He held up a hand. “Fine. Can you please keep your voice down so that Traci isn’t a part of this conversation?”

Jacqui pressed her lips together. “Fine,” she said.

“I... I don’t ask you for a lot, Jacqui. I pretty much let you set the rules about when and where I get to see Traci. And you’ve been fair and we’ve managed to work through things. All I’m asking is that you not purposely screw up what I’ve got going with Tess.”

She stared at him.

He stared back.

“Is that all?” she asked finally.

“Yeah. That’s all.”

She turned. “You can let yourself out, A.L.”

He did just that. He was pretty sure he’d gotten his message across but whether Jacqui chose to heed the request was anyone’s guess.

Fourteen

The next morning, Rena was drumming her fingers on her desk when A.L. arrived at 6:30. She looked as if she had something to tell him. “What?” he asked.

“We checked for the wrong sister,” she announced.

“I’ve only had one cup of coffee. You’re going to have to give me more than that.”

“We checked to make sure that Kara Wiese didn’t have a sister.”

“And that her mother was dead,” he added.

She waved a hand. “This is about sisters.”

“Okay,” he said. He pulled out his chair.

“Alice Quest has a sister,” Rena said. “We never checked for that. There was no reason to.”

“And this is important because?”

“Because she lives in Dover.”

A.L. picked up his empty coffee cup and set it back down. “Very little in life is a coincidence.”

“You always say that.”

“Because it’s true,” A.L. said. “What’s her name?”

“Melissa Wayne.”

“Older? Younger?”

“Older by two years. Alice is fifty-two. Melissa just turned fifty-four. Alice lied to us. Looked us right in the eye and lied. We were talking about Brenda Owen calling her and we asked her if she knew Dover and she said no. Her sister lives there.”

“She also said that she’d never heard about Corrine Antler. Guess we don’t know if that’s true or not,” he said.

“I’m going to find out,” Rena said. “I’m pissed at her and...I guess disappointed.”

“Yeah, doesn’t look good for Alice,” A.L. said. “Do you think it’s even possible that there is any intersect between Alice and Rosemary Bracken?”

“I thought of that. Nothing that I’ve been able to find thus far. But I think I’m going back to Dover.”

“Your gut is talking to you again?” A.L. asked.

“I think its heartburn,” she said. “Maybe you should go back to the psychic and ask her about Dover.”

“I think I’m going to talk to a few more parents, ask some more specific questions about Alice.”

“Are we in danger of missing the trees for the forest?”