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the slopes, he had experience.
    She scrolled through his pictures, many of them outdoors with small groups of friends, mostly including Carlos. Few, if any, with Tom. He had a lot of people he was friends with on Facebook, but few comments on his posts—almost all from Carlos, his younger brother who was in junior high, and someone from his English class who posted odd snippets of apparent humor that Max didn’t quite understand. From the few comments over the past year along with the photos, Max put together a clear portrait of Arthur Cowan: he was a prankster, and while some people found him hilarious, most thought his jokes were in poor taste. At least a dozen posts were people telling him he did something “not cool” and Arthur would tell them to lighten up or that it was just a joke.
    He was athletic, but seemed to participate only in individual sports like skiing. Carlos and Arthur had gone to high school together, and seemed to be inseparable. Three months ago, several people ragged on him for writing profanity on a kid’s face with permanent marker, because the kid was the first to pass out drinking at a party.
    Max flipped over to Carlos Ibarra’s page. He hadn’t posted anything for three weeks, and his last post was a photo of him and Arthur during spring break in Los Angeles. They were on the beach. That photo had become his avatar. Carlos had even fewer friends than Arthur, and as Max looked at the history between them, it became clear that Carlos and Arthur were joined at the hip. They did everything together, they both majored in business, they shared a dorm room. Arthur was clearly the dominant personality.
    She frowned. What did all this tell her? Absolutely nothing.
    Not nothing, Max. There’s a pattern here. One of these things is not like the other.
    Tom. He wasn’t part of Arthur and Carlos’s two-man clique. He was a year younger—Scott’s age. He tried too hard to make friends, as evidenced by his constant parties and incessant posting and poor attempts at humor. No one consistently popped up on his page. He was awkward and a bit nerdy, drank because it was social and he thought he could make friends. Max had known kids like him in college—the ones who were the life of the party, but mostly because people laughed at them.
    How had Tom Keller hooked up with Arthur and Carlos? Why had the four of them gone camping?
    Tom was the weak link. Carlos and Arthur were longtime friends; Tom wasn’t part of their clique. If Max could get him to talk to her about that weekend, then maybe the truth would come out.
    Max was about to log out of Jess’s account when another thought occurred to her. Jess hadn’t been social with these boys since Scott disappeared, at least publicly, but it was clear she’d known them. Max clicked over to Jess’s private messages. She didn’t want to invade her privacy more than necessary, so she skimmed the names until she found one familiar.
    Scott Sheldon.
    Even though his account was deleted, the messages he’d sent to Jess were archived on her page. Reading them, it was clear that they were friends and might have liked each other more, but both talked around it. That would fit with Scott’s shy reputation.
    Thursday night, before he left on the camping trip, Scott had sent Jess a message.
    S: Why are you mad that I’m going camping with the guys?
    J: Since when did Art and Carlos become “the guys”? Art’s a jackass. I told you that last week.
    S: It’s not easy for me to make friends. Ian thinks I’m a nerd, and all he talks about is baseball. I played baseball one year, when I was 9. I was the worst player on the team and once, when I tried to catch a fly ball, it hit my forehead and I passed out. I don’t fit in anywhere, and Art is nice to me.
    J: Scott, you’ll find your niche. We’re friends, right? Art is only nice because he wants something.
    S: It’s just for the weekend. I’ll call you when I get back, okay?
    J: Whatever.
    Jess was