“It probably won’t come to that,” she said. “Let me remind you, this is a huge step for Wingfield. We don’t think he actually planned Tanya’s murder. It seems like more of a crime of passion, or opportunity. Yeah, he wanted her off his payroll, but at no time did he ever mention violence to me. As far as we know, he doesn’t have a lot of acquaintances in the criminal world.”

“As far as you know,” Joe said pointedly. “There’s a wild card in this situation, you know.”

“You mean Declan Rooney?”

He nodded. “I ran a search on him. There are still warrants out for him in a couple different jurisdictions around Florida, but he seems to have flown off the radar. Do the feds know anything about his whereabouts?”

Vikki Hill chewed on the end of a breadstick. “No.”

“Does that mean you don’t know, or the feds don’t know, or you know but can’t acknowledge that you know where Rooney is?”

“Sometimes, Joe, a no is just a no,” she said. She glanced at her phone, which was sitting on the bar top beside her, then drained her wineglass and gestured to the bartender for her check. “Gotta go. See you back at the motel, right?”

“Maybe. You’ll call me as soon as you know something, right? I’m taking PTO for the next couple days, so I’ll be around.”

Letty awoke with a start. It was still pitch-black outside. Ten after two in the morning. She got out of bed and checked on Maya, who was still sleeping. She heard it then, a faint sound, like metal scraping on metal. Her heart thudded in her chest.

She crept into the living room, moved the curtain aside, and peeked out the front window. The breezeway outside the unit was empty. Beyond, in the parking lot, Midnight, the motel’s pregnant resident black cat, slunk into the shadows. She exhaled slowly and stood still, listening.

The faint skriiiiccch sound repeated, and her heart beat even faster. Letty stepped into the darkness and moved slowly toward the sliding glass door, her legs trembling so badly she was amazed she couldn’t hear her knees knocking together. It was nothing, she told herself, a leaf scraping against a window screen. The curtains were partially open, allowing a sliver of light to fall onto the floor, and she silently cursed herself for forgetting to draw them before she’d gone to bed.

Had she remembered to lock the slider? She took two steps forward and stopped in her tracks when she saw something move on the patio. She leaned forward again and peeked outside.