The parking lot held two vehicles, both Dodge trucks, one white, one black. Good. I wouldn’t have to do my show-and-tell in front of the whole class. I parked next to the white truck, grabbed my business fake-leather folder, and walked into the office. Nobody was manning the counter, so I rang the bell and waited.

The door swung open and a man in his early thirties shouldered his way in. Tall and lanky, he looked spare; not underfed but dried like jerky under the sun. He wore a T-shirt smudged with oil and faded old jeans. His skin was a rich olive brown, about a shade or two darker than my own. He’d shaved his head, but a short, carefully shaped beard hugged his jaw. I recognized him from the image Bern had dug up during his research—Gustave Peralta, the owner.

He saw me and blinked. I clearly wasn’t someone he’d expected. “How can I help you?”

“My name is Nevada Baylor. I’m looking for Gustave Peralta.”

“Call me Gus,” he said. “What can I do for you?”

I passed him my business card.

“Private investigator.” He frowned. “That’s new.”

“I was hired by House Pierce to find Adam Pierce.”

“Can’t help you,” Gus said. “Haven’t seen him in the last six months.”

An annoying magic click. A lie.

“He hasn’t visited the shop in the last week?” The Twitter photo was shared this Monday.

“Nope.”

A lie.

“Gus . . .”

“Mr. Peralta. I have nothing to say to you. You can show yourself out.” He turned to leave.

I opened the folder and pulled a piece of paper out. “This is the printout of your payments received.”

He stopped and turned on his heel toward me.

I put a second piece of paper on the counter. “This is the printout of your outgoing payments. And this is your payroll.”

He grabbed the paper off the counter. “Where did you get this?”

“We hacked your office computer.”

“That’s illegal!”

I shrugged. “I told you, I’m not the cops.”

He reached for his cell phone. “How about I’ll dial nine-one-one right now and report this?”

I smiled. “Let me get to the end, and if you still want to call the cops, I won’t stop you. If you look over here where I drew a small star? This shows a payment in the amount of nine thousand nine hundred and ninety dollars labeled ‘Motorcycle repairs.’”

The righteous anger died down a little in Gus’s eyes. “So what?”

“This is a recurring payment that’s coming out of Christina Pierce’s personal account.” Mrs. Pierce was a wild guess. The best we’d been able to do was determine that the payment had been made from an account owned by someone within House Pierce. Adam’s mother seemed like a safe bet.

“So? I did some work for Adam back then, and he was low on cash. His family makes payments.”

“No, Mr. Peralta. You and I make payments. Adam Pierce walks in and says, ‘I’ll take one of each color’ and throws down his Visa Black Card. If you look right here, in your payroll, you will see a gentleman by the name of Reginald Harrison listed as an independent contractor. You will also see that Reginald Harrison is paid nine thousand nine hundred and ninety dollars in cash. The nine thousand nine hundred and ninety dollars number is very interesting because the IRS pays attention to any cash transaction in the amount of ten thousand dollars or above.”

“So what? Reginald works for me.”

Lie. “Reginald Harrison’s net worth is close to twenty million dollars, so I very much doubt that. He does have a younger brother, Cornelius Harrison, a very nice man, who happens to be Adam Pierce’s childhood friend. You’re washing Adam’s money. His family makes a payment and you pass it on to Adam in cash, while Reginald claims it on his taxes. You receive five hundred dollars in compensation via the second payment, two days later, once Adam gets his money.”

Gus crossed his arms.

“The payments are made on the seventh of each month. That means the next payment is in two days and Adam Pierce will visit you to pick up his pocket change. I’m guessing you didn’t mention this to the nice detectives who interviewed you.”

If I’d had the manpower, and if I’d been confident that Houston’s finest wouldn’t find Adam for two more days, I would have laid a lovely trap. But Adam would burn through anything I could throw at him, and the manhunt had reached hysterical levels. Talking Adam into surrendering to his House was still my best and only strategy. To do that, I had to show that I wasn’t lying.

“He didn’t do it,” Gus said. “Adam is a stand-up guy.”

“I don’t care,” I said. “Right now most of the city’s police force is foaming at the mouth hoping to blow his brain over the nearest sidewalk. You’re a reasonable man. Honestly, what do you think his chances are of getting out of this alive?”

Gus grimaced. “Look, I don’t know where he is.”

True. “I just want to bring him home safe to his mother. She loves him. He is her baby boy. She doesn’t want to lose him to some trigger-happy SWAT sniper.” I pushed my card across the counter. “Tell him I came by. That’s all I’m asking.”

The shark fin of Montgomery International Investigations rose among the towers of Houston’s downtown, still as menacing as ever. I stuck my tongue at it. It didn’t seem impressed.

I parked and marched to Augustine Montgomery’s office. The immaculate receptionist spoke into her headset and motioned me to follow.

“So how long did it take you to figure out which shade of liquid foundation would cover up your bruise?” she asked.

“About half an hour. Did it work?”

“No.”

Touché.

Augustine Montgomery, still impossibly beautiful, raised his eyes from his tablet. “I am not a terrible person.”

“Yes, you are. The note in the file states that House Pierce cut off Adam financially. They are still giving him money. His mother is probably the culprit.”

Augustine leaned back and braided his long fingers into a single fist. If their shredder stopped working, they could just dump the paper over his head and his marble-perfect cheekbones would slice it to ribbons on the way down.

“I was assured that all financial ties were severed.”

I put the printouts of Gustave’s business hijinks on Augustine’s desk. He studied them for a long moment. “Do I want to know how you got these?”