Amy Perkins wore yoga pants and a blouse that screamed expensive without appearing to be anything special. Her makeup was flawless, and her hair was carefully crafted into a wavy updo, suggesting the styling might’ve taken a lot more time than was reasonable.

  Affluent and focused on the menus of overpriced entrées before them, the Perkinses weren’t exactly what he would have pictured if asked to visualize a circus performer’s parents.

  Still, the couple had just lost their son. There was no harm in giving them the benefit of the doubt, despite the situation being less than ideal. They’d flown in from California, hadn’t they? That said something about their feelings.

  Even if the pair were gazing at their menus as if they had nothing else to worry about.

  So much for wanting to get this over with.

  “Charge an arm and a leg around here, don’t they?” The man slammed shut the menu and shoved it back into the holder against the wall. After little hesitation, his wife did the same.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Perkins, we appreciate your time.” Leo leaned back in his seat to make room for the server dropping off their drinks. He waited for her to get a few steps away before moving on. “What can you tell us about your son’s work at the circus, his relationships—”

  “Are you kidding me?” Ted Perkins rolled his eyes. He gulped his water before shooting his wife a sidelong glance. “This is why I needed a drink. Still driving me to drink even after he’s dead, that kid. You hear this guy? Kyle’s fucking relationships.”

  Denae drummed her fingers on the table. “I take it you weren’t a fan of Kyle’s job?”

  The man’s eyes grew wide, and Leo mentally congratulated Denae for keeping her voice so even. This guy was a piece of work.

  Before Perkins could answer her, though, the server came back with his drink. He held up a finger to signal she should wait while he tasted the drink and lifted the glass for a slobbery sip.

  When the drink came away from his mouth, he grinned as if he’d just been discussing his golf game rather than his recently deceased son. “Thanks, sweetheart. Keep ’em coming, and we’ll make sure to tip accordingly, all right?”

  The woman gave a tight smile communicating anything but goodwill in response.

  “Agents…” Perkins tapped his temple.

  “Ambrose and Monroe.” Leo handed over his business card, as did Denae.

  “Right.” Ted Perkins took a deep swallow of his liquor, ignoring the cards on the table. “You must already know that Kyle was only with that dumbass circus for six months before this bullshit happened.”

  Bullshit? That’s one way to describe your son’s murder.

  Amy Perkins finished stirring sugar into her coffee and placed one hand on her husband’s arm. “You must understand, Agents, we haven’t seen Kyle in over five years. Not since his wedding day. We were glad to come out here, of course, as things must be taken care of, and he was, after all, our son, but…” She trailed off, shrugging as if there were nothing more to say.

  “Five years?” Leo felt Denae’s knee bouncing up and down under the table. He wasn’t the only one on edge. “What kept you all from getting together for such a long time?”

  “Geography.” Ted Perkins was halfway through his whiskey sour now. Unfortunately, the drink didn’t seem to be improving his temper. “Kyle and his wife, Marsha, lived on the East Coast. They couldn’t be bothered to visit us, so we couldn’t be bothered to visit them. Understand? Then, this past year, Kyle up and lost his mind. Left Marsha, got divorced, and joined the circus. You want to tell me what kind of a man does that? Child’s fairy tale, that’s what that is.”

  “It wasn’t just geography.” Amy Perkins shook her head. “You see, Ted accused Kyle of being a…” her voice dropped, as if she were afraid nearby diners would overhear, “homo.”

  Unbelievable.

  The emphasis said everything about this couple’s feelings, and openness, toward their son.

  Amy sipped her coffee and went on. It took everything Leo had to keep his face neutral. “You see, a bit over five years ago, Ted made it very clear that he knew why our Kyle hadn’t married his longtime girlfriend…his now ex-wife, Marsha, you understand. And just like that, Kyle married her, and they moved away. I hate to say it, but it was…probably to appease his father.”

  “Another thing a real man wouldn’t do,” the man in question grumbled.

