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Was anything he told her true? Who’d been played?

But she remembered his shock at seeing her in her office, no one could act that well. So the part about having a problem was likely valid. And the fact that he’d been spurred by the Jane X article clarified the problem: a criminally dangerous murderous relative.

Moral parameters... not a blast from the past, something ongoing. A tortured, internal debate about whether or not to go public.

And now he was dead.

Just to make sure he hadn’t learned about her some other way, Grace did something she found abhorrent: Googled herself. All that came up were academic citations, not a single image, lending credence to at least part of Andrew’s story.

She thought about the geography of his last living day.

Drinks in B.H., therapy in West Hollywood.

Death downtown. For as long as Grace could recall, the district underwent development that seemed to end up overly optimistic. Despite Staples Center, converted lofts, yuppie condos, and bars, huge swaths of downtown L.A. remained bleak and dangerous as soon as rush hour ended and the streets were commandeered by armies of homeless schizophrenics, criminal illegals, addicts, dealers, and the like.

Had Andrew, new to the city, simply wandered into the wrong area and come up against a psychotic obeying a command hallucination?

Pitiful, dingy way to die.

Or did his murder indeed relate to his moral quest, best intentions and all?

An eddy of curiosity whipped up in Grace’s gut, displacing some of her anxiety.

If Henke made good on that one-hour prediction, fifty-one minutes remained before Grace met her first homicide detective.

Meanwhile... a bracing walk around the neighborhood would kill some time but she felt oddly disinclined to move. She tried catching up on journal articles but couldn’t focus.

Andrew Toner.

Something about the name bothered her but she couldn’t figure out what until her eyes drifted to her date book. The notation she’d made regarding his appointment, followed by the phone number he’d given her exchange.

A. Toner. Viewed as a collection of letters, the answer was obvious.

Atoner.

A man seeking expiation.

What Detective Elaine Henke would consider a clue.

Grace decided not to mention it to Henke. She’d come across weirdly over-involved, turn herself into a person of greater interest.

Atoner.

What was your sin, Andrew? Or have you taken on someone else’s iniquity?

Given what we did in the parking lot, do I really want to know?

Ignorance could truly be bliss. But she called the number he’d left, anyway.

Not in service.

Chapter 14

By the time Grace’s meager belongings were packed in Wayne the caseworker’s car, the sun was sinking and graying the Valley, making everything look heavy, almost liquid.

He started up the engine and looked back at her. “You okay?”

Grace nodded.

“Can’t hear you, kid.”

“M’okay.”

When Grace got moved from foster to foster, the trip was usually short — bounces from one small nondescript house to another. This time Wayne got on the freeway and drove for a long time.

Grace hoped that didn’t mean a big change, some sort of special place. All she wanted was people feeding her and leaving her alone so she could think and read and imagine.

She was still hoping for all that when Wayne got off the freeway and she read the exit sign and a pain started high up in her belly. It had been a long time but the sign shone through the enveloping darkness and she remembered: The few times Dodie or Ardis had taken her out of the single-wide, this was the way they’d come back home.

She cracked her window, let in dust and heat and diesel fuel. The sun was gone now but you could still see things and they pricked her memory, too: The fringy tops of those wrinkled plants with their gray leaves. Discarded oil drums and other metal stuff heaped in piles off the side of the road.

Desert, miles of it.

And now Wayne had turned off onto a road that made Grace’s heart pound. A sign pointed the way to Desert Dreams. If he wasn’t going so fast, she would’ve tried to jump out of the car.

Even though she couldn’t escape, she imagined it. Balling her hands into fists so she could punch Wayne on the back of his fat neck, make him stop.

The desert. How long could she survive by herself?

Not long, no place to hide. Unless she could make it all the way to the mountains. But maybe it was worse up there, she had no idea, she’d never been.

All she had on was a Disneyland T-shirt, shorts, sneakers. Up in the mountains it could probably get real cold, even in the summer.

She knew that because sometimes when Dodie used to complain about living in a damn oven, Grace could see snow atop the mountains.

It was too dark to tell if there was snow, all Grace could see were the outlines of the mountains, big and sharp.

Like knives.

Wayne said, “Almost there. How ya doin’?”

Terrible, you stupid caseworker.

Grace said, “Okay.”

“A little nervous, huh? That’s natural, new surroundings. Tell the truth, kid, I don’t know how any of you do it, the constant shuffling — being moved around.” He chuckled. “Shuffled like cards in a deck. Come to think about it, it is kind of like a game of chance.”

Grace stared at the back of his neck. Spotted a pimple to the side of his ponytail. If she used her nail to flick it, the pain might be enough to...

Then she realized he hadn’t turned toward Desert Dreams, this was a road she’d never seen. Skinnier, real dark, and Wayne was muttering something about “out in the boonies” and making his headlights brighter, turning the area in front of the car into a cold, white tube.

Dust flew up from the tires, like upside-down rain. The sand stretched forever.

Why was he taking her here?

Now a different kind of fear crawled into her belly and kept going, lodging in her throat.

Was he one of those?

She searched for some detail to remember. It took a long time before anything rose above the desert. But then: A big yard of metal garbage. Broken-up trucks. Part of an old bus, too. Heaps of wheels and metal grilles and things that looked like metal branches.

As soon as the junkyard was gone, a fenced area that said Water Station: No Admittance.

Grace put one hand on her seat belt clasp so she could undo it fast if she needed to.

Wayne was fat, Grace figured she could outrun him.

He began to hum off-key.

All of a sudden more buildings appeared outside Grace’s window. A trailer park just like Desert Dreams, this one was called Antelope Palms but with no palms or any other kind of plant around. To her surprise, she was happy seeing the mobiles.

Wayne kept driving and humming louder. More open space followed by another mobile park. And another. Brightly lit signs chewing their way through the darkness.

Sunrise Motor Estates.

Morningview Motorhaven.

Okay, so she’d end up somewhere like Desert Dreams, but without the memories... okay, that would be okay.

Despite telling herself that, she shuddered. Hugged herself tight and tried not to be sick.

Time for good thoughts, she’d been practicing that in order to drive out bad ones, it was hard but she was getting better at it.

Okay. Breathe. Think good... maybe her new fosters would live in a double-wide with a real bed for her... maybe there’d be a big enough refrigerator so she wouldn’t have to wait for scraps. Maybe — Wayne made a sudden turn and got on another road, this one really, really bumpy.