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She smiled an old smile as she traced the edges with a finger. “Anthony DiMorello. He was handsome and reckless. Drank like a fish. Always finding trouble. He wasn’t the brightest, but his heart was usually in the right place.

“Then there was Karl. Karl Miller was a sweet man.” She shook her head and her smile fell away. “It never made sense to me, that a guy like Karl could leave his wife and run off with some other woman. He was too good a man to do something like that. I used to think that your father’s friends were so connected, so dependent on one another, that together they made a whole person. Karl was the heart of that person.”

“What was Anthony?”

“He was the muscle,” she laughed. “I guess you could say Craig Reinnert was the conscience. The future city councilman; well-spoken, well-dressed, always trying to keep an upstanding face. Uptight, Anthony used to call him.” My mother bit her lip, lost somewhere in a memory. “Then there was your father. He was the soul—the living, breathing, dreaming core. He was the glue that brought them all together, sweeping them all up in his big plans and his big ideas.” She trailed off, as if she was watching him go.

“What about Jason Fowler. What was he like?”

She heaved a sigh while she thought about him. “Jeremy’s dad was the brains of the club. And he never let you forget it. Heaven help you if you disagreed with him. He and Reggie used to go fisticuffs all the time.” She laughed at the memory. “Then Karl would peel them off each other, and Anthony would take them all out for drinks until the fight was water under the bridge.”

My mother handed the photo back to me, her thumb covering Reggie Wiles’s missing face.

“Was Reggie Wiles a friend?” I asked.

My mother’s smile was deeply sad. “He was once. Your dad’s
best
friend.”

“What was his role in the group?”

She looked away. “Oh, I don’t know,” she said with a dismissive wave. “I guess he was the id. All need and want and raw ambition. Reggie Wiles was always hungry. And when he wanted something, nothing could stand in his way.”

“Were you afraid of him?”

Her smile crumbled, and I watched her struggle to build it back up again. She pulled me in close to her side. Her worry was a gnawing acid. It climbed up my throat and I felt her push it back down. “No more than you should be.”

I
AWOKE ON
S
ATURDAY MORNING
with my cell phone in my hand. More than two days since I’d seen Reece at Gentleman Jim’s, and even though I wasn’t exactly sure what I needed to hear or what I expected him to say, a not so small part of me ached for him to figure it out.

A car door slammed and I leaped to the window, still clutching the phone. Reece wasn’t there. But my neighbor emerged from her trailer, still wearing her nightgown, leaning up on her toes to get a better look at some invisible point down the street.

I dropped the curtain and ran to the front porch, where I was greeted by the muted drone of a police radio. A crowd had gathered at the bottom of Sunny View Drive, all of them staring toward Lonny Johnson’s trailer.

A strand of yellow-and-black police tape cordoned off a perimeter around Lonny’s Lexus, his driveway, then wrapped around the narrow property surrounding his trailer. Two police cars parked alongside the gravel street.

I ran back to my room and got dressed. Grabbing my cell phone and house keys, I left, quietly bolting the door so I wouldn’t wake my mother.

I wove my way toward Lonny’s trailer, through the crowd of curious neighbors. Arrests in Sunny View weren’t all that uncommon. And patrol cars did regular drive-bys almost every day. So why did it seem like the entire neighborhood was standing in the street watching? What had they all come to see?

Billy Wiles opened his door and squinted down the street. He scrubbed a filthy hand over his sleepy red eyes and the whiskers on his face, and scowled as I walked by, like the noise that had woken him had been my fault. Then he pulled on a tattered button-down and ambled off his porch toward the Bui Mart, like the show wasn’t worth his time.

Mrs. Moates stood in a circle of the neighborhood gossips, one of her mangy-looking cats weaving in and out of her ankles. She held another tightly to her bathrobe while she stroked its head and talked too loudly. I listened, picking up bits of conversation. Piecing them together. The police had come that morning with a warrant. Had searched Lonny’s car. And then his trailer. Adrienne Wilkerson was dead.

So that was it. Everyone knew about Adrienne now. But that didn’t explain what the police were doing here. Or the yellow tape.

Deputies in uniform took up positions around the tight perimeter. Behind them, a detective I didn’t recognize held open the trailer door. Lonny appeared, with his hands cuffed. Our eyes caught and held. His stare was insistent, demanding something from me as he slowly descended his porch steps.

I surveyed the scene, the faces of the cops. The strange man standing off to the side that didn’t look like a cop or a neighbor. I stood on tiptoes as someone stepped into my way, desperate for a better look. But the man was gone.

The detective escorted Lonny under the police tape toward a line of parked police cars. Lonny watched me from the corner of his eye. If I let them arrest him, I might not get another chance to talk with him. To find out what happened.

I ran alongside them. “Please,” I said. “I’m a friend. Can I talk to him, just for a minute?”

The detective ignored me, directing Lonny into the back of a waiting cruiser. Lonny’s eyes never left mine as they took him away.

