To the master suite, where I’d showered in the massive white bathroom, where there was a huge white bed and another fireplace, this one gas, which Bear flicked on with a remote control. There was nothing over the windows, the panes just wood framed, tall, thin, bare to the outside. Anyone out there could see everything inside. The high ceiling. A sleek, three-blade fan, far above, that I kept my eyes on a lot of the time.

The bed felt like silk, like glass.

Don’t think, I thought, but what I meant to tell myself was not to want anything so hard.

Bear put his hands on my neck and told me to relax. He kissed the skin underneath my ear, down to my collarbone.

I thought I wasn’t even there, that it couldn’t be real, that I was imagining everything and I’d wake up in my twin bed with the power out, with Birdie singing while she sat on the toilet. Or maybe I was the one outside the window, watching a kid who looked like me, with this beautiful man, the hair on his belly just the way I’d hotly imagined.

But he snapped me to, grabbing my hand. “Do you want this?”

“Yes,” I said.

He burrowed his face in my neck. “Then stop fighting,” he said.

SIXTEEN: KATERI

MONDAY, OCTOBER 23

There are benefits to a small town. Having the bank know you by name when you walk in. Recognizing a lost dog and then knowing where his owner lives. Having one law office.

Kateri goes to the front desk at Bond, Sullivan, and King and speaks to the receptionist. The office is a large, converted farmhouse, the desk in a spacious front hall with an oak staircase leading up to offices. There’s a conference room that looks like a formal dining room, and at the back of the house, a kitchen.

The receptionist is a young woman, dark haired and pretty, just out of college or still in. Kateri shows her badge and tells her she needs information on a recently handled property issue.

The girl takes out a pad and starts jotting things down.

“The Jenkins property,” Kateri says, “was recently transferred to Shannon Jenkins.”

“Uh-huh,” the girl says. “I saw that.”

“Can you tell me which lawyer handled that?”

“Mr. Sullivan,” she says.

“Is Mr. Sullivan in?” Kateri asks. The downfalls of a small town sometimes include a slow pace, long lunches, people getting back to you when they feel like it. “It’s urgent,” Kateri says, and the girl straightens her back, picks up the phone.

Dan Sullivan meets her in the conference room. It’s annoyingly country in there: plaid wallpaper, dried flowers. It smells like apple-cinnamon candles.

“You’re aware,” Kateri says, “that we’re investigating the death of a deputy, Craig O’Neil, as well as the recent disappearance of Pearl Jenkins.” She doesn’t sit. She doesn’t want to give the impression of ample time, of a leisurely pace. She’s afraid someone else will end up dead. And that it might be the girl.