seems like she has two thugs for brothers. Marco bears looking into.”

“I’m one step ahead of you. My deputy did a run on him yesterday after I first heard about the restraining order.” Reading from his phone, Hill said, “I just heard back from George, my deputy. Marco has quite a sheet in the D.R. Drugs and larceny, B&E, gang-related stuff. He’s a busy dude. I can’t believe Willie gave him close to a million bucks, and he came back for more. That takes some kind of nerve.”

“And yet,” Sam said, “I can see how Carmen wanted to keep the peace. Just give him the money, and make everyone happy.”

“Willie was wise to think about the future. You hear so many stories about professional athletes who blow all the money during the salad years and leave themselves short for the golden years.”

“Hard to believe that people with that kind of money could ever be short on cash.”

“People who’ve never had money tend to go through it like crazy when they get it.”

“True. So where can we find Marco Peña?”

“We were able to track him down in the D.R. My deputy was unable to find any sign of him leaving there in the last week. The last time he was in the U.S. was in April. One of us should probably go there to track him down.”

“I hate to say this because I’ve always said I’d never be this kind of cop, but I can’t go. Nick is heading out of town for a couple of days, and I can’t leave my son. He took the news about Willie really hard and—”

“It’s okay, Sam. You don’t have to explain. I’ll go.”

“Are you sure? Do you have time? I mean, technically this isn’t even your case.”