• • •

Three hours later, I sat in an empty interview room in the police station, my forehead resting on the cool metal table and my phone hot in my hands. I lifted my head to check the screen again. No missed calls. No new messages. Reece hadn’t called since I’d seen him at the club. Hadn’t sent a single text message to apologize, or even try to explain. I’d called Gena for a ride to the station, and nagged her until she finally conceded to talk to Alex and arrange for me to see Lonny.

My head snapped up when the doorknob turned and Alex came in. He looked tired. Inconvenienced. It was long past the end of his shift, and he probably wanted nothing more than to go home. He dropped into the chair across from me.

“What’s happening to Lonny?” I asked.

Alex clenched his jaw, and I wondered if Gena would ever hear the end of it for making him help me. “Lonny’s in a temporary holding cell until his attorney can get here. I pulled some strings and bought you five minutes. That’s all you’ve got. Get in, say what you need to say, and get out. Got it?”

“What’s he being held for?”

“He’s in for questioning. He hasn’t been charged yet.”

“Charged for what? Why is his trailer all taped off?”

Alex looked me over. If I were anyone else, the conversation would have been over.

“A girl named Adrienne Wilkerson was murdered. Her body was found by hikers in Mount Vernon District Park.” Alex paused. “She lived in Sunny View. You know her?”

I shook my head. “Not well. What does this have to do with Lonny?”

“Maybe the question you should be asking is, what does this have to do with you?”

Truth was, I had asked myself the same question. Over and over again. “I’m just trying to help.”

Alex muttered a frustrated curse. “You don’t owe him any favors. He’s been in and out of this place so many times, Nicholson might as well install a revolving door with Lonny Johnson’s name on it.”

“So you’re saying he’ll be out of here soon? That they’ll let him go?” If that was the case, I could just go home.

“No. What I’m saying is he can’t be helped, Leigh. I know you’ve got a thing for bad boys and all, but—”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means he can’t be fixed. Lonny’s rap sheet is a mile long and with his record, it doesn’t look good.” Alex took a weary breath. “Look, I shouldn’t be telling you this, but the investigators got a lead from someone who claimed they saw Lonny and Adrienne together the night she disappeared. Lonny doesn’t have an alibi and the evidence suggests he was involved.”

“What kind of evidence?”

Alex shook his head. “Come on, Leigh. You know I can’t tell you that.”

“Do you think he did it?” I blurted without thinking. Alex knew Lonny Johnson better than anyone. He’d spent nine months undercover as Lonny’s right-hand man. They’d gotten close. Lonny had trusted him.

Alex paused, thoughtful. If I touched him, I suspected he would taste like disappointment and regret. Like maybe I wasn’t the only one who wished I knew how to save a guy like Lonny Johnson. “I don’t think he’ll walk this time,” he said quietly. “So you don’t need to worry about repaying any favors. But if you want to take your five minutes and say good-bye, they’re probably going to transfer him to county detention later tonight.”

Alex led me to the desk in the holding area. He asked permission before checking my clothes for contraband, then directed me inside. The holding area was exactly what I’d imagined —a narrow corridor lined with cells. A uniformed officer stood beside an open cell door. Head down, I almost bumped into the prisoner emerging from it. I uttered an apology, but when I looked up into his face, my throat filled with something hot and sour.

Reece stood in the corridor in a rumpled shirt, dumbfounded and staring at me, waiting as the officer opened the adjacent cell and released a girl with bloodshot eyes. She slipped her arms around Reece’s shoulders, letting her sleep-matted hair fall over them.

“What’s the holdup, babe?” Her voice was raspy. She looked up at him with a full-lipped smile, then at me. Her eyes lit with recognition. “Wait, isn’t that the girl from the club?” I watched, my chest clenching like a fist as her fingers snaked into his. Eyes burning, I stared at their hands. This was her. The girl on the cell phone. The one at Gentleman Jim’s. I stood, blocking the corridor, waiting for him to shake her off, but he didn’t.

He darted a quick look at Alex. Past me. Through me.

Alex cleared his throat quietly, pulling me gently aside to let them pass. Reece grabbed the girl’s hand and pulled her to the door.

“I’m so ready to get out of here. Want to go to my place?” the raspy-voiced girl asked Reece. Alex nudged me on, and the door to the holding area shut before I could hear Reece’s answer.

A knot swelled in my throat. It was all that was holding back the tears.

“It’s not what it looks like, Leigh,” Alex said.

“You’re defending him?” I choked out.

“No. I think he’s an asshole. You deserve better.”

“Better than what?”

“Better than someone who spends more time in lockup than in class.”

“I thought you all were supposed to be on the same side.”

Alex cast a wary glance at the cells. All but one was empty—Lonny’s—but Alex lowered his voice anyway. “He’s an informant, Leigh. Not a cop. And people only become informants for two reasons. Because they need the money. Or because they need to get out of trouble.”

“So you’re saying Reece is a criminal.”

“No, I’m saying he doesn’t narc out of the goodness of his heart. He does it because he has to.”

