Page 72 of Second Chance

“Hi.” Lawrence studies them both. “You were both at Amy’s memorial, weren’t you?”

“Yup, we were.”

“What are you doing here?”

Tony glances over at Colette. She’s stock-still, frozen solid, staring at the dashboard.

Nothing for it but to go for broke. “You know Daniel? Daniel Rosenbaum?”

Lawrence squints. “That’s one of the guys who does admin at the college, right?”

“He’s a professor,” Tony corrects. “And a dean, now, I guess.”

“Right.” Lawrence straightens, pulling his face away from the window and giving Tony slightly more breathing room. “I probably owe him an apology, huh?”

“Have you seen him?”

“Huh?”

“He’s missing. And we think it might be…connected.”

“Connected,” Lawrence repeats. “I…listen, you’d better come inside.”

He turns on his heel and heads toward his house.

“We can’t go in there, right?” Colette asks. “If he’s a suspect…”

Tony shakes his head. “We can’t not go in there now. And thanks for all your help.”

“I’m an academic, not a spy!”

“Yeah, well, we’re all trying new things.” Tony unbuckles his seatbelt and gets out of the car. “Come on.”

“This is how Stacy got you.” Colette still opens the door and slides out.

“Totally different situation.” Tony fumbles his phone out. “Look, there’s two of us. What could possibly happen? I’ll record everything as a voice message to you. It’ll be fine.”

“All right. All right.”

Kid’s shoes litter the floor of the Lawrence house’s hallway and stacks of unopened mail cover the side table. Two letters have fallen down the crack between the table and the wall, and no one has bothered to pick them up.

“I know it’s a mess,” Lawrence says, ducking out of the kitchen. “Coffee?”

“Sure.” Tony’s bloodstream is probably mostly caffeine at this point, but nothing matters, so he might as well.

Colette elbows him sharply. “None for me, thank you.”

Right. She probably thinks it’s full of sedatives or something.

They follow Lawrence into the kitchen. He dumps a used coffee filter into the overflowing trash and rummages in the cupboard for a clean cup. His own cup, he picks seemingly at random from the graveyard of used dishes piled up by the sink.

This man does not strike Tony as a criminal mastermind.

“So.” Lawrence leans against the counter while the coffee brews. “You were parked outside my house because a college dean went missing, and you think it’s connected to Amy. You think I did it, right?”

Blood shoots to Tony’s head, flushing his cheeks and his neck so fast he gets dizzy.

“The thought had crossed our minds, Mr. Lawrence.” Now of all times, Colette manages to be cool as a cucumber, perfectly collected.

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