Live to Tell

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

A rumbling sound from the hallway wakes me up. My eyes pop open. I feel a moment of intense, overwhelming nausea, and roll onto my right side to vomit.

Then the queasiness passes, and I’m left disoriented and shaken. Slowly, I return to my back. I stare at the blank ceiling of my hospital room and give myself a moment to adjust.

Playing with my son. Speaking with my ex-husband. And then… this.

Should I cry? I want to. I think if your child stabs you, crying is probably a logical thing to do. But I can’t summon any tears. I feel stark, hollowed out. For years I’ve fought a war. Then, in thirty seconds, I lost it.

Now there’s no going back. This is the new reality. My son is a violent offender and I’m his first victim.

At least it wasn’t Chelsea, I think, and then I do cry, low, muffled sobs of relief, because Michael wasn’t the only one who’d spent years terrified that one day he’d have to harm his son to save his daughter. At least it didn’t come to that. At least not that.

Then I picture Evan again, his bright blue eyes and infectious giggle as we raced around the backyard, and I cry harder.

I will always look at Evan and know what he did. And he will always look at me and know what he did, too.

Can’t go back. No going back.

It comes to me again. The burning, obsessive realization: I have to get out of here. I can’t be this person anymore. I can’t lead this life. It hurts too much.

I sit up. The movement sends a sharp, bolting pain through my left side. I gasp, falter, then catch myself. After everything I’ve been through, I refuse to be cowed by something as trivial as physical pain. I grit my teeth, and force my way to standing.

My legs wobble. I grab the metal bed-rail and hang on tight.

When I’m finally convinced I won’t collapse, I turn my attention to the row of machines. I turn off the heart monitor first, unclipping the plastic lead from my finger. Next, I remove the tape holding the IV needle in the back of my hand, sliding the needle free. A single drop of blood appears against my pale skin. I wipe it away and will myself not to bleed again.

I walk gingerly, five steps across the room; I’m not going to make it. With each inhale, my insides feel like they’re being flayed by shards of glass. I’m light-headed, achy. I need to lie down. I can try again tomorrow. But when I turn back to the bed, I can’t do it. Maybe I’m crazy. Maybe Evan isn’t the only one who broke this morning. But I can’t go back. I won’t.

Goddammit, after the past eight years, I’m entitled to at least one nervous breakdown.

Tighter binding, I decide. Something wrapped around my ribs to support my weakened side.

Good news: I’ve spent years quietly repairing the results of Evan’s rampages. I’ve reset finger bones, superglued deep cuts (I saw it on the Discovery Channel), and taped fractured ribs. All I need is a few supplies, and I’m a surprisingly decent medic.

Well, I am in a hospital.

I shuffle slowly into the hallway, clutching the back of my hospital gown. The clock on the wall shows it’s after midnight. Sunday is over. Monday has officially begun. I try to find strength in that. A brave new day. Mostly, standing in the middle of the overbright corridor, I feel lost and alone.

The ward is quiet, the nurses’ station empty. I keep moving. Four doors down, tucked against a wall, I find a cart of first-aid supplies. I slip a roll of gauze and a box of butterfly clips into my hands, then shuffle back to my room, shutting the door behind me. I have to rest. My head is spinning. I chew some ice chips, then crawl into bed. My lips hurt. I chew more ice; then, despite my best intentions, I fall asleep.

When I wake up, the wall clock tells me two hours have passed. Someone has placed a blanket over me, and a small duffel bag rests on the chair. Michael, probably. I feel an ache in my chest, as if my ex-husband has left me all over again. Crazy. I’m going crazy.

I don’t care.

I’m still clutching the first-aid supplies. That fortifies me, returns my sense of purpose. I climb out of bed; my legs feel stronger this time and my breathing remains even.

I peel off my flimsy hospital gown, inspecting the bandage on my side. Dark pinpricks of rust. Old blood. Not fresh. Good enough for me.

I work carefully, wrapping the gauze around my rib cage, pulling it tight with each pass, until the constriction forces me to elongate my back and breathe in shallow gasps. Finally, I secure the binding, stabilizing my ribs and easing the sharpest edge of my pain.

Next I explore the duffel bag. Michael has thrown together the basics: sweats, underwear, socks, flip-flops, toiletries. I have a sense of déjà vu, then it comes to me: The duffel bag holds the same items as the hospital bag I packed for Chelsea’s birth, and the one I’d planned to pack for Evan’s birth, had I not gone into premature labor.

I struggle again. Wanting to finger each item as if it’s a talisman of the life I can’t give up, of the woman I’d hoped to be. I’ll sit here. Cry pathetically with my sweatpants on my lap.

The wash of self-pity disgusts me. I’m sick of crying. I’m sick of loving a man who left me. And I’m sick of nurturing a child who drove a knife between my ribs, then phoned to tell me he’d get it right next time.

The life I thought I was going to lead is over. It’s time for a new beginning, a new woman. One who walks white sandy beaches in a long purple peasant skirt, with a salt-rimmed margarita in hand. Maybe I’ll meet a young, handsome surfer dude. We’ll have sex under the palm trees and get sand in interesting places. I’ll watch the sun rise while listening to the call of the gulls. I’ll think only of myself and what I want to do every minute of every day. And I’ll like it.

I have lost my mind.

Fuck it. I get dressed.

It hurts like hell. I use the pain to stiffen my resolve. Underwear. Sweatpants. T-shirt. Flip-flops. I brush my teeth and comb my hair. World, look out.

I’m sweating. My side burns. I drink the water left in the cup by my melted ice.

I have no money, no passport, no sanity. Not exactly a recipe for success.

And I remember now that I’ve never really liked the sun. I burn too easily, especially the top of my head. I don’t want a margarita. I don’t even want a surfer dude.

Mostly, I want to see Evan again.

Eighth floor, they said. Maybe I could creep upstairs, gaze in on him sleeping…

I will tell him that I love him, whisper it in his ear, the way I used to do every night when he was a baby.

I’ll touch a blonde curl, the stubborn cowlick above his right eye. I’ll finger its softness, and that’ll remind me of all the times Evan hugged me, Evan kissed me, Evan told me he loved me.

To the moon and the stars and back again…

I don’t want to run away. I just want to hold my son. I want us to be all right again.

Eighth floor. Not so far. Not so hard. A short elevator ride to Evan.

I crack open my door, peer down the hall. Coast is clear. I make a break for it, hobbling my way to freedom.

I pass the nurses’ station, getting halfway down the hall, then three-quarters of the way. Almost to the elevator banks. So close. Fifteen more feet. Ten. Five. Two more steps, I’ll be able to reach out-

“Victoria?”

The voice behind me brings me up short. I turn reluctantly, feeling doomed. I can’t go back, I think wildly. I need my son. I need my freedom. I need something other than this incredible ache in my chest.

“Victoria?” my lover says again. His face a picture of concern. “What are you doing up? You shouldn’t be out of bed.”

“I’m feeling much better, thank you.”

“Victoria, I think your side…”

I look down. What do you know? I’m bleeding.

He holds out an arm. “Come on, follow me.”

“No.”

“Victoria?”

“I have to go upstairs. Find Evan. Please. Please help me.”

I realize for the first time that he’s holding a large black gadget between his hands. It looks like a gun, but not really. “What’s that?” I ask.

He looks around. Still no nurses in sight. “Expediency,” he says.

He points it at me. I feel a sudden electric jolt, and then…

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

D.D. and Alex bypassed the elevators in favor of the stairs. They needed to stretch their legs, and the empty stairwell was excellent for talking.

“What d’you think?” she asked Alex the moment the heavy fire door closed behind them.

“About Gym Coach Greg?”

“About all of them. We have Nurse Danielle, whose family history dovetails with the crimes, as well as having a personal connection to both Lucy and Lightfoot.”

“Lightfoot?”

“He was into her, even if she wasn’t into him.”

Alex considered this as they descended the first flight of stairs. “Meaning, if someone were targeting Danielle, the methodology of the first two crimes and the targets of the second two crimes would make sense.”

“Which also points the finger at Gym Coach Greg, who has motive.”

“Unrequited love.”

“Exactly. Worships Danielle for years, can’t even get dinner with her, though she accepts Lightfoot’s invite. He has opportunity-knows the Harringtons, knows the Laraquette-Solis family. He was on duty the night Lucy disappeared, and working tonight when someone spiked Lightfoot’s drink.”

“He claims to have an alibi for the Harringtons’ murders.”

“An alibi not easy to verify, given that the mother has been stabbed and the child’s psycho.”

“Attack gone awry?” Alex mused.

“What d’you mean?”

“The son stabbed the mother. Sounds a bit like our first two crime scenes.”

