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reckless. “You can’t honestly pretend that you weren’t a little bit scared.”
    January gave me a bemused look that might or might not have been genuine, a knowing glint flickering in the depths of her placid blue eyes. “Flynn, haven’t you figured it out by now? I’m not scared of anything.”
    *   *   *
    The next day at school I learned that Wilkerson and Moses had wasted no time in following up on the names I’d given them: At least five of January’s closest friends came up to me in the halls to tell me they’d received visits from the cops the night before. None of them knew anything, just as I’d surmised, and most of them tried to pump me for more information. The only person I’d held out any real hope of January’s having confided in was Tiana Hughes, her best friend and—not coincidentally—Micah’s girlfriend.
    I caught Tiana at her locker after first period, where she was trying to fix the hinge on a heart-shaped locket that Micah had given her for their two-month anniversary the previous summer. She seemed to sense my arrival because, without even looking up from what she was doing, she groused, “This fucking heart keeps breaking and it’s starting to make me homicidal.”
    â€œI hope that’s no reflection on the state of your relationship,” I said, and she smirked.
    â€œPlease. It’ll take way more than Micah’s questionable taste in jewelry to drive us apart,” Tiana said, “although you might want to tell him, for future reference, that just because something’s an antique doesn’t mean it isn’t also a piece of crap.” Giving up, she tossed the necklace into her locker and slammed the door shut. Then she turned to face me for the first time, her brown eyes wide and frank. “Dude.”
    With just that one word, I knew the cops had spoken to her as well. Without any real hope, I asked, “You don’t happen to know where she is, do you?”
    â€œNo.” Tiana tossed her hands up and let them drop to her sides. “Do you?” When I shook my head, she bit her lip, looked away, and then met my eyes again, her brow furrowed worriedly. “Flynn … how freaked should I be here? Honestly.”
    The fact that she even had to ask sort of upped the Freak-Out Quotient automatically for me. “The cops told me they think she’s probably, like, hiding out somewhere, trying to scare Tammy and Jonathan. I mean, it kinda sounds like her, doesn’t it?” I received a noncommittal hitch of one shoulder from Tiana, and continued, meekly, “I thought maybe she might’ve talked about it with you.”
    â€œShe didn’t, or I’d have told her it was a stupid-ass idea,” Tiana replied in a level tone, and she was clearly being honest. The girl was not exactly known for keeping her opinions to herself for the sake of diplomacy.
    â€œWhen is the last time you talked to her?”
    Shifting her weight unhappily, Tiana made a strange face. “I don’t know. Maybe a couple of weeks ago?”
    â€œWhat, did your iPhones melt down from overuse or something?” I asked, only half kidding. January and Tiana sort of famously couldn’t last five whole minutes without one of them texting the other; January once drowned a phone in the shower because she was trying to write Tiana something she’d forgotten to tell her when they’d been Skyping ten minutes previously. “I thought you guys talked, like, constantly!”
    Tiana shifted again, and her strange expression became more pronounced, a mingling of unhappiness, embarrassment, and vulnerability. I had never seen Tiana—a girl who once chased a guy built like a linebacker across a Burger King parking lot, loudly and publicly denouncing him as a dick for knocking the cup of change out of a homeless man’s hand—look the least bit vulnerable.