“Yeah, well, that’s all I got for you, man, swear. I will say this, though. She ain’t come back. She went off with her ma like poof. I figured in a week or so she’d peace out on rehab and come tap-tap-tapping at my window. Or I’d see her at any of our hangouts and we’d drift back together-like, the way we always done. But damned if I have.” Toby shook his head and made a spitting gesture. “Shit, maybe she did get clean. For now. But I know that girl. You want to find her, wait for her mom to kick it. She’ll be back with me before the body hits the ground.” He shrugged.

Marshall was already getting his phone out. He showed Toby the grainy picture from Bree’s security camera. The old woman, her eyes like black holes, stared boldly up into the camera. “You recognize this woman?”

Toby nodded. “Fuck, yeah. That’s her. Lexie’s mom. Spooky old bat, eh?”

Marshall had been almost sure, but now he knew. Lexie Pine was the daughter. He was on the right trail, for all that it was cold here. Time to go. He passed the bill over and let Toby disappear back inside. Then he went out and sat in his car to check his phone, setting his .38 out in easy reach beside him because he knew the neighborhood.

The first thing he opened was an email from Bree. It was long. Detailed. He sat in the car, looking up and checking his perimeter every few sentences, scanning the story Trey had told her.

Scanning wasn’t enough. He went back to the start and read it slow and careful, the way he would a witness statement, with his brain in neutral. As if it were possible to kill off every warring bias in his head.

It wasn’t possible. He finished it, then went back to the beginning again. This time he tried to read it the way Bree might. With a different, more believing bias. He read it as if Bree herself had witnessed these things and was telling him this story.

Even assuming it was gospel, he felt a deep fury growing toward Trey, singular and separate from any other feelings he had about Trey’s wife. The girl, Lexie-that-was, must have been so bright and so driven to parlay a high-school diploma from a public school in Eastern Jesus, Georgia, to a full ride at UVA. She’d grown herself a single, shining opportunity in a wasteland with no seeds or soil or light. She’d been driven out and lost it, while the boys suffered no consequences at all. He could see how, in Coral Lee’s eyes, her daughter’s life had been stolen. He could admit that her anger was righteous.