here when they were diving for Brian. There was a mob, all of them hoping to see a body. Some of them had cameras, for Godâs sake. Sick.â
I nodded.
âSo whyâre you here?â she said.
I shrugged. âSame reason you are, I guess.â
âWeâre remembering Jenny,â she said. âShe was our friend. Flowers on the water.â
âBrian wasnât your friend?â
She frowned, and her eyes darted away from mine for an instant. Then she nodded quickly. âOf course he was. Brian, too. Flowers for both of our friends.â She held her bunch of daisies to me. âYou want to toss in a flower?â
I plucked two daisies from her hand. âThank you,â I said. âIâd like to do that.â
I followed her to the edge of the river, closed my eyes for a moment to focus my thoughts on Brian, then tossed one of the daisies into the water. Then I tried to think about Jenny Rolando. I remembered her photo on the wall in the police station, and the image of that young girl strapped behind the wheel of an upside-down car with water pouring in was vivid in my mind. I tossed the other daisy onto the swirling currents.
The girl touched my arm. âIâm Sandy,â she said.
âIâm Brady Coyne. I knew Brian when he was a baby.â I arched my eyebrows at Sandy and jerked my head in the other girlâs direction. She had continued to sit there on the rock with her back to me. She wore a grayish quilted ankle-length coat and a black knit watch cap. Her head was bowed and she was hugging herself.
âThatâs Mikki,â said Sandy. âSheâs pretty broken up.â
âI guess everybody is,â I said. âBrianâs parents are devastated. The fact that they canât find his body â¦â
Sandyâs eyes flickered, and she turned quickly and tossed a daisy onto the water. She glanced at me, then went and crouched beside Mikki. She whispered to her for a moment, then helped Mikki stand up and led her over to where I was standing. âThis is Mikki,â said Sandy. To Mikki she said, âThis is Mr. Coyne. Heâs a friend of Brian.â
Mikki was a tiny Asian girl. She looked like a papoose huddled in her ankle-length coat. She had smooth olive skin and dark eyes and long ebony hair. She held out her hand to me. âHello,â she said softly.
I took her hand. âHello, Mikki.â I looked from one girl to the other. âWhat do you think happened here?â
Mikki stared at me for a moment. Then her eyes brimmed. She shook her head, turned, and went back to sit on the rocks.
âIâm sorry,â I said to Sandy. âIâve upset her.â
âSheâs already upset,â said Sandy. âYouâre not exactly helping.â
âHow about you?â I said. âWhat do you think happened?â
She shrugged. âWhat do you mean? What kind of question is that? Their car went into the water, andâand they died. What are you, anyway? Some kind of cop?â
âNo,â I said. âIâm actually a lawyer. The Golds have been my clients and friends for years.â
âSo you gonna sue somebody? That why youâre snooping around?â
âNo. Iâm not here as a lawyer, and Iâm not snooping. Iâm here as a friend. Iâm sad about what happened just the way you are.â
âI doubt that,â said Sandy.
âHey,â I said. âLawyers have feelings, too, you know.â
She smiled for the first time. âYeah, right.â She squinted at me. âSo why are you here?â
âI was visiting Brianâs parents. Theyâre out of their minds with grief, and they will be forever until their boyâs body is found.â
Sandy shook her head. âThatâs pretty awful.â
âDo you have any idea where Brian and Jenny were going the other night?â I said.
She flapped her hands. âJust