The Twitter Twins idled at the gate for a moment, wrinkling their noses. Then Lili shrugged and said something to Gabby that Emma couldn’t hear. The two of them smiled, and Gabby threw the vehicle into reverse. Both girls gave Emma a three-finger wave as they pulled away.

Emma waited a few beats for her heart to slow down. Then she turned to the impound worker. “I’m here to pick up my car,” she said, her voice cracking.

“Come in here.” The worker led Emma to the building inside the lot. “I need your driver’s license and credit card.”

Emma handed over Sutton’s license from her wallet. The worker typed something into a dusty keyboard and stared at the screen. A wrinkle formed on his brow. “Sutton Mercer?” he repeated. “1965 Volvo?”

“That’s right,” Emma said, remembering the details from Sutton’s police file.

The man gave her a long, suspicious look. “It says here that you picked up this vehicle nearly a month ago.”

Emma blinked. “What?”

“It’s right here. You signed it out on the morning of August thirty-first. The fine was paid in full.” He twisted the monitor to show Emma the screen. She stared at a scan of the car’s release form. There, at the bottom, next to the X, was Sutton’s signature.

A memory bloomed in my mind: I had been here before. I remembered the leaky Bic pen that I used to sign the release forms. I remembered hearing my phone ring and feeling a jolt of happiness. But before I could get a look at the screen, the vision tunneled and blinked off.

Emma stared at Sutton’s signature, that swooping S, the humps of the M. It was another clear link to what Sutton was doing the day she died, but it felt like her investigation had taken a huge left turn. Why hadn’t Sutton told anyone she’d signed out the car that day? And where was Sutton’s car now?

The man cleared his throat, breaking Emma from her thoughts. “This is your signature, right?”

Emma’s tongue felt like it was made of lead. She wasn’t sure how to answer. Should she say it wasn’t and report the car stolen? But what if she did that and then the police found Sutton’s body in the trunk? As soon as that happened, Emma would be arrested—without any other evidence, she was the most likely suspect in her sister’s murder: the unlucky twin trying to escape a life of poverty.

“Uh . . . I guess I made a mistake,” she croaked. Then she backed out of the little booth and into the blinding sunset.