“So you know my girl, Mr. Lerner?” the dark woman asked Sam. She was wearing a turquoise kerchief around her head, a yellow cotton blouse and a red skirt. Sam rubbed his aching skull and averted his eyes. She was far too vivid for Sam to focus on this morning.
“I"ve met her,” he told Madsen"s mother. “She was lovely.”
“Really? Is she?”
Sam sorted through the possessions in Madsen"s room as he pondered the woman"s odd response and use of the present tense when referring to her daughter.
“You, uh, didn"t have much contact?” he asked, noticing that the woman had beautiful eyes like her daughter.
“She"s been gone since she was twelve. I"m a working woman. I didn"t have time to chase her down.”
Sam observed the woman"s graceful movements. She had long, slender fingers adorned with gold ri