D.D. shook her head. “Too small. This family is just a mother and child. No father figure, and in the first two attacks, the father figure mattered. That’s who had to be posed just so. The crimes had to reflect on the fathers.”

“Dads are evil.”

“At least the ones who kill their families.”

Alex seemed to accept this. “Problem is, Lightfoot knew the families, too. So now we have two suspects to consider. Both of whom have lied to us.”

“Lightfoot told us he didn’t know Tika Solis, when he did.”

“And Greg said he’d never met Tika’s family, when he had.”

“Actually,” D.D. pointed out, “Greg never said he hadn’t met the family. He just said they didn’t visit the ward.”

Alex gave her a look. “You’re letting him off on a technicality? Remind me to wear more tight-fitting T-shirts and speak in a baritone.”

D.D. rolled her eyes. “Don’t get me wrong-Gym Coach still makes the most sense. After all, Lightfoot wasn’t working the night Lucy was hanged. Plus, there’s the matter of him being poisoned.”

Alex nodded. “Kind of wonder,” he said as they rounded the fifth-floor landing. “First we had no links between the families, now we have all kinds: the unit, an MC/respite worker, and the local spiritual healer. Begs the question, who else don’t we know about? Mentally ill kids appears to be a small and incestuous world. So maybe there are other experts-a psychiatrist, a therapist, a respite worker, a nurse?”

“Meaning we should check in with Phil and Neil: Phil, who’s running the background reports, and Neil, who’s making the list of all the employees who regularly visit the unit. Put those two items together…”

“See who else shakes out.”

D.D. liked it. They had four more flights to go, so she worked her cell phone.

She got Phil on the first ring. He sounded tired and hungry. Apparently, back at the ranch, they hadn’t gotten around to take-out pizza. Then again, HQ hadn’t dealt with a bunch of kids threatening to gouge out eyeballs. Win some, lose some.

So far, Phil had covered the basics: DMV records, employment history, and various criminal databases. Running the list of employees that Karen had supplied, Phil could report that no one had any outstanding warrants or history of arrest. Ed, the burly MC, liked to speed, and Danielle needed to clean up a few parking tickets. Greg, on the other hand, was clean as a whistle. D.D. supplied the MC’s sordid family history. Phil promised to dig deeper into Greg and his sister’s past.

“Though, by the sound of it, Sally was a juvenile and it never went to trial, so not sure what I’ll find in the system,” Phil warned.

“Let’s start with verifying that Sally exists, that her parents were poisoned with strychnine, and that her current residence is costing Greg an extra twenty grand a year.”

“That I can do.” D.D. could practically hear Phil cracking his knuckles over the phone lines. He loved a good data search.

“Have you heard from Neil? How’s he coming with the list of other hospital employees, contractors, etc.?” D.D. asked.

“He turned in a preliminary list of janitors, food service workers, deliverymen, and a few contractors an hour ago. Still working on those, though one name did jump out-the healer, Andrew Lightfoot. Guessing Lightfoot’s not a real name, because it’s not in the system.”

D.D. glanced at Alex, then remembered. “He mentioned in the first interview that he reverted to an old family name. Sounded better for business.”

“Well, if you want the skinny, get me better info.”

“Deal.” D.D. snapped her phone shut, turned to Alex. “More questions for Lightfoot,” she reported. “Starting with his real last name.”

Which shouldn’t have been too hard, except when they reached the main ward of the hospital, Lightfoot had disappeared.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked Greg.

“Why didn’t you ever ask?” he replied.

We were huddled at the interrogation table, confined to the classroom, under another detective’s watchful eye. The nanny detective was on the other side of the room, eating pizza and reading files. That gave us the illusion of privacy, though he probably had crack hearing and was writing down every word we said.

“I would’ve understood,” I said. I sounded petulant, even to me. Greg’s secrets angered me. I was the one with baggage. He was supposed to be an open book. Now I had to face the fact that Greg had his own tragic past, and was still a better-adjusted person than me.

Greg regarded me thoughtfully. “Why?”

“How can you even ask? Your family history, my family history. You could have told me about your sister. I would’ve understood!”

“Why?” he asked again. “For me to presume to know what you’re feeling, for you to presume to know what I’m feeling…” He shrugged. “Isn’t there some quote: ‘All happy families are alike, but each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way’?”

“Anna Karenina. Only line of the book I read. But still…” I sat back, hands tucked in my front pockets, still scowling. “Most people know who their families were, or what their families were. But we don’t. Our family history remains a question mark. Was your father that bad or was your sister that ill? Was my father that bad or did the drinking make him that ill? We don’t know. We’ll never know. And that kind of not knowing really sucks.”

“I miss my parents,” Greg said after a moment. “My dad was a good dad to me. My mom was a good mom. I wish they could see me now. I wish they could know that at least one of their kids got it right.”

I nodded. I thought that, too, the few times I allowed myself to think of my family. Would my mom be proud of me? Would Natalie and Johnny appreciate my work with troubled kids? Maybe, when I’d graduated from the nursing program, they would’ve cheered for me. And maybe, when I saw success with my first disturbed child, they would’ve liked to hear my stories from work.

I should’ve gone to dinner with Greg. He was a good person. The decent guy who didn’t get the girl, because most girls, including me, were stupid about things like that.

“I don’t want you feeling sorry for me,” he was saying now, voice grim. “I don’t need your pity.”

“Not what I was thinking.”

“I mean, look at the kids here. Most of them don’t have fathers. Most of them don’t have involved caretakers of any kind. That’s life. If we expect them to get over it, we can, too.”

“You should come to my place,” I said. “In two weeks. I’ll be saner then. The dust will have settled on this mess. I’ll fix you dinner.”

Greg blinked. Paused. Blinked again. “Your place?”

“I don’t have roommates. And we have unfinished business.”

His mouth formed a soundless Oh. It made me feel better about things. But then Greg narrowed his gaze, studying me intently.

“Think you’ll really be saner?” he asked. “Think the dust really will have settled?”

“Hope so.”

“Why don’t you let go, Danielle? It’s been decades for you and, speaking strictly as a friend, each anniversary you get worse, not better. Is it that you ask too many questions, or not enough?”

“I don’t know. Maybe…” I sighed. The nanny detective still seemed preoccupied. What the hell. I bent my head closer to Greg’s and whispered: “For the longest time, I didn’t ask any questions. I was angry and content to stay that way. But this time around… I’ve starting thinking about that night. Remembering. I was the one who brought my father’s gun to my parents’ room. I was fed up. My dad was… doing things. I wanted it to stop. My mother forced me to give her the gun. She said she’d take care of things. She promised me.

“Next thing I remember is my father standing in the doorway, blowing out his brains. I always thought it was my fault. I had confessed to my mother. She had confronted my father. He had gone berserk. Had to be my fault, right? But now… I don’t know. My aunt says there were problems in the marriage, things that had nothing to do with me. And I’d swear the clock read ten twenty-three when I left my parents’ room. The police didn’t arrive until one a.m. That’s two and a half hours later. What happened? My parents fought? My mother confessed to an affair, tried to kick him out? Two and a half hours is a long time. Two and half hours…”

I shook my head, confused. “I always thought the central question of my life was whether my father spared me because he loved me that much, or because he hated me that much. Now I wonder if my entire life doesn’t boil down to two and a half hours when I was hiding under the covers of my bed.”

“Danielle-” Greg began.

“Remember the deal: no pity.”

“And dinner in two weeks.”

“Yeah, dinner in two weeks. No roommates.”

He grinned. It eased the tightness in my chest, made me want to touch the bruise I’d left on his jaw.

“I’m not good girlfriend material,” I reminded him. I heard the edge in my voice. “I’m gonna try. It’s time to forgive. Time to forget. But this is new territory for me. I’m better at being angry.”

“Danielle-”

“My family’s dead. I’m still alive. I need start doing something with that.”

“Are you done?”

“Okay.”

“Danielle, how long have we known each other?”

“Years.”

“Five, to be exact. I’ve only been asking you out for the past two. You can be angry, Danielle. It’s nothing I haven’t seen. And you can be sad, because it’s nothing I won’t understand. And if you want to learn to forgive and forget, I’m happy to help with that, too. Maybe I’ll even learn something along the way. But you don’t have to change, Danielle. Not for me.”

“You’re a brave man.”

He smiled. “Nah, but I’m solid. Just am. And solid’s not glamorous and it’s not for every girl. But I’m hoping it will be enough for you.”

“I’ve never done solid. For me, solid will be glamorous.”

“So two weeks-” Greg began, then stopped. He sat up, sniffed the air. “Do you smell smoke?”

I paused, sniffed. At first, I smelled only cheese and pepperoni, but then… “Yeah, I do.”

Suddenly, the smoke alarm split the air. I covered my ears, pushing back the chair.

