Toni smiled at her. “I’d appreciate a glass of water, Miss Shields, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble. I get a little carsick when I ride too long, and water settles my stomach.”

“Oh, no trouble at all.” She scurried toward the kitchen.

Jason shot Toni an irritated glance. “Since when do you get carsick?”

“It comes and goes at my convenience. Listen, pal, you and your steely-eyed stare are making her so nervous that she’s starting to worry about rubber hoses and bamboo slivers.”

“I’m not doing anything.”

“Witnesses who get too nervous either forget important details or make them up to please the person asking the questions.”

Jason frowned at a ceramic statue of a clown. “I want to get this over with.”

He wasn’t the only one. Special teams all over the country were tracking down tips that had been phoned in from citizens who were sure they’d seen Cornelia Case getting out of a limousine at an airport or lazing on the beach at Malibu. But the tip from Barbara Shields, a grocery store clerk in Vincennes, Indiana, was the one that had caught Toni and Jason’s attention.

Shields had reported seeing a woman who looked like Cornelia Case shopping in the Kroger’s where she worked. The woman had been traveling with a dark-haired man, a teenager, and a baby in a pink cap. The cursory description matched the description of the woman in the celebrity lookalike contest, right down to the short light brown hair.

Toni and Jason had discussed it. They both considered it unlikely that a woman traveling with three other people, two of whom were children, could be Cornelia Case. But they still wanted to talk with her in person, and their boss, Ken Braddock, had agreed.

Shields came out of the kitchen with a frosted blue water glass. Toni was ninety percent convinced they were on a fool’s errand, but she managed a smile. “Do you mind if we sit down?”

“Mind? No, no. Go ahead.” She rubbed her palms on her blue slacks, then perched on the edge of an armchair across from the couch. “I’m just a little nervous. I never met real government agents before.”

“Perfectly understandable.” Toni took a seat next to Jason. He opened his notebook, but Toni left hers in her purse. “Why don’t you just tell us what you saw?”

More palm-rubbing. “Well, it was Friday, two days ago. It was my first day back at work since my surgery.” She indicated her wrist. “I got carpal tunnel from scanning groceries. Repetitive stress injury, they call it. Everybody talks about helping office workers who get it from using computers, but nobody thinks about cashiers. I guess we’re not important enough.” Her expression indicated she was used to coming out on the short end of the checkout line.