Lost in thought, Ben wandered down the stairs and out the back door into the garden, where he grabbed a shovel. Perhaps the only outcome of all of this would be that he ended up looking very foolish, but Marla had some explaining to do anyway, didn’t she? Those were Todd Sutton’s keys hidden in a shoe in her closet. He scanned the garden, trying to figure out what she would have done if she’d wanted to bury someone. Spying the location where she’d put the cement bench that he knew she’d ordered last fall, he went over and shoved it away, surprised at its weight. The length was about right, and there were telltale signs of an extra layer of fresh lime mixed with the surrounding plants and soil.

He couldn’t imagine how she might have dug a deep-enough hole, but then he hadn’t been focused on this house and garden all those weeks after Todd Sutton’s disappearance. He’d been down at Cabot Farms with Lara. He dug quickly but soon became winded. About three or four feet into the ground, Ben stepped into the hole to get a better angle. After many more shovelfuls, the blade hit something that sounded like stone but wasn’t. Ben’s shovel ripped free a layered piece of denim from what appeared to be a corpse. He pushed some dirt away to find a gray Chuck Taylor sneaker.

It was the sneaker. The one that Lara had described multiple times in police reports. He’d noticed that sneaker on every man since, looking up to see if it was attached to a man who looked like Todd Sutton.

Oh Jesus. Ben leaned against the opening he’d dug. He rubbed his jaw. This is real.

Struggling to process everything in front of him—the physical evidence as well as the crazy tale of the circus that he’d read—he crawled out of the hole and began to pace. Just as he was about to return to the house to call Doyle on the kitchen phone, he heard the iron gate shut.

“What are you doing here?” She was wearing a pair of jeans, a black Lacoste polo shirt, and espadrilles.

Ben followed her eyes to the pit he’d just dug in their garden. “I should ask you the same question.”

Her hands were in her pockets. Her long chestnut-colored hair hung below her shoulders, and her clear blue eyes were bright. She looked exactly like the woman he’d known all these years. She peered into the hole, expressionless.

Ben pointed to the grave. “That is Todd fucking Sutton, Marla.” He moved toward the kitchen door.

“Where are you going?” Her voice had risen a degree, but no more.

“I’m calling Doyle.”