News reports about the house fire made it clear that the authorities were treating Dunn’s death as an accident, and LeAnne had no intention of trying to convince anyone otherwise. If the person responsible for Lowell Dunn’s death was also involved in the attack on Lance, she didn’t want to call a killer’s attention to the fact that Lance, although gravely wounded, was still very much alive.

  Late in the afternoon, with Lance again asleep, Sister Anselm returned to his room and took LeAnne aside. “Have you been home even to visit your other children since Lance has been here?”

  “No,” LeAnne began, “but—”

  “Go back to San Leandro and have dinner with them tonight,” Sister Anselm suggested. “I’ve just had several hours’ worth of rest, and I’ll be glad to stay here through the night. Your focus on Lance is commendable, but it’s not fair to your other boys. They need to know that you haven’t forgotten them, and it’ll do you a world of good to sleep in your own bed.”

  “Still—”

  “There’s one more thing we need you to do while you’re there,” Sister Anselm interrupted.

  “What?”

  “Track down Mr. Dunn’s family. I believe he mentioned having a daughter and grandson living in the area. I want you to stop by and offer your condolences.”

  “Even if I can find out what his daughter’s name is or where she lives, why would she want to hear that from me? I’d only just met her father.”

  “If there’s even the smallest chance that Mr. Dunn died because he offered to help Lance,” Sister Anselm said, “then you owe him something, and you owe his family, too.”

  The nun spoke in a manner that brooked no argument. For a few brief moments, LeAnne was propelled back in time. Long ago, as a first-grader, she briefly attended a parochial school, a Lutheran one rather than a Catholic. Mrs. Grace, the stern teacher in charge, hadn’t been a nun, but the rules were the same: What Mrs. Grace said went. She allowed no weaseling or excuses. She issued orders with the confident expectation that they would be obeyed without question.

  In this instance, Sister Anselm and Mrs. Grace could have been twins. The nun had couched her remarks about LeAnne’s going back home for the night in the light of its being good for all concerned. Even so, LeAnne recognized it as a direct order rather than a suggestion.

  “What am I supposed to do when I see his daughter?” LeAnne asked.

  “Put yourself in her shoes,” Sister Anselm said. “You’ve been at the hospital all this time with all the reports circulating that Lance was supposedly responsible for his own injuries. Wouldn’t it have been nice if someone had come forward who seemed to take Lance’s side?”

  LeAnne thought about how she had blurted out her story, first to someone on the phone and later to Sister Anselm. She nodded.

  “What if Mr. Dunn’s daughter is in a similar situation? Maybe it’s true that her father’s death was an accident. No doubt she will have heard that version of events from the fire marshal, but what if she has another opinion? What if she has some ideas about what happened that the cops aren’t willing to consider? What if her concerns have been brushed aside the same way yours were?”

  “You’re asking me to leave Lance’s bedside to go on a recon mission?”

  “If that’s what you wish to call it, yes,” Sister Anselm said. “If I were to show up unannounced, she’d look at me as a stranger and I most likely wouldn’t get anywhere, but you as a grieving mother to a grieving daughter? That’s going to work like gangbusters.”

  “How do I find her?”

  Sister Anselm handed LeAnne a piece of paper. On it was written the name Susannah Dunn Bissell, with an address on South Seventh Street in San Leandro along with a telephone number. Below it was another San Leandro address, this one on Main Street.

  “How did you get this information?” LeAnne asked. “I don’t remember seeing the daughter’s name or address mentioned in any of the reports.”

  “Sometimes,” Sister Anselm counseled, “it’s better not to ask about the origin of one of God’s mysterious blessings and simply go with the flow.”

  “What’s the second address?” LeAnne asked.

  “That’s a gun shop: Jake’s Guns and Ammo. It’s just off Main and Mountain. A Taser has been purchased in your name. They’re holding it for you.”

  “You bought me a Taser?” LeAnne said. “Are you kidding?”