  “Doesn’t seem to have worked anyway,” Denae said. “You—”

  Leo jerked his knee, bumping her under the table to stop whatever else she was about to say. Which probably would have ended with “asshole.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Nothing, sir.” Leo kept his tone neutral, hating himself for attempting to appease the unappeasable. He needed information, which was something he wouldn’t get if he punched these people in their evil, bigoted faces.

  His sympathy for Kyle Perkins grew. Despite his muscles, the son had been defenseless against his father.

  Ted Perkins downed the remainder of his drink and gestured to the server. She was there in seconds, another glass in hand.

  “Honey, enough.” Amy Perkins caught her husband’s wrist and gripped it, holding him silent. “If you ask me, Kyle just couldn’t keep pretending he wasn’t gay.” A haunted look filled her eyes. “He was living a lie, and that’s why he got a divorce. I would’ve welcomed him home if he’d come, with open arms, but Kyle never even tried to come home.”

  Leo let that thought hang in the air and watched as Ted Perkins glared at his wife, as if she’d just suggested the whole circus, horse and all, move in with them rent-free.

  It was abundantly clear why Kyle hadn’t tried to reconnect with his mother. Whether she realized it or not, the way she spoke of her son was alienating. And her true allegiance was to her spouse. Her home was toxic.

  Denae leaned into the table, her focus on the mother. “So you haven’t had contact with Kyle for five years? How did you know he joined the circus?”

  “We didn’t see each other, but we did speak. He or Marsha would call every few months.” Amy Perkins released her husband and reached for her coffee. “Tell us how fine everything was.”

  “Amy would speak to him. I spoke to him only once after the divorce.” Ted wagged a finger. “Once. That boy called a few months after he walked out on his wife to tell us he’d joined the circus. And you know he had the nerve to say that their circus ringmaster, whatever the hell his name was—”

  Amy grimaced. “Reggie O’Rourke.”

  “That’s right!” Ted slapped the table, sloshing his drink. “Reggie O’Rourke’s his name. Kyle had the nerve to say that that man was more of a father figure to him in those few months than I ever was. You believe that? The nerve of that kid. Bullshit’s what it is.”

  Beside him, Denae practically vibrated with repressed fury. Leo didn’t even bother to smile. This man wasn’t worth the effort.

  Perkins went back to his drink as his wife leaned over the table, both hands wrapped around her coffee. “Maybe it’s him! Where was this Reggie O’Rourke when Kyle was poisoned? My husband is a good man, and for Kyle to say anything less, he must’ve been brainwashed. Don’t you think it must’ve been the ringmaster who killed him?”

  “Man supported him being a…a…I can’t even say it.” Perkins lifted his drink like he’d finish it in one swallow but paused with the glass in front of his mouth. He set it down and stared at the table. “I just can’t believe he would choose to be that way. Not when I’d raised him to be a man like me.”

  Leo signaled for the server. He was close to done with this conversation, and he dreaded the questions he had to ask next.

  “Do you have any idea if Kyle kept in touch with his wife? If their divorce was amicable?”

  Amy shrugged. “We exchanged Christmas cards with Marsha. Got a postcard of her and her dog. I called, and she said she’s well. A nice girl. She…didn’t seem broken up.”

  “Did she say where she was the day Kyle died?”

  Ted Perkins almost choked on the remains of his drink. “You’re asking for alibis? From his ex-wife, the woman he bailed on to go play with the clowns and freaks?”

  Not for the first time that morning, Leo was grateful for Denae’s presence. She had a quick save on her lips before he could get out the words brewing behind his own.

  “In every investigation, there are ugly questions. It’s our job to ask them, and sometimes that means uncovering an uglier truth. We’re not doing this for fun or to cause more suffering for anyone.”

  Ted Perkins harrumphed, sliding a twenty onto the table as the server brought their bills.

  “Fine. Ask your ‘ugly questions,’ and maybe I’ll answer them.”

  Leo took a gamble. He’d had enough of the man’s bluster. “Subpoenas are real things, Mr. Perkins. If you want to go through the process of getting your lawyer involved, we can go that route. Or you can answer our questions here, and, assuming neither you nor Mrs. Perkins have anything to hide, you can be on your way back to your life in California.”

