Although the sun was up, Cyrus used his flashlight to scan the little front yard. He didn’t find anything in the weedy grass. Before he could check the backyard, Nora pulled up in her Mustang and parked in front of the house on the street. Thank God, she was dressed normal. Jeans, white tank, sneakers. Duffle bag, which probably had that cock-ring chastity thing in it.

“Over here,” he said and waved her to the front door.

“You heard back from Sister Margaret yet about the message?” Nora asked.

“Not yet.”

Using the key Katherine had given him, Cyrus opened the front door and let them both in the house.

They paused at the entryway as if afraid to go in further. The house didn’t look like the scene of a crime. The clean-up was over. No red left on the old oak floors. It just looked like a little guest house—bookshelves filled with mismatched knickknacks and old books that either came from Goodwill or ought to go there, ugly plaid sofa, coffee table from the ’70s, wallpaper from the ’60s, brick fireplace plugged up since the ’50s. Why do it here? Of all the places to kill yourself…

“It’s clean,” Cyrus said, glancing around. “Nothing to worry about.”

“Why do you look so worried then?” Nora asked. She didn’t look too relaxed herself.

“We’re not supposed to be here, technically. So look hard and fast and try not to mess anything up.”

Nora nodded. Cyrus said, “Good luck.”

He left her in the living room while he walked through to the kitchen and out the backdoor. With his flashlight he made a circuit of the yard. Didn’t find anything. Not until he went all the way around the side of the house again and noticed paper sticking out of the mailbox.

He knew he shouldn’t be digging through the mail—federal crime and all that—but it wouldn’t kill him to look. Turned out the box was stuffed solid with several days of mail. Junk mostly. Flyers and notices. But there was something else, a big pink envelope, the kind that went with a big greeting card. Except this envelope had no address or name written on it, no return address or stamp. And it didn’t hold a card. It held something hard, something solid, something that jingled.

Shaking, Cyrus pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and grasped the envelope by the corner before he got his fingerprints all over it. Cyrus stepped into the front door and found Nora had taken all the couch cushions off and was digging through the seats.

“Come here. I got something.”

She stood up fast and Cyrus nodded toward the kitchen where there was good bright light.

At the kitchen counter, Cyrus laid the envelope down.

“Feels like keys,” he explained to Nora as he dug latex gloves out of his pocket. “Sounds like them, too.”

He turned the envelope over. Holding the flap down was a sticker.

“A butterfly,” Nora said.

That’s what it was, all right. A round sticker about the size of a half dollar with an illustration of a monarch butterfly.