“Wow … that’s cool.”

“Hayley, shut up!”

She held my shoulders, and I started to cry. She hugged me tightly and I let her do it. “You’re okay, Cin, you’re okay.”

“It was just so awful … that horrible noise!” I pulled away. “We’ve got to find the purse. We’ve got to find out who she is … was.”

“I know he’s a jerk, Decker. I know I’m a jerk for going out with him, especially ’cause he still likes you—”

“Not the time for a psychodrama, Marx.” I stepped away from her and took in my surroundings. The body had landed around ten feet from a stucco office building encircled by a three-foot hedge of waxy privet. Maybe the purse landed somewhere in the bushes. I began separating branch from branch. It was dark and I was looking into black holes.

“Maybe you’d do better if you could see.” Hayley offered me the flashlight. I took it and shone the beam into the thick leaves.

“Thanks.”

“How about I hold while you look?”

I nodded. “Thanks.” A pause. “I know I’m being a butt.”

“You’re fine, Decker, but you witnessed something shocking. Oliver’s right. You should sit down.”

Sharp twigs scratched the back of my hands. “Oliver’s not right about anything.”

“How long have you been going with this guy?”

“A week. It’s nothing, okay? You know you can shine the light and look at the same time.”

Hayley began a perfunctory search through the flora. “First date?”

“Third.”

“Third … It’s going well then.”

“Can I get a little illumination over here?”

She shifted the angle of the beam. “You do anything yet?”

I didn’t answer.

Excitement in her voice. “Is he good?”

Again I didn’t answer.

More excitement. “Is it true what they say about black guys?”

It took herculean effort not to punch her out, but once more I didn’t answer.

Hayley was staring into the bushes, bringing the light into focus on something. “What’s this?”

“What?”

“That!” It was rectangular in shape and made from chrome or steel or silver. It winked in the dark. She squinted. “Maybe a pop-top?”

I went in for a closer inspection. “Too big. It could have come from her purse. We shouldn’t touch it … although I don’t know why.”

“Just in case.” Hayley reached in her own purse and pulled out a tissue. “Here.”

I retrieved the metal and was surprised to find it attached to a chain. It was the type of dog tag usually worn by GIs. The surface was embossed with a name, a phone number, and a notice that the wearer was on Dilantin and phenobarbital, and was allergic to penicillin and all its derivatives as well as erythromycin and all its derivatives.

“This is one ill girl.”

“‘Belinda Syracuse.’” Hayley read the inscription in the beam of light. “Think it’s her?”

I took out my cell phone, my heart thumping in my chest. “There’s one way to find out.” As I phoned the number, I had an eerie sense of déjà vu. Then I began to sweat, thinking about what I’d say to whoever answered the phone at three-thirty in the morning. After three rings, a machine kicked in. When the recorded voice told me who was on the other end of the line, I gasped and dropped the phone. It bounced several times but didn’t break.