The Darkest Evening Of The Year

Chapter 58

Harrow stands on the rocky brink above the beach, watching the wall of fog advance across the sea.

In a sufficient desolation of fog, when above the lower mist the sky itself is plated with black clouds and sunlight therefore doubly curtained, the automated lighthouse is programmed to beam forth even before darkfall.

Although the Coast Guard engineers are unaware of it, Harrow has learned to confuse the sensors and to prevent the light show from starting early in this weather. There will be no high flare to warn their incoming visitors.

Having waited nine years to finish the hard work of that night, he is impatient to show Amy the whetted knife, which is the same he used then. He hopes that she will recognize it and know, as he slips it in, that her daughter’s fate is hers, after all.

She may know the knife before she recognizes him. During the two years that he lived in Brazil, much work was done on his face.

Rio is the world capital of plastic surgery, boasting the finest collection of cosmetic surgeons to be found anywhere. People travel there from every continent to be made young and recuperate.

When after two years he returned to the States with a different name and a different face, he had begun to search for Amy. He was a busy man, with numerous lieutenants, and though he gave them orders for the most part indirectly and from a distance, he could not make the search his full-time job. He made of it instead his primary avocation.

He’d had to be discreet. Expressing an interest in her fate to anyone with access to sealed court records would bring him under too much scrutiny.

For a long while, both his own wits and private investigators had failed him. She had gone deep into her new life.

Only nine months ago had he thought of the locket she wore and of the sentimental story she had told about the dog that had walked out of a meadow, starving, and into the hearts of nuns and orphans.

She had always so admired golden retrievers. She had said that when Nicole was eight or nine, old enough to be responsible for a dog, she would buy a golden for the girl.

Also she had given money-his money-to a local golden-retriever rescue group. He had seen their publication and had wondered why they bothered. Dogs are dogs, and men are men, and they all die, and none of it matters if it isn’t you.

He suspected that, when adopting a new identity, she had kept her first name. Most people did, even in the witness-protection program, when the mob was hunting them.

Besides, after that winter night, she’d had not much left except her name. Needy orphan that she is, she would not want to be shorn of both her Christian name and her surname. Even more than most people, she has always needed something of the past to which she can hold tight.

The Internet had failed him and the investigators he had hired, but only for the lack of the right search string. With the words Amy, dogs, golden, retriever, and rescue, he made another try.

He located more than a few dog-loving Amys, but none other that had founded a rescue group. Her photograph did not grace their web site, but the more he read of the rescue accounts that she posted there, the more he recognized the voice of the woman he had married.

An investigator named Vernon Lesley had been able to obtain a photo of her, which confirmed that she was, indeed, the mother of Michael Cogland’s child, Harrow ’s child.

He could have moved against her then, aggressively, but he did not know how wary she might be. He took his time. He did research.

When he discovered she was dating McCarthy, he paid Vernon Lesley to do a sweep of the architect’s apartment. From that, he had learned of Vanessa, had read the e-mails she sent to Brian, and had become fascinated by her.

When he tracked her down-using sources more illegal than any available to McCarthy-and saw what she looked like, and met her face to face, he knew that his life had changed. Exploring the body, mind, and heart of Moongirl became more important to him, for a while, than finishing his business with Amy.

Now the day has come.