“You been arguing?”

“No!” She thought of the exultant way Cyrus had touched her, looked into her face like she was made of light. Did him not wanting a baby constitute an argument? No. He’d said he loved her, hadn’t he? He always said he loved her.

But he changed the passcode?

She saw the officer glance down at the silver band on her ring finger. “You two married?”

Might as well be. But she shook her head, no.

Was that a smirk on his face? “Signs of anything else out of the ordinary?” he asked.

Izzy bristled cat-like from the nape of her neck and all down her spine. “He wasn’t there. His phone and socks and—”

“I understand. Other than that. How was his mood?”

His mood? How could she make this man see? “We’ve been together almost nine years.” How could she explain what “together” meant—that they had seen each other exclusively all that time, even as kids; that they had, together, built a house with a doggy door for her tortoise. They were all going to move to LA together. Weren’t they?

“Anyone that might have had a problem with him?” the officer asked.

She shook her head again. Cyrus wasn’t close to a lot of people, but everyone he ever met seemed to fall in love with him. Except Joe, maybe. “He has a brother at CAL,” she ventured.

“I’m aware,” said Decker. So, that was what she’d seen on the man’s face. Guilt by association. Or something more? “The Rivera brothers got themselves into some trouble growing up,” he added, squinting at his computer screen.

“That was Joe.” Joe’s ex-girlfriend Selma had asked him to deliver a package. Joe insisted that he hadn’t known about the drugs inside, but he’d been put away just the same.

The officer cleared his throat.

“Cyrus never—”

“Has your husband—Has Mr. Rivera,” Decker corrected himself with a subtle but distinct flourish, and she wondered if he meant something by it, or was she just being paranoid? “Has Mr. Rivera ever taken off like this before?”

“No.” She added, “Sir,” and composed her face, hoping to encourage some more sympathy. Cyrus did check in always, right? The stress had slowed her mind.

“It happens,” the officer said. “Sometimes people take off.”

“But the truck,” she said.

“There are other modes of transportation, Miss Ames.”

She was losing ground here. “I’d like to file a report.” They’d changed the law in California; you didn’t have to wait anymore.

He drummed his fingers on the desk top. “This kind of thing happens all the time. Men leave.”

“Men leave?” She could no longer play the part she thought the officer wanted. “He would never leave me. He would never.”

Izzy saw the tightness in Decker’s face, then—she’d irritated him, apparently.

“Look, lady, I don’t know what to tell you. I know you’re upset. But like I said, these things happen. Doesn’t sound like a case of foul play.” He stood up, jammed his thumbs into his belt loops, and thrust out his chest. His stance reminded her of the cop she’d talked to when Larry scared her with the knife.