XO

Chapter 1

THE HEART OF a concert hall is people.

And when the vast space is dim and empty, as this one was at the moment, a venue can bristle with impatience, indifference.

Even hostility.

Okay, rein in that imagination, Kayleigh Towne told herself. Stop acting like a kid. Standing on the wide, scuffed stage of the Fresno Conference Center’s main hall, she surveyed the place once more, bringing her typically hypercritical eye to the task of preparing for Friday’s concert, considering and reconsidering lighting and stage movements and where the members of the band should stand and sit. Where best to walk out near, though not into, the crowd and touch hands and blow kisses. Where best acoustically to place the foldback speakers-the monitors that were pointed toward the band so they could hear themselves without echoes or distortion. Many performers now used earbuds for this; Kayleigh liked the immediacy of traditional foldbacks.

There were a hundred other details to think about. She believed that every performance should be perfect, more than perfect. Every audience deserved the best. One hundred ten percent.

She had, after all, grown up in Bishop Towne’s shadow.

An unfortunate choice of word, Kayleigh now reflected.

I’ll be your shadow. Forever…

Back to the planning. This show had to be different from the previous one here, about eight months ago. A retooled program was especially important since many of the fans would have regularly attended her hometown concerts and she wanted to make sure they got something unexpected. That was one thing about Kayleigh Towne’s music; her audiences weren’t as big as some but were loyal as golden retrievers. They knew her lyrics cold, knew her guitar licks, knew her moves onstage and laughed at her shtick before she finished the lines. They lived and breathed her performances, hung on her words, knew her bio and likes and dislikes.

And some wanted to know much more…

With that thought, her heart and gut clenched as if she’d stepped into Hensley Lake in January.

Thinking about him, of course.

Then she froze, gasping. Yes, someone was watching her from the far end of the hall! Where none of the crew would be.

Shadows were moving.

Or was it her imagination? Or maybe her eyesight? Kayleigh had been given perfect pitch and an angelic voice but God had decided enough was enough and skimped big-time on the vision. She squinted, adjusted her glasses. She was sure that someone was hiding, rocking back and forth in the doorway that led to the storage area for the concession stands.

Then the movement stopped.

She decided it wasn’t movement at all and never had been. Just a hint of light, a suggestion of shading.

Though still, she heard a series of troubling clicks and snaps and groans-from where, she couldn’t tell-and felt a chill of panic bubble up her spine.

Him…

The man who had written her hundreds of emails and letters, intimate, delusional, speaking of the life they could share together, asking for a strand of hair, a fingernail clipping. The man who had somehow gotten near enough at a dozen shows to take close-up pictures of Kayleigh, without anyone ever seeing him. The man who had possibly-though it had never been proven-slipped into the band buses or motor homes on the road and stolen articles of her clothing, underwear included.

The man who had sent her dozen of pictures of himself: shaggy hair, fat, in clothing that looked unwashed. Never obscene but, curiously, the images were all the more disturbing for their familiarity. They were the shots a boyfriend would text her from a trip.

Him…

Her father had recently hired a personal bodyguard, a huge man with a round, bullet-shaped head and an occasional curly wire sprouting from his ear to make clear what his job was. But Darthur Morgan was outside at the moment, making the rounds and checking cars. His security plan also included a nice touch: simply being visible so that potential stalkers would turn around and leave rather than risk a confrontation with a 250-pound man who looked like a rapper with an attitude (which, sure enough, he’d been in his teen years).

She scanned the recesses of the hall again-the best place he might stand and watch her. Then gritting her teeth in anger at her fear and mostly at her failure to tame the uneasiness and distraction, she thought, Get. Back. To. Work.

And what’re you worried about? You’re not alone. The band wasn’t in town yet-they were finishing some studio work in Nashville-but Bobby was at the huge Midas XL8 mixing console dominating the control deck in the back of the hall, two hundred feet away. Alicia was getting the rehearsal rooms in order. A couple of the beefy guys in Bobby’s road crew were unpacking the truck in the back, assembling and organizing the hundreds of cases and tools and props and plywood sheets and stands and wires and amps and instruments and computers and tuners-the tons of gear that even modest touring bands like Kayleigh’s needed.

She supposed one of them could get to her in a hurry if the source of the shadow had been him.

Dammit, quit making him more than he is! Him, him, him, like you’re even afraid to say his name. As if to utter it would conjure up his presence.

She’d had other obsessed fans, plenty of them-what gorgeous singer-songwriter with a voice from heaven wouldn’t collect a few inappropriate admirers? She’d had twelve marriage proposals from men she’d never met, three from women. A dozen couples wanted to adopt her, thirty or so teen girls wanted to be her best friend, a thousand men wanted to buy her a drink or dinner at Bob Evans or the Mandarin Oriental… and there’d been plenty of invitations to enjoy a wedding night without the inconvenience of a wedding. Hey Kayleigh think on it cause Ill show you a good time better than you ever had and by the by heres a picture of what you can expect yah its really me not bad huh???

