Max held his tongue until that thought passed. Then he said, “If there is no other man, then what? Was she robbed? Carjacked? There are other possibilities out there, but…”

The cogs in David’s head seemed to fall into line and he gripped the edge of the table. “Oh, Jesus.”

Max regretted where he had led the conversation, and again wished that he had never left his cabin. Sandy wasn’t his daughter; she wasn’t his girlfriend. Pip wasn’t his child. But there he was amid a pall of despair so thick that he could feel it pressing his shoulders, the weight of this woman and child another burden for him to carry.

He should have kept his mouth shut. He should have left Niki alone. Then, at least, they could all have held on to their hope.

CHAPTER 23

Bolger kept Lyle and Max waiting for half an hour. When he walked into the meeting room, he carried himself like a man ready to wrestle a steer, his stride impatient and purposeful. He plopped down in a chair and looked at Lyle and then at Max and said, “Okay, let’s hear it.”

They had decided that Max would do most of the talking, keep the personal animosity on the sidelines as much as possible. Max had his laptop ready, the footage from the Rook cued up. “We just wanted to run something by you,” Max said. “To start with, is it still your theory that Sandy Voight left her home voluntarily back last Tuesday?”

“That’s what the evidence supports,” Bolger said.

“Are you still of the opinion that Sandy ran off with another man?”

“That’s my deduction.”

Lyle stepped in. “If there’s no evidence one way or the other, it’s not a deduction—it’s speculation.”

Max reached over and patted the older man’s arm. Then he returned his attention to Bolger. “You’re drawing that… conclusion because of the clothing being moved out.”

“That’s right.”

“Because a person getting kidnapped wouldn’t pack their clothes.”

“Not in my experience,” Bolger said with more than a touch of condescension.

“It’s logical,” Max agreed.

Bolger must have felt that he was being led into a trap, because he answered cautiously. “Yes… logical.”

“Would it be logical for a woman—as frugal as they come—to buy an expensive couch if she was planning to skip town?”

“What couch would that be?”

Max slid the paperwork to Bolger. “Cost them near four grand.”

Bolger leaned back and smiled. “Running away can be an act of impulsivity. You don’t think Sandy Voight has the capacity to be impulsive?”

Max said, “Sheriff, she took all the clothes from her closet. She took clothes she didn’t like—clothes that didn’t fit her anymore. Is that logical?”

“She was in a hurry. She had to get out of there before Haas came home.”

“She had all night to pack. Haas worked the night shift.”

“Now who’s speculating?” Bolger said.

Max looked at Lyle, whose nostrils flared with the strain of keeping quiet. Max turned the laptop so that the screen faced Bolger. “This is a video from a surveillance camera outside of a bar on Lyndale Avenue. Sandy would have passed this spot on her way to the convenience store where her credit card was last used. This is her Honda Passport.”