  They sat back from the table, stunned into silence, if their gaping mouths and wide eyes were any indication.

  “Ready? Okay, first, I’ll repeat my question from earlier. Did Kyle’s ex-wife, Marsha, mention where she was the day Kyle died?”

  Perkins answered first. “You’d have to ask my wife. I didn’t talk to Marsha.”

  “Mrs. Perkins?”

  “Not specifically, no. But she did say she’d been out running that morning and that she’d stopped by one of those delivery florists to arrange for a sympathy bouquet. She said it would arrive later this week.”

  “Okay. We can look into that. And thank you. Now what about you and Mr. Perkins? You were both at home, in California?”

  Ted Perkins burst into laughter, loud and mocking. “Yeah. That’s right. California, before we jumped on our private supersonic jet, flew out here, killed our son, and then flew back home in time to catch a flight back here so we could answer your questions. Yeesh, you get paid with my tax dollars, right?”

  His wife leaned back with a sound that might’ve been a sigh or a cutoff sob.

  “You all have soft spots for that asshole. It’s bullshit. Maybe if Marsha or his mother had demanded he be a man, he would’ve.”

  Amy Perkins refrained from defending herself or Marsha to her husband. Instead, she looked at Leo and reached for Denae’s hand.

  Leo had to credit the agent for not pulling away.

  “We had to come. Ted loved Kyle.” Amy Perkins elbowed her husband as if to remind him of that supposed fact, jerking Denae’s hand in the process. “He did. Parents love their children. They want what’s best for them. You understand that, don’t you? We wanted what was best for Kyle, and Marsha—”

  “Was the best thing for him,” Ted Perkins all but growled. The words came off as a rebuke of his wife more than anything.

  The spouses were clearly growing more annoyed with each other, angry not so much about Kyle’s murder as about who he’d been. Even Amy Perkins seemed more concerned about convincing them of her love, her duty as a mother, than grief-stricken at the loss of her son. And Ted Perkins had proven himself done with answering any further questions, ugly or otherwise.

  Denae freed her hand and slipped some money from her wallet to cover the coffee. Leo added a few more bills, knowing the male counterpart of the so-called grieving couple likely didn’t cover his two whiskeys and his wife’s coffee with a twenty, and he wanted to pad the tip too.

  “Why don’t we drop you off at your hotel?” Denae suggested. “Perhaps we can finish this discussion after you’ve had some rest.”

  Translation: Once you’ve had a chance to sober up. Assuming you know how.

  With the couple’s begrudging agreement, Leo stood and grabbed the handle of Mrs. Perkins’s carry-on. He led the way from the tavern, channeling his irritation into getting out of the damn airport.

  Personally, Leo was no longer sure there’d be much point to questioning the couple further, estranged as they’d been from their son, but he’d discuss that with Denae once they made their escape.

  Even if Ted Perkins was more concerned about his next drink than his own son, Leo would honor the man who’d had the strength to live life his own way.

  Until someone ended it.

  20

  Emma and Mia found Jacinda in the staging tent of the circus.

  The SSA sat at a table reviewing interview notes from some of Griff’s officers. Emma wondered how Jacinda always looked so pulled together. Even after hours of working on-site, Jacinda’s red hair was shiny, and not a single frown line appeared on her face. Emma felt as if the cold had permanently frizzed her own light-brown locks.

  Vance stood in the background, talking to a group of older men huddled just outside the big top. There was no sign of Leo or Denae.

  They’d all had their separate morning duties, with an agreement to meet up after lunch. A slow start to the second day of the investigation, but Emma blamed that entirely on Reggie O’Rourke for making them hold off on returning to the circus until after noon.

  His ducking and dodging were over. The man could only hide behind medical checkups and counseling sessions for so long before he started answering some damn questions.

  Jacinda swiped her hair back behind her shoulders and greeted Emma and Mia with a wave. “Any earth-shattering insights after meeting Penelope’s parents?”

  “Just that her parents thought she was having an affair with O’Rourke.” Mia gave an exaggerated look around the area, as if to ask if either hide or hair had been seen of the man.

