But he did know the cases.

And now that she’d talked with him more, she thought Dan seemed like a haunted man. Not by ghosts—though, it appeared he was—but by the past. The murder scenes he’d witnessed had apparently done something to him. He was passionate about finding the truth.

“I think we should bring Dan into this on a double-pronged deal,” Adam said. They had ordered; she’d assured him the shrimp and grits here were about the best to be found anywhere, and the table had ordered the meal along with Mama Didi’s famous corn bread and salads.

“Ryder Stapleton, with the NOPD, told me I needed to have a survivor hire me,” Dan said, looking straight at Katie.

She sighed. “I do all right, but I don’t have the funds to hire a private investigator.”

“I’ll take a dollar,” he told her.

The man was serious.

“Of course, we’ll bring you in as a consultant,” Adam Harrison said. “I believe we’ll be taking lead in the case, and if so, that is all you need. But, Katie, yes—give him a dollar. Hire him officially.”

“Okay,” she said slowly.

Axel laughed. “Now. You need to give him a dollar now. It’s a verbal contract witnessed by Adam and me.”

She dug in her pocket for a dollar and gave it to Dan.

There was something in the pained look he gave her as he accepted it that suddenly made it all seem more palatable to her.

“So we’re set,” Adam said. “We have a great artist in the NOLA office. We’ll go to him for the sketches as soon as we’ve finished eating.”

Their food arrived. Dan compared it to a place a friend of his owned that was in the Irish Channel.

“You really have family here?” Katie asked Dan.

He hesitated and shrugged. “I have family here—they’re in Lafayette Cemetery. I do have a sister not so far away—she’s living in Baton Rouge. I grew up going back and forth. My dad’s family—and my mom—are in Lafayette Cemetery.”

“I’m sorry,” she told him.

He nodded and said quietly, “They had good lives. They were happy together. The two of them lived in Florida as their main home, but the house I’m living in has been in my family for years.”

“And it’s in New Orleans?” she asked.

“French Quarter,” he told her.

“Ah. Well, I guess that’s New Orleans, all right,” she said. She was surprised to feel her cheeks redden. She felt a bit bad about assuming he’d followed her to the city when she’d first seen him.

“Katie, you remember these people, right? What they looked like?” Axel asked her.

“Of course.”

“It was twelve years ago,” Dan said.

“You don’t forget a day like that,” she said.