Rivers thought she felt a little worse than she was admitting and decided to push it. “So where were you on the night Megan Travers went missing?”

Jennifer Korpi blinked, surprised. “You think I had something to do with that? Really? It wasn’t Megan who broke us up. It was that sister of hers—Rebecca. I thought I made that clear a second ago.” Jennifer’s voice held more than a smidgeon of irritation, and she let out a huff of disgusted air. “As to your question. I was with Gus the night Megan went missing. We grabbed a pizza at Mario’s. Ate it back at his place and watched the game. The Hawks were on.”

Rivers knew the Seahawks had been playing the Forty-Niners. He’d watched the Seattle team lose the lead and go down in the fourth quarter.

Jennifer wasn’t finished. “As I said, I already told the Marysville police about it. Wait.” She stopped as if a sudden thought struck her. “Didn’t Gus back me up?”

“He did.” Mendoza was nodding.

“Well . . . ?” Holding up a hand as if that explained everything, she looked at Rivers, silently accusing him of being dumb as a stone not to come up with what she considered an obvious conclusion. Her phone buzzed, and she said, “Excuse me, I really have to take this,” then answered quickly and walked to a corner of the room, turning her back on them. Mendoza watched her, while Rivers moved around a bit. He walked to her desk and saw a still-wet tea bag in one of the coffee cups as he heard her part of the conversation. “Hey, I’m with the police now . . . yeah, the missing woman thing . . . soon, I think . . .”

He noticed the tension ball and, shifting his body so that his back was a shield and neither woman could see his actions, plucked the purple sphere nimbly from her desk and slipped it into his pocket before continuing through the room. A glance up confirmed what he’d thought—no cameras surveying the room. Walking along the windows, where the rain peppered the glass and the tape on a paper angel was failing, one of its wings sagging, he eavesdropped on the private conversation.

“Yeah, I know . . . won’t be long. Then I need to run to the hospital. Gus was in an accident . . . I think he’ll be okay. But I really have to go now,” Jennifer was saying. “Yeah. Love you too.” She clicked off as Rivers reached the leaning Christmas tree and terrarium. The lizard inside blinked his eyes slowly.