“She said she would meet us at the lawyer’s building at two o’clock.”

“That’s fine,” Daniel said, finishing the rest of the dark coffee in one long gulp.

“We don’t need her there anyway.”

He set the empty porcelain cup down on the marble counter, completely unaware of the bitter film settling at the bottom of his stomach.

By one forty-five, the sky over Crestview had turned the color of wet slate.

Daniel parked his silver sedan in the asphalt lot outside Attorney Lin’s strip mall office, right beside an old delivery van.

His movements were already noticeably slower as he unbuckled his seatbelt, taking two tries to press the red release button.