Louisa waited just inside the door, watching raindrops roll down the glass. Conor's Porsche pulled up to the curb. She went out, popping up her umbrella as she ran for the street. A fine drizzle amplified the scent of falling leaves. She climbed into the passenger seat, shook the umbrella, and closed the car door.

"How do you run in those shoes?" Conor eyed her pumps.

"It isn't easy." Her toes had felt the quick jog across the sidewalk.

"I still don't get why you wear shoes that aren't comfortable."

She looked down at the pretty, nude, patent leather Pradas. "Because I like them."

Shaking his head, Conor eased into traffic.

A tractor-trailer rattled past as he took the ramp for the Schuylkill Expressway, nicknamed the Sure Kill Expressway by Philadelphia residents for a reason. A bus driver blew his horn as Conor merged into traffic and drove toward University City. He reached behind the seat and handed her a Styrofoam box.

She lifted the lid. He'd brought her a sandwich. "What's this?"

"Turkey club. This is the third lunch you've missed this week."

"Thank you." She took a small bite. Her stomach approved.

"You're welcome. Now eat," he ordered.

She raised a brow at his bossy tone, but he ignored her. She finished the sandwich in a few impolitely large bites. She opened the bottle of water he handed her. "Are the police following you today?"

"Probably. Black-and-whites stand out, but sometimes the unmarked cars are hard to spot." Conor sighed. "I just assume they're there all the time."

He parked at the curb a few units away from Zoe and Isa's apartment. "Be careful."

"I'll be fine." Louisa opened the car door and popped her umbrella as she stepped out onto the sidewalk. She hurried to the covered front porch and scanned the list of names. She rang the intercom for apartment 3B. Nothing. She pressed the buzzer again.

"Who is it?" a sleepy and slightly testy voice asked.

Gotcha. "Hello, Isa. It's Dr. Hancock."

After a few seconds of silence, the voice mumbled something incoherent. With a faint buzz, the door lock clicked. Louisa went into the foyer and went up the two flights of dark, wooden steps to the third-floor landing. A girl in pajamas and a camisole held the door open. Her brown hair was pulled back in a sloppy tail, her face devoid of makeup, her eyes wary and irritated. She hadn't expected Louisa's visit, and she wasn't happy about it.

Louisa stepped inside. "I'm Dr. Hancock."

"I'm Isa." She rubbed a hand over her face.

"I'm sorry I woke you." Louisa crossed the threshold. The door opened into a cramped living room and kitchenette combination. Squeezed between the couch and the kitchen counter was a round laminate table covered with books and papers.

"It's OK." Isa yawned. "I have a ton of research to do anyway."

"Late night?"

"Yeah. I'm working on a project for the Pendleton grant."

"Congratulations," Louisa said. "That's a lot of work."

Isa smiled. "It is, but I'll power through it."

"Good attitude."

"What did you want to talk to me about?"

"Zoe."

"I don't know what else I can tell you. The police were already here. I told them everything I knew. They searched her room and everything." Isa nodded toward a closed door off the living room.

"Would you mind if I took a look?"

She lifted a shoulder. "I guess not. They took a bunch of stuff."

Louisa walked to the doorway and peered inside Zoe's closet-size bedroom. The bed was made. A small desk in the corner held books and papers stacked in neat piles. Zoe's backpack hung by the straps over the back of her chair. "You're sure she didn't come home Monday night?"

"Yeah, I pulled an all-nighter." Isa walked to the fridge and poured Diet Coke into a glass. "Want a Coke?"

"No, thanks. Is that normal for her not to come home?"

"We've only been rooming together since the beginning of the semester. So we really haven't established norms yet."

Louisa rephrased the question. "Had she ever not come home before?"

"No. Not that I'm aware of."

"You were here all night? You didn't run out to the library or to grab a pizza?"

"I said I was here all night." Isa's voice grew irritable.

"Why didn't you answer Zoe's texts Monday night?"

"My phone battery was dead." The words were flat, as practiced as a child reading a memorized line in the school play. "I'm terrible about keeping it charged."

Louisa could hear Conor in her mind. Lame. Charging a cell phone was as second nature to twentysomethings as brushing their teeth.

"I feel terrible about it. If I had picked her up . . ." Isa's eyes watered. She brushed at the corner of one.

Real or fake tears? Louisa scanned the apartment. No boxes of tissues. No tissues in the trash can. Isa's eyes didn't show any signs of previous crying. Louisa just couldn't shake the sense that something wasn't right.

Isa returned the two-liter soda bottle to the refrigerator. "I fell asleep around eleven."

"How long had she been dating Heath?" Louisa's gaze swept the cluttered surfaces. "She said he was new, but how new?"

"Maybe a few weeks?" Isa opened a white box emblazoned with the pink-and-orange Dunkin' Donuts logo. She held it out to Louisa. "Doughnut?"

"I'm fine. Thank you."

"When she didn't come home, I thought maybe she spent the night at Heath's."

"Had their relationship progressed that far?" Louisa hated to think Heath had taken advantage of the younger Zoe. But Zoe was naive, a perfect target for a handsome, popular guy like Heath.

"I'm not sure. We aren't really close." Isa shrugged. "Zoe's a lot younger than the rest of us. She doesn't really fit in."

Louisa switched topics. "How well do you know Heath?"

