“Don’t worry, I’m fine,” she said, as if we’d expressed concern.

Milo said, “Now what else are you going to tell us?”

“I swear there’s nothing, guys. It’s not like I actually met her. Or him. To us they’re just names.”

We waited her out.

She said, “I swear.”

“One more question: Did anyone else named Suss log onto your site?”

She hesitated, threw up her hands, typed. “Negative.”

“What about Longellos?” He spelled it.

“Negative.”

“Okay, Suki, we’re leaving now but if we find out you held back on anything—”

“I haven’t,” she said. “That would be poor judgment and I’m known for good judgment. We’re going to button things down even tighter from now on, but no one ever accused any of us of being stupid.”

“Let’s hear it for the Agajanian kids,” he said.

“We’re achievers. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. Now, I really need to get to those emails.”

We left her at her desk, texting with one hand, typing with the other. But before we reached the door to the hallway, she was running toward us, barefoot. “Could I ask you one thing—you don’t have to answer but I really need to ask. How’d you actually connect us with her? Tara. Whatever her real name is.”

“Just what we told you,” said Milo. “Anonymous tip.”

Ashen innocence gave way to a crafty smile. “C’mon, guys, really.”

“Really.”

“That doesn’t make sense. Who’d want to screw us like that? That’s totally sneaky and low.”

Milo said, “Anonymous tips are our bread and butter.”

“That’s so sad.”

“What is?”

“People messing with each other.”

He winked at her. “We love our job anyway.”

As we walked to the elevator, he said, “Truth is, I’ve been wondering about the tip myself, trying to figure out who else knew about any of this. With all the trouble Muhrmann and Tara and probably Connie Longellos took to cover their tracks, you’d think they wouldn’t confide in anyone else.”

I kept my voice even. “You’d think.”

In the car, he said, “Rich family, it’s all gonna boil down to mow-ney.”

I said, “How about this for a soap opera: Suss fell quickly into lust, started out paying Tara a monthly allowance, no big deal for someone with his net worth. Then he became emotionally involved and upped the stipend. With Stevie and Connie and Tara splitting the proceeds, that kind of progress was in everyone’s interest. But the goose keeled over unexpectedly, the income stream dribbled out, and not only did Tara refuse to hook up with another Daddy, she wanted a lump-sum payment to finance her retirement, threatened Connie she’d tell the rest of the family about the scheme. That would mean more than lost income to Connie. It would spell disaster.”