Almost instantly, Amanda picked up. “Brandon Michael, where the hell are you?” she asked, her speech slurred. “I’ve been texting you all damn day.”

“Ms. Keen, this isn’t Brandon,” Aaron said, keeping his voice completely calm, despite her obvious agitated, and extremely inebriated, state. “This is Aaron McReynolds. I was a friend of Elliott’s.”

There was silence on the other end for a moment while Amanda absorbed that information before she said, “How the ...