"Not well at all. I've seen him around, but he's in the business program. We don't have any classes together." Isa bit into the doughnut and chewed. Her appetite appeared to be solid.

"How did Zoe meet him?"

"I don't really remember." Isa looked away. "I have to get in the shower. I have a class soon."

"Sure. I'll get out of your way." Louisa headed for the door. "Thanks for talking to me."

Outside, she went back to the car.

"Well?" Conor asked as she slid into the passenger side.

"I think she was lying or hiding something." She slouched down in the seat and recited her conversation with Isa back to Conor. "I could be wrong. She said they weren't that close, but Zoe was still her roommate. Maybe I expect too much, but her demeanor just felt . . . off. Can we wait a while? I'd like to follow her."

Isa came out in less than two minutes, not nearly enough time to have showered.

"You'd better wait here."

"Why? I want to follow her," Louisa protested.

He grinned and gave her a deliberate once-over. "Dressed like that, you aren't going to blend. Plus she already knows what you look like. She may not recognize me."

The after-the-boxing-match picture the media had shown of Conor was chosen to make him appear rough, but the bruised and swollen face in the photo barely resembled him.

Conor flipped up the hood of his sweatshirt to conceal his face. With his jeans, boots, and lean body, he could pass for a student. But he was right. In her suit and pumps, she did not blend in with the student population.

"All right," she sighed.

"I'll text you if anything interesting happens," Conor said. "Lock the doors."

Louisa slid farther down in the seat. Where was Isa going?

Conor shoved his hands in the kangaroo pocket of his shirt and strode down the sidewalk. Even at a seemingly casual pace, his long legs kept pace with the girl hurrying a block ahead.

Two blocks later, Isa turned at the corner and broke into a jog as the rain increased. Conor followed as she cut through a service alley. Three houses down the next street, she was running up onto the porch to ring the buzzer of Heath Yeager's place.

There was a bus stop at the corner. Conor ducked into the clear three-sided shelter. He sat down on the bench and pulled out his cell phone. Pretending to text, he kept one eye on the door to Heath's building.

Isa wasn't long. In barely ten minutes, she retraced her steps.

Conor texted Louisa: WATCH FOR ISA.

A few minutes later, she texted back: SHE'S HERE.

He watched Heath's apartment another half hour, but the door didn't open. He returned to the car and slid into the driver's seat.

"She's still inside," Louisa said.

Conor brushed the hood off his head. His shirt was damp. "Heath hasn't gone anywhere either."

"What now?"

"I'll take you back to work." Conor started the car and pulled away from the curb. "At least we know they're both lying. They know each other much better than they'll admit."

"What could they be lying about?"

"They're up to something." Conor turned back toward Center City. "I'd love to get inside Heath's apartment."

"That's illegal."

"Yes, it is. And I have to work tonight anyway."

Louisa chewed on her lip. "I'd hate for you to get into more trouble with the police."

"OK. We'll shelve that idea for now." But eventually he might need to get into Heath's apartment and find out why he and Isa were lying. He glanced in the rearview mirror and picked out a dark-blue American sedan four cars back. He was probably already in more trouble with the police. But what choice did he have? Even when the DNA results came back on the blood and confirmed it wasn't Zoe's, Damian had flat-out told him he could still be arrested and convicted. The hair was hers, and Conor had admitted she'd been in his apartment. Either he solved his own case, or he went on trial for murder.

18.

"Have a nice evening, Dr. Hancock."

"Thank you, Gerome." Friday evening, Louisa walked through the open door to meet her aunt. She hadn't seen Conor since lunchtime the day before, but he'd texted her a few times. They'd both been busy with work. She'd spent the day moving artifacts into the Celtic Warrior exhibit cases. The exhibit wasn't finished, but guests at tomorrow night's fund-raiser would get a sense of how the display would come together. Conor had been tied up at the bar handling deliveries.

Neither of them had any ideas on how to look for Zoe. The Finches had done several heart-wrenching interviews begging for their daughter's return. The DNA tests had not come in. Did the labs work on the weekend, or would Conor be safe until Monday?

"You'll call if you need the car later?" the doorman asked with a polite smile.

"I will. Thank you."

A cool wind sent dead leaves scurrying in the gutter, and the moon shone with spectacular clarity through a few wisps of thin clouds. If only Aunt Margaret's intentions were as clear as the night sky. Would her aunt give her news that would unravel her life? Louisa pulled her cashmere wrap tighter around her shoulders as she crossed the pavement. A black town car waited at the curb. It seemed silly to ask for a car to drive her the half mile from the Rittenhouse to her aunt's hotel, but she'd had too many creepy being watched sensations in the past couple of days. Walking alone at night didn't appeal.

The driver stood by the open rear door. Louisa eased into the back. The silk of her simple black sheath dress slid across the seat, the leather chilling the backs of her thighs.

The car dropped her in front of the Ritz Carlton. Louisa climbed the granite steps and went through the glass doors. Situated on the prestigious Avenue of the Arts section of Broad Street, the hotel was located in the former historic Girard Bank building. The rotunda building was modeled after the Pantheon in Rome, complete with a soaring domed ceiling and neoclassical columns. More than a hundred feet in the air, the night sky darkened the glass oculus in the dome's apex. Voices and utensils echoed in the cavernous space as Louisa crossed the white marble floor.