I didn’t know what to say. Suddenly, I felt so stupid. It’s exactly what Reece had been trying to tell me. That he’d taken this job for the wrong reasons. That he hated it. All this time, I’d been telling myself that Reece was good at his job because he was noble and heroic. But he was just good at pretending to be bad because he wasn’t really pretending at all. Maybe that’s what he meant when he said he didn’t have a choice. That he couldn’t choose to do the right thing because inside he was still the same person he’d been before. He’d liked taking Alex’s car. I’d tasted the cool rush of adrenaline when he did. Did being with this girl make him feel that way too?

As if reading my thoughts, Alex took me by the shoulders and looked me in the eyes. “If it makes you feel any better, I’ve spent more nights than I can count on the wrong side of those bars, with the wrong people, when all I really wanted was to curl up with Gena at home on my couch.”

I nodded, but it was small consolation, remembering the way Reece felt in my arms on my own couch a few nights ago. The way it all seemed to change the minute that girl called.

“Alex, did you ever . . . you know . . . have feelings for any of the people you got close to when you were narcing?”

“We’re all human, Leigh. We can’t get close to people without feeling something.” He glanced toward Lonny’s cell. “His attorney’s going to be here soon. Do you still want to see him?”

I nodded, wiping my eyes as Alex led me to the last cell.

Lonny sat alone on the cot in the small enclosure, his head tipped back against the wall. His eyes were closed, but one of them opened lazily when Alex rapped on his cell door. “You’ve got a visitor. Five minutes. Your attorney’s on his way.”

All afternoon I wanted to talk to Lonny, but now, looking back at him through the bars, I didn’t know what to say.

“Did you mean what you said?” His voice sounded so weary and rutted, I could almost taste the resignation in it. “You told that detective you were my friend. Did you mean it?” This was a test. The way every interaction with Lonny was a test.

I lifted my chin as he stood up and strode toward me.

“They’re going to convict me, Boswell. For the same reason my attorney is going to let them. Because it’s human nature. Because we make decisions that support our preconceptions of what’s right. The cops think I’m bad. So they assume I’m guilty. They’ll cherry-pick the evidence that proves that they’re right. They’ll stuff the DA full of everything he wants to hear. That I cut Adrienne up into little tiny pieces and dumped her body in the woods. But it’s bullshit—”

“Wait,” I said, thrown suddenly off balance. “What did you say?”

“I said it’s all bullshit. I didn’t kill her.”

I’d seen Adrienne’s body in the Fridge. She hadn’t been cut. She’d been strangled. So why would Lonny think she’d been chopped up unless the cops had led him to believe it. Unless they intentionally misrepresented how she died to trick him into some kind of knee-jerk attempt to correct them. It’s like they were hoping he’d react, or say something incriminating, something that might prove he knew exactly how she died.

I withdrew my hands from my pockets and stepped close to the bars, placing them over his. They were cool and dry. There was no conflict. Nothing difficult to place. Underneath his anger and grief, a confidence lingered, crisp and cold on my breath.

He hadn’t corrected them. Because he couldn’t. Because he didn’t know how Adrienne died. Because he wasn’t the one who’d killed her.

I began to pull my hands away, but he held me in place. Held my stare.

“I know you didn’t kill Adrienne,” I said. “The evidence they found is probably just circumstantial. Maybe that’s why they haven’t charged you yet.”

“What are you going do about it . . . friend?” He stared at our joined hands. Then glanced over my shoulder at the duty officer who was watching us closely. And at Alex, who was pretending not to. My face burned. I wanted to snatch my hands from his.

There was nothing I could do for him. Nothing I would do if it meant jeopardizing my internship. “They can’t hold you forever. Eventually, they’ll have to let you go.”

Lonny laughed. His syrupy-hot cynicism stung my throat. It left an ache in my chest.

What was it Alex had said?

. . . the evidence suggests he was involved.

“What did they find?” I asked.

“I don’t know. They won’t tell me. Whatever it is, they’re going to make it stick.” Lonny believed this, and it was difficult to think logically while his resignation, the hopeless acceptance of his circumstances, tried to settle in my heart.

“Think.” I pulled my hands from his to clear my head. “Did the police find anything of Adrienne’s in your house when they searched it? Could she have had anything of yours when she was killed?”

Lonny rubbed his eyes, looking frustrated. “My lighter and phone went missing the afternoon Adrienne disappeared.”

“Is it possible Adrienne had them?”

“I don’t know.” He shook his head. “She’d been at my place that day. I guess it’s possible. I left them on my front porch, we went inside. She was there for twenty minutes or so, and then she left. When I came back outside, they were gone.”

If Adrienne had taken his phone and his lighter, and that’s what the police had found, they would have been transported to the lab for examination. Raj said murder cases were prioritized above most others, so it would be processed quickly. The prosecutor would have to produce evidence beyond a reasonable doubt that Lonny had committed the crime in order to indict him for murder. If the evidence against Lonny was purely circumstantial, they couldn’t keep him locked up. His lawyer would make sure of it. But if it wasn’t . . .