Seven Minutes to Noon

was ashen despite his recent beach vacation.
    Tim sighed and lifted his eyes to Alice. For the first time in all their years, she saw how truly green they were. Just like Austin’s. Bright, lucid green.
    “They said to wait until morning, see if she comes home tonight.”
    “They?”
    “The police at the Seventy-sixth Precinct. I just came from there.”
    Alice didn’t know what to say. What about Ivy? This made no sense.
    “I’ll go back in the morning,” he said, “first thing. I thought it might be better if Austin stayed over here tonight.”
    “Sure,” Alice said. “But I don’t understand.”
    “I think it might make things worse if he comes home and she’s not there.” Tim’s eyes teared up. “Don’t you think so, Alice?”
    “I don’t really know what to think.”
    “Will you tell him I had to work late? He’s used to that. He won’t question it.”
    “But what do I say about Lauren?”
    Tim stood in front of her, clearly unable to offer advice. She felt her heart plunge through her body, into the floor, to the center of an ancient earth. Stepping forward, Alice took Tim in her arms. He held her fiercely, crying.
    And Alice knew. She just knew.
    Lauren was not coming home.

Chapter 4
    The next day a dark blue sedan eased up to the curb in front of Blue Shoes. Two people got out, a tall man with a gray-speckled buzz cut, and a young woman. Alice recognized Frannie immediately. Without putting a quarter into the meter, they crossed the sidewalk to the store. Frannie first, the man following. She pulled open the door, which tinkled to announce the arrival of a customer, and he walked in behind her. She stood there looking around at the posh, renovated space.
    “So this is your place,” Frannie said. “When I heard Alice Halpern and Maggie Blue, I wasn’t sure.”
    Alice came around the counter, glad for a diversion from the troubling morning. Maggie stayed behind the counter, distracting herself with receipts, having joined Alice on her alternate Saturday shift. They had spent all morning worrying about Lauren. Making incessant, unanswered calls to her cell phone. Unraveling possibilities until they were depleted. Finally, they had walked the neighborhood, posting MISSING signs they had made at the store and printed on bright yellow paper.
    MISSING
    Lauren Barnet
    36 years old, long brown hair, pale blue eyes,
red birthmark on back of neck. 8 1 / 2 MOS. PREGNANT.
Last seen on Carroll St. leaving P.S. 58
Friday, Sept. 8, at 8:45 a.m.
Please call with any information.
    Just above her name, a photo of Lauren smiled beneath the paper’s yellow haze.
    After posting a hundred signs, Alice and Maggie had returned to the store, unsure of what to do next.
    “It’s our place,” Alice told Frannie. “Like it?”
    Frannie glanced down at her worn black sneakers and shrugged her shoulders. “I guess shoes aren’t really my thing. It’s strange. I don’t even recognize this place and I’ve been coming here my whole life. I always got my Halloween costumes at Manny’s Variety when I was a kid. Penny candies. The works.” She shook her head.
    “Sorry,” Alice said, receiving a sharp glance from Maggie, who hated it when Alice apologized. Maggie believed the neighborhood’s gentrification was inevitable, while Alice couldn’t help feeling guilty for being part of the spit and polish that was rubbing out so many old-timers. Like Manny’s Variety. And Frannie’s childhood memories.
    “Listen, I hate to do this.” Frannie dug into her back pocket and withdrew a thin billfold, which she flipped open. “I’m here on business.”
    Alice was stunned to see the identification encased in the billfold Frannie was showing her. A badge emblazoned with NYPD. And a card reading DETECTIVE FRANCESCA VIOLA, 76TH PRECINCT, DETECTIVES UNIT.
    Frannie was a police detective ?
    “This is Detective Giometti.” Frannie tilted her head toward the large man who stood behind her. Alice nodded hello to him and was immediately struck by an unusual steadiness in his gaze, a lack of wavering. He had long eyelashes, she noticed, a softness that contrasted with the masklike quality of his skin. Teenage acne, she guessed, though he was attractive despite it.
    He opened his own wallet: DETECTIVE PAUL GIOMETTI, 60 TH PRECINCT, HOMICIDE.
    “Homicide?” Alice blurted.
    Maggie hurried around the counter, took one look at Giometti’s identification and said, “You found Lauren, didn’t you?”
    “No,”