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Nick crossed the room and came to stand in front of me. “So how’s the detecting going?”

“They haven’t given up, if that’s what you’re asking,” I said.

He shrugged. “I’ve kind of given up on that happening.”

I pushed back the sleeves of my T-shirt. “Were you around when Caleb Swift disappeared?” I asked.

He nodded. “I remember that. They found his sailboat adrift and no sign of him or of any foul play.”

I looked up at him. “I know this is going to sound crazy, but do you think there’s any chance that Caleb Swift is alive?”

“Have you been drinking?” Nick asked, narrowing his brown eyes at me.

“No,” I said. “I know it sounds a little out there.”

“And I think I know where the idea came from.”

“You think it’s impossible.”

“I do,” he said. “If Caleb were alive, his grandfather would have found him. Sarah, the old man broke his ankle just after Thanksgiving and had to have it pinned. He ran Swift Holdings from his hospital room. He doesn’t give up. He couldn’t find Caleb because Caleb is dead.” He frowned at me. “Why the interest anyway?”

“Lily,” I said. “I’m grasping at straws.”

Nick smiled. “Yeah, you are.”

Elvis jumped up on a stool, put a paw on the counter and sniffed at Charlotte’s bag.

“Get away from that,” I said. I turned back to Nick. “Would you like to join me . . . us? I know Charlotte. There’s more than enough food for two people.”

“Thanks,” he said, “but I’m meeting a couple of the guys down at The Black Bear to watch the game. Rain check?”

“Absolutely.” I walked him to the door. “Thanks for bringing the food,” I said.

He smiled. “You’re welcome.” He hesitated. “I know you want to see whoever killed Lily brought to justice. So do I. But she wasn’t killed by a dead man, Sarah.”

I nodded.

“How about dinner sometime next week?” he said, pulling on his gloves.

“Sounds good,” I said.

“Good. I’ll call you.”

We said good night and he left.

Elvis was still sitting on the stool, eyeing the food from Charlotte.

“Merow!” he said.

“Give me a minute,” I said.

The cat made a sound a lot like a sigh.

I warmed up half the scallop and ham and put the rest in the fridge for another night. Then I took my plate and sat on the couch with Elvis beside me mooching tiny bites of ham.

“Nick’s right, you know,” I said. “If Caleb Swift were alive, the old man would have found him.” I remembered the elder Swift in his office, so arrogant as he talked to Liz. I tried to imagine him running his company from a hospital bed.

The potato scallop was delicious, tender potatoes in a creamy sauce with mushroom and onions. I wondered if Rose could actually succeed in teaching me how to cook. No one else had been able to. Not my mom. Not Gram. Liam could cook. The last time he’d been in town, he’d made coleslaw and pulled-pork sandwiches on Mom’s sourdough bread.

Sourdough bread.

What had Daniel Swift said about Lily? I closed my eyes and tried to hear the conversation in my head. Do you really think I care about some small-town baker making her little loaves of sourdough bread and hoping we’d all hold hands and sing “Kumbaya”?

Elvis leaned sideways so his furry face was in my field of vision. “Murp?” he said inquiringly.

“How did he know?” I asked.

The cat looked around a bit uncertainly. I pointed a finger at him. “Asia told me that Lily was making sourdough bread. How did Daniel Swift know that if he wasn’t there? She didn’t make that regularly.” I shifted Elvis on my lap. “He was there.”

“Murp,” he said.

My logic was a bit ropy, but I decided that was a yes.

“So how did he get in the building? He wouldn’t have been stupid enough to walk in the front door.”

As far as Elvis was concerned, if there was no more ham to mooch, the conversation was over. He jumped from my lap onto the old steamer trunk I was using as a coffee table. His back foot hit my cell phone and sent it to the floor. It skidded under the front of the club chair opposite the sofa and out the back, coming to a stop against the baseboard.

Elvis dropped his head and gave me his remember-how-cute-I-am face.

“You’re not in trouble,” I said, waving a hand at him in a placating gesture. My focus was on the phone. It had slid all the way under the chair and out the other side.

And suddenly I knew. “That’s how he did it,” I said.

Was it Liz or Charlotte who had told me about the buildings along the street by the bakery? They had all had connected basements at one time. That’s how Daniel Swift had gotten into the bakery. That’s how he’d killed Lily.

“He broke his ankle,” I said slowly. “I don’t see a man like that using crutches, but maybe a cane.” I remembered the conversation I’d had with Nick, all hypotheticals. Could a cane have caused Lily’s head wound? It seemed possible to me.

“I have to call Michelle,” I said. I got up to retrieve my phone, and there was a knock at the door.

“I bet that’s Rose,” I said. She’d been planning on spending the week with Charlotte so she could get the apartment organized, but I knew she was eager to be all moved in. I scooped up the phone with one hand and turned to open the door with the other.

Daniel Swift was standing there. “Hello, Sarah,” he said. Then he pointed a gun at me.

I took several steps backward. I didn’t really have a choice. Elvis hissed at the man, his ears flattened against his head.

“What a stupid animal,” Swift said. “I should have guessed you’d be a cat person. Cats are devious. I don’t like them.”

I bent down and picked up Elvis. “Maybe you don’t like being reminded of your own duplicity,” I said.

My heart was thumping in my chest, but if Liz could stand up to this man, then so could I.

“You know,” he said flatly. At least there was no beating around the bush.

“Yes, I do,” I said. “And so do the police.”

His hand shot out and grabbed my wrist. My cell phone hit the floor. I saw a flash of black fur, and Swift pulled his hand back, but he had my phone now. He also had a nasty scratch, courtesy of Elvis.

“Very good,” I whispered to the cat.

“I sincerely hope I didn’t catch anything from that . . . animal,” Swift said, pulling a linen handkerchief from his pocket and wrapping it around his left hand, all the while keeping the gun on me.

“I’m more worried about my cat getting something from you,” I said.

He gave me the same smile I’d seen earlier, all ice and arrogance. “You’ve been spending too much time with Elizabeth.”

I swallowed down the large lump in my throat. “She had you pegged,” I said. “You killed Lily.”

“I slipped when I mentioned what kind of bread she was making, didn’t I?” he said.

I swallowed down the lump in my throat. “Why did you kill her?”

“I didn’t kill her. She died. It was an accident.”

“Then tell the police that.” I made a move toward the phone on the counter.

He blocked my way, the gun only a few inches from my head. “Don’t do that,” he said. “I will shoot you.”

“You can’t get away with killing me, too,” I said, faking a confidence I didn’t feel. “And you won’t get away with killing Lily, either.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” he said. His face hardened. He tapped my shoulder with the gun. “Move.”

“Where?” I said.

“Upstairs.”

My keys were on the counter, and he grabbed them as we passed. Why were we going upstairs?

Swift nudged me into the entryway and up the staircase to Gram’s second-floor apartment. “Which key is it?” he said.