  “Not at all,” Sister Anselm responded. “I’m dead serious. Considering what may have happened to Mr. Dunn, I regard your having a Taser as a wise precautionary measure. I didn’t purchase it personally. It went on the expense account.”

  LeAnne studied the paper. Although she had never ventured inside Jake’s, she recognized the name. It was located on the north side of town in a small strip mall that she drove past twice a day. The other address was close to downtown. “All right,” she said at last. “I’ll do it.”

  “If you like, I can call ahead and let them know you’re coming.”

  LeAnne glanced at the clock. It was three-thirty. “What time does Jake’s close?”

  “Nine.”

  “There should be plenty of time. They’ll just give me the Taser and that’s it?”

  “You’ll need to fill out the questionnaire for a background check. The Taser won’t be activated until that comes back. In the meantime you can watch the training video.”

  Capitulating, LeAnne folded the paper and stuffed it into her pocket. Half an hour later, having called to let her mother know that she’d be home for dinner, LeAnne Tucker rode downstairs in the hospital elevator wondering as she went what kind of weird nun Sister Anselm could possibly be.

  Don’t worry about it, LeAnne told herself. Just go with the flow.

  In the parking garage, she had to pay a king’s ransom to bail her aging Taurus out of hock. Fortunately, there was enough room left on her one working credit card for the charge to go through. The car had been parked there long enough to be dusty, but there was sufficient charge in the battery that it turned over on the first try, and there was enough fuel in the tank to make it to San Leandro. Thinking about trying to find the money to refill the tank made her wish that she had kept Mr. Crutcher’s check rather than giving it back.

  Traffic heading for the freeway entrance moved at a snail’s pace. Even though it was cold and windy outside, LeAnne had to admit that after close to two weeks of being confined to the hospital’s stale atmosphere and artificial light, it felt good to be outdoors in real sunlight and real air. Despite the chill, she drove with her window cracked, savoring the wintery breeze on her face.

  LeAnne wasn’t exactly lighthearted, but with each passing mile, she felt slightly more hopeful. However Sister Anselm had come into the equation, her reassuring presence made all the difference because LeAnne was no longer alone in the battle. She could leave the hospital for a few hours, knowing that Lance wouldn’t be there alone. She’d be able to look Thad and Connor in the eye and tell them honestly and in person that she believed Lance would make it. His life would be altered and so would theirs, but somehow, together, they would make it work.

  LeAnne was enough ahead of rush hour that once on the freeway she made good time; it was only five-thirty as she approached the San Leandro exits. Her mother had told her that due to basketball practice, she and the boys wouldn’t be home for dinner until close to seven; there was no rush. When LeAnne reached the downtown exit, she hesitated, but in the end, she turned off there and headed for the address Sister Anselm had given her. She wasn’t looking forward to meeting Lowell Dunn’s daughter, but she had said she would, and LeAnne Tucker liked to think she was a woman of her word.

  Susannah Bissell lived in a neighborhood of aging clapboard houses that backed up on an abandoned railroad right of way. The street out front was parked full of cars, so LeAnne had to park several houses away. Walking back, she noticed that the Bissell home was in better shape than some of its neighbors. A boy’s bicycle leaned up against a small wooden porch, and a young black kid of eleven or twelve sat on the front porch, cell phone in hand and earbuds dangling from beneath a faded Texas Rangers baseball cap.

  LeAnne was only a few feet away before he noticed her and stood up. “Who are you,” he asked, “another cop to talk to my mother about what happened to my grandfather?”

  “I’m not a cop,” Leanne said. “My name is LeAnne Tucker. I’m a friend of your grandfather’s—more of an acquaintance than a friend. I wanted to tell you and your mother how sorry I am about what happened.”

  “She’s got people with her right now,” the boy said. “Friends and stuff.”

  “Of course,” LeAnne said. “I don’t want to intrude, but could you maybe let her know that I’m out here?”

