Marion Street. Carroll Street. Lafayette Avenue. Soulard Street.

Maybe Matty hadn’t meant the Soulard area. Maybe he had been trying to tell Shaw what street he was on.

Cranking the wheel, Shaw swerved down Soulard. This street, like so many others, was cramped with cars parked on either side. The asphalt was old and broken—but that was better than the streets still paved with brick. On the next corner, a restaurant called Twisted Ranch had its lights off and the windows dark. Then a long open parking lot reserved for the Lutheran church. Then the Soulard Soap Laundromat, security lights framing the building in a sterile white screen—a bright island that ended abruptly where darkness swallowed the alley.

At the next intersection, Shaw hesitated. If he kept following this street, he’d leave the Soulard area. How far might Matty have run? That was the kind of question North was good at, and right then, Shaw could have used his help. But he didn’t have North, and so he let the Mercedes idle at the intersection.

Soulard. Matty had only said Soulard. And if Shaw’s guess was right, and Matty had been trying to tell him the street name, that was important because it wasn’t a very long road and it wasn’t a major thoroughfare.

What would North do?

That soft pop of the leather strap echoed in Shaw’s head.

Shaw forced himself to think. Matty’s building was west of here and closer to the water. If Matty had fled his apartment, frightened, he probably hadn’t been thinking clearly. So what would he do? He’d either follow the easiest path, or he’d follow the most familiar path, letting his brain run on autopilot. Easiest meant downhill, toward the water. If Matty had gone that way, he would have passed through some very rough territory—and Shaw would need to hurry his search.

But what if Matty had let routine take over? What if he had gotten out of the building and, in too much of a panic to think rationally, he had gone the way he always went when he left his building? I have coffee at the farmers market every morning they’re open, he had said. I just walk a few blocks and I’m there. If Matty had come this way, if he’d gone toward the farmers market like he did most mornings, then this would be about the exact midpoint between his apartment and the market. He might have recovered from his panic enough, by this point, to make a call. He might have pulled himself together enough to stop running. To hide. To try to get help.

Shaw pulled around the corner, parked, and left the Mercedes. He jogged back down Soulard. When he passed through the glare of the laundromat’s security lights, something rattled in the alley’s darkness. A cat. Or a raccoon. Or a possum. All of them likely. Much more likely than a badly frightened boy. But Shaw turned toward the noise.

Another five feet, and Shaw left the sharp demarcation of the security lights. He stopped. He was sweating, even with the damp April air sucking the heat from his body, but he wasn’t shaking. That was remarkable. He wasn’t even cold. And back at North’s house, he had been shaking like a three-day-dry drunk.