Grace gave Kadence a wan smile. “We had a few follow up questions we wanted to ask you.”

  “About Felicia? Andrew? Did you find him?”

  Shaking her head, Grace looked into Kadence’s brown eyes. “When was the last time you saw them?”

  “The other week.” Kadence pushed her fingers through her hair as she sat on her couch, Grace next to her. “I went to bring a gift for Andrew. Felicia let me hold him. I wasn’t there very long, since I had to go to work.”

  “Did everything seem normal?”

  “Yeah. Felicia didn’t seem worried or anything.”

  “Was anyone else there?”

  “No.” Kadence flicked her gaze too Abrams. “Have you found something?”

  “Nothing we can share at this time,” Abrams interjected.

  Grace reset herself. “We’ve been trying to connect with some of Felicia’s friends, the people she would have talked to last. You two went to high school together, right?”

  Kadence nodded. “For a couple years. She and Jonas are…were…in the same class together. I’m a couple years older, so we were only at school together for one year.”

  “But you were around her because of Jonas.” Grace phrased it like a statement, but she really meant it to be a question.

  “I guess? I don’t know who her friends are. They kind of kept to themselves for the few years they were married and that was it. I didn’t pay attention in high school because who cares about their little brother and his girlfriend, you know?”

  Grace didn’t know, since she didn’t have siblings—or at least hadn’t grown up with them—but from what she’d seen of Amya’s family that was vastly untrue as a generic statement. “Do you know anyone who might have wanted to hurt Felicia or who might have wanted to take Andrew?”

  “No. No one. My cousin just had a baby, too. They were so excited to have them grow up together.”

  “All right. I do have to ask, where were you the night Felicia was murdered?”

  Kadence paled, her eyes watering. Grace feared she was going to cry like Theresa had, and she really wished she and Abrams could switch spots. Luckily, Kadence pulled her shit together and wiped her fingers under her cheeks. “I was here, with my boyfriend. I’ll give you his name and number. I can’t believe…I can’t believe anyone would want her dead. She was so sweet.”

  Grace would have agreed, except she hadn’t known Felicia. What they’d found out about her so far was nothing out of the ordinary except the issue with the phone calls, and they really needed to get those records to start putting some pieces together. She’d double-check on that before she left the office for the day.

  They finished with Kadence, not finding any other information that they needed. Grace called the boyfriend while Abrams drove back to the station. Sure enough, Kadence and his stories were the same, so she had little doubt that Kadence had much to do with the murder and kidnapping. Grace’s stomach growled, and she realized she’d forgotten to eat anything that day. It was nearing the end of her shift, and instead of going home, she had a pile of paperwork she’d have to finish up.

  “Do you think Felicia was involved in something no one knew about and got herself into some trouble?” Grace asked.

  Abrams shrugged. “Could be, but it’s hard to keep secrets like that from everyone.”

  “True, but we haven’t talked to any of her friends yet.”

  He sighed. “Tomorrow. I’m too tired to go through another interview today.”

  Chuckling, Grace nodded. “I can get on board with that.”

  “You hesitated earlier.”

  “I…what?” Grace turned to him, surprise hanging in her chest. She couldn’t follow his train of thought or what he was asking. She hadn’t hesitated at all when interviewing George, though he hadn’t been present for that. Even with Kadence, Grace had been confident in every question she’d asked. All the questions had been standard. It wasn’t an interrogation, so she didn’t have to plan or prep for it.

  “When I asked if you had kids.”

  Oh. Grace tightened her hand into a fist and stared out the front windshield. She hated this conversation. People normally never accepted her response and she was always made to feel bad. “What do you mean?”

  “You hesitated. Do you want kids?”

  “Not really,” Grace muttered.

  “I can see why you hesitated then.”

  She let out a whoosh of air from her lungs. “That’s not why.”

  There was no reason for her to open up to him. She didn’t know him. She didn’t even call him by his first name, but something in his question, in his composure, begged her to share.

  “We have a twenty-one-year-old and a seventeen-year-old living with us.”

  “Foster care?”

  “One, officially, now, but not before.”

  “What do you mean before?”

  Straightening her shoulders, Grace risked a glance at him. He seemed sincere in his probing, so she continued. “Peter is twenty-one. I met him on a call, actually, and he kind of stuck around. He was a kid, out of high school but not doing much else with his life, drunk off his ass more times than I can count. We helped him kind of get his life back in order. For a time. He started graduate school last year, but ended up falling off the wagon, so he moved home around Christmas. He’s thinking about trying school again in the spring.”

  “Think he’s ready?”

  “No.” Grace smiled. “But I don’t think he’ll ever be ready. Addiction is not easy, and he’s got an upward hill to climb every day for the rest of his life.”

  “Seems like you’ve got the right mindset for him. What about the other one?”

  “Kit. My first missing persons case was a pregnant teen who’d run away for an abortion. Kit is her best friend, and got kicked out of her house for being gay—I’m sorry, lesbian, as she would insist I say.” Grace rolled her eyes at the last bit, imagining Kit’s snarky tone as she corrected Grace’s statement.