Greg was already climbing to his feet, the detective, as well.

“You two, stay put-” the detective began.

Greg cut him off. “Not a chance. After that episode earlier this evening, most of these kids are heavily medicated. They’re not walking out of here. We’ll have to carry them.”

Greg headed for the door, placing his hand against it. “Cool to the touch,” he reported. He flung it open. Tendrils of smoke were wafting down the hall and we could hear the rapid patter of running feet.

Definitely not a drill. Greg and I looked at the cop. The cop looked back at us.

“First kid you see,” I informed the detective, “grab him or her and get down the stairs. Fourteen kids to go, and we’ll be right behind you.”

We got to work.

Karen led the charge. We found her positioned before the ward’s front doors, checklist in hand, wire-rimmed glasses askew on the tip of her nose. I still couldn’t see the cause of the smoke or feel any heat, but the hallway was noticeably hazy, smoke curling around Karen’s feet as she read off each child’s name in a firm, tight voice.

Ed stood nearby, preparing to take the first group of kids, a groggy trio Cecille was herding down the hall. She had them walking single file, their hand on the shoulder of the child in front of them, just as we’d practiced. The kids, still wearing pajamas, stumbled along, too tired to do anything other than what they were told.

Then a door flew open, and Jorge and Benny bolted out. They charged into the trio, knocking Aimee to the floor before leaping onto the sofas, hands clasped over their ears, each boy screeching louder than the alarm itself.

“You,” Karen ordered Greg. “Round up Benny and Jorge. And you,” she glanced at me, “you’ll take-”

“Evan,” Greg interrupted. “The new kid. We gave him a double dose of Ativan just two hours ago. Kid’s zonked out of his head.”

“All right.” Karen marked Evan’s name, turned back to me. “You get Evan. You”-she pointed at Greg-“you’re still on monkey duty.”

Greg headed for the leaping Benny and Jorge. I raced down the hall.

I passed by two open doors, small faces with large eyes peering out at me. I wanted to grab each child, carry them personally to safety. Not gonna work. Had to stick to the plan.

“Single file, into the hall. Ed will come get you,” I told them, keeping on mission.

The smoke was thicker at the end of the hall, making my eyes sting. I started coughing, holding one hand over my mouth as I entered Evan’s room. Despite the noise, the boy was passed out cold, curled up in a ball, with a blanket over his head.

I grabbed his shoulder, shook him, hard. Nothing.

The smoke made me cough again. I yanked off the blanket, lightly slapping Evan’s cheeks. Still nothing.

More smoke. My eyes burning. My chest, getting tight.

Fuck it. I dug my hand under his shoulders and propped him into a sitting position. Evan’s head rolled back against my arm, his mouth slack-jawed. I braced my legs, counted to three, then heaved him up, like an overgrown baby.

I staggered back, gritting my teeth. Right before I toppled, I found my balance, getting my legs beneath me as I shifted Evan’s deadweight in my arms. The boy wasn’t too heavy but a long, awkward shape, with his scrawny limbs flopping about.

Coughing harder, I put one arm around Evan’s shoulders, the other around his hips, then stumbled into the hall.

The hall was growing darker, harder to see, harder to breathe.

I tripped, almost going down. At the last instant, I caught Evan by the waist of his pajamas, and forged ahead. Vacant rooms loomed on either side of me. One, two, three, four, five.

The team had done their job. I passed the common area and arrived in front of Karen.

“Evan,” she triumphantly checked off. “That’s a wrap. Into the stairwell, Danielle. I’ll bring up the rear.”

The smoke alarm was still shrieking. Karen held open the door for me. The lobby area was clear of smoke, allowing me to draw a deeper breath as I made my way toward the emergency exit. Evan felt heavier now. My arms burned. Lower back, too. I needed to hit the gym. Lift weights. Something.

I got the fire door open. One flight at a time. Help awaited at the bottom of the stairs.

I rounded the seventh-floor landing with my shoulder leaning against the wall for support. Above me, I heard the fire door clang shut: Karen, beginning her own descent.

Eight-year-olds are heavy. Seventh floor down. Then the sixth. One foot, then the other.

I made it to the third-floor landing, paused to catch my breath, then the door burst open. I blinked against the sudden infusion of light.

Andrew Lightfoot strode into the stairwell.

“Perfect,” he said. “And you brought Evan. Makes my life even easier.”

“Andrew? Shouldn’t you be recovering-”

I never finished. Andrew stepped forward, two slender black wires flew through the air, and I felt a zap wallop my chest.

Evan dropped to the floor. I was right behind him.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

By the time the fire engines roared up to the front entrance of the Kirkland Medical Center, D.D. and Alex had already spent fifteen minutes fighting their way through the growing throng of overworked staff and confused patients. There were nurses directing wheelchairs with attached oxygen tanks, interns guiding hospital beds bearing patients, and security guards trying to keep the exits clear. Glass doors opened. People poured out. Firefighters rushed in. Alarms continued to shriek.

The whole episode had D.D. troubled. First Andrew Lightfoot was poisoned. Then, according to one frazzled nurse, he hopped off the gurney and walked out of the emergency room. An hour later, the smoke alarms sounded, and now the entire hospital was being evacuated.

What were the odds?

Standing in the parking lot, peering up at the seven-story building with her hands clasped over her ears, D.D. couldn’t make out any sign of flames. Smoke, however, drifted up from rooftop vents. A fire in the walls? Electrical issues?

She turned to Alex. “Real or fake?” she asked him above the din.

“Smoke seems real enough.”

“And where there’s smoke…” Screw it, it felt wrong. D.D. went in search of a fireman.

First one she spotted was standing next to the fire engine, chattering on his walkie-talkie. He didn’t look happy to be interrupted by a civilian, but responded to her detective’s shield.

“What’s the situation?” she asked, shouting to be heard.

“Reports of smoke on the eighth floor. Seems to be coming from the ventilation system.”

“Fire?” she asked.

“No heat,” the fireman said with a frown. “Generally means we got a sleeper fire somewhere in the walls. Gotta watch how we vent, or we can create one helluva backdraft. Crew is climbing all over the building now, still can’t find the source.”

“Mechanical room?”

“Working on accessing.”

“Thanks. Keep us posted.”

D.D. turned away from the fireman, went back to Alex. “My Spidey-sense is tingly,” she muttered.

“Mine, too.”

“Cops do know woo-woo. Fucking Lightfoot. It’s about the psych ward. He rigged something, did something to force the evacuation. Question is, why, and did he get what he wanted?”

“Where are the kids?” Alex asked, peering around the crowded parking lot. Bedridden patients, standing patients, and wheelchair-bound patients. No kids.

A nurse raced by. D.D. grabbed the man’s arm, forcing him to pause.

“Hey, Boston PD!” she yelled. “I need to know: the kids on the eighth-floor assessment unit. Where do they exit for one of these drills?”

The nurse blinked at D.D., obviously caught between multiple tasks. Then he pointed to the side of the massive building, his words rushed as he bolted for his next patient. “They evacuate over there, the playground.” He raced off.

She and Alex hustled their way through the dense crowd to the other side of the building.

“It’s Lightfoot,” D.D. muttered, hands back over her ears. “I know it. But why him? And how?”

“We need his name,” Alex said. “That’s the problem. We don’t even know who the hell he is.”

“Someone does.”

“Gym Coach Greg,” Alex said.

“Actually, I was thinking Danielle.”

When D.D. and Alex made it around the building to a grassy clearing, they discovered fourteen huddled children and seven frayed adults. The noise from the fire alarms was quieter here. The noise from the howling children louder. D.D. headed for the nurse manager, Karen, but Greg got to them first.

“Where’s Danielle?” he demanded, his face tight.

“Funny, that’s what we were going to ask you.”

“Karen sent her to get Evan. I haven’t seen her since.”

They turned to Karen, who was already frowning. “But she got Evan. I checked them off; they headed down the stairwell right before me.”

“You saw them enter the stairwell?” D.D. clarified.

“Yes. I grabbed a last few things, then headed down. I could hear them in front of me. At least, I assumed it was them.”

“Danielle and a kid?”

“The Oliver boy. Evan. He was admitted earlier today-”

“Wait.” D.D. whirled back to Greg. “This is the Evan you know? You worked for his mom, who was stabbed this morning?”

Greg nodded.

“And Lightfoot knew them, too, right?”

“He paid me a finder’s fee.”

“Excuse me?” Karen spoke up. “You worked for a family? Finder’s fee?”

Greg winced, stuck his hands in his pockets. “Once things are calmer, I have some things I need to tell you.”

Karen opened her mouth as if to demand an explanation immediately, but D.D. was already waving her hand. “Yeah, yeah, yeah, and confession’s good for the soul. But first things first: I want Danielle. I want Evan. And I want Lightfoot. Anyone got a clue where the hell they are?”