(Very stupid idea to send a picture like that to a seventeen-year-old, Kayleigh’s age at the time. By the by.)

Usually she was cautiously amused by the attention. But not always and definitely not now. Kayleigh found herself snagging her denim jacket from a nearby chair and pulling it on to cover her T-shirt, providing another barrier to any prying eyes. This, despite the characteristic September heat in Fresno, which filled the murky venue like thin stew.

And more of those clicks and taps from nowhere.

“Kayleigh?”

She turned quickly, trying to hide her slight jump, even though she recognized the voice.

A solidly built woman of around thirty paused halfway across the stage. She had cropped red hair and some subdued inking on arms, shoulders and spine, partly visible thanks to her trim tank top and tight, hip-hugging black jeans. Fancy cowboy boots. “Didn’t mean to scare you. You okay?”

“You didn’t. What’s up?” she asked Alicia Sessions.

A nod toward the iPad she carried. “These just came in. Proofs for the new posters? If we get them to the printer today we’ll definitely have them by the show. They look okay to you?”

Kayleigh bent over the screen and examined them. Music nowadays is only partly about music, of course. Probably always has been, she supposed, but it seemed that as her popularity had grown, the business side of her career took up a lot more time than it used to. She didn’t have much interest in these matters but she generally didn’t need to. Her father was her manager, Alicia handled the day-to-day paperwork and scheduling, the lawyers read the contracts, the record company made arrangements with the recording studios and the CD production companies and the retail and download outlets; her longtime producer and friend at BHRC Records, Barry Zeigler, handled the technical side of arranging and production, and Bobby and the crew set up and ran the shows.

All so that Kayleigh Towne could do what she did best: write songs and sing them.

Still, one business matter of interest to her was making sure fans-many of them young or without much money-could buy cheap but decent memorabilia to make the night of the concert that much more special. Posters like this one, T-shirts, key chains, bracelets, charms, guitar chord books, headbands, backpacks… and mugs, for the moms and dads driving the youngsters to and from the shows and, of course, often buying the tickets, as well.

She studied the proofs. The image was of Kayleigh and her favorite Martin guitar-not a big dreadnought-size but a smaller, 000-18, ancient, with a crisp yellowing spruce top and a voice of its own. The photo was the inside picture from her latest album, Your Shadow.

Him…

No, don’t.

Eyes scanning the doors again.

“You sure you’re okay?” Alicia asked, voice buzzing with a faint Texas twang.

“Yeah.” Kayleigh returned to the poster proofs, which all featured the same photo though with different type, messages and background. Her picture was a straight-on shot, depicting her much as she saw herself: at five-two, shorter than she would have liked, her face a bit long, but with stunning blue eyes, lashes that wouldn’t quit and lips that had some reporters talking collagen. As if… Her trademark golden hair, four feet long-and no, not cut, only trimmed, in ten years and four months-flowed in the fake gentle breeze from the photographer’s electric fan. Designer jeans and high-collared dark-red blouse. A small diamond crucifix.

“You gotta give the fans the package,” Bishop Towne always said. “That’s visual too, I’m talking. And the standards’re different ’tween men and women. You get into trouble, you deny it.” He meant that in the country music world a man could get away with a look like Bishop’s own: jutting belly, cigarette, a lined, craggy face riddled with stubble, wrinkled shirt, scuffed boots and faded jeans. A woman singer, he lectured-though he really intended to say “girl”-had to be put together for date night. And in Kayleigh’s case that meant a church social, of course: the good girl next door was the image on which she’d built her career. Sure, the jeans could be a little tight, the blouses and sweaters could closely hug her round chest, but the necklines were high. The makeup was subtle and leaned toward pinks.

“Go with them.”

“Great.” Alicia shut off the device. A slight pause. “I haven’t gotten your father’s okay yet.”

“They’re good,” the singer reassured her, nodding at the iPad.

“Sure. I’ll just run it by him. You know.”

Now Kayleigh paused. Then: “Okay.”

“Acoustics good here?” asked Alicia, who had been a performer herself; she had quite a voice and a love of music, which was undoubtedly why she’d taken a job for someone like Kayleigh Towne, when the efficient, no-nonsense woman could have earned twice as much as a personal assistant for a corporate executive. She’d signed on last spring and had never heard the band perform here.

“Oh, the sound is great,” Kayleigh said enthusiastically, glancing at the ugly concrete walls. “You wouldn’t think it.” She explained how the designers of the venue, back in the 1960s, had done their homework; too many concert halls-even sophisticated ones intended for classical music-had been built by people without confidence in the natural ability of musical instruments and voices to reach the farthest seats with “direct volume,” that is, the sound emanating from the stage. Architects would add angular surfaces and free-standing shapes to boost the volume of the music, which did that but also sent the vibrations in a hundred different directions. This resulted in every performer’s acoustic nightmare, reverberation: in effect, echoes upon echoes that yielded muddy, sometimes even off-key, sounds.

