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whereabouts are accounted for. He went to work. Then stayed overnight at his girlfriend’s.”
    “Girlfriend?”
    “Plenty of people vouched for him.”
    “You think maybe the mother staged the whole thing?”
    “I don’t see how. Or why.”
    “Munchausen’s?” she asked. Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy was a form of child abuse in which a mother invents imaginary symptoms of illness in a child that are subsequently treated, sometimes with fatal results. “It could be a variation.”
    O’Malley shook his head. “No evidence.”
    “There wouldn’t have to be.” Georgia said. “Anyone following up with the kid? About her captors, how she was treated?”
    “Parker’s trying, but the mother won’t let us talk to her. Says there’s been too much trauma. But we’ll keep at it.”
    Georgia ran a finger around the rim of her glass. “You said your guys went downtown with her?”
    “Yeah.”
    “When was this?”
    “Wednesday morning. The kid came back that afternoon.”
    “Why did she go downtown in the middle of everything? The mother, I mean. How could she work while this was going on? Why wasn’t she glued to the phone at home?”
    “She said she wanted to pick up a few things. Pictures of Molly, her laptop. She left it there when the kid was taken.”
    “If my daughter had been kidnapped, and I didn’t know if she was alive or dead, I sure as hell wouldn’t take time to ‘pick up a few things at the office.’”
    O’Malley shrugged. “Parker told her we’d get the stuff for her, but...”
    “He was obviously very persuasive.” She frowned. “And Molly was released that afternoon.” She stared at O’Malley.
    “Hey, Davis. Our job is over. The girl is safe. We got a happy ending. We move on. We’re having a press conference later today.”
    “Which will thank everyone for doing a great job.”
    “What do you want from me?” He tapped his glass on the bar again. Then he stopped. “You know Eric Olson is gonna retire next year.”
    Eric Olson was the village’s Chief of Police. O’Malley’s boss. “I didn’t know.”
    “I need good officers, Davis. I know you told him no last year. But what if I asked you to come back?”
    Georgia propped an elbow on the bar and massaged her temples. She didn’t answer for a minute. Then, “Don’t go there, Dan. Not right now.”

chapter 6
    O ne of the things I love about the Midwest is that you really can see to the horizon. I’ve spent time on both coasts and, except for the beach, the cities and suburbs are densely packed and obstruct your sight lines. Here on the prairie, though, the eye sweeps across the landscape, and you can see for miles.
    Mac and I were driving through farmland in central Illinois the following Monday. The occasional metal silo and cell phone tower glinted in the sun, reminding me I wasn’t really that far from civilization. The ground shimmered with the pale growth of early summer, and when I rolled down the window, an earthy, damp aroma poured in. In a few months, the growth would be thick and sturdy—not quite lush, but our version of it. For now, though, everything was tender and green and very Norman Rockwell.
    Mac is Mackenzie Kendall the Third, and he owns a video production studio in Northbrook. He pretends to be an aging hippie, and he rarely changes out of jeans and sandals. A jagged scar down his cheek used to make him look dangerous, but he’s older and grayer, and the sharp planes of his face have softened. A year ago he added a silver hoop earring. Rachel, who knows about these things, promptly told him he’d pierced the wrong ear.
    Despite his idiosyncrasies, Mac is a talented director and a shrewd businessman. We’ve worked together for fifteen years. He also employs Hank Chenowsky, one of the best video editors in the solar system. I’m convinced Hank grew up in a dark room with a computer monitor as his only source of light, because he works magic with my shows, making them look like they have twice