It was the bag that stopped her. Glossy and heavy-looking, all black, with two thin plastic grooves running down one side.
She glanced back at the closed door to the house. She’d have to get back in there soon. She pushed aside the images in her mind of Diana Whitacre and Ricardo Cruz and tried to listen with another part of her brain, where a tiny bell was ringing about the bag.
Her concentration was broken by a buzz on her phone. A response from Ramirez:
Where is Hanley now?
Now? Lana hadn’t expected the detective to get back to her so quickly. The truck was good, but she needed more evidence. Lana weighed her options. She really didn’t want to lie to a sheriff’s deputy. Not again. At least, not in text.
She took a deep breath and dialed.
Ramirez picked up right away. The sound quality was terrible, making it seem like the woman was yelling at her. Or maybe she was yelling.
“WELL?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know what?”
“I don’t know what Paul Hanley’s doing at the moment.” Lana had some ideas. The possibilities were limited. But technically, she couldn’t be sure. “But I know he’ll be here at eight.”
The detective went into a long speech about the consequences of lying to a sworn officer, wasting government resources, harboring dangerous criminals, and so on. Lana pulled the phone away from her ear and looked at the time: 6:38. She had to get back into the house.
“Reception here is terrible,” Lana shouted into the phone. “I can’t hear you. I’ll see you at eight.”
And then, despite her misgivings, Lana hung up.
The front door to the house opened, and Lana hopped sideways, trying to put as much distance as possible between her and the Maserati without it being too obvious. She dropped to the ground, pretending to adjust a nonexistent strap on her high heel. At the same time, she turned the phone in her hand, trying to fashion it into a blunt weapon.
Lana slowly raised her eyes, trying her best to look like a tired, foolish woman who needed her medication.
“Ma, you okay?” Beth asked.
Lana straightened up at the sound of her daughter’s voice and gave her a smile. She looked down. Her hand was buzzing with a stream of all-caps texts from the detective. She slid the phone to silent, pocketed it, and followed Beth inside.
Back in the dining room, Martin was eating the last of his pizza wafer. Diana had pushed aside the plates, making room for a sheaf of papers she pulled out of a slim leather folio.
“Ready?” she asked crisply.
“Almost,” Lana said. She held up the pill dispenser. Diana frowned and rocked backward, as if lung cancer might be contagious. “I’ll just need a few minutes in the restroom.”
Martin stood. “Di, I wonder if we might start this conversation privately. It’s clear Lana needs some time to take care of herself. Perhaps we could go into Dad’s study?”
Lana looked up. Private was good. Private meant she could search the house. Diana reluctantly stood and walked toward her brother with her stack of paper.
“We’ll be out shortly,” she said. “To talk through the financials. And the comps we discussed. I sincerely hope you’ll be able to participate by then.” She raised a hand to Lana, dismissing her, and followed her brother down the hall. A door swung shut beyond the den.
“Well, that was pleasant,” Lana said. “Where’s Jack?”
“She went exploring,” Beth said. “Outside.”
Lana nodded.
“Ma, what exactly are you up to?”
“Stay here. Give me a shout if that door opens.”
After a quick glance at the closed door of the study, Lana headed up the stairs and along a hallway she hoped led to the bedrooms. And a bathroom, where she could say she wanted privacy if someone came looking for her.
The first door she came to must have been Martin’s room. There was a double bed with a dark blue wool coverlet, a scratched-up desk, and a bulky dark-wood bureau with a line of tiny Star Wars figurines marching across it. The walls were adorned with San Francisco 49ers posters, M.C. Escher prints, and an MIT pennant. Despite the personal touches, the room was cleaned out. There were no papers on the desk, no trash in the wastebasket on the floor. The aroma of watered-down bleach hung in the air. Lana took a quick pull at the top drawer of the bureau. Nothing. Not even a dust bunny.
She proceeded to the next door. This room was smaller, more worn. There was a twin bed, a simple dresser, and an antique, heavy-looking crib, the kind someone had probably carried in a wagon over the plains to California generations ago. The closet was stuffed with coats and faded quilts. But it didn’t seem to be a storeroom for old furniture. There were small clumps of dried dirt on the floor, and Lana could smell the faint scents of sage and moss on the bed. Someone had stayed here recently, their presence not yet swept away.