Here, in modest Fresno, Kayleigh explained to Alicia, as her father had to her, the designers had trusted in the power and purity of the voice and drum skin and sounding board and reed and string. She was about to ask the assistant to join her in a chorus of one of her songs to prove her point-Alicia did great harmonies-when she noticed her looking toward the back of the hall. She assumed the woman was bored with the scientific discussion. But the frowning gaze suggested something else was on her mind.

“What?” Kayleigh asked.

“Isn’t it just us and Bobby?”

“What do you mean?”

“I thought I saw somebody.” She lifted a finger tipped in a black-painted nail. “That doorway. There.”

Just where Kayleigh herself had thought she’d seen the shadow ten minutes before.

Palms sweating, absently touching her phone, Kayleigh stared at the changing shapes in the back of the hall.

Yes… no. She just couldn’t tell.

Then shrugging her broad shoulders, one of them sporting a tattoo of a snake in red and green, Alicia said, “Hm. Guess not. Whatever it was it’s gone now… Okay, see you later. The restaurant at one?”

“Yeah, sure.”

Kayleigh listened absently to the thumping of boots as she left and continued to stare at the black doorways.

Angrily, she suddenly whispered, “Edwin Sharp.”

There I’ve said his name.

“Edwin, Edwin, Edwin.”

Now that I’ve conjured you up, listen here: Get the hell out of my concert hall! I’ve got work to do.

And she turned away from the shadowy, gaping doorway from which, of course, no one was leering at her at all. She stepped to center stage, looking over the masking tape on the dusty wood, blocking out where she would stand at different points during the concert.

It was then that she heard a man’s voice crying from the back of the hall, “Kayleigh!” It was Bobby, now rising from behind the mixing console, knocking his chair over and ripping off his hard-shell earphones. He waved to her with one hand and pointed to a spot over her head with another. “Look out!… No, Kayleigh!”

She glanced up fast and saw one of the strip lights-a seven-foot Colortran unit-falling free of its mounting and swinging toward the stage by its thick electric cable.

Stepping back instinctively, she tripped over a guitar stand she hadn’t remembered was behind her.

Tumbling, arms flailing, gasping…

The young woman hit the stage hard, on her tailbone. The massive light plummeted toward her, a deadly pendulum, growing bigger and bigger. She tried desperately to rise but fell back, blinded as the searing beams from the thousand-watt bulbs turned her way.

Then everything went black.

Chapter 2

KATHRYN DANCE HAD several lives.

Widowed mother of two children approaching their teen years.

Agent with the California Bureau of Investigation, her specialty interrogation and kinesics-body language analysis.

Dutiful, if sometimes irreverent and exasperated, daughter to parents who lived nearby.

That was the order in which she placed these aspects of her life.

Then there was number four, which was nearly as vital to her psychic well-being as the first three: music. Like Alan Lomax in the middle of the last century, Dance was a folklorist, a song catcher. Occasionally she’d take time off, climb into her SUV, sometimes with kids and dogs, sometimes, like now, solo, and go in search of music, the way hunters take to the fields for deer or turkey.

Dance was now piloting her Pathfinder along Highway 152 from the Monterey Peninsula through a largely barren stretch of California to Fresno in the San Joaquin Valley, three hours away. This was the agricultural heart of the country and open double-trailer trucks, piled high with garlic, tomatoes, and other fruits and vegetables, rolled endlessly toward the massive food-processing plants in the hazy distance. The working fields were verdant or, if harvested already, rich black, but everything else was dry and dun as forgotten toast.

Dust swirled in the Nissan’s wake and insects died splatty deaths on the windshield.

Dance’s mission over the next few days was to record the homemade tunes of a local group of Mexican musicians, all of whom lived in or near Fresno. Most of them picked in the fields so they’d adopted the name Los Trabajadores, the Workers. Dance would record them on her digital TASCAM HD-P2, a bit more expensive than she could afford but superb, then edit and post the songs on her website, “American Tunes.”

People could download them for a small fee, of which she would send most to the musicians, and would keep enough to cover the cost of the site and to take herself and the kids out to dinner occasionally. No one got rich from the downloads but some of the groups that she and her business partner in the venture, Martine Christensen, had discovered had come to regional and even national attention.

She’d just come off a tough case in Monterey, the CBI office she was assigned to, and decided to take some time off. The children were at their music and sports camps, spending the nights with their grandparents. Dance was free to roam Fresno, Yosemite, and environs, record Los Trabajadores and look for other talent in this musically rich area. Not only Latino but a unique strain of country could be found here (there’s a reason, of course, the genre is often called country-western). In fact the Bakersfield sound, originating in that city a few hours south of Fresno, had been a major country music movement; it had arisen in reaction to what some people thought was the overly slick productions of Nashville in the fifties. Performers like Buck Owens and Merle Haggard began the movement and it had enjoyed a recent resurgence, in the music of such artists as Dwight Yoakam and Gary Allan.