She glared at the nurse administrator, then Greg, then the staff as a whole.

One by one, they all shook their heads.

“She’s the target,” Alex murmured in D.D.’s ear. “Lightfoot did this to get to her. But why? And where?”

D.D. looked at him grimly. “And how much time does she have left?”

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

I jerk awake with my mouth open as if to scream. For a second, I lie still, struggling to get my bearings. My heart’s racing. My side aches. I feel dazed, as if roused from a terrible dream.

By degrees, I register that I’m in my own bed. The windows are dark, my bedside clock glows four-fifteen. I start to relax, then realize I can’t feel my arms and legs.

In a fresh rush of panic, I try to sit up.

And immediately understand the problem. My arms are tied behind my back. My legs are tied at the ankles. I am trussed up, like a Thanksgiving turkey. But I’m in my own home, in my own bed…

It comes back to me. Waking up in the hospital. My determined desire to see Evan on the eighth-floor pediatric unit.

I’d made it to the elevator banks. I can remember my hand reaching for the button. I can remember thinking that I was going to make it.

Then Andrew appeared. His presence confused me. We didn’t have that kind of relationship. He used my body for sex, and I let him.

And, Saturday’s interlude aside, he hadn’t wanted to see me at all. He needed to prepare something, he’d told me. A Monday surprise.

It comes to me. Today is Monday.

And when I’d met Andrew at the elevator banks, he’d hit me with some kind of electrical charge. A bone-deep, searing pain. And then…

My lover deliberately incapacitated me, and now here I am, alone in the dark.

I hear a groan, coming from downstairs.

No, not alone.

Michael is here, too.

What in the world?

Suddenly, I remember two recent cases in the news: families, both with troubled kids, murdered in their own homes.

We’re missing Evan, I understand now. Andrew will bring Evan. Then the killing will begin.

Furiously, I work my hands against my plastic bindings. No time for the pain in my side. No time for the pain in my head. Have to get out. Have to get us all out. Michael, Evan. I have made such a terrible, terrible mistake.

But before I have a chance to get started, it all ends. I hear the door open downstairs. I hear footsteps in the foyer.

“Honey,” Andrew’s voice croons. “I’m home.”

CHAPTER FORTY

My fucking head. That was my first thought. Next came awareness of shooting pains down my arms, muscles cramping in my right shoulder. I needed to move, stretch out, sit up…

I was tied up.

The realization stunned me. I froze, trying to figure out what the hell had happened. I’d been carrying Evan, working my way down the stairwell. A door opened. Andrew stepped out.

The bastard had tasered me. The realization was so shocking, I tried to sit up again, and promptly whacked my head against a hard metal surface. Sagging, I honed in on the sound of tires on pavement, the scent of exhaust fumes, the stifling heat of a closed-in space, and the next piece of the puzzle struck me.

The bastard had tasered me, then tossed me into the trunk of his car.

Son of a bitch. He must’ve faked the whole poisoning episode. Gotten himself a free pass out of the unit, into the main hospital, where he’d disappeared, then circled back around to… torch the hospital? Attack the ward?

Evan. Oh God. What had happened to Evan?

I struggled desperately, rolling helplessly from side to side in the darkness of the trunk. I encountered something that felt like a metal tool chest, then a soft duffel bag. But no Evan.

Maybe he was okay. Karen had been behind me. She would’ve found him, carried him to safety.

The thought comforted me. I rested, wiggling my fingers and toes as I heard the hum of the pavement below, and felt the weight of the trunk door above. I wanted to throw up. Instead, I forced myself to take a deep breath, then marshaled my resources, and determined the best plan of attack.

I wasn’t scared. Maybe I should’ve been. But mostly, I was very pissed off.

I’d hidden once in my life. I’d handed over my safety to another and I’d buried myself under the covers. And we all knew how well that had worked out.

This time, I vowed, I was gonna put up one helluva fight.

The car slowed. I felt the momentum grind to a halt. Seconds later, the engine cut out; we’d reached our destination. My head pounded harder. The exhaust fumes had made me nauseous, while my right shoulder had locked up painfully. Despite my best efforts, I’d lost all feeling in my fingers and toes at least five miles ago.

I tensed, bracing myself for God knows what. Andrew would come around the car. Pop open the trunk. And I’d… leap out at him? Scream bloody murder? I was bound and gagged. Couldn’t move. Couldn’t scream. Didn’t have a cell phone. Didn’t have a weapon. I was doomed.

A car door opened. Slammed shut. Another door opened, maybe a passenger door. Andrew was getting something out.

My body screamed with tension. I squeezed my eyes shut, though I was already lost in the dark.

Footsteps, growing closer. I had to do something. Think.

There was nothing I could do. I was trapped, helpless.

I didn’t feel brave anymore. I pictured my sister, gunned down in the hall. I remembered my brother and his desperate race for the stairs. And I wanted to cry for them. I wanted to cry for all of us, because after tonight, I was pretty sure there would be no survivors.

The footsteps faded away. Long seconds ticked by without anything happening. My body relaxed, degree by degree. Think, think, think.

Both D.D. Warren and Greg seemed to feel that Andrew had personal feelings for me. Could I use that? Could I convince him that I liked him, too? If I could just sweet-talk him into loosening the bindings, giving myself one shot at escape…

The footsteps were back, growing louder. Then, before I was ready, the trunk flew open. Andrew loomed above me, his body shrouded in night. I couldn’t see his face, but felt his eyes upon me.

“Do you understand?” he asked me.

Bewildered, I shook my head, cotton gag chafing my lips.

“You will. It’s time to face your past, Danielle. I’ve been trying to tell you that, but you ignored me. Drastic times call for drastic measures. So here we are. Twenty-five years later. Same day. Time for a new understanding.”

He reached down, grabbed my shoulders, and forced me up. I screamed against the gag as blood-starved nerve endings roared to life. The sound was muffled, the shriek rebounding into my throat, where it died a quick death. Andrew grunted in satisfaction.

“You must open your senses,” he intoned, hands under my arms, dragging my deadweight from the trunk. “Remove your judgments. Listen with your heart, remember with your mind. He’ll find you. He’s been trying to contact you for years.”

He set me on the pavement. Run, my head commanded, even as my legs crumpled and I fell against my captor. Andrew was strong. I remembered his stories of running six miles in soft sand. Now he hefted me easily onto his back in a fireman’s hold. I tried to kick out with my legs, but couldn’t get any momentum.

With me in place, Andrew trudged toward a large house I didn’t recognize. He pushed open the front door and strode into the darkened foyer.

“Honey, I’m home,” he called out.

Upstairs, I heard a woman begin to weep.

Memory is a funny thing. My entire life had been defined by one episode, that until today, I’d assumed lasted no more than forty minutes. In my memory, my father was holding the gun. In my memory, my father shot himself, instead of me. In my memory.

Andrew removed my gag. I opened my mouth to scream, and he pressed a finger over my lips.

“Shhh, don’t forget about Evan and his mother and father. Surely you’d like to save one family.”

I closed my lips and stared at Andrew. We were upstairs, in a pink ruffled bedroom that clearly belonged to a young girl. I didn’t see any sign of her, and the bed was made, so I was hoping that meant she was no longer around, or maybe this room had been staged for my benefit. I wasn’t sure, and the not knowing kept me silent.

I studied Andrew, a mouse pinned by a cat, desperate for a glimmer of escape.

“What do you mean?” I asked. My mouth felt cottony from the gag. I couldn’t get enough saliva to enunciate clearly. I licked my lips, but it didn’t help.

Andrew set the flashlight between us. I’d grab it and bash it against the side of his skull, except my hands remained tied behind me. He’d released my ankles, allowing us both to sit cross-legged on the floor. I had my back against a wall of dark windows. He had himself situated between me and the bedroom door.

I didn’t hear crying anymore. The house had gone eerily quiet, the silence freaking me out more than the noises had. Bad things happened in places that were this hushed.

“Evan is an old soul,” Andrew stated.

This sounded like the Andrew I knew, so I nodded.

“He feels too much, is saturated by the negativity of this world. Other, crueler souls haunt his dreams. They seep into his waking consciousness. They encourage him to do bad things, such as kill his own mother. It’s a terrible way to live, such a young boy, fighting a war nobody else can see.”

I’d heard this spiel before, so I nodded again.

“He’s not the only one, Danielle. There are other souls caught in a horrible abyss. They cannot return to this world for a fresh set of experiences, nor can they journey to any other plane. They are trapped in the black hole of unfinished business. This is the Hell writers such as Dante described for us. It is a horrible, horrible existence, Danielle, for it has no end. Old, sensitive souls trapped for eternity.”

