On our side, it’s better, too. When there’s motive, you can trace the pieces—drugs, abuse, broken relationships, whatever they are—backward. From head hitting windshield, to perpetrator getting into car, to stealing keys, to roommate fistfight, scorned lover, drug deal gone wrong, or gambling debt. It’s harder to find a murderer if they’ve chosen someone at random. That’s one reason they say truck drivers make good serial killers. Always on the road, moving from place to place, no time to form connections who might rat you out but enough time to stash the body. But no one thinks there’s a serial hit-and-runner out there. They think it’s a car thief, who somehow managed to hit the owner of the vehicle nowhere near the location it was stolen, freaked out, and drove off. The driver ditched the car in the woods, drove it into a lake, or hid it in a garage. Whatever he did, without the car, there are no ties. Without motive, even fewer. No strand to follow. Nothing to go on.

I stop by my desk and feel Truman’s eyes through his window. My folder with the call sheets is still there, but it’s closed and neatly put aside, like Teddy or Oliver had been rolling back and forth between their desks and mine, flipping through my notes, and decided they were no longer necessary. There’s also a button blinking on my office phone. I shake my head as I dial my voicemail. Why people still call this thing instead of my cell, I’ll never know.

“Hey, Marlitt, it’s Ben” —a small hesitation— “from Missing Persons.” In my mind, I see a wiry middle-aged white guy with thinning hair and a tired smile. The kind of guy you could meet and instantly forget, except we go back—Missing Persons has to call us in more than they would like—and one of my first cases started with a phone call like this, with Ben’s soft voice on the other end, asking for assistance on a missing-woman case. “Listen, I sent over a file for you, may be nothing, but just take a look and let me know what you think. Give me a call this afternoon if you can.”

Perhaps it’s the lack of urgency in Ben’s voice—normally a call from Missing Persons has you feeling like you’re racing against an accelerating clock—but I forget about Ben’s call and the manila envelope as soon as I slip it into my bag. Instead, I flip open the Kemp folder and run my finger down the call sheet. There’s something here, I’m sure of it, just like I was before.

The door to Truman’s office opens, and I stuff the folder next to Ben’s envelope before Oliver turns.

I call Teddy again on my way out the door, but it goes straight to voicemail.