"You look terrible."

I glared at Clarissa across the greasy table as a waitress set two plates of French toast down in front of us.

"Of course I look terrible," I said as she walked away. "I was up until two getting accused of sabotaging my own car and then finding a new mechanic who wasn't a total creep."

She ignored the silent And it's all your fault that I threw in. "Sabotage? What do you mean?"

I snorted, taking an obnoxiously large bite of toast. "Please, like it wasn't all your plan to have me meet Donovan and Ciar in one night."

Clarissa froze, a syrupy square of bread dangling from her fork halfway between her plate and her mouth. "You met Ciar last night?"

"Yeah, and don't tell me you didn't take my starter...thingy, knowing the garage he works at was the closest one to the gallery."

"I didn't," she said. "I would have rather you never met Ciar at all."

"Why?" I leaned forward without waiting for her answer. "It's because he's dangerous, isn't it?"

"It's because this investigation has nothing to do with him."

"Well maybe it should."

Clarissa sat up straighter, eyeing me keenly. "Why? Did he say something?"

"No, he's just creepy as hell. And it was his boat you caught the signal from out in Provincetown."

"I already told you he wasn't on the boat," Clarissa said sternly.

"Yeah, but you can't even tell me if Tilda was," I shot back.

"That's different," she said immediately. "Ciar had an alibi. Your sister didn't."

"But she wouldn't do something like that," I insisted, unsure who I was trying to convince as Donovan's words from last night flitted through my mind. "Would she?"

I felt like a specimen under her analyzing gaze as she put down her fork. "What's this really about, Maisye?"

I bit my lip, my knuckles whitening around my knife. It shouldn't matter. Tilda obviously hadn't cared about me, not even enough to mention me to her fiancé. Why should I care about her?

But I knew why. It was because we'd been through everything together. She was the only person who understood why I was the way I was, and I'd always thought she'd be there for me when I needed her. And then she wasn't—that night on the Golden Gate Bridge, she wasn't.

I'd tried to contact her, I'd yearned to hear her voice so badly that I'd almost thrown myself into the bay—and she had the nerve to pretend I'd never existed?

"Why didn't you tell me she changed her name?" I burst out. "Why didn't you tell me no one here knew who I was? Why didn't you tell me anything?"

She pursed her lips at my volume. The waitress glanced our way as she stopped at a nearby table, but I ignored her.

"You knew. I know you did. You know everything. You even knew how I met Mark. Don't tell me you didn't know about Tilda." I narrowed my eyes, trying to channel all of the accusatory arrogance Ciar had last night.

"Maisye...." She sighed, watching the line at the counter inch forward. "Be honest. If you'd known, would you have accepted?"

"Yes," I said immediately.

"Think about it," she returned.

Would I have leapt on board an investigation into my sister's potential murder—not to mention the disappearance of three women who looked remarkably like her—if I'd known she hated me enough to strike me out of her entire life?

She was still Tilda. I still remembered a time when she'd hear me crying at night and curl herself around me and squeeze tight. She'd grown out of it as we got older, and she vehemently denied it ever happened every time I mentioned it, but that Tilda—she was the one I remembered. She was the one who deserved justice, no matter what she'd become.

"Yeah," I said, honestly this time. "I would have."

She returned to her breakfast. "Then nothing has really changed, has it?"

Reluctantly, I raised my fork again. I supposed she was right. I got the feeling that happened a lot.

"Anyway, onto more important things," she said. "Donovan Cosgrave."

"What about him?" I asked around a large mouthful of food.

"What did he say to you last night? Actually"—she held out a hand—"let's take a step back even further. What did you talk about the first night? On the bridge?"

"Nothing," I said quickly, trying to contain the flush reddening my cheeks as I remembered the kiss.

Clarissa gave me a look. "I'm an FBI agent, remember? Not that a two-year-old couldn't tell you're lying."

"Look, it was dark, and he obviously thought I was Tilda—"

"Maisye! Why didn't you tell me?"

"Is it really your business who I accidentally kind of kiss?" I asked.

"When that person is Donovan Cosgrave, yes!"

She chewed on the inside of her cheek and stared out the window at pedestrians strolling by. I followed her gaze, envying their careless lives as they laughed with their friends or flipped through songs on their iPhones. I had to meet her at a diner all the way across town so that no one connected to Donovan would see us together. Where was my sense of normalcy?

Then I laughed. Nothing had been normal for a very, very long time.

"This is serious, Maisye!" Clarissa hissed.

"I'm sorry!" I sighed and poked at the last bit of toast on my plate, suddenly full. "I didn't mean for it to happen. But I don't think it messed anything up, either. He still came to the gallery last night."

"I'm not worried about him, Maisye. It's obvious you've got him hook, line, and sinker. I'm worried about you."