Dance sipped a Sprite and juggled radio stations. She’d considered making this trip a romantic getaway and inviting Jon Boling to come with her. But he’d just gotten a consulting assignment for a computer start-up and would be tied up for several days. And for some reason, Dance had decided she preferred to make the trip solo. The kidnapping case she’d just closed had been tough; two days ago she’d attended the funeral of the one victim they couldn’t save, in the company of the two they had.

She turned up the AC. This time of year the Monterey Peninsula was comfortable, even chilly occasionally, and she’d dressed according to her port of embarkation. In a long-sleeved gray cotton shirt and blue jeans, she was hot. She slipped off her pink-rimmed glasses and wiped them on a napkin, steering with her knees. Somehow sweat had managed to crawl down one lens. The Pathfinder’s thermometer reported 96 degrees outside.

September. Right.

Dance was looking forward to the trip for another reason-to see her only celebrity friend, Kayleigh Towne, the now famous singer-songwriter. Kayleigh had been a longtime supporter of Dance’s website and the indigenous musicians she and Martine championed. The singer had invited Dance to her big concert Friday night in Fresno. Though a dozen years younger than Dance, Kayleigh had been a performer since she was nine or ten years old and a pro since her late teens. Funny, sophisticated and one hell of a writer and entertainer, with no ego whatsoever, the woman was mature beyond her years, and Dance enjoyed her company very much.

She was also the daughter of country music legend Bishop Towne.

On the two or three occasions when Dance had come to Kayleigh’s performances, or visited her in Fresno, bearlike Bishop had lumbered into the room with his thousand-pound ego and the intensity of somebody as addicted to recovery as he had been to cocaine and liquor. He’d rambled on about people in the Industry-spoken with an inflected capital I: musicians he knew intimately (hundreds), musicians he’d learned from (only the greats), musicians he’d mentored (most of the present-day superstars) and musicians he’d gotten into fistfights with (plenty of those too).

He was brash, crude and overtly theatrical; Dance had been enthralled.

On the other hand, his latest album had tanked. His voice had deserted him, his energy too, and those were two things that even the most sophisticated digital massaging in the studio can’t do much about. And nothing could rescue the trite songwriting, so different from the brilliant words and tunes that had made him a hit years ago.

Still, he had his faithful entourage and he was in bold control of Kayleigh’s career; woe to any producer or record company or music venue that didn’t treat her right.

Dance now entered Fresno proper. Salinas Valley, one hundred miles to the west, was known as the nation’s Lettuce Bowl. But the San Joaquin was bigger and produced more and Fresno was its heart. The place was a nondescript working town of about a half million. It had some gang activity and the same domestic, robbery, homicide and even terrorist threats that you saw in every small urban area nowadays, with the rate a bit higher than the national average for all crimes. That inflation, she surmised, was a reflection of unemployment-hovering here around 18 percent. She noticed a number of young men, living evidence of this statistic, hanging out on hazy street corners. Dressed in sleeveless T-shirts and baggy shorts or jeans, they watched her and other cars pass by or talked and laughed and drank from bottles swathed in paper bags.

Dust and heat waves rose from baking surfaces. Dogs sat on porches and gazed through her car at distant nothingness and she caught glimpses of children in backyards jumping happily over trickling sprinklers, a questionable if not illegal activity in perpetually drought-plagued California.

The satellite got her easily to the Mountain View Motel off Highway 41. It had no such vista, though that might be due to the haze. At best, she deduced, squinting east and north, were some timid foothills that would eventually lead to majestic Yosemite.

Stepping into the brittle heat, Dance actually felt light-headed. Breakfast with the kids and dogs had been a long time ago.

The hotel room wasn’t ready yet but that didn’t matter, since she was meeting Kayleigh and some friends in a half hour, at one. She checked her bags with the front desk and jumped back into the Pathfinder, which was already the temperature of a hotplate.

She punched another address into the GPS and dutifully headed where directed, wondering why most of the programmed voices in sat-nav were women’s.

At a stoplight she picked up her phone and glanced at the incoming call and text list.

Empty.

Good that no one at the office or the children’s camps had contacted her.

But odd that there was nothing from Kayleigh, who was going to call that morning to confirm their get-together. And one thing about the performer that had always impressed Dance: despite her fame, she never neglected the little things. In fact, in life, and performances, she seemed to be utterly responsible.

Another call to Kayleigh.

Straight to voicemail.

KATHRYN DANCE HAD to laugh.

The owners of the Cowboy Saloon had a sense of humor. The dark, woody place, giddily cool, had not a single cowboy artifact. But life in the saddle was well represented-by the women who rode the range, roped, branded and punched cattle… and did some fancy six-gun work, if you could believe the poster showing an Old West version of Rosie the Riveter shooting bottles off a fence rail.

