Free Face of Betrayal by Lis Wiehl Page B

think”—his voice broke—“do you think she’s with Cindy? Do you think Katie’s dead?”
    “What I think,” Nic said, pushing herself away from the table and getting to her feet, “is that Lorena is using your personal nightmare to make money.” She leaned over the table, getting within a foot of the psychic’s face.
    Lorena’s eyes widened.
    “Let me ask you something. If I start checking up on you, what am I going to find? Is everything squeaky clean and aboveboard? Or is something going to come crawling out from under a rock?”
    Lorena opened her mouth, but no words came out. Wayne and Valerie looked nervously back and forth between the two of them.
    “That’s what I thought,” Nic said, finally straightening up. “When you leave, I suggest you keep your head down and not say one word to any-one. And if I find out that you have defrauded the Converses in any way, or if you try to use this to make some kind of profit, then so help me, I will start digging. And I have a feeling you won’t like what I will do when I find something.”

RANGEL RESIDENCE
    December 20
    A fter the vigil, Allison went to her boss and asked to be assigned to Katie’s case. Assuming it was a case. But it was, she was sure of it. She could feel it in her bones. “This one really speaks to me, Dan,” she had said. “And you know I’ve done homicides.”
    “We don’t know that it’s a homicide.” Dan picked up a pen on his desk, fiddled with it, put it down. Then added, when Allison wouldn’t look away, “Yet.”
    “I know I’m not out of line,” she said, working Dan as hard as she had ever worked any jury. “I deserve this.”
    It was sure to be a high-profile case, with all the potential for success—as well as failure—that entailed. Big cases made big names for prosecutors—which could lead to big bucks if they ever decided to jump the fence and become defense attorneys. Even if they stayed put, big cases also led to promotions. And good publicity if they ever decided they wanted to run for district attorney.
    But that wasn’t why Allison wanted this case. She only wanted to do right by this girl. If someone had hurt Katie, Allison wanted to bring that person to justice.
    Dan closed his eyes and rested his chin on his thumbs and his fore-head on his steepled fingers.
    Finally, he took a deep breath, opened his eyes, and said one word. “Okay.”
    Now Allison had teamed up with Nicole to question Lily Rangel, Katie’s old best friend. Lily was a plump girl who Allison thought was trying a little too hard to look dangerous. She had skin as white as a vampire’s, and there was a silver stud just underneath her black-lipsticked lips. Her hair had been dyed black, straightened, and then brushed for-ward so that it covered her forehead and cheeks in long spikes. A streak of electric blue hung over her left eye. Her clothes were all layers of black, except for black-and-red-striped socks that stretched above her knees.
    “You just let me know if you girls need anything. It’s no trouble to make coffee.” With a little wave, Lily’s mom left the room. She was a plain, sweet, and essentially colorless woman.
    It wasn’t too hard to guess what Lily was rebelling against.
    Lily sighed. “My mom is clueless. She thinks Katie and me are still friends. She keeps asking me if I know where Katie really is.”
    Allison and Nicole exchanged a look. Allison said, “Katie’s mom told us you were Katie’s oldest friend.”
    Lily made a dismissive sound and shook her head. “We’ve known each other since we were like, in diapers.” She looked down, fingering the black choker that cut into the soft flesh of her neck. “But that’s not the same thing as being tight.”
    Allison decided to start with the big picture. “Tell me, what was Katie like?”
    Lily’s head jerked up, and her startled eyes, rimmed with black liner a quarter inch wide, met Allison’s. “You mean, what is she like? You said was. ”
    This