I withered under her stare as she leaned on her elbows, hands clasped under her chin and her posture ramrod straight.

"I'm worried about why you feel like you need to lie to me. And I'm worried about why you don't think you can trust me. Why would you think I sabotaged your car?"

"Well somebody did," I pointed out.

"And I will look into that."

"Thanks," I muttered, letting my fork fall with a clatter.

She frowned at me for a solid thirty seconds, letting me soak in her disapproving silence. Then she sat back. "You'll tell me if you want to back out, right?"

I blinked. "Why would I back out?"

She just shrugged, daring me to come up with a reason.

"I want to know what happened to Tilda," I said.

Her eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly, but all she said was, "Good."

I nodded and took a gulp of water to soothe my suddenly arid mouth.

"What did you and Donovan talk about last night?" she asked after a moment.

I sighed. "Tilda. The fact that he didn't know who I was. I don't know, we just commiserated over the fact that we'd both just found out we didn't really know her at all. It wasn't anything exciting."

I bit my lip before I could tell her that Donovan couldn't have killed Tilda. If she already suspected my loyalty, I didn't need to give her another reason.

"When are you seeing him next?"

"I don't know, I guess whenever the not-so-subtle hand of God decides to intervene." I gave her a pointed stare.

"I'd rather let things happen naturally," she said, unaffected by my sarcasm. "The more I interfere, the more obvious I become."

I let her declaration hang between us, wondering where she'd draw the line at standing back and watching. Surely if I was in danger, she'd warn me, right? If I managed to call her after being kidnapped, she wouldn't just tell me to dial 911 and hang up, would she?

Why did it suddenly feel like I trusted Donovan more than I trusted her?

"He doesn't even have my number," I said. "Unless you gave it to him."

"No. That would be interfering. Besides, it seemed like you had everything under control."

I bit back another laugh. "Under control" and I didn't have a good history.

She leaned back in the booth and sighed. "It's fine. It's not hard to have you mysteriously appear at the grocery store he frequents every Saturday morning. Just another coincidence."

"There seem to be a lot of those around here." I took a drink of my water, still not quite convinced that she hadn't killed my car last night. I stared her down over the rim of my glass, waiting.

But Clarissa Parker had one hell of a poker face.

I was the only one who jumped when my phone buzzed to life beside my plate. I checked the caller ID. A 617 number. Probably the garage I'd left my car at last night.

"Hello?" I asked, ignoring Clarissa's piercing gaze.

"Maisye?"

I nodded out of habit. "Yes?"

"It's me."

It's me. That was all he had to say. In the silence, I heard the soft, rhythmic rush of breaths over the speaker. In, out. In, out. Waiting.

"Donovan?"

Clarissa perked up, going absolutely rigid. I narrowed my eyes at her. I only needed one guess as to how he'd gotten my number, and it directly contradicted her claim earlier that she hadn't given it to him.

"Speaker," she hissed, frowning at me until I obeyed, setting the phone on the center of the table.

"I'm sorry." Donovan's voice came tinny and distorted through the speaker, and I hoped he couldn't hear the clink of silverware from the surrounding diners. "I know this is weird and out of the blue...."

"How did you get my number?" I interrupted, staring daggers at Clarissa as I did.

"Do you want to meet up?" he asked instead of answering. "I have some—"

Clarissa was gesturing wildly, head bobbing up and down. Yes, she mouthed, her eyes wide.

I ignored her. "How did you get this number?"

"I...." He paused for so long that I thought he'd hung up. "Ciar gave it to me."

I sat back. I had a hard time imagining Ciar doing anything of the sort after last night.

"He did?"

He must have heard my skepticism, because there was another long pause, like he was choosing his words carefully. "Maybe I stole it from his office."

What was I supposed to say to that?

"Look, Maisye, I know it's weird and stalkerish and I'm sorry, but I just—I feel like I know you and I don't know you. And I want to know you. We have a lot in common."

Clarissa's eyes burned holes into the side of my skull, and I knew I'd end up agreeing eventually.

"I have some of Tillie's old things at our place—my place," Donovan added. "I thought you might want to go through them, take anything you wanted...."

I swallowed, suddenly finding it painful. Tillie's things. Not Tilda's things. He was offering me a chance to know her as everyone else did.

"I...." My voice trembled, and Clarissa finally looked away. The tiny offer of privacy only left me ashamed.

I took a deep breath and cleared my throat. "What's the address?" I asked.

"How about you just meet me at the garage?" he suggested. "I'll pick you up there."

For a moment, Ciar's frigid blue eyes flashed through my memory, the sting of my palm as he flung my keys at me.

And then Donovan's voice again: Tillie's things.

I nodded at the phone, even though he couldn't see me. "I'll be there."