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Josie’s feet moved forward without any conscious instruction. “What are you talking about?”

Trinity held up a book that Noah had been reading. “Still an astronomy buff, I see. The Milky Way, huh?”

“I took him to Cherry Springs to see it last year. He loved it. He’s had his eye on a telescope for a long time. A very expensive one.” If he came home, she’d buy him one, damn the cost.

Not if. When.

“Trinity, what did you find out?”

She placed the book on top of Noah’s nightstand. “None of the neighbors’ Wi-Fi was out last night. Only yours.”

There was a flutter in Josie’s chest. The Wi-Fi outage was one of the things she’d been wondering about all night. Both Turner and Heather said it had happened with some of the recent armed robberies. Josie had only cursory knowledge of them. There’d been three in Denton—which Turner had handled—and a handful more in the surrounding areas. Most of the time, the break-ins were carried out when no one was home. However, on two occasions, the homeowner had been in the residence. Josie remembered hearing that said homeowners had been badly beaten, which meant the perpetrators had no qualms about using violence. Three perpetrators. Enough to subdue a grown man.

If it was the same crew, why had they left the other homeowners behind but taken Noah? Again, the seasoned detective inside her gave a detached and instantaneous answer. The most obvious one. Noah was dead.

No. She rejected the thought just as she had the night before when she spoke with Turner. He’s alive. He has to be alive.

“It’s weird, right?” Trinity said, interrupting her thoughts. “That it was only your Wi-Fi. How is that even possible?”

“There are ways to do it,” Josie said. “Not all of them legal.”

“It means you guys were targeted though,” Trinity said. “Don’t you think?”

“Maybe.”

Josie thought back to the last couple of weeks, trying to remember if anything or anyone unusual had stood out to her. People she didn’t recognize lingering outside. Cars that repeatedly drove down the block or that slowed in front of her house. There was nothing.

“How do you know about the Wi-Fi?” she asked Trinity.

There was no way the state police were giving out this kind of information to the press, even Josie’s sister.

Trinity found Noah’s phone charger on the floor and put it on top of the book. “I asked around.”

“You went door to door.” It wasn’t a question.

“Not everyone answered,” Trinity said.

“Trin, the investigation. It can’t be compromised. You can’t?—”

She looked up at Josie then, her blue eyes so intense, the words dried up in Josie’s throat. “I can. I’m not going to compromise the police investigation. I wouldn’t do that. But I am a journalist and it’s my job to ask questions.”

“This isn’t a story.” Josie’s voice came very close to cracking. Control. She had to stay in control.

Trinity surged upright onto her feet and closed the distance between them, clamping her hands over Josie’s upper arms. “No, it’s not a story. I’m not doing it because I’m a journalist. I’m getting away with it because I’m a journalist. People will answer my questions. Most people, anyway. I’ve built up a lot of goodwill in Denton and a lot of places in this whole country. People trust me. They’re comfortable with me, which means they’ll talk. You’re going to be shut out of this investigation. You’re too close. Hell, your department isn’t even handling it. But I know you. After the people you love, the most important thing in your life is your work. It’s the thing that makes all the bad shit bearable. I’ve seen you bury yourself in it a hundred times when you were at your lowest points. You don’t have that right now and clearly, you’re not going to do one damn thing your therapist taught you, so I’m doing this for you.”

There was a hairline fracture in Josie’s mental shield. “Trin,” she choked. “I probably shouldn’t be involved in?—”

Trinity lowered her arms. “Involved in what? Putting all your stuff back while you listen to me talk? You’re not doing anything but what Detective Loughlin asked you to do—see if anything besides the jewelry is missing. Now go to the other side of the bed and start cleaning up.”

Clutching Noah’s shirt against her stomach, Josie walked around to her side of the bed. Reverently, she placed the shirt on top of her dresser and started picking up its overturned drawers.

Trinity said, “The neighbor across the street, two doors down, saw a young man—maybe mid-twenties—walking down the street a few times around seven thirty. Not someone he’s seen on this street before. The reason he noticed the man was because he kept walking back and forth, up the block and then down. Then up again.”

Josie slid each dresser drawer home, relieved none of them were damaged beyond repair. “Description?”

“White, brown hoodie, jeans, maybe five-foot eight or nine. Average size. Nothing more than that. The neighbor never saw him approach the house, only walking along the street several times. Another neighbor captured him walking past his house on his home security camera. He turned the footage over to police last night.”

Josie froze. “Did you see it?”

Trinity rolled her eyes and picked her way over to where Josie stood. “What do you think?”