that acted as his desk, a laptop open in front of him. He was not a bad-looking man, if you liked the chilly, Nordic type. Tall and thin, he had high cheekbones, graying blond hair, and narrow blue eyes that missed nothing.
The office, which she would always think of as Smith’s, was large and sparsely furnished. Two chrome-and-black leather chairs faced his desk, above which a poster-sized street map of Savannah had been fixed to the wall. Red pins marked the site of every murder in the last twelve months. Harper knew without counting that there would be around forty of them. It had been a bad year.
Blazer peered at her over the top of a pair of reading glasses. “You can have five minutes. I’ve got a budget meeting this afternoon and God himself couldn’t get me out of it.”
Harper got straight to the point. “I’m covering this missing-person case out at Tybee. Are you guys working on it yet? He’s been gone a day and a half and I’m not sure the local cops have it under control.”
“The Tybee Police Department is professional and highly rated,” Blazer said, coolly.
“They found his guitar on the beach and gave it back to his housemates without printing it,” she told him.
There was a pause before he said, “Get out your notebook.”
Smiling, Harper pulled out a pen.
“I received a call this morning from the island’s chief of police. He asked us to take the lead. A Savannah detective team has been assigned to the case as of today.”
Harper looked up at him in surprise. Nobody at Tybee PD had whispered a word about that. “Does that mean you’re treating this as a potential homicide?”
“We’re treating it like a missing-person investigation, McClain,” he said. “We don’t know where he is. We intend to find him. There’s not much else I can tell you.”
“Tybee PD thinks he went swimming and got caught in a riptide,” she said. “But it seems strange to me that he’d swim in February. The water’s freezing.”
“Nothing musicians do surprise me.” His tone was dry.
“I wouldn’t put my toe in that water,” she said.
“That is irrelevant to my case.”
He obviously wasn’t going to give her any more to work with. Harper slid her pen back into her pocket as she asked, “Who’s lead detective?”
Only she would have noticed the infinitesimal hesitation before he replied. “Julie Daltrey and Luke Walker have this one.”
She didn’t react. Still, he fixed her with a look. “Don’t you go bothering Luke for information.”
“I won’t bug them any more than I bug you,” she said.
“In that case, God help them.” With a glance at his watch, he stood up. “I’ve got to get going or they’ll decide we can live without heat all winter.” He headed for the door, motioning for her to follow him into the crowded hallway. “Look, McClain, go slow on this. Don’t write a murder where there isn’t one. Give us time to do our jobs.”
Leaving that as his good-bye, he ran up the stairs, back stiff, laptop clutched firmly in one hand.
After he’d gone, Harper lingered in the hallway, pretending to check her cell phone. Really, she was watching the clock on the screen. She waited four minutes, until she was certain Blazer must be in his meeting; then she ran up the same stairs he’d taken and down a long hallway at the top.
The detectives’ office was a few doors from the end. When she reached the unmarked door, she stopped, steeling herself. There is nothing on the planet more intimidating than walking into a room full of detectives.
She knocked on the door briskly, opening it without waiting for a response.
The room was crowded and badly in need of a paint job. The chilly air had a permanent smell of sweat and stale coffee. Eight desks were arranged along scuffed walls that had once been white. Only three were occupied.
Detective Roy Davenport gawked at her from the nearest desk. Detective Shumaker, the most senior detective in the room, sat a few seats away. Next to him was Luke Walker.
“Well, hell. I didn’t know we were due a visit from the fourth estate,” Shumaker drawled. His voice sounded amused but his eyes were alert.
“Sorry to intrude,” Harper said. “I was hoping to find Julie Daltrey.” She glanced fleetingly at Luke, who watched her with a guarded expression.
“She’s out,” Davenport offered. Tall and angular, with a heavy country accent, he was the newest detective on the team. “Won’t be back for an