I had no idea what he was talking about, but I nodded again. Gag was gone. Ankle bindings were gone. If he’d just release my hands, I might have a chance of winning this.

“People fear death. They’re bound by primitive notions of Heaven and Hell. But that assumes we exist only in one dimension. Once you accept that souls are capable of moving among many spiritual planes, then you understand the greater truth of our existence. Physical death is nothing, merely a blip on a soul’s radar screen. Ozzie and his parents-they’re not gone; they’ve simply moved to the next set of experiences. Ishy, Rochelle, Tika, and baby Vivi. Again, not destroyed, just set free from an unfortunate corporal existence.”

“You killed the Harringtons and the Laraquettes?” I exclaimed in horror.

“I enabled them to move on to the next plane of existence,” Andrew corrected.

“Oh my God. And Lucy, too?”

“I’ve already explained to you that she’s happier now. You know what happened to her here. Surely you can understand it’s been better for her to journey on.”

“You hanged her?”

“She saw through me, straight into my heart. A powerful soul, that one. So I waited until it was late, and the unit lightly staffed. Then I simply led her out of the ward. She followed willingly. Again, she’s much happier-”

“You sick son of a bitch!” I interrupted hotly. “You had no right! Maybe Lucy followed you through the doors, but what about when you entered the radiology room? What about when you tied the knot in the rope? You murdered her. You violated the choice she made to exist on this plane of being. How could you!”

Andrew glared at me. “You’re not listening-”

“You weren’t even poisoned, were you?” I interrupted again, pissed off to the point of recklessness. “That was just a little charade to get you away from the unit. You’re a fraud. I knew it!”

“Quiet!”

“Fuck you!”

Suddenly, Andrew wasn’t sitting across from me. Suddenly, he loomed over me, his face inches from mine, the fury in his eyes threatening to drill me to the floor. I wanted him to be crazy. I wanted to see a rabid light shining in his gaze. Instead, the determination in his face frightened me to the core.

“You will believe. You will visit the interplanes, you will open your mind and open your heart. Or you and everyone in this house will die. Are you paying attention yet, Danielle? Are you listening to me?”

Wordlessly, I nodded. His blue eyes were burning, burning, burning. He was on fire with something. Faith, I thought. Mad faith.

When he spoke next, his words were clipped and direct. “I’ve hidden a gun in this house. It contains four bullets. I know where it is, and the person who killed your family knows where it is. Now we’re going to have a race. Whoever finds the gun first gets to use it. To be fair about it, I’ll give you a ten-minute head start. You may waste time searching for a phone, if you’d like. The phone service has been disconnected, just as the electricity has been terminated. Also, this house was set up by Evan’s mother to contain him twenty-four/seven. The locks are key-in, key-out, and there’s only one key that works.” Andrew lifted a chain around his neck, to reveal the single key.

“Finally, before you resort to smashing windows or other such nonsense, understand that you’ll be deserting Evan; his mother, Victoria; and his father, Michael, who did me the favor of showing up at the hospital. When the ten minutes are up, I will shoot them. I doubt you can break a window, race to the neighbors’, and summon help before ten minutes expire, particularly as your hands will be tied for the duration of our little race. Continue your policy of denial and people will die. Face your past, open your heart, and you have a fighting chance. You’ve driven me to this, Danielle. But I’m trying to be fair about things.”

“You want… you expect me to find my father’s soul on the spiritual interplanes and ask him about the hidden gun? I’m supposed to… talk to him?”

Andrew tilted his head. “What do you fear most, Danielle? That he won’t offer to save you? Or that he will?”

“You’re insane.”

“An explanation that enables you to continue your policy of denial. Let me give you a hint: Who saved you that night, Danielle?”

“Sheriff Wayne.”

“How did he get there? You never left your room and your house was located miles from the nearest neighbor. Who heard the gunfire? Who called nine-one-one?”

I stared at him blankly, not getting it.

Andrew sighed, shook his head at me, then rose to his feet. “You focus too much on the corporal world, Danielle. You hate yourself for not saving your family’s lives. I want you to fight for their souls. You don’t know the truth of that night. You refuse to see what you can’t accept. And in doing so, you’ve damned them all, especially my father.”

“Your father?” I asked incredulously.

“The respectable Sheriff Wayne. An old soul trapped in the abyss. That’s the true hell, Danielle. That’s what all of us should wisely fear.”

Andrew glanced at his watch. “Ten minutes. You can confront your past, or you can lose your future. You can save my father’s soul, or I will use all four bullets. I’ll start with the mother. That’s how these things are generally done. Then Evan. Then his father. I’ll save you for last, the order you know best. Tell me, Danielle, how many families are you prepared to lose?”

Andrew disappeared into the gloom of the hallway. I sat frozen, too stunned to move. Then I heard a new sound, from the room next to mine.

“Mommy?” Evan whispered, his voice tinny with fear. “Mommy?”

Andrew was insane, I thought, and we were all going to die.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

Phil was a brilliant man. Via cell phone, D.D. gave him the update on Andrew Lightfoot, who appeared to have abducted Danielle and Evan. They needed Andrew’s last name and background info, fast.

Phil answered by cross-referencing Lightfoot’s address with the state licensing board for financial traders. Given that Lightfoot used to be an investment banker, it stood to reason that he kept his license up, if only to manage his own assets.

Sure enough, the database spit back the name Andrew Ficke, son of Wayne and Sheila Ficke. Sheila had an address in Newburyport, not far from her son. Wayne, a former sheriff, had died two years ago.

D.D. called Sheila, told the bewildered woman that her son was currently assisting the BPD with an urgent investigation and they needed to locate him immediately. A list of known addresses, please?

Turned out Andrew owned a seaside home, a yacht, and a co-op in New York. If souls really got to choose their experiences, D.D. was coming back as a New Age healer.

She doubted Andrew would run all the way to New York with an abducted woman. Seaside home too obvious. Yacht more interesting; lots of privacy out at sea. D.D. would notify local uniforms to watch the docks, and the Coast Guard to monitor the harbor.

“Sorry to call so late,” D.D. told the woman, not wanting her to be alarmed and attempt to contact Andrew. “We’re all set now. Thanks again.”

“What’s the case?” Sheila asked.

“Excuse me?”

“You said Andrew was assisting with a case. Which case? If you can talk about it, of course.”

D.D. almost said no. But then, at the last second: “He’s helping us investigate the murders of two families. Maybe you’ve seen the reports on the news.”

“Oh, that sounds like Andrew. He’s been fascinated by such cases ever since his father’s involvement, of course.”

“His father’s involvement?”

“Way before your time, dear. Back in eighty-five, when Wayne was still sheriff, one of his former deputies got drunk and turned his gun on his family, then himself. Only the girl survived. Danielle Burton. Such a terrible night. Wayne put together an album of the event, filled with newspaper clippings and such. Right up until his death I’d find him searching through it. I think he kept looking for what he might have done differently, the warning he should’ve spotted, the action he could’ve taken, which would’ve spared that poor family.”

“Where’s the album?” D.D. asked immediately.

“Andrew took it. My husband was the first on the scene, carrying the girl from the house. Many of the newspapers dubbed him a hero. I don’t know that Wayne agreed, but the articles are flattering and it’s nice for a son to have such stories of his father.”

“Wayne ever talk about that night? The details of what happened?”

“No, he wasn’t a talking sort of man. He put together the album. I think that was his therapy.”

“What about Andrew? Did he question your husband about the case?”

“Andrew asked Wayne questions every now and then. But once my husband retired, he left those days behind him and took up fishing. That seemed to work for him.”

D.D. ended the call, turned to Alex.

“Andrew Lightfoot’s father was the sheriff who handled the shooting deaths of Danielle’s family twenty-five years ago,” she reported excitedly. “What are the odds of that being a coincidence?”

“His father was at the scene?”

“His father was considered a hero for entering the carnage and rescuing Danielle.”

Alex blinked, paused, got the same intense look that was on her face. “So… we have Andrew Lightfoot, linked to Danielle’s past, linked to Danielle’s present. Has a family connection to a historic mass murder. Has a personal connection to two families who have presently been murdered. Shit. It’s a reenactment!”

“Reenactment?”

“The Harringtons and Laraquette-Solis family. He’s staged them to be similar to Danielle’s family.”

“But why?” D.D. demanded, running an impatient hand through her hair. “Million-dollar question, and we still don’t have a penny’s worth of answer.”

“I have no idea.” Alex grabbed D.D.’s arm. “Wait. We’re being stupid about this. The boy, Evan. Wasn’t his mother admitted to the hospital earlier today with a knife wound?”

“I think so.”

“Where is she now?”

“Somewhere in the parking lot with all the other patients, I presume.”