  “One more finger pointing at the ringmaster.” Jacinda noted some last bit of information on her tablet and stood. “Vance and I kept digging this morning. Found another case that was sealed by the court to protect a minor involved. In addition to O’Rourke’s more recent involvement with a seventeen-year-old who claimed she was nineteen, he knowingly, by his own admission, had intercourse with a sixteen-year-old girl in rural New York. This occurred when he was just twenty-one. We have a pattern, and it’s not one that O’Rourke seems particularly concerned about breaking.”

  “What happened with the sixteen-year-old?”

  “The parents pushed a lawsuit, and O’Rourke pled guilty. He was convicted of felony statutory rape.”

  Emma whistled. “That’s prison time.”

  “Two years, served six months.” Jacinda gestured to the notes spread on the table. “Griff’s detectives got here at noon and managed to question some of the carnies who run stands and concessions before they were asked to leave the fairgrounds. I’m going over those notes now.” She waved behind her toward Vance. “He’s talking to the last of them. Nothing we haven’t heard yet. You two up for finally tackling O’Rourke?”

  Emma couldn’t help grinning. “You have no idea how ready I am.”

  Jacinda chuckled. “Well, you’ve won the lucky draw since you’re first back. You run into any trouble, shout.”

  Emma wasted no time leading Mia toward O’Rourke’s. As she traveled the now-familiar terrain of the camper maze, she kept an eye out for Penelope’s ghost. If Penelope had become pregnant and adopted the child away, maybe O’Rourke took that as a slight he couldn’t bear and killed her for it. But that wouldn’t explain Dennis Hamel or Kyle Perkins being killed. Maybe she would see one of them too.

  Not that any of the ghosts had been particularly communicative. They seemed to prefer playing charades.

  Across from the horse corral, Emma pulled up short.

  There was the man himself. With his bushy white hair only partially tamed beneath a stocking cap, he was unmistakable.

  O’Rourke carried a trash bag toward the dumpsters at the edge of the fairgrounds. Cardboard boxes sat in a clumsy pile beside the dumpster.

  I guess that’s a half-assed attempt at recycling.

  The older man scurried forward, occasionally glancing around the surrounding grounds. He couldn’t have appeared guiltier if he’d tried.

  When he’d dropped the bag through one of the dumpster windows, he turned back and froze.

  Emma and Mia were still a hundred feet behind him but approaching fast. Emma was in the lead. “Mr. O’Rourke. We’d like to speak to you.”

  The ringmaster paused, seeming to acknowledge he’d finally been caught out. In a flash, though, he changed his mind and fled, running flat out in the direction of his trailer.

  “What the hell?”

  Mia started after him. “Stop. Mr. O’Rourke! Federal agents!”

  Emma’s instinct was to break into a sprint, but a sudden drop in air pressure sent a sharp pain through her head. A blast of icy air reinforced the ice-cream-headache sensation.

  In the open area beside the dumpsters, Penelope, Kyle, and Dennis appeared, all clustered together. White-eyed and flat-faced, the three ghosts pointed at the dumpster in unison, a collage of accusatory gore and death Emma couldn’t ignore.

  “Mia, hold up!” Emma beckoned.

  Mia skidded to a stop and whirled to face Emma. “Emma! What are you doing? He’s getting away!”

  “I know.” Emma swallowed, searching for words. “But he’ll go to his camper. I, uh, Mia, we need to examine that trash. Now.”

  Mia gestured in the direction O’Rourke had disappeared. “Seriously? We can search the trash later. It’s trash. It’s not going anywhere.”

  Striding toward the dumpster, Emma tried to project confidence. The ghosts disappeared as she approached. Typical. “That trash bag could have the evidence we need to get a search warrant. An arrest warrant, even. If it leaves our sight, someone can claim we picked up the wrong bag.”

  Emma reached the dumpster and pulled latex gloves from her shoulder bag. “O’Rourke’s not going anywhere we can’t find him.”

  Walking back toward the dumpsters, Mia only shook her head. “Your gut’s a strong, obstinate little thing, huh?”

  “You have no idea.” Emma was already reaching into the dumpster, pulling out the bag O’Rourke had dropped.