I blinked, unable to reconcile the vision of a carefree wild child and Cookie.

“That night.” When I didn’t interrupt—I didn’t dare—she continued. “So, we’re in his parents’ hotel room later that night, on what we were calling our honeymoon, and his … pants … kind of—” The longer she spoke, the softer her voice became.

“His what did what?”

“His pants caught on fire.”

“Of course they did. He was eighteen.”

“No, I mean, literally.”

“Oh, like, on fire on fire?”

“Yeah. He’d spilled wine on his pants while we were having a candlelight dinner, at his parents’ expense, naturally, and when I jumped up to help him, I knocked over the candle and … well, you get the idea.”

“Oh, man. That had to hurt.”

“I’m sure it did, but he was never the same after that. He was actually quite a jerk. Thankfully, his parents had the marriage annulled as soon as he told them what we’d done.”

“Okay, so your first honeymoon didn’t go so well. But surely you had better luck with Amber’s father.”

“My second honeymoon was worse.”

“No,” I said, intrigued again.

She nodded. “We lived together a whole year. Everything was wonderful until the day we got married. Everything changed.”

“Cook, what happened?”

“Well, it started out okay. We had the wedding. It was a huge event. All the crazies from my side showed up, and his family numbered in the thousands. It was nice, but not really me, you know?”

“I do.”

“I was so nervous that I drank a little wine before the wedding.”

“Uh-oh.”

“Oh, the ceremony went off without a hitch. I slurred my vows a bit, but other than that, perfection.”

“Okay,” I said, growing wary nonetheless.

“So, we had the reception and I drank some more.”

That was never good.

“And we did the whole rice thing and left in a limousine for the hotel. We were going to stay the night, then fly out the next morning to Cancún.”

“Awesome. Loving it so far.”

“Well, I’d had a bit too much to drink, we both had, and Noah decided to moon the people on the freeway.”

“Wait, who’s Noah?”

“Amber’s father,” she said, suddenly annoyed.

“Oh, right, I knew that. Okay, so he’s mooning everyone.”

“Yes, but I started to get sick.”

“Understandable.”

“And I just reached for the closest door handle.”

“No.”

“Yes. I opened the door while he was mooning everyone. He fell out of the limo on I-25.”

I sat stunned.

“South,” she added.

I still sat stunned.

“Near the Gibson exit.”

“Cookie,” I said at last, “what happened?”

“He suffered multiple fractures, a ruptured spleen, and a mild concussion.”

I slammed my hands over my mouth.

“I know. Things just changed after that. Even after ten years of marriage, we never found what we had again.”

“I’m sorry, hon.”

“I just don’t have the best luck with honeymoons.”

“No, that’s not true. Those were total coincidences.”

She smiled sadly. “You don’t believe in coincidences.”

I squeezed her hand. “I do now.”

“This is so much better,” Amber chimed as she skipped back to her seat.

“I can’t believe you’re that girl,” I said softly as Amber tried to get back under Quentin’s shoe and balance her hot chocolate at the same time.

“What girl?”

“The one who meets a guy and marries him twelve hours later.”

“Nine.”

I stifled a grin.

“And a half.”

I leaned forward and gave her my best hug. “But now you have Uncle Bob. Nothing is going to change his mind about how unbelievably perfect you are.”

She giggled. “You might be surprised.”

“Never.”

“What are you guys whispering about?” Amber asked, her hair in her face as she shimmied up the back of the couch under the weight of an anvil.

Cookie leaned back and wiped at her eyes. “We’re talking about the boarding school we’re going to send you to if you don’t start earning your keep.”

Amber blew her bangs out of her face. “You have to come up with some new material, Mom. That hasn’t worked on me since I was three.”

“She catches on quick,” I said. “So, any luck with the information Kit sent over?”

The frustrated sigh that escaped her lungs told me everything I needed to know. “Nothing. Everything they have is right. Faris was supposed to go to the park after school, and then she and her friends were going to walk to a party.”

“A party her mother didn’t know about,” I added.

“I don’t get it, though,” Amber said, scanning a handful of pages, and I realized she had been going over the case with Cookie. “Why are the cops so worried about that party or the park?”

“Because according to all her friends, that’s where she was going.”

“Which friends?” she asked as though we’d lost it. “Certainly not the one she was texting that day.”