When Lindsay finally came up with a potential strategy to get Hope a state ID card, she couldn’t understand why Hope didn’t jump at the chance, even if it was a long shot. Lindsay had kept pushing until Hope finally revealed that she’d always had a gut feeling that she might have been involved in something dangerous before the accident. It explained why she had always seemed distrustful of police—except, eventually, Lindsay’s father. She was driving a stolen car when she was found, after all, with no wallet in her purse and only a Hefty bag filled with clothes in the trunk. For all she knew, she could be wanted—by the police or worse—and she wasn’t willing to risk it.

“You think someone was looking for her all this time?”

“Some people never quit. But even if that’s the case, the blood sample’s still my best lead. It belongs to someone who lived in Wichita, Kansas, at some point twenty-some-odd years ago. I guess this leads me to the reason I called you in the first place: Any chance you know someone down there who can shed some light into whatever they know about that DNA?”

“Let me see what I can do.”

Lindsay had no way to know that for the first time in years, Detective Ellie Hatcher was allowing herself to believe once again that maybe she didn’t know the truth about her father’s death after all.

14
Monday, June 21, 1:18 p.m.

Carter flipped down the sun visor of his department-issued Dodge Charger to cut the glare reflecting off the water as he turned onto Star Island Road. Carter was born and bred on the East End, but he could count on one hand the number of times he’d been to this tiny island in Lake Montauk—once for a bar mitzvah and twice for weddings. The flashing lights of two marked police cars and an ambulance in a parking lot next to the yacht club tennis courts were a stark contrast to the rest of the scenery.

Carter badged the uniformed Suffolk County Police officers who were unspooling a roll of crime scene tape across the entrance to the path to the marina and made his way to the cluster of activity on the nearest boat dock, next to a boat marked “Marine Patrol.” He recognized the officer who hopped effortlessly from the police boat and began to make her way toward him. Her name was Lisa Robbins, and Carter knew for a fact that she liked him, even though she shouldn’t.

“Carter, what are you doing here?” she asked. It sounded flirty, and he noticed her adjusting the navy-blue polo shirt of her uniform.