  With a shrug, the boy turned and went inside. A few minutes later, the door opened and a woman came out. She was about LeAnne’s age. Her dark eyes were bloodshot. She clutched a white hankie in one hand. “You’re the mother of the boy Papa went to see in the hospital yesterday?”

  Her words sounded more like an accusation than a welcome. LeAnne nodded. “I heard about the accident,” she said. “Your father was kind to my son. I wanted to say how sorry I am.”

  “No matter what the cops say, it wasn’t an accident,” Susannah Bissell declared.

  “But it said on the news—”

  “I don’t care what it said!” she declared. “After my mother died, I gave my dad strict orders that if he was going to keep on smoking, he was going to have a smoke alarm, like it or not. We had one installed and I made sure the batteries got replaced just like you’re supposed to do whenever we switch over to daylight savings time. The fire marshal tried to tell me that the alarm probably started beeping and Papa took the batteries out himself. That didn’t happen. My husband is the only one who messes with the smoke alarms or their batteries. The investigator wrote it into his notes, but I don’t think he was listening, not really.”

  “They’re saying the same kinds of things about my son,” LeAnne offered quietly. “The cops claim he set himself on fire deliberately, even though I’ve told them that makes no sense. What I wanted you to know is that when your father stopped by to see us at the hospital yesterday, he said the same thing. He didn’t believe Lance did it, either. I’m afraid that’s why your father’s dead—because he was taking our side.”

  There was an electric moment, and in that instant, the connection Sister Anselm had hinted at between the grieving mother and grieving daughter snapped together.

  “Is your son going to be all right?” Susannah asked.

  “I think so. They had to amputate one leg, but so far the other one shows no sign of infection. In other words, he’s better than he was.”

  “On the way home from Austin, Papa was talking about Lance,” Susannah said. “He thought your son got a raw deal.”

  “That’s the other reason I came to see you,” LeAnne said. “Did he say anything specific about that, about his offering to help us?”

  “He was more than just offering,” Susannah said. “Papa told me he was suspicious about one of the guards. When he was a kid, the guy got sent to juvie for being a firebug. After he got out and had his juvenile record expunged, he pulled enough strings to hire on as a guard at the same detention center where he used to be a prisoner.”

  “A firebug?” LeAnne asked.

  “You know, an arsonist. Papa said that Marvin Cotton was the first person the cops should have looked at, but since they hadn’t, he started asking a few questions himself.”

  “If this Marvin guy’s record was expunged, how did your father know anything about it?”

  “My father had dyslexia,” Susannah explained. “He couldn’t read or write. It was supposed to be a big secret. My sister and I figured it out; we just never let on. One of the ways he coped was by having an encyclopedic memory. If he heard something once, he remembered it. He probably could have told you the name of every kid who came through that detention center in the last forty years. He knew what they got sent up for and how long they were in. Most of the kids were way worse off when they got out than when they went in. He told me Lance was an exception to that rule, that he was still a good kid. That’s why he wanted to help find out who set your son on fire.”

  “Did he come right out and say he thought Marvin was responsible?”

  “No, but before I dropped him off, he told me that he had been talking to the warden’s office to find out what shift Marvin was working that day and whether he had been anywhere near the rec room.”

  “In other words, your father had already been doing some checking on Marvin before he came to the hospital yesterday?”

  “Evidently,” Susannah said. “But I have no idea how far he had gotten.”

  Far enough to step on somebody’s toes and get himself killed, LeAnne thought.

  Another vehicle stopped out front. As a new family of well-wishers arrived to visit with Susannah, LeAnne took her leave. Back in the car, she called Sister Anselm.

  “I talked to Susannah Bissell,” LeAnne said. “Her father evidently thought that one of the guards, a guy named Marvin Cotton, might have had something to do with what happened to Lance. What should we do now, give that information to the police?”

  “We still don’t have any solid information,” Sister Anselm said. “We have the unfounded suspicions of a man who’s dead.”