They both turned back to the hospital. The fire engines were still on-site, as well as numerous uniformed officers. Patients, staff, and curious onlookers were now corralled a safe distance from the building, where nothing much seemed to be happening. No smoke. No shooting flames. The fire, if there had been one, appeared under control.

“Let’s not presume.” Alex released her arm. “We need to find her and ask about Lightfoot.”

“We don’t know what she looks like.”

“Greg does.”

The staff and kids from the psych unit remained huddled by a copse of trees, waiting for the signal to reenter the hospital. Most of the kids were awake now and getting into trouble.

Greg flashed Alex and D.D. a quick glance as they approached. Then he yelled at Jorge to get out of the tree, told Jimmy to drop the stick, and whirled to grab an escaping Benny by the shoulder.

“We need you to find Evan’s mom,” Alex informed the MC tersely.

“Right now?” Greg raised one arm, Benny dangling from his biceps. Jorge and Jimmy came racing toward them, arms outstretched like airplanes.

“Vroom, vroom, vroom!” the boys cried.

“Right now,” Alex said over the noise. “This is about families, right? Entire families. So if Evan’s gone…”

“Where is his family?” Greg filled in.

“Exactly.”

Benny dropped off Greg’s biceps, and joined his vrooming friends, weaving among the bushes. Greg looked from the kids to the detectives and back to the kids again. His dilemma was clear.

“Oh crap.” D.D. closed her eyes and bit the bullet. “I’ll take the kids,” she informed Greg. “You go with Alex and locate Evan’s mom.”

Greg arched a brow. “You sure?”

“I’m sure.” D.D. eyed the racing kids dubiously. “But hurry. I mean it. For all of our sakes, run!”

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

How long was ten minutes? When you were a kid, ten minutes seemed like forever. Once you were in school, it became a fifth of a class. And when your hands were bound and you were stumbling around a darkened house…

I was in the hallway, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the gloom. The night had been an endless one, and the first tendrils of morning were starting to seep into the sky. In another thirty minutes, the house would be bright with the daylight. Assuming any of us were alive to see it.

Evan was in the room next to the girl’s; I could hear him mumbling a stream of agitated gibberish. There appeared to be four bedrooms on this floor. Probably a girl’s room, a boy’s room, a guest room, and the master suite. The traditional Colonial setup.

I didn’t know where Andrew was, so I flattened my back against the hall wall for protection, and slid my way toward the room I hoped would be the master suite. I needed to find Evan’s parents. If they were conscious, maybe between the three of us…

How did Sheriff Wayne get to my house? I never asked him the night I had him in my apartment. He was the sheriff. Of course he showed up at a crime scene. It never occurred to me to question his presence.

But our house was isolated, miles away from the nearest neighbor, and I hadn’t called 911.

My mother? My sister or brother?

There was a logical explanation. There was always a logical explanation.

I heard weeping. I turned into the next doorway, discovering a large, shadowed space dominated by huge pieces of furniture. I made out a king-size sleigh bed, then realized there was a woman on the bed and she was crying.

“Hello?” I whispered softly.

She shut up. “Who’s there?” Her voice was as hushed as mine, cautious.

“Are you Evan’s mom?” I edged closer, my eyes darting around the space, noting the standing mirror, perfect for Andrew to hide behind. Or maybe he was tucked behind that decorative tree, or inside the master bath, the walk-in closet.

“Andrew’s not here,” the woman whispered, as if reading my mind. “I’m Victoria.”

“Danielle.”

I hurried closer to the bed and she rolled toward the edge. Quick inventory revealed her hands and feet were bound with zip ties. The plastic bindings were too thick for either of us to pull off the other. We needed something. Knife, scissors, key.

“What does he want with you?” I asked, trying to figure out what to do next.

“I’m not sure. I hired him to help Evan, then we became lovers. But it wasn’t an intense affair. I don’t think he’d kidnap me over that.”

“He kidnapped you?”

“From the hospital.”

“Me, too.”

“You were his lover?” she asked.

“I didn’t even get through dinner with him. Apparently, I’m the person who damned his father’s soul to Hell. We need scissors,” I muttered.

“In the master bath. Top drawer, right of the sink.” I was impressed. Victoria was good under pressure. Then again, given Evan’s history, she’d had lots of practice.

“I’ll be back,” I promised.

“Thank you,” she murmured, and her gratitude grounded me. I wasn’t alone. She wasn’t alone. Together we’d get Evan, escape from the house, and call the police.

I located the bathroom drawer, pulled it out, and awkwardly searched for scissors with two hands bound behind my back.

As a voice suddenly boomed through the house: “Oh Danny girl. My pretty, pretty Danny girl!”

I dropped the scissors, recoiling against the wall. The voice boomed again, loud enough to pound against my skull, echoing so that I couldn’t pinpoint the source. Megaphone, I thought. Somewhere in the house, Andrew was using a megaphone and this was his sick idea of the ten-minute countdown cheer.

“Oh Danny girl. My pretty, pretty Danny girl!” he sang again. “How do I know that song, Danielle? How do I know those are the last words your father spoke to you?”

Because I’d told the police that, I thought resentfully, pushing myself away from the bathroom wall. I’d told Sheriff Wayne.

My mother had called him. The realization stopped me in my tracks. My mother had called Sheriff Wayne. I could hear her voice, a distant memory, talking on the phone:

“I need you, Wayne. I can’t do this anymore. He’s drunk, out of control. And Danielle came to my room tonight. You won’t believe what my little girl told me. It has to be tonight. Please, Wayne. I love you. Please.”

How much time was left? Seven, eight minutes?

I returned to the drawer, finally locating the metal scissors when they pricked my finger. The pain felt good. It cleared the cobwebs from my mind, focused me on matters at hand.

I crept back to the bed.

“What’s he talking about?” Victoria whispered.

“The night my parents died. My father shot everyone to death. Then Andrew’s father, the sheriff, found me.”

“Your father shot everyone but you?”

“Story of my life,” I said, but Andrew did good work because I was already wondering, Or is it?

Victoria rolled onto her stomach, lifting her bound wrists. I wedged my numb fingers into the loops of the scissor handles.

“Andrew’s hidden a gun,” I told Victoria as I tried to locate her wrists with my back to her and my own mobility limited. “If I find the gun first, I win. If he finds it first, he’s going to kill us. I’m supposed to visit my father’s soul on the spiritual superhighway and ask him for the weapon. While I’m there, I need to save Sheriff Wayne’s soul. Sadly, I don’t believe in spiritual interplanes, though I’m pretty certain Andrew’s mad as a hatter.”

I finally located Victoria’s hands. I stabbed her twice, myself three or four times. My fingers grew slippery with blood. I heard Victoria whimper once in pain. Just when I thought I was going to scream in frustration, I felt the jaws of the scissors slide around the plastic tie. I squeezed the handles, sawing the blades back and forth, back and forth… The tie snapped. One of us was freed.

How much time left? Six minutes?

“Oh Danny girl. My pretty, pretty Danny girl!” Andrew sang again, megavoice warbling down the hall.

His voice was all wrong. Too gleeful. My father hadn’t sung like that.

As he stood in the glow of the hallway light, his hand raising the gun. Pointing it at me, pointing it at me…

“Oh Danny girl. My pretty, pretty Danny girl!”

“Put the gun down. Joe. Wayne. Stop it. Not like this. This isn’t what I wanted.”

My head hurt. I had that feeling again-like my family was standing right beside me. If I concentrated hard enough, I could see them, maybe even reach out and touch them.

I dropped the scissors on the bed. Victoria sat up, shaking out her hands. Then she cut my bindings, as well as the ones around her ankles.

We stood side by side, two women armed with one pair of scissors in a darkened master bedroom.

“Evan,” she said.

I heard him, still muttering gibberish down the hall. Then I glanced at the bedside clock. Three minutes left, give or take.

“Evan can’t help us,” I told her.

“He can’t help me,” Victoria agreed. Then, after a heartbeat of silence: “But I think he can help you.”

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

I remember a story Michael and I once saw on the news: Two men in ski masks had broken into an upscale Boston townhouse and killed the entire family before fleeing with a jewelry box. Evan was nine months old at the time. As a new mom, I was appalled by the violence, shaken by the ruthless unfairness of it.

Michael had turned to me during the commercial break. “Anything happens in our house,” he said, “you get Evan and get out. Don’t worry about me. Save Evan.”

So here I am, under siege in my own home, and the stranger I just met is going to find my son, while I search for Michael.

Time is ticking, and I don’t see where we have many options. Andrew wasn’t lying to Danielle-my house is a fortress, every detail designed to contain a troubled child.

The phones are dead, the electricity out. I have no idea what happened to my cell phone, and my laptop is downstairs in the family room. We’re isolated, and according to Danielle, Andrew has a gun.

