“James and I saw each other in Seattle, but he lived here, and once he and Megan . . . once they got together, she moved here to be near him.”

“Six months ago?”

“Around that time. Yes.”

“But she called you when they weren’t getting along?”

“More so lately.”

“That must’ve been awkward,” Mendoza observed.

“Well, yes. But I got over it.”

Was that a lie? Rivers couldn’t be sure. She was twisting her ring again, then, as if realizing it, stopped and put her hands in her lap.

“Is this your sister’s handwriting?” Rivers asked and slid the once-crumpled note in a plastic bag across the table. He knew the answer, had seen Megan’s loopy scrawl on notes in her apartment.

“Looks like it,” she said, nodding, her dark hair showing glints of red under the overhead lights. “Oh, Megan.” Sadness came over her then, as if she’d come to the fatal conclusion she might not see her sister again. “I assume you’ve talked to James.” She slid the note back.

“Yes.”

“But he can’t remember what happened. Right? That’s what he says?”

“He’s not clear.”

She snorted.

“Do you know a woman named Sophia Russo?” Mendoza checked her notes as if getting her information straight, but that was all for show. She’d already started tracking down the woman that Bobby Knowlton had told her James Cahill had been seeing.

She shook her head. “Is she the woman James was involved with?”

Mendoza said, “We don’t know.”

“Megan didn’t give me any names. She was so upset; she just let me know she was coming and was crying. She said she’d tell me all about it when she got to Seattle, but . . .” She let that thought trail off.

“Do you know anyone who would do her harm? Does she have any enemies?” Rivers asked.

“No . . .”

“How about friends she may have called?”

“I tried them,” she said.

“Do you have their names and numbers?”

“Some.”

“Would you share them?”

“Of course.”

Mendoza slid the legal pad across the table, and Rebecca, after checking her phone, used her own pen to write a short list of names and numbers. “I don’t really know who her friends are, not anymore, other than the one woman she worked with. The nurse.” She thought for a second. “Andie.”

“Andrea Jeffries,” Mendoza supplied. “We talked to her.” She glanced at Rivers, who gave a quick nod, but Jeffries, who had been interviewed by one of the deputies, hadn’t indicated she’d been close to Megan, just that they’d worked together for less than a year.

“That might be. I’ve never met her.” Rebecca pointed at the pad with the pen. “Those names are people from, like, high school, people I’ve met, but I’m not even sure she’s in contact with any of them. Don’t you have her phone records?”

Mendoza was nodding. “We do.”