  Abrams laughed at it, too. “So you found her on the street?”

  “The mall. The first time. Different places after that. It’s been back and forth with her and DCFS, but she’s permanently ours now until she’s eighteen.”

  “Think she’ll stay after that?”

  “Yeah, I think she’ll stick around. She likes my dog.”

  Abrams belted into a full out laugh as he pulled into the station. “Because she likes your dog?”

  “It’s the small things. She graduates this spring, so if she moves, we’re about to have an empty house again, right after it filled up.”

  “Think you’ll do it again?”

  “Do what?” Grace undid the buckle on her seatbelt.

  Abrams paused. “Foster.”

  “Oh. I honestly hadn’t thought about it. They just needed a home and some stability. We could offer that.”

  “Halling, there’s a lot of kids that need a home and some stability, and a dog too.”

  “Huh. Hadn’t really thought of it like that.”

  “Give yourself some time with an empty house. Then decide.”

  “I guess.” Getting out of the car, Grace headed inside to finish out her day. Hopefully Paige wouldn’t keep her too late this time.

  Who Has Rights?

  “Halling!” Paige shrilly yelled through the unit.

  Grace cringed. The day before, when she’d been gone with Abrams, had been the best reprieve she’d had in months. A full eight hours without Paige on her ass, though she’d come back to an angry boss and a mountain of work to unravel.

  Getting up from her seat, Grace dragged her feet as she moved into the Paige’s office. She’d barely been there five minutes, and she was fifteen minutes late—again. As she got to the door, Paige motioned for her to close it. Worry etched its way into her stomach that she was finally going to be written up for being late all these months. Instead, Paige tossed a notepad at her.

  “You need to deal with these grandmas.”

  “With who?” Grace’s mind raced to catch up. She really needed at least one more cup of coffee before she tackled Paige and her weird quirks that morning.

  “The grandmas for your case.”

  “O…kay? What’s going on? I just saw Theresa Erikson yesterday and she seemed fine.”

  “Fine? Grace, she’s called in here twice since you left her yesterday and asked for an update on the case. The other one has called three times in the last three days.”

  “They just want updates on the case?”

  “Oh, no. If it was only that simple.”

  Grace’s patience was already running short. She’d noticed that as the months went on with Paige as her boss, her patience for Paige’s idiosyncrasies was thin. Not that Grace had much patience to begin with. Everyone on the force knew that. She was the least patient person in the world. Thank God Amya had it in spades.

  “If what was simple?”

  “They want custody.”

  “Of Andrew?”

  “Of course of Andrew. Who else?”

  “I don’t know, the body in the morgue.”

  Paige paled. “I’m pretty sure only Felicia’s mom wants that. I’m talking about custody of Andrew.”

  “We haven’t even found him yet.”

  “Which brings me to another point. What is it you’re doing with Abrams all day? Because it doesn’t seem like you’re actually working on solving this case.”

  Grace pressed her lips tightly together to try and keep her tongue in check. Saying something stupid that would only piss Paige off would not help either of them in the long run. “Yesterday we interviewed Jonas, like I told you we were going to do Monday night.” She didn’t add the fact that Paige had interrupted her Thanksgiving dinner in order to have that conversation even though she really wanted to.

  “Where are you on the case?”

  “Nowhere, really. Still waiting on the full autopsy report back on Felicia. We got the first chunk of it, but not any of the tests run.”

  “What did it say?”

  “It’s in the report I wrote up for you to read.”

  “You know I hate reading those things.”

  Swallowing down her snide retort, Grace listed out what Paige might need to know about the murder. “Cause of death is stabbing. She was stabbed twenty-two times in the upper torso, in her arms, and three times in her neck. The killer avoided her abdomen and anywhere else on her body completely. The knife was in fact not serrated like the ME thought at first. It was a smooth knife, most likely a very sharp kitchen knife or hunting knife, about seven inches in length. Knife was nowhere on scene.”

  “Did she struggle?”

  “Yes. She hit her head on the floor and on the corner of the counter by her temple.” Grace raised her hand to show Paige where. “It’s honestly probably that hit that stunned her enough to let the killer finish the job.”

  “This killer sounds pissed off.”

  “Or desperate.”

  Paige cocked her head at Grace. “Go on.”

  “The body was left where it fell. We’ve collected samples and are running them, but like toxicity reports, DNA takes a few weeks to come back, so still waiting on that.”

  “I hope Homicide is paying for those.”

  Grace shrugged. “Don’t know. Don’t care. That’s above my pay grade.”

  Paige shot Grace a sharp look. “I suppose you’re right about that.”

  “Tip lines have been less than helpful so far. Lots of baby sightings, none have been Andrew. I should be getting the reports from the phone records in today or tomorrow, and I will go through them as soon as I get a minute.”

  “I don’t want you spending all your time over in Homicide working their case for them.”

  “This is a joint investigation, Paige. They’re helping me as much as I’m helping them. That’s the entire point of doing this together.”

  “I don’t like you being out of the office for so long.”