According to the movie art, blown-up book jackets, lunch boxes, toys, paintings and photos, the era must have been saturated with flip-haired, excessively busty gals in five-gallon hats, cute neckerchiefs, suede skirts and embroidered blouses, as well as some of the finest boots ever made. Kathryn Dance loved footwear and owned two pairs of elaborately tooled Noconas. But neither came close to the ones worn by Dale Evans, Roy Rogers’s partner, from the 1950s TV show, on impressive display in a faded poster.

At the bar she ordered an iced tea, drank it down fast and got another, then sat at one of the round tables, overvarnished and nicked, looking at the clientele. Two elderly couples; a trio of tired, jumpsuited utility workers, who’d probably been on the job at dawn; a slim young man in jeans and plaid shirt, studying the old-fashioned jukebox; several businessmen in white shirts and dark ties, minus jackets.

She was looking forward to seeing Kayleigh, to recording the songs of the Workers; looking forward to lunch too. She was starving.

And concerned.

It was now one-twenty. Where was her friend?

Music from the jukebox filled the place. Dance gave a faint laugh. It was a Kayleigh Towne song-a particularly good choice too, considering this venue: “Me, I’m Not a Cowgirl.”

The song was about a suburban soccer mom, who seems to live a life very different from that of a cowgirl but in the end realizes that maybe she’s one in spirit. Typical of Kayleigh’s songs, it was lighthearted and yet spoke meaningfully to people.

It was then that the front door opened and a slab of powerful sunlight fell onto the scuffed linoleum floor, on which danced geometric shapes, the shadows of the people entering.

Dance rose. “Kayleigh!”

Surrounded by four others, the young singer stepped into the restaurant, smiling but also looking around quickly. She was troubled, Dance noted immediately. No, more than that, Kayleigh Towne was scared.

But whatever she’d been concerned about finding here was absent and she relaxed, then stepped forward, hugging Dance firmly. “Kathryn, hey. This is so great!”

“I couldn’t wait to get here.”

The singer was in jeans and, oddly, a thick denim jacket, despite the heat. Her lovely hair flowed free, nearly as long as she was tall.

Dance added, “I called a couple of times.”

“There was… well, there was a little problem at the concert hall. It’s all right. Hey, everybody, this’s my bud, Kathryn Dance.”

Dance greeted Bobby Prescott, whom she’d met a few years ago: thirtyish, an actor’s looks belied by a shy smile, curly brown hair. There was also pudgy and terminally shy Tye Slocum, with long reddish hair in need of a trim. He was the band’s guitar technician and repairman. Unsmiling, athletic Alicia Sessions, who looked to Dance like she belonged in a downtown Manhattan punk-rock club, was Kayleigh’s personal assistant.

And someone else was in the entourage. An African-American man, over six feet tall, well into the 250-pound range.

Security.

The fact that Kayleigh had a bodyguard wasn’t surprising, though Dance was troubled to note that he was intently on the job, even here. He carefully examined everyone in the bar-the young man at the jukebox, the workers, the businessmen and even the elderly couples and the bartender, clearly running their faces through a mental database of potential threats.

What had prompted this?

Whatever threat he was here to guard against wasn’t present and he turned his attention back to Kayleigh. He didn’t relax, though. People like him never did-that’s what made them so good. He went into a waiting state. “Looks okay to me.”

His name was Darthur Morgan and when he shook Dance’s hand he examined her closely and his eyes gave a flicker of recognition. Dance, as an expert in kinesics and body language, knew that she gave off “cop” vibrations, even when not intending to.

“Join us for lunch,” Kayleigh said to the big man.

“No, thank you, ma’am. I’ll be outside.”

“No, it’s too hot.”

“Better there.”

“Well, get an iced tea or soda. And come in if you need to.”

But without ordering a beverage, he steamed slowly through the dim restaurant and, with one glance at a wax museum cowgirl twirling a lasso, stepped outside.

The skinny bartender came around, carrying menus and a fierce admiration for Kayleigh Towne, who smiled at the young man in a maternal way, though they were about the same age.

Kayleigh glanced at the jukebox, embarrassed that it was her voice serenading them.

“So,” Dance asked, “what happened?”

“Okay, I’ll tell you.” She explained that as she was doing some prep work for the Friday-night concert a strip light-one of the long ones above the stage-came loose and fell.

“My God. You’re all right?”

“Yeah, fine. Aside from a sore butt.”

Bobby, sitting next to Kayleigh, gripped her arm. He looked at her protectively. “I don’t know how it happened,” he said in a low voice. “I mean, it was a strip light, a cyc light. You don’t mount or dismount it for a show. It was there permanently.”

Eyes avoiding everyone’s, big Tye Slocum offered, “And you checked it, Bobby. I saw you. Twice. All the lights. Bobby’s the best roadie around. Never had an accident like that before.”

“If it’d hit her,” Alicia said, anger in her voice, “man, that would have been it. It could’ve killed her.”

Bobby added, “It’s a thousand watts. Could also’ve set the whole place on fire, if the lamps had shattered. I cut the main power switch in case they did. I’m going to check it out better when I’m back tonight. I’ve got to go to Bakersfield and pick up a new amplifier and speaker bank.”

