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“Hazel?” Chief. His voice had a strange note to it, more animation than usual.

I turned too quickly. How long had I been frozen in place, staring down?

He stood several yards away near the doors to the athletic wing.

Football bag still over his shoulder. Watching me.

Not the list in my hand. Me.

His face had gone very still. There it was.

The look.

I hated that look. I hated more that some small part of me understood it.

I forced myself not to look down at the key again.

“Knock it off,” I called. “Drama queen.”

Chief didn’t smile. But something in his shoulders loosened. Just slightly.

I held his gaze for a few beats longer.

Then I walked away.

I left the key where it was.

It was only a key.

A week after Max disappeared, Dad and Riot were discussing murder over dinner.

This was not unusual.

Most of their truly gnarly stories came from their years working homicide in San Antonio, before they moved their families to comparatively peaceful Briar. Apparently big-city murderers had given them enough material to last a lifetime.

Some of the stories were so bizarre they sounded made up.

They never were.

Sunshine had been complaining about attics, which was also nothing new.

Sadie’s ears perked up. “Why do you hate attics so much? No one’s told me.”

Sunshine grimaced. “One of Buck’s first cases. He’s had worse since. More victims, certainly. But that one was just so creepy.”

Sadie was glued. “How many victims?”

“One. Sixteen-year-old girl.”

“She was killed in an attic?” Sadie prompted.

“Eventually.” Sunshine put down her fork. “It was drawn out and bloody. There was so much blood it soaked through the ceiling and started dripping onto the floor below. That’s how her parents found her.”

Sadie stopped eating.

So did I.

“That isn’t even the part that bothered me most,” Sunshine continued. “He’d been stalking her for nearly a year. Spending time in their attic, watching her. He had a shrine hidden up there among the boxes and clutter.”