Chapter 18: Clues Only

"The prosecutor needs weeks," the officer said on the phone. "It's a good recording. It isn't a fast one."

I thanked him and hung up and set the phone face down on my kitchen island.

Gabe sat across from it with the brass key on its blue ribbon lying between his hands.

"It's cut for the lock I put in September," he said. "She has never seen that lock. Somebody copied one of my keys."

"Who had one?"

"The man who fixed my gutters in October." He turned the ribbon over. "I'm calling the locksmith at nine, and I'm rekeying every door."

My friend the school nurse sat beside him, cracking pistachios into a bowl.

"Weeks," I said. "She has weeks to put another coffee cake in front of somebody."

"Then don't wait for weeks," said the nurse.

I looked at her.

"You told me the Prescotts have one rule," she said. "You've been telling me for a year. Don't ask, guess, and pay when you're wrong."

"Yes."

"So play."

I opened my laptop.

The Prescott Table had posted at noon, a photo of Colby alone on a motel balcony with the caption Rebuilding. Real family doesn't need to ask.

It had four thousand comments.

I made a new post on my own account, the one with eleven followers and a photo of a lamp.

I wrote it slowly.

You are all invited to the housewarming I paid for. Saturday, six o'clock. Dinner, music, sparkling wine.

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