He got out of the car and walked down a path bordered by huge hydrangeas. I couldn't see or hear anything, but Mercer and I figured that when Mike didn't return he'd been admitted to the house.
"The water looks mighty rough," Mercer said, turning on the radio to check the track of the rainstorm that had been predicted for the next day. "Hope that damn thing blows out to sea instead of hitting us."
"They downgraded it from a hurricane, didn't they?"
"That's the last I heard."
We were talking through the case with each other when a screen door slammed on the back porch. Two girls who appeared to be teenagers came out together, and a man's voice called after them.
"Shauna? Damn it, girl, get back in here."
"I'm just walking Erin home, Dad. I'll be right back."
Mercer and I watched as they passed in front of our parked car. The one called Erin removed a joint from her pants pocket, lighted it, and then passed it to Shauna, who took a few drags before they resumed their walk.
They continued on their way until they were out of sight, but the distinctive sweet smell of the marijuana wafted through the car window in the heavy night air.
A few minutes later, Shauna came back down the street by herself, the hood of her rain jacket drawn tightly around her face. She stopped in the driveway behind her house for a few more tokes before going back in.
"Take a shot at her, Alex. You've got nothing to lose."
I hesitated for several seconds, then opened the car door. When I shut it behind me, the girl turned her head to check me out and threw her cigarette to the ground.
"Shauna Dylan?"
She didn't move, but she didn't answer either.
"Are you Shauna Dylan?"
"Yeah. And you're the police, aren't you?" She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and I could see that she had been crying.
"I'm not a cop. I'm with the DA's office. And yes, I'm here with Detective Chapman."
"Well, Kiernan's not home, if that's what you've come for."
"I'm glad to hear that, actually."
"Right," she said. She was steadying herself with the handrail on the steps, twisting her body to look at me, as though she was stoned or had been drinking too much. "You're totally full of shit. You've wrecked Kiernan's life, you know. You've wrecked his life over what? My father's mad as all hell at him, he won't let my mother come back from Ireland till all this stuff in the newspapers calms down, and everything they've both put into Ruffles will be gone. Completely gone."
She was crying now, reaching down with one hand to lower herself onto the top step of the porch, beneath the roof that shielded her from the rain. I took a couple of steps in her direction.
"Stay away from me, okay? I don't even have a family anymore. The detective thinks Kiernan's a murderer and now my mother's threatening to leave my father because she's so mortified about that-that whore. We're all sick over this, and Frank Shea won't even tell my dad where Kiernan's gone. Now I'm glad. I don't want him to come back here so you can try to make a fool out of him again."
Shauna pulled herself up to walk to the back door of the house.
"You reek of marijuana, Shauna. Unless your father doesn't mind that."
She stopped in place, swaying a bit from side to side. She sniffed a few times, first the air and then her hands. "You gonna lock me up, too? You gonna lock me up 'cause I'm wasted-'cause my whole family is falling apart?"
"I didn't want my friend to arrest your brother on Saturday. We had a big fight about it, too."
She eyed me warily now.
"We really didn't come here to talk to Kiernan tonight. Mike Chapman wanted to tell your father some things we found out today. About somebody else. About a man Kiernan knows who may have killed the three women who've disappeared."
Shauna smiled despite herself. "Like he wants to apologize, this detective?"
There was no need to tell her that Mike didn't view it quite that way.
"He wants to explain what's going on to your father," I said. "Would you mind sitting with me on the steps for a couple of minutes, till they're done? Let me get out of the rain?"
She sniffed her fingers again and then sat down beside me.
"How old are you, Shauna?"
"Nineteen. What's the difference?"
"What do you do?"
"I'm gonna be a sophomore at college. Going back next week, after Labor Day, if my father lets me with all this going on."
"Have you spent much time at Ruffles?" I asked.
"My father won't hear of it. I'd catch hell for it, 'cause of my age. The boys do it all right, but somehow it's different with my sisters and me."
I got it. Let everybody else's kids get loaded. Take their money and send them out into the night with any guy who'll pay the tab. But keep your own child out of harm's way.
"Are you and Kiernan close?"
"Sure we are. We're all close."
"I want you to tell him something, Shauna. I want you to-"
"I don't know where he is. None of us do."
"He's got a cell phone, hasn't he? Or you can tell Frank Shea to get a message to him."
She stared straight ahead, listening to me but not making any promises.
"He didn't kill those girls, Shauna. I know that and Detective Chapman knows that. We weren't sure about it on Saturday night, but we're certain now," I said. "You've got to tell him that before he does something foolish."
"Like what?"
Desperate people, Mike liked to remind me, did desperate things. "Like go to Ireland, where you've got family, instead of resolving these things with the police. Like hurt himself, even accidentally."
Shauna closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
"When I asked you if you've spent any time at Ruffles, you told me your father doesn't let you go there. That's not exactly an answer to my question, is it?" I asked. "You've been there, haven't you?"
She looked away from me. "Do you know the guys who work there?"
She wouldn't even meet me halfway. "Charlie. You know Charlie, don't you?"
"Yeah." There was a slight inflection in her voice, as though she was surprised I knew the bartender's name.
"How about Troy?"
No answer.
"Have you met a guy named Troy, Shauna? He's one of the bouncers."
"That's how much you know. You cops think you know everything about Kiernan 'cause you went to Ruffles once. It's such a joke. There's nobody called Troy, okay?"
"He'd be new. Started this summer, maybe the end of July or the beginning of this month."
"You can tell my father I've been to Ruffles, okay? I don't care what he does to me. It can't get any worse than this. But I'm telling you I was at the bar last week, with my brother Danny and my friend Erin," Shauna said, pointing down the street. "There isn't any Troy. I'd know if there was."
"Did you see the picture of Kiernan in the paper this morning?" I said reluctantly, knowing the perp walk image would revive her hostility.
"Did I see it? Hello? I mean everyone we know saw it."
"There's a man standing behind Kiernan, over the shoulder of one of the detectives. He was working the door on Saturday night," I said. "He's in his forties, a tall black man with a thick scar on the side of his neck, and tattoos-tattoos with initials all up and down his arms."
Shauna was dripping with sarcasm now, pleased to show that she knew more than Mike and I did. "Why? The detective wants to apologize to him, too? For thinking he's Troy somebody or other? Well, he's not Troy. There is no Troy at Ruffles. His name is Wilson."
"Wilson." I thought of the body we had discovered tonight. Wilson Rasheed. "You've met him?"
"That's who my friends had to ask for to get in. I mean, I've seen him there the last couple of weeks. It's not like he's my buddy. Wilson and Hank. They're the guys on the door. You ask for them, you show them one of Kiernan's cards, and you get in."
"Wilson-that's his first name or last?"
"Now why would I know that? Just Wilson is all anybody called him."