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“Us too. Lori has been talking about it nonstop. She really misses you. She works a lot, so we don’t really have time for, you know, friends.” He laughed, and she laughed too.

“Hey, speaking of friends,” she said.

“Yeah?”

“Would it be terribly rude if I brought someone along with me?” she asked. “I know it’s last minute, and if my mother knew I was even asking, she’d lose her mind, but—”

“No! It’s fine! The more, the merrier.”

“Are you sure?” Annie asked. “We can get a hotel room, if that would be easier.”

“Annie Weaver, please. Don’t be absurd. Lori would never stand for that. You guys are like sisters, which means you’re family, so bring whomever you want.”

“Thanks, Lou,” she said. “Really.”

“You want me to have her call you when she gets home?”

“If she wants,” Annie said. “I’m still planning on driving up on Wednesday.”

“We’ll see you then.”

When Annie hung up the phone, something eased in her chest.

* * *

The pager woke her up. She hadn’t been summoned since Annika went missing, and she’d worried it was because the girl had been found too late. Maybe they thought Annie hadn’t done enough. That explained the LAPD not calling, but no one else? She’d started to wonder whether she needed to get a real job instead.

She fumbled for the lamp and reached for the pager. The clock showed3:44 on Tuesday morning, though she could barely make out the numbers through her bleary eyes. She rolled out of bed and shivered. The concrete floor was cold through the thin area rug. She put on slippers and her big robe. Put her keys and the pager in her pocket and made her way through the backyard.

She unlocked the back door, slipped in, and closed it behind her. She picked up the kitchen wall phone by the door and punched in the numbers by feel, squinting at the green light of the pager.

The phone on the other end rang three times before a familiar voice answered.

“Agent Juno, Akron,” she said, then covered the mouthpiece of the phone with her hand while she yawned.

He sounded tired too as he read her the address. FBI again.

“Hey,” she said before he could hang up. “What happens if I say no?”

“I’m sorry?”

“It’s just that I’m going out of town for a few days, and if I get paged… If I say no, you let them know, right?”

“That is the procedure, yes. What happens from there, well, that’s up to your supervisors, I suppose.”

“Do people say no?”

He hesitated and then said, “Your case is unique.”

She laughed. “Yeah, I bet it is. All right, I’ll be there in an hour.”

The sun was just starting to lighten the horizon when she pulled into the drab government building’s mostly empty parking lot. She’d expected more activity for a middle-of-the-night phone call.

Inside, a receptionist checked her in, went through her bag, and issued her a visitor’s pass. Then she waited for someone to come get her.

She recognized the agent that emerged from the elevator and cringed. “Agent Katz.”

“We meet again.”