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funeral is on hold for now, pending the—the autopsy….” He seemed to drift off, then added quietly, “It’s hard to think about the future.”
    “Then don’t. Think about what you need to do right now. Are you alone?”
    “Melanie’s on her way.”
    The fiancée. Jo pulled her car door open. “That’s good.”
    “We’ll come up there if we need to. Nora and I—we used to be so close. I wish you’d known us then. She doesn’t communicate with me the way she used to. Remember being eighteen?”
    Staying on the lake next to Elijah, she’d been remembering being eighteen a lot. But she wasn’t going there. “Why did Nora quit school? Was there a precipitating incident—a crisis, anything?”
    “I think it was pure impulse. She loves Vermont, or at least the idea of it.” Thomas’s tone cooled noticeably. “Her decision to take a break from college has nothing to do with Alex’s death.”
    “All right. I’ll get back to you as soon as I’ve laid eyes on her.”
    “I haven’t even asked how you are,” he said quietly.
    “I just had a warm scone and coffee at the café where I understand you and Melanie met.”
    “Ah.” He seemed to try to sound cheerful. “The Three Sisters Café of Black Falls, Vermont, has the best scones anywhere.” But he choked up with emotion. “Jo…”
    “I know, Thomas. I’m so sorry. I’ll go look in on Nora now.”
    “Thank you.”
    He hung up, and Jo climbed into her car and stuck the key in the ignition. Her head felt pinched, tight. Had Nora talked to her father before she’d fled the café? Was that why she was so upset? Had Devin known her stepfather was dead?
    Had Elijah known?
    She debated, then dialed several law enforcement friends in Washington. No one picked up. A cell signal wasn’t the problem this time. “From hero to goat,” she muttered. She wasn’t offended. She relented and tried her boss.
    Francona picked up on the first ring. “Thought you’d be in a canoe.”
    “Ambassador Bruni’s stepdaughter lives in Black Falls. She just took off from the café where she works—”
    “Three Sisters on Main Street. I’ve got the Web site up now.” He paused and added, “Quaint.”
    “The owners aren’t sisters.”
    “Beth Harper’s your sister.”
    Jo didn’t respond.
    “I’m surprised the lakes up there aren’t all frozen. Do you own a canoe?”
    Yesterday, she and Beth had appropriated the canoe left on her property. Elijah’s, no doubt. “Actually, no.”
    “Borrow one. Rent one. Whatever.”
    Jo sighed. “Did a report on Bruni just cross your desk? Is that why you had the café Web site up?”
    “Wear a life vest.”
    He disconnected.
    Mark Francona was difficult and exacting on a good day. Today, Jo thought, wasn’t a good day.
    She drove up along the town green and crossed the covered bridge over the river, heading up a hill toward the country estate where Nora Asher lived.
    “I’d give my life for Elijah.”
    Jo gripped the wheel and pushed back the image of Drew Cameron on their walk among the cherry blossoms. She didn’t know anything that would connect their unsettling conversation and his death two weeks later, much less Alexander Bruni’s death a few hours ago.
    But something was wrong in Black Falls, she thought, and had been for some time.
     
     
     

Chapter Six
     
     
    Fighting tears, Nora set her backpack on the gray-painted wood floor of the small porch of the stone guesthouse she’d moved into after she’d quit college. She’d wanted to rent her own apartment—to really be independent—but when Lowell and Vivian Whittaker, the couple who owned the guesthouse, offered to let her live there in exchange for odd jobs, her parents had bullied her into agreeing. The Whittakers were closer friends with Alex and her mom than with her dad, but he’d jumped right in with them. They’d all provided practical reasons why living in the guesthouse made sense, but she knew they just didn’t think she could make