  “So we do nothing?”

  “I didn’t say that,” the nun responded. “Let me run that name by a few people and see what they come up with.”

  Back in the suite, Ali found the sitting room empty. The door to Leland’s room was closed, with no light showing in the crack under the door. It was only eleven. She was tempted to call B., but knowing he’d spent a long day on the plane, she decided to let him sleep. Instead, firing up her computer and finding the Wi-Fi connection working properly, Ali sent him a long e-mail, telling in detail about her visit to Banshee Group and her long chat with Thomas Blackfield after Leland’s abrupt departure from the bar.

  When her phone rang, she was surprised to see Sister Anselm’s name in the caller window. “Hey,” Ali said, “how’s my favorite matron of honor?”

  “I’m currently your favorite patient advocate,” Sister Anselm said. “Have you had a chance to look into the situation with Lance’s former teacher?”

  “Not yet. I was busy all day, and someone ran me off the road on the way back to the hotel. Hang on. Let me take a look at my mail.”

  There were no direct messages from Stu on her e-mail list, but there was one from her mother at High Noon. When she opened it there was another scenic Sedona photo, which no doubt contained an encoded message from Stu. Turning from her computer, Ali reached for her purse and began searching for her thumb drive.

  “You were run off the road?” Sister Anselm interjected. “Are you all right? Did you get hurt?”

  “Bruised by the seat belt but otherwise fine.”

  “What happened?”

  “A guy swerved into my lane. I managed to avoid hitting him, but my car ended up in a ditch. What makes the case even more interesting is that the Good Samaritan who pulled me out of the wreckage turned out to be a car thief.”

  “You have the uncanny ability to attract trouble wherever you go,” Sister Anselm said with a laugh.

  “Thanks for laughing,” Ali said. “It didn’t seem all that funny when I was hanging upside down in the rental car. Hertz doesn’t think it’s especially funny, either. What’s happening on your end of the world?”

  The laughter went out of Sister Anselm’s voice. “I ordered Lance’s mother to take the night off. She went home to spend some time with Lance’s brothers, who have barely seen her since all this happened. She just called, though. On her way through San Leandro, she uncovered something I’d like High Noon to look into. It could be important.”

  “What?”

  “LeAnne stopped off to see a woman named Susannah Bissell. Susannah is the daughter of last night’s fire victim.”

  “Yes,” Ali said. “Lowell Dunn. B. told me about him earlier. What happened?”

  “According to Susannah, Mr. Dunn mentioned that he thought he knew who might have been involved in what happened to Lance—a guy by the name of Marvin Cotton.”

  “Who’s he and what do we know about him?” Ali asked.

  “Not a lot,” Sister Anselm said. “I tried Googling him but didn’t get anywhere. According to Susannah he’s currently a guard at the same juvenile facility where Lance Tucker was incarcerated but a number of years ago, Cotton was also an inmate there.”

  “On what charges?”

  “Arson, supposedly, but there’s no easy way to verify that. Cotton’s record was expunged. With this new case of something that might be arson too, I was hoping High Noon could look into it.”

  Ali had spent the entire time they’d been on the phone searching for the thumb drive and worrying that it might have tumbled out of her purse in the accident. She finally found it, but just as she inserted it into the computer, Leland’s door opened. Wearing his robe, he came out to the sitting room and sat down across from her. Ali trusted herself to be able to do two things at once, but not three.

  “Let me get back to you on this once I see what Stu’s sent me.”

  “Whenever is fine,” Sister Anselm said. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  Leland started to rise. “I shouldn’t interrupt.”

  “I’m fine,” Ali said, putting down the phone and closing the computer. “Are you all right?”

  “I can’t sleep,” he said. “Guilty conscience. I shouldn’t have stomped off like that. It was rude of me to leave you to deal with Thomas. I don’t know what came over me.”

  “What came over you is an unexpected dose of the past,” Ali said.