He’ll start shooting soon, I know that, and I can’t leave Michael to be his first target. I need him. He may be a pretty suit these days, but Michael grew up hard. He can take a punch and deliver in kind. He might be a match for Andrew, at least more of a match than two women and an eight-year-old boy.

Danielle heads for Evan’s room. I scoot toward the staircase, scissors clenched like a weapon in my fist.

I can’t hear Andrew anymore. No voice booming down the hall. The silence is unnerving. What’s Andrew doing? Where is he hiding? What’s he plotting next?

My hands are trembling. I want to stop, huddle like a small animal caught in the open by a bird of prey.

I won’t do it. My house, my child, my ex-husband. I started this mess. I’ll finish it.

Here’s the home court advantage-I have spent years learning how to navigate these stairs so that I won’t wake Evan in the middle of the night. I know each squeaky step, each groaning floorboard. Unfortunately, my stab wound isn’t doing so well. I’m pretty sure I’m bleeding, and beneath the ache I feel an itchy burn. Infection, most likely. I grit my teeth, picture my family, and push forward.

I hit the bottom step and pause to get my bearings. Daybreak lightens the glass panes beside the door. I can just make out each corner of the foyer, the empty space behind the ficus tree, the yawning archway leading toward the kitchen. No Andrew. I slip away from the stairs, hugging the wall for support, heartbeat quickening.

I hear a groan from the living room. Michael. I want to rush to his side. I force myself to take small, measured steps, listening carefully. The silence terrifies me.

Then I hear rustling from down the hall. Maybe from the downstairs lavette, maybe the front study. I dart into the family room, ducking beside the entertainment center. From here, I can see the sofa. Michael is sprawled on the floor in front of it. His wrists and ankles are bound. His head is moving fitfully, as if he’s struggling to wake from a nightmare.

For one second, I’m tempted to leave him. He’s better off unconscious, not knowing what’s happening to his wife and child, never seeing the bullet coming.

A glow appears in the hallway. Flashlight, coming toward the living room, on course to pass directly by me.

I bolt, racing to the other side of the entertainment unit, where I cover myself with the curtains. One of Evan’s favorite hiding spaces.

“Danny boy,” Andrew is crooning as he appears in the living room. “Oh Danny boy.”

He stops, studying Michael’s prone body on the floor. When Michael doesn’t move, Andrew continues on to the foyer. “Time’s up,” he calls out. “Know where the gun is yet, Danielle? Because I do.”

Andrew starts to climb the stairs, carrying something down by his right leg. A knife, I realize. A very large butcher knife.

And he’s heading straight for my child.

I rush into the living room, collapse on my knees beside my husband, and quickly cut the zip ties. He moans again. I kiss him once. A foolish notion from a foolish woman still learning to let go. Then I slap him, hard.

“Dammit, Michael, wake up. Our son needs you.”

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

“Victoria’s not here,” Greg reported ten minutes later, gasping slightly from his run around the hospital. Alex was three beats behind the MC and breathing harder.

“Nurse says Victoria must have left her room shortly after midnight,” he filled in. “They haven’t seen her since.”

“A woman who was stabbed disappeared from her room and they did nothing about it?”

“The nurse found the hospital gown on a chair, and noticed that the fresh set of clothes brought by Victoria’s ex-husband was gone. She assumed Victoria checked herself out against doctor’s orders. They put in a call to her ex, who I guess was handling everything, but they haven’t heard back from him yet.”

“Her ex was here?”

Alex nodded. “Michael dropped off some stuff, spoke with the doctors, yeah.”

D.D. scowled, turned instinctively back to the nearest bush, which was now filled with five hyperactive boys. Another MC-Ed-had come over to assist. It was possible that D.D. wasn’t prepared to handle three crazy boys. It was possible no one was prepared to handle these three boys.

“So Evan, his mother, Danielle, and Andrew have all disappeared from this hospital in the past two hours,” D.D. summarized. “Did you speak to the attendants who took Andrew to the emergency room?”

“Victor and Noam,” Greg said. “They said Lightfoot’s condition appeared to stabilize in the elevator. They got him to the ER, left him for just a second to file paperwork. When the nurse appeared with the first dose of medication, Lightfoot was gone. Hospital security was notified, but hasn’t spotted him.”

“Hospital security,” D.D. mused, then perked up. “Security cameras. We’re going to need access to them.”

Alex nodded, but glanced pointedly at his watch. Viewing security footage could be arranged, but would take hours to execute. And in the meantime…

“It’s a reenactment,” Alex told them. “Andrew’s going family by family, following some agenda only he understands. Assuming he’s abducted Evan and Evan’s mother, he will look to staging next.”

“The boat?” D.D. wondered. “Very private.”

“Not the right feel. It needs to be domestic.”

“His house?” That didn’t sound right to her. Lightfoot’s house was an architectural marvel, not a suburban daydream.

“Why not the Olivers’ house?” Greg suggested. “Evan and his mom live in Cambridge, no more than ten, fifteen minutes from here. Andrew would know where it is; he worked for them.”

“Shit. You and me,” D.D. said to Alex, “to Evan’s house. I’ll call for backup along the way.”

She and Alex took a step forward. Greg caught her shoulder.

“I want to go,” he started, then waved to the screaming kids behind him. “Obviously, I can’t. But you’ll find Danielle, right? You’ll keep her safe. Return her to us. She’s… she’s special to me.”

“Give me an hour or two,” D.D. said with forced optimism, “and hopefully you can tell her that yourself.”

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

“It’s dark.”

“The electricity’s out. Evan, my name’s Danielle, I met you earlier this evening. I’m a friend of Greg’s.”

I eased into Evan’s bedroom, mindful of shadowed corners and Andrew’s unknown location. Victoria thought he was downstairs, but neither of us was certain. She was going to try to free Michael, one more foot soldier to join the war. I was supposed to ask Evan to surf the mumbo-jumbo superhighway on our behalf. Find an angel, locate a gun. What the hell.

“It’s dark,” Evan said again, sounding more petulant than frightened. I made it to his bed, where I saw he was lying on his side, hands and ankles captured in zip ties.

“I can cut you loose,” I offered. “Do you have scissors anywhere?”

“Not allowed sharp objects,” Evan said.

On second thought, that made sense. Not sure how to proceed, I sat gingerly on the edge of the bed, trying to find Evan’s face in the early-morning gloom.

“It’s dark,” he said for the third time.

“The sun will be up soon.”

Somberly, he shook his head. “That won’t help you.”

I wondered if Andrew had told him something. Warned him, or tried to win him over to his side. Maybe it was just as well that Evan was tied up. Clearly, he was a kid capable of doing damage.

“Your mom says you’ve been working with Andrew,” I started. “She says he’s been teaching you how to control the energies around you.”

“The dark,” the kid insisted again. “You must learn to control the dark.”

“The dark? Is that how you refer to the negative energies?”

“They’re all around you.”

“Yes, the power is out.”

“No,” he said, “they’re all around you.”

It took me a second, then I finally got it. Evan wasn’t talking about the lack of overhead lighting. He was talking about me. Apparently, I was the source of negative energy, a walking, talking black hole.

Given how tired and scared I currently was, that made perfect sense.

“Evan, can you tell me how you fight the dark?”

“Call upon the angels,” he reported. “Close your eyes. Picture a white light. Call it to you. Seven hugs from seven angels. They will help you.”

“Can you do that for me? Call the angels? Then, when you feel the light, can you ask the angels a question?”

In the gloom, Evan blinked at me, curiously.

“Andrew has hidden a gun,” I said quietly. “The angels know where it is. We need to find that gun, Evan. Can you ask the angels to help us?”

“Guns are bad,” said Evan.

“So is Andrew. Help us, Evan. Your mommy and daddy need you.”

Evan’s chin came up. He regarded at me solemnly. “I will help you.”

I hid Evan, still bound, inside his closet, beneath a pile of pillows and clothes. Ten minutes had to be up. Andrew was coming. With the gun. Without the gun. I scoured Evan’s room for possible weapons. Maybe a lamp, clock radio, or a framed picture. Victoria ran a tight ship. No feasible weapons in her violent child’s room.

Think, think, think.

My heart was beating too hard. I felt a dull roaring in my ears, becoming hyperaware of too many things at once: Evan’s low whisper, “Breathe in, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven… Exhale, one, two, three, four, five…” Myself, standing unarmed in the middle of his darkened bedroom.

Then another sound, farther down the hall. The creak of a floorboard.

Andrew, coming up the stairs.

My father, singing as he approached my room. My father, blood spattered across his cheeks-my mother’s, my sister’s, my brother’s.

I wouldn’t curl up under the covers this time. I wouldn’t hide in a bedroom.