Then the incident was tucked away and they ordered lunch. Dance was in fighting trim after the two-week-long kidnapping case-she’d shed nine pounds-and decided to splurge with an order of fries with her grilled chicken sandwich. Kayleigh and Tye ordered salads. Alicia and Bobby had tostadas and opted for coffee, despite the heat. The conversation turned to Dance’s musical website and she talked a bit about her own failed attempts at being a singer in San Francisco.

“Kathryn has a great voice,” Kayleigh said, displaying five or six kinesic deception clues. Dance smiled.

A man’s voice interrupted. “Excuse me, folks. Hey, there, Kayleigh.”

It was the young man from the jukebox. Smiling, he nodded at Dance and the table and then looked down at Kayleigh.

“Hello.” The singer’s tone had gone suddenly into a different mode, bright but guarded.

“Didn’t mean to be eavesdropping. I heard there was some problem. You all right?”

“Just fine, thanks.”

Silence for a moment, the sort that means, Appreciate your interest but you can head off now.

Kayleigh said, “You’re a fan?”

“Sure am.”

“Well, thanks for your support. And your concern. You going to the concert on Friday?”

“Oh, you bet. I’ll be there. Wouldn’t miss it for the world. You sure you’re okay?”

A pause, bordering on the awkward. Maybe Kayleigh was digesting the last sentence.

“Sure am.”

Bobby said, “Okay, friend. You take care now. We’re going to get back to lunch.”

As if the roadie hadn’t even spoken, the man said with a breathy laugh, “You don’t recognize me, do you?”

“Sorry,” the singer offered.

Alicia said firmly, “Ms. Towne’d like some privacy, you don’t mind.”

“Hey, Alicia,” the young man said to her.

The personal assistant blinked. Obviously she hadn’t recognized the man and would be wondering how he knew her name.

Then he ignored her too and laughed again, his voice high, eerie. “It’s me, Kayleigh! Edwin Sharp. Your shadow.”

Chapter 3

A LOUD BANG echoed in the restaurant as Kayleigh’s iced tea glass slipped from her grip and slammed into the floor.

The big glass landed at just the right angle to produce a sound so like a gunshot that Dance found her hand moving to the place where her Glock pistol-presently locked away in her bedside safe at home-normally rested.

Eyes wide, breath rasping in and out of her lungs, Kayleigh said, “You’re… you’re… Edwin.”

Her reaction was one approaching panic but, with a brow furrowed in sympathy, the man said, “Hey, there, Kayleigh, it’s okay. Don’t you worry.”

“But…” Her eyes were zipping to the door, on the other side of which was Darthur Morgan and, if Dance was right, his own pistol.

Dance tried to piece it together. Couldn’t be a former boyfriend; she’d have recognized him earlier. Must be an inappropriate fan. Kayleigh was just the sort of performer-beautiful, single, talented-to have stalker problems.

“No embarrassment you didn’t recognize me,” Edwin said, bizarrely reassuring her and oblivious to her distress. “Since I sent you that last picture of me I lost a bit of weight. Yep, seventy-three pounds.” He tapped his belly. “I didn’t write you about it. Wanted it to be a surprise. I read Country Week and EW, see the pictures of you with some of those boys. I know you like the slimmer builds. Didn’t think you’d appreciate a chubby. And got myself a twenty-five-dollar haircut. You know how men are always talking about changing but they never do. Like your song. I wasn’t going to give you a Mr. Tomorrow. I’m a Mr. Today.”

Kayleigh was speechless. Nearly hyperventilating.

From some angles Edwin would be good-looking-full head of black hair trimmed conservatively like a politician’s and sprayed firmly into place, keen, deep brown eyes, smooth complexion, if a bit pale. But that face was also very long, angular, with heavy, protruding eyebrows, like soot. He was trim, yes, but big-larger than she’d noticed at first, easily six-two or -three, and despite the weight loss he was probably two hundred pounds. His rangy arms were long, and his hands massive but curiously-and unsettlingly-pink.

Instantly Bobby Prescott was on his feet and stepping in front of the man. Bobby was large too but wide, not tall, and Edwin towered over him. “Hey,” Edwin said cheerfully, “Bobby. The roadie. Excuse me, chief of the road crew.”

And then his eyes returned to Kayleigh, staring at her adoringly. “I’d be honored if you’d have some iced tea with me. Just over there in the corner. I’ve got a few things to show you.”

“How did you-”

“Know you’d be here? Hell, everybody knows that this is your favorite place. Just look at the blogs. It’s where you wrote ‘Me, I’m Not a Cowgirl.’” He nodded at the jukebox, from which that very song was playing-now for the second time, Dance noted.

The suburbs and the cities, that’s what I’m about.

Me, I’m not a cowgirl, unless maybe you count:

Looking people in the eye and talking to them straight.

Not putting up with bigots or cheaters or with hate.

Remembering everything my mom and daddy said

About how to treat my family, my country and my friends.

