“I think you were still in high school when I left,” Caleb says after a while. “I drifted for a few years, and then enlisted in the navy. I was happy to be out of here, even when I went to the Persian Gulf.”

“Iran? That must have been tough.”

“Some of it, sure. I was there in ’79 during the Islamic Revolution. That was pretty intense, but the ocean was amazing. Super warm, not like this bitch.” He smiles. “I learned to free dive there. Oysters the size of fucking softballs. And the reefs were fucking incredible.” He takes a long slug from the Coors in his hand. “How about you?”

“I did half a year at San Francisco State, then dropped out and drifted for a bit. For a while I did Outward Bound trips in Yosemite.”

“That sounds cool.”

“It was fun, yeah, but started to feel like summer camp over time.”

“You didn’t want to be a ranger?”

“I thought about it, but police work felt more important. Once I entered the academy I gave it everything I had. I was interested in missing persons from the beginning. That seemed like the clearest way I could do some good. Never left the Bay Area.”

“Missing persons, huh?” He sounds surprised. “So are you here to help find that high-school girl?”

“No.” Not yet, my mind fills in, but I keep it to myself, uneasy about treading so close to old feelings. About conjuring up Jenny more than we already have. “I’m taking a break right now.”

“Oh, good, then.” He sounds like he means it. “Good for you.”

“Thanks.”

The sun is sinking fast now, staining the cloud line. Gulls draft over the chop below us, buoyed and free.

“This place,” Caleb says quietly, as if he’s read my mind.

“I know.”

(eleven)

One particularly bad year at Searchlight, when I’d dealt with three dead kids in a handful of months, Frank Leary sent me to a therapist. “It’s not a punishment,” he said. “Just protocol. You’ve been through a lot, Anna.”

“I’m fine.”

“Good. Let’s keep it that way.”

The therapist’s name was Corolla, like the car. Her office was in the Embarcadero with a view of the Bay Bridge. Only a small, metallic sliver of the bridge was recognizable from her window, a toothpick-sized joke if you were going to charge for it. She had an Eames chair and red-framed Sally Jessy Raphael glasses, and a cashmere poncho that covered her knees, the triangle tip pointing at the conservative Persian carpet when she crossed her legs.

How was this going to work? I wondered. How could I possibly tell this woman in a poncho anything of consequence? And why would I want to? I was good at my job and had a strong track record. We hadn’t saved these three, but that happened. We would save the next one. We would keep fighting.