  “You never minded before.” Grace clenched her jaw hard, biting her tongue when she realized she’d said too much and pushed it a bit too far. Paige used to always want to be out of the office, doing something other than sitting on her butt all day. In some ways, that might have been why she tried to keep Grace in as much as she did, so she wasn’t bored and stuck by her lonesome. Still, Grace had a job to do, and she needed to get it done without Paige watching over her shoulder every two seconds.

  Paige said nothing, only gave Grace a hard stare for a few minutes before continuing to her next question. “Who are your suspects?”

  “None that we really like at the moment. Jonas Erickson is still a suspect. If these grandma’s keep up this shenanigan, it’ll bump them up the list a bit. We’ve checked out most of the family in town, and they’re not hitting any part of what we’re looking for and there have been no signs of Andrew in any of their homes.”

  “Friends?”

  “Can’t seem to find any.”

  “A twenty-year-old just doesn’t not have friends, Grace.”

  “I know. But that’s what I need the phone records for. None of the numbers in her phone that she called or texted had names in them. I need the records to know who she was talking to.”

  “Why wouldn’t she add contacts?”

  “To hide whoever she was talking to. Or because it was a newer contact.”

  Paige rested her elbow on her desk as she leaned over the top of it. “Which do you think?”

  “I think she didn’t want anyone to know who she was talking to.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know, Paige, that’s what I’m trying to figure out. Instead, I’m stuck in here giving you an update on what you could very well read in the report I updated last night before I left.”

  “Pissy much this morning, Halling? Go have some orange juice or something.”

  Grace glowered. “I’m going to go to my desk and work through some financials. I’d appreciate at least a few hours before being interrupted again.”

  Without another word, Grace stood up and walked to her desk. As soon as she was settled in, she turned on her computer and started into her research. Abrams said he’d already gone through it, but a second eye would be helpful. Grace had one idea as to why Felicia was hiding who she was talking to, and she wanted to test that theory before she told anyone what it might be.

  ###

  Grace had a list of locations based on Felicia’s financials that she wanted to check out. She also really needed to talk to Abrams about her theory, since he was the second closest person to the investigation. Glancing around the unit told her most people were in for the day. Jackson and Kline sat at their desks, typing away at whatever cases they had. She was lucky so far to only have one case, which was probably Paige’s doing since hers was so high profile and she was unit hopping.

  With the list in her notebook, Grace rolled her neck to remove any of the kinks from her muscles after having been bent over her desk for the better part of hours. Office work had never been her preference, but she was getting more used to it as the years went on. She did have to work out more often to keep up her physical fitness, but that had gone to the wayside lately because her hours had been so horrible. She missed working out with Amya.

  Grace nodded at Kline as she grabbed a small baggie from her desk drawer filled with dried bananas. She could snack while she walked down to Homicide to talk with Abrams. As she walked down the halls, Grace munched on her banana chips until she stopped short. Abrams was coming toward her, a hard set look on his face.

  He glared at her. Grace furrowed her brow, trying to read between the lines and figure out why he was upset, but she couldn’t figure out a good reason. He grunted at her. Turning her chin up to look into his eyes, she shook her head.

  “What happened?”

  “You don’t want to work with me anymore?”

  Confused, Grace stared at him. “I never said that.”

  “Delwin asked for another detective to be assigned the case, specifically requesting Honeywell.”

  “The fuck?” Grace spun on her toes to face the office she’d just come from.

  “My captain is in a tizzy over it, thinking I did something to offend you.”

  “Absolutely not.” Grace’s jaw hardened. “I need to speak with your captain.”

  Abrams cocked his head at her. “Why?”

  “Just let me speak with your captain.”

  “I was going to confront Delwin.”

  “Ignore her. Come on.” Grace moved toward Homicide. Everything with Paige seemed to be moving a level up lately, and her resolve to hold out until Paige was once again demoted was thinning.

  Abrams and she walked to Homicide. Grace set her crap at Abrams desk before he knocked on the door. “Captain, this is Grace Halling.”

  The man was hunched over his desk, his silver hair gelled up to make him no doubt look taller than he actually was. Seated, he seemed small, but he was well-built. Thick with muscles, broad shoulders, and a gruff look on his face. He didn’t say anything.

  Abrams continued, “She wanted to speak with you.”

  “Fine.”

  Grace stepped inside, raised an eyebrow at Abrams before shooing him out of the office. Her stomach twisted, her heart rate picking up. Confrontation with captains was something she hated, and she was about to throw Paige under the bus, at least a bit. With the door shut, Grace put her hands on her hips and faced the captain down.

  “I don’t have a problem working with Abrams.”

  “Oh?” He leaned back in his chair, his fingers steepled together.

  “I actually quite enjoy working with him. He’s very smart, experienced in detective work, and I’ve been learning from him.”

  “He said the same about you.”

  Grace’s cheeks flushed hot. “Oh. Well, um, I think Lieutenant Delwin is having some issues with me working with Homicide in general, not Abrams specifically.”

  “Why would she have problems with that?”

  “She wants me to stay in Missing Persons.”

  That bushy eyebrow of his shot upward. “Are you planning on asking for a transfer to Homicide?”