“We have a photo we’d like you to look at, sir. To see if you recognize it as one of the men that you kicked out of here on Tuesday night.” A.L. pulled his phone. Thumbed through his messages. Held the phone out for the older man to see.

Mr. Gibacki stared at it. For a whole minute. Finally, he looked up. “His hair was much longer, more wild-looking. But I think it’s him.”

As A.L. and Rena brought Chief Faster up to speed on Coyote Frogg, his eyes started to dance. It took just seconds, really, for the man to make several leaps in logic. One, that Coyote Frogg’s father had been a person of intense interest in the Corrine Antler disappearance. Two, that perhaps the Dover police had been too focused on the father and had not spent enough energy on the son. And three, if Coyote Frogg could be found, there was a chance to solve not one but two kidnappings.

What didn’t get said was that it just felt better that it was a stranger than a family member.

Faster rubbed his hands together. “I’ve already had a call from the mayor this morning. His office is getting lots of pressure to solve this case. When people don’t feel as if their children are safe, they don’t have much tolerance for anything else that isn’t quite right in the community. He’s going to be happy to hear this news.”

A.L. said nothing. His own heart had beat fast when Mr. Gibacki had identified Coyote Frogg’s photo as the same man he’d booted from his restaurant on Tuesday night. He understood the interest in finding Coyote Frogg. But he also knew that eyewitness testimony was more unreliable than most people realized. Mistakes were made all the time.

“I want the two of you back in Dover. The Frogg family lived there for more than twenty-five years. There have to be distant relatives or former friends, somebody who can lead us to Coyote Frogg.”

“We’re going to need a warrant to get more information out of the medical record,” A.L. said. That would include information on the patient’s tattoos.”

“I’ll get it for you,” Faster said. “And I’ll fill in the FBI and others.”

The man had a head of steam going and there was no sense in trying to convince him not to get too focused on one person. He’d never been a great cop and he never would be. And right now, he was in charge. So that meant A.L. and Rena were going to Dover.

And he could be right. A.L. didn’t want his own issues with Faster to cloud the possibility that this really could be the break they were looking for. “Ready,” he said, looking at Rena.