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Roxy chortled and bounced off her shoulder. By the time Leona looked up from her phone, the dust bunny was racing toward the food truck parked in the long driveway.

“What could possibly go wrong?”

Oh, yeah. Right.

“Roxy, come back, sweetie. The car will be here soon. Time to go.”

But Roxy had arrived at the food truck. She vaulted up onto the ledge in front of the order window and went into adorable mode.

The server chuckled and handed her a bag of pretzels. “There you go.”

Roxy chortled in delight and went to work opening her prize. The bored reporters were amused.

Leona groaned and walked toward the truck. “How much do I owe you?”

“No charge,” the server said. “Worth it for the entertainment.”

“How are things going in there?” one of the reporters asked, angling his head to indicate the mansion. “Are they finding anything interesting?”

“You’ll have to ask the people in charge,” Leona said. “I’m an outside consultant. I never comment on my clients’ projects.”

A woman carrying a microphone stepped in front of her. “Why did they think it was necessary to bring in an outside consultant?”

“It’s routine to call in specialized talent on major projects like this one. Don’t worry, I’m sure the director, Dr. Fullerton, will hold a press conference later today. You’ll have to excuse me. I’ve got an appointment with another client.”

She scooped up Roxy and hurried back to the front steps of the mansion.

Her phone rang. She recognized the familiar code and took the call.

“Hi, Mom. What’s up?”

“We just finished running the genealogical search using the data about the Willard brothers and their sister, Agnes,” Eugenie said.

“It was a complex search,” Charlotte added. “We won’t bore you with the details. Suffice it to say that the real clues were in the files of the asylum where Agnes was hospitalized. We told you that she died a few months ago. Turns out there wasn’t much in the way of an estate, but what she did have—mostly her personal effects—went to the only surviving relative, a niece.”

“So Cyrus Willard had a child?”

“Yes,” Eugenie said. “But he never knew her. Evidently he needed cash at some point, so he sold his sperm to a fertility clinic. It took some doing—Charlotte had to hack the sperm bank records—but we think we tracked down the daughter.”

“Got a photo?”

“Yes,” Eugenie said. “That wasn’t easy, by the way. No social media presence. Evidently she likes to keep a low profile. A DMV shot was the best we could do.”

“Text it to me.”

“Sending now,” Eugenie said.

A silver-gray car with heavily tinted windows turned into the drive. Roxy chortled, enthused about the prospect of a ride.

“Hang on, my car just arrived,” Leona said. She hurried down the steps.

“Where are you?” Charlotte asked.

“At the Antiquarian Society mansion. Meet the new consultant on the block. I just concluded a job for the Hollister team. And get this, Matt Fullerton is in charge of the project. Having to call me in on an emergency project was very hard for him.”

“Revenge is sweet,” Eugenie said.

“Not as sweet as I expected,” Leona said. “It was kind of a letdown, to be honest. But that chapter of my life is definitely closed. I saw the flower of opportunity blossoming in the shadows and I grabbed it.”

“What does that mean?” Eugenie asked.

“It’s advice from a book I’m reading,” Leona said.

She tucked Roxy under one arm, jumped into the back seat of the vehicle, and closed the door. She focused on her phone, waiting for the photo.

“You made good time,” she said to the driver without looking up from the screen. “I’m glad because I’m—” She broke off because the photo had appeared on the screen. “Oh, shit.”

“What is it?” Charlotte asked, her voice sharpening.

“I recognize Agnes Willard’s niece,” Leona said.

The phone went dead as the car pulled away from the steps. Roxy was suddenly sleeked out and growling. Leona looked up. For the first time, she saw that a glass window separated the driver’s compartment from the rear seat.

She grabbed the door handle but the automatic locks had clicked shut, trapping her. She could unlock them but it would take a moment. She needed her talent to pull off that particular trick, and her talent was seeping away like water down a drain.

An unfamiliar, unpleasantly herbal scent wafted in the atmosphere. Roxy was no longer growling. She had gone limp. Not asleep, Leona realized. Roxy was unconscious.

She would be soon, too, because the scent was growing stronger. She tried to cover her mouth and nose with the sleeve of her jacket but it was too late.

The driver did not turn his head to look at her, but she could see his eyes and a portion of his face in the rearview mirror. Baxter Richey was no longer playing the role of na?ve, enthusiastic paranormal investigator. He drove like a robot at the wheel—or as if he were in a hypnotic trance.

He was not alone in the front of the car. There was a woman in the passenger seat. A baseball cap concealed her hair. She turned around to peer through the glass barrier. Her eyes glittered with barely controlled fury.

“Darla Price,” Leona whispered, her voice thick from the effects of the drug.

“That name was for the Lost Creek portion of the project, the part you fucked up. You can call me Melody Palantine.”