I wanted to fight.

I needed to fight.

If I just had the damn gun…

Then, in the next heartbeat, it came to me. I didn’t need Evan. I didn’t need to visit the celestial superhighway. This was all about my father, right?

I knew exactly where the gun was.

I’d dumped my father into the damn sewer system, and the son of a bitch had been trying to escape ever since.

When Andrew topped the stairs, I was waiting for him in the hallway. I sat cross-legged on the floor, hands quiet on my lap. I had my eyes closed, listening to the low murmur of Evan’s voice from the neighboring bedroom. I could feel currents of air whispering against my cheeks. Cold and warm. Light and dark.

I felt different. Tingling. Flushed. Powerful. As if maybe I was in the company of angels. The memories, I realized. I’d finally opened my mind. Allowed myself to know everything that I knew, and now it was as if I were back in the house that night, except this time my mother and siblings were beside me. We were united. Four against one.

And the images that filled my mind were both violent and painful.

“You don’t have the gun,” Andrew stated. “You failed.”

He took the first step forward, and I finally opened my eyes.

“Sheriff Wayne saved me,” I said, my voice strong. “My father didn’t kill himself that night. Sheriff Wayne killed him.”

“You… you spoke to him?” Andrew sounded bewildered. He paused, six steps away, knife pressed against his pant leg.

“My mother loved him. Have you seen her on the interplanes? Have you asked her about that? Sheriff Wayne was a good man, and she cherished him for that.”

Andrew became immediately agitated. It proved what I was beginning to suspect.

“She called the sheriff after I spoke to her, after my father came home. She wanted to kick my father out. But my father refused to go. So she called your father-her lover, Sheriff Wayne-to assist.”

“He shouldn’t have left his family,” Andrew snapped.

“Even a good man can be tempted,” I answered. “Even a good man can want something he shouldn’t have. Wayne came over as a man, not an officer of the law. He hoped to reason with my father, convince him to leave the property. Bullies crack under pressure, right? And everyone knew my father was a first-class bully.”

More agitation. The whap whap of the blade against Andrew’s pant leg.

“It didn’t go the way anyone planned. My father refused to budge from the bedroom, so Sheriff Wayne went upstairs to fetch him. They started to yell. Then my father spotted his gun, resting on the nightstand. He grabbed it, pointed it at Sheriff Wayne, just as my mother got between them. She took the bullet meant for her lover, dead before she hit the floor.”

Pictures again, like an old home movie streaming through my head. Had I crept out of my room that night, seen more than I’d known I’d seen? Or were the images from something else? The warmth caressing my cheek. The feel again-my mother, Natalie, Johnny. Four against one. The way it should’ve been that night, twenty-five years ago.

“My dad hesitated,” I whispered now, “shocked by my mother’s death. It gave Sheriff Wayne the time he needed to bolt from the house to his car. Service firearm, locked in the glove compartment. He had to work the key, hands trembling. Get the door open. Retrieve the nine-millimeter. Check the chamber.”

More images. A fourth presence, joining me in the hall.

“While he was gone, Natalie stuck her head out of her room. Johnny made a mad dash for the stairs. And my father started walking down the hall toward my bedroom.”

The air currents again, shifting. Hot and cold. Light and dark. Swelling.

“Sheriff Wayne saved my life,” I said loudly. “He shot my father. He carried me from the carnage. Then he called for backup, never telling anyone what really brought him to the house that night. No point in harming his family with his dirty secret, now that my family was dead. As the officer in charge, he controlled the crime scene. That made it easy for him to write it up as a one-man rampage-my father killing most of his family before turning his gun on himself.

“Sheriff Wayne carried his guilt to his deathbed, where he finally confessed to his son. Is that what brought you to find me? Is that what convinced you I had to face my past, Andrew?”

I wondered if I’d see a spark of recognition in his eyes, a reaction to his name. But the swirling darkness around him remained impenetrable.

Evan’s voice crested inside the closet, summoning the final angel, calling for the light.

“You didn’t have to kill anyone,” I told Andrew. “Your father’s soul was freed the moment he confessed. He wasn’t trapped in the void between the interplanes. But my father was…”

Andrew snarled. Fresh rage as he understood what I’d finally figured out. He raised his knife.

And I curled my fingers around the handle of the gun I’d found in the master bath. From my father’s ashes dumped down a sewer, to his old service weapon taped to a toilet. In these last few seconds, it all started to make sense.

Andrew stormed down the hall.

And I had seen my father staring from his eyes.

My mother always smelled of oranges and ginger. She would feed me strawberry Popsicles on hot days, and stay up with me when I was sick. She loved the Sunday comics and used to pore over Vogue magazine, debating which expensive outfit she would one day love to buy.

Natalie liked to snack on fresh lemon slices sprinkled with sugar. She’d eat out the pulp, then curl the yellow peel over her teeth and smile at everyone. That last summer, she’d started using lemon juice to bleach out the freckles spattering across her nose. Though I never told her, I secretly loved her freckles and hoped every day to see some on my own face.

Johnny’s favorite game had been hide-and-seek. He could contort his body into the tiniest spaces, and we couldn’t find him. One day, he wedged himself behind the water heater and couldn’t get out. Natalie laughed, but I could tell he was scared. I held his hand while my mother doused him in vegetable oil. Later, after he’d taken a bath, he shared his favorite comic book with me just to say thanks.

Andrew, charging. Six yards away, five, four…

My father, a crush of darkness roaring down upon me like a freight train.

… three, two…

“Evan!” a man cried behind Andrew. Michael Oliver, cresting the stairs.

“Michael, Michael, the police. They’re here, they’re here!” Victoria screamed from downstairs.

“Mommy!” Evan yelled from the bedroom closet. “Mommy, Daddy!”

And then Andrew was upon me.

“Look out!” Michael roared.

A crash of breaking glass from the entryway.

“Daddy, Daddy, Daddy!”

Love and light. Light and love. A family’s last stand.

“Die!” Andrew howled into my face, knife arcing down.

I thought of my mother’s love. I remembered my siblings’ goofy grins. And this time I didn’t hide.

I pulled the trigger.

The recoil snapped my arms up. The gun connected with Andrew’s chin, knocking him backwards. Did I hit him? Was he bleeding? I couldn’t tell. My ears were ringing, my eyes tearing from pain. My right hand throbbed, burnt from the ejecting brass.

Evan still screaming. Footsteps pounding up the stairs.

“Police, police! Drop your weapons!”

Andrew picking himself off the floor, shaking his head.

I noticed two things at once. His right side was bleeding, and he still held the knife.

He looked down at me and started to grin, just as Michael Oliver tackled him from behind.

“Son of a bitch. How dare you hurt my family. Son of a bitch!”

“Drop your weapon! For God’s sake, drop it!”

Sergeant D.D. Warren had topped the stairs, blonde curls flying. She had her drawn weapon pointed at me, and her gaze locked on the tangle of grown men. Her partner, and Victoria, poured into the hall behind her.

“The police, Michael,” Victoria was trying to say. “The police.”

“Mommy?” Evan cried from the closet.

“Drop your weapon!” D.D. screamed again.

I put down the gun, my gaze still on Andrew.

“Kick it away. Behind you,” D.D. ordered.

I did as I was told. Michael was on top of Andrew now, bashing Andrew’s forehead into the floor.

“Stop it!” D.D. yelled angrily. “Police! Get up, get away. Now!”

Her voice must have finally penetrated. Michael slowly released Andrew’s hair. He rose shakily, breath shallow, expression wild. D.D.’s partner stepped forward to assist.

“Evan’s in his closet,” I spoke up. “He needs help. Please?”

Those words seemed to finally rouse Michael. He stepped back from Andrew. Victoria was already scurrying by the detectives into her son’s room. She returned a minute later, Evan in her arms.

She looked at her husband. He looked at her. The next instant, they were together, parents, holding tight, their child cradled between them.

And I felt an ache, deep and endless inside my chest. My mother, Natalie, Johnny.

I love you. I love you. I love you. And I miss you so much.

A brush against my cheek. A flutter, like butterfly wings against my right temple. I wanted to hold on, hold close.

I love you, I thought again. Then I let go, as I should’ve done years ago.

The other detective was beside Andrew’s prone form. He reached down to feel for a pulse while D.D. covered him with her gun.

The detective frowned, looked back at D.D., made a small shake of his head.

I realized then what we’d all missed before: the pool of blood slowly growing beneath Andrew’s body. When Michael tackled him, Andrew had still been holding the knife. Apparently, it had finally found a target.

“Everyone out,” D.D. ordered flatly.

We moved to the driveway, where the sun was coming up. Michael and Victoria remained huddled close, Evan nestled between them, refusing to let their son go. I stood off to the side, turning my face toward the light.