More, even, than a mentor. After their tour of duty in Afghanistan, it had been Hughes who convinced Matt to write off his troubles by leaving the East Coast and moving to Los Angeles. It had been Hughes who took him under his wing and brought him into the department. Matt’s aunt had died six months before he enlisted. He could remember Hughes telling him that there was no longer a good reason to live in New Jersey. It was time to begin what he called the forgetting process. LA was a city of distraction that ran 24/7. Any bad dreams he might still be carrying from his childhood, any losses, any monkeys still clinging to his back would be wiped out by the bright sunlight and what they’d just been through overseas.

Matt got out of the car, his jaw muscles twitching. He took a step toward the house and then another, struggling to dampen his mind. He could hear a small pack of coyotes yipping and howling further up the hill as he reached the walkway. The kitelike sound of the wind blowing through the palm trees in the dark sky above. As he climbed the front steps, he took a quick glimpse through the window and saw a note on the table by the lamp. The note had been left for Hughes by his wife, and seeing it felt like a flock of blackbirds had just flown through his soul.

He turned away, staring at the illuminated doorbell for a long time. Then he finally pressed the button and listened to the chimes invading the serenity of the house. A lamp on the second floor switched on, its light spilling onto the front lawn. Looking through the window again, he waited to see Laura walk down the staircase. When several minutes passed and nothing happened, he rang the bell again and moved closer to the window so that she would be able to see his face from the landing.

More time passed, nervous beats in the center of his chest followed by quick breaths. The hallway on the second floor remained dark. Matt thought it over. It was the dead of night. She wasn’t going to answer the door.

He pulled out his phone, found Hughes’s home number, and hit Call. Laura picked up on the first ring and sounded frightened.

“There’s someone at the front door,” she said. “There’s someone trying to get into the house.”

Matt paused a moment. What came next was inevitable.

“It’s not a burglar,” he said. “It’s me, Laura. I just rang your doorbell.”

“What are you doing here? Where’s Kevin? Why isn’t he answering his cell phone?”

Inevitable.

“Come downstairs and open the door, Laura. We need to talk.”

Inevitable.

He could hear the change. The sudden short gasp. The quick flash of dread.

“Oh, God. Oh my God.”

He slipped the phone into his pocket and took a step back.