Didn’t think I was a cowgirl, but I guess that all depends.

“Love that song,” he gushed. “Just love it. Well, you know that. I told you must be a hundred times.”

“I really…” Kayleigh was a deer in the middle of the road.

Bobby put his hand on Edwin’s shoulder. Not quite hostile, not quite friendly. Dance wondered if this would be the start of a fight and she reached for the only weapon she had-her mobile-to dial 911 if need be. But Edwin simply stepped back a few inches, ignoring Bobby. “Come on, let’s get that iced tea. I know you think theirs here is the best in town. I’ll treat. Mr. Today, remember? Hey, your hair’s really beautiful. Ten years, four months.”

Dance had no idea what that meant but the comment clearly upset Kayleigh even more. Her jaw trembled.

“Kayleigh’d like to be left alone,” Alicia said firmly. The woman seemed to be just as strong as Bobby Prescott and her glare was more fierce.

“You enjoying working for the band, Alicia?” he asked her as if making conversation at a cocktail party. “You’ve been with ’em about, what? Five, six months, right? You’re talented too. I’ve seen you on YouTube. You surely can sing. Wow.”

Alicia leaned forward ominously. “What the hell is this? How do you know me?”

“Listen, friend,” Bobby said. “Time for you to leave.”

Then Tye Slocum slowly pushed back in his chair and strode to the door. Edwin’s eyes followed and on his face was welded the same smile that had been there from the moment he’d stepped to the table. But something had changed; it was as if he actually expected Kayleigh to join him for tea and was perplexed she wasn’t. Tye’s mission to summon the security guard seemed to irritate him. “Kayleigh. Please. I didn’t want to bother you here but you never got back to me on email. I just want to visit for a bit. We’ve got a lot to talk about.”

“I really can’t.”

Bobby took Edwin’s arm once more before Dance could intervene. But again the man simply stood back. He didn’t seem to have any interest in a confrontation, much less a physical fight.

There was a blinding flash and the table was immersed in light as the door opened, then the illumination was blocked. Removing his aviator shades, Darthur Morgan moved in fast. He looked at Edwin’s face and Dance could see the muscles around his mouth tighten, a sign of displeasure at himself for missing the slimmed-down stalker.

“You’re Edwin Sharp?”

“That’s right, Mr. Morgan.”

It wasn’t hard to get information about people nowadays, especially those connected with a very public person like Kayleigh Towne. But learning the name of her security guard?

“I’m going to ask you to leave Ms. Towne alone now. She wants you to leave. You’re becoming a security threat.”

“Well, under Giles versus Lohan, I’m really not, Mr. Morgan. There’s not even an implied threat. Anyway, the last thing that I want is to hurt or threaten anybody. I’m just here offering my friend some sympathy over something that happened to her, something traumatic. And seeing if she’d like some tea. Happy to buy you some too.”

“I think that’s about it now,” Morgan said in a low, insistent baritone.

Edwin continued calmly, “You’re private, of course. You can make a citizen’s arrest but only if you see me committing a crime. And I haven’t done that. You were a police officer, that’d be different, but you’re-”

Well, it’s come to that, Dance thought. Guess I knew it would. And she rose, displaying her CBI identification card.

“Ah.” Edwin stared for what seemed to be an inordinately long time as if memorizing it. “Had a feeling you were law.”

“Could I see some ID?”

“You bet.” He handed over his driver’s license, issued by Washington state. Edwin Stanton Sharp. Address in Seattle. The picture was of somebody who was indeed much heavier and with long, stringy hair.

“Where are you staying in Fresno?” Dance asked.

“A house by Woodward Park. One of those new developments. It’s not bad.” A smile. “Sure gets hot in Fresno.”

“You moved here?” Alicia asked in a surprised whisper.

Kayleigh’s eyes widened at this and her shoulders rose.

“Nope, just renting. For the time being. I’m in town for the concert. It’s going to be the best of the year. I can’t wait.”

Why would he rent a house to attend a single concert?

“No, you wanted to stalk Kayleigh,” Bobby blurted. “The lawyers warned you about that.”

Lawyers? Dance wondered.

Edwin looked around the table. The smile dimmed. “I think all of you… how you’re acting is upsetting Kayleigh.” He said to her, “I’m sorry about that. I know what you’re up against. But don’t worry, it’ll all work out.” He walked to the door, paused and turned back. “And goodbye to you too, Agent Dance. God bless you for the sacrifices you make for the people of this state.”

Chapter 4

WHEN DANCE SAID, “Tell me,” they did. All of them.

At once.

And only after she reined in the intersecting narratives did she begin to grasp the whole picture. Last winter a fan had become convinced that Kayleigh’s automated form letters and emails, signed “XO, Kayleigh,” hugs and kisses, were to be taken personally. Because the songs had meant so much to him, perfectly expressing how he felt about life, he’d told himself that they were soul mates. He began a barrage of correspondence-email, Facebook and Twitter posts, handwritten letters-and he’d sent her presents.

Advised to ignore him, Kayleigh and her assistants stopped responding, except to send back any gifts, unopened, but Edwin Sharp nonetheless persisted, apparently believing that her father and handlers felt threatened by the connection between him and Kayleigh and wanted to keep them apart.

He was told to stop, dozens of times. The law firm representing Kayleigh and her father threatened him with civil action and referral to the police if he didn’t cease and desist.

But he hadn’t.

“It’s been so creepy,” Kayleigh now said, her voice breaking. She took a sip of tea from a new glass the bartender had brought her when he’d come to mop up the spill. “He’d want a strand of hair, a fingernail clipping, a piece of paper I’d kissed, with my lipstick on it. He’d take pictures of me in places where I’d never seen him. Backstage or in parking lots.”

Dance said, “That’s the thing about a crime like this. You never quite know where the stalker is. Maybe miles away. Maybe outside your window.”

Kayleigh continued, “And the mail! Hundreds of letters and email messages. I’d change my email address and a few hours later he’d have the new one.”

“Do you think he had anything to do with the light that fell?” Dance asked.

Kayleigh said she thought she’d seen some “weird” things that morning at the convention center, maybe shadows moving, maybe not. She hadn’t seen an actual person.

Alicia Sessions was more certain. “I saw something too, I’m sure.” She shrugged her broad shoulders, offering hints of tattoos largely hidden under the cloth. “Nothing specific, though. No face or body.”

The band wasn’t in town yet and the rest of the crew had been outside when they thought they’d seen the shadowy figure. Bobby hadn’t seen anything other than the strip light starting to fall.

Dance asked, “Do the local deputies know about him?”

The singer answered, “Oh, yeah, they do. They knew he was planning to come to the concert on Friday-even though the lawyers threatened to get a restraining order. They didn’t really think he’d done anything bad enough for us to get one, though. But the sheriff was going to keep an eye on him if he showed up. Make sure he knew they were watching him.”

“I’ll call the sheriff’s office,” Alicia said, “and tell them he’s here. And where he’s staying.” She gave a surprised laugh. “He sure didn’t hide it.”

Kayleigh looked around, troubled. “This used to be my favorite restaurant in town. Now, it’s all spoiled… I’m not hungry anymore. I’d like to leave. I’m sorry.”

She waved for and settled up the check.

“Hold on a second.” Bobby walked to the front door and opened it a crack. He spoke to Darthur Morgan. The roadie returned to the table. “He’s gone. Darthur saw him get in his car and drive off.”

“Let’s go out the back, just the same,” Alicia suggested. Tye asked Morgan to drive around to that lot and Dance accompanied the small entourage through a beer-pungent storeroom, past a grim toilet. They stepped into a parking lot of bleached weeds and dusty cars and crumbling asphalt.

Dance noticed Kayleigh glance to her right and gasp. She followed the singer’s gaze.

Twenty feet away a car was parked in the lot behind the restaurant. It was a huge old model, dull red. Sitting in the driver’s seat was Edwin Sharp. Through the open window, he called, “Hey, Kayleigh! Check out my wheels! It’s not a Cadillac, just a Buick. Like it?” He didn’t seem to expect an answer. He added, “Don’t worry, I’ll never put my car ahead of you!”

“My Red Cadillac” was one of Kayleigh’s smash hits. It was about a girl who loves her old car… and dumps any man who doesn’t care for the big, battered vehicle.

Bobby Prescott stormed forward and raged, “Get the fuck out of here, you son of a bitch! And don’t even think about following us to find out where Kayleigh lives. You try that and I’m calling the cops.”

Edwin nodded, smiling, and drove off.

With the sun’s glare and the unsure kinesics of someone she’d just met, Dance couldn’t be certain but her impression was that the stalker’s face had registered a hint of confusion when Bobby spoke-as if of course he knew where Kayleigh lived. Why wouldn’t he?

Chapter 5

NO SURPRISE, CALIFORNIA has always been home to Latino music, some Salvadoran, Honduran and Nicaraguan, but the bulk of the sounds are mexicana: traditional mariachi, banda, ranchera, norteño and sones. Plenty of pop and rock too and even South of the Border’s own brand of ska and hip-hop.

These sounds flowed from the many Spanish-language stations up and down the Central Valley into the homes, businesses and fields here, taking up half the airwaves-the rest of the bandwidth split between Anglo music and check-seeking religious stations spouting incoherent theology.

It was close to 9:00 P.M. and Dance was now getting a firsthand taste of this musical sound in the sweltering garage of Jose Villalobos, on the outskirts of Fresno. The family’s two Toyotas had been banished from the small, detached structure, which was usually a rehearsal hall. Tonight, though, it was a recording studio. The six musicians of Los Trabajadores were just finishing up the last number for Dance’s digital recorder. The men, ranging in age from twenty-five to sixty, had been playing together for some years, both traditional Mexican folk music and their own material.

The recording had gone well, though the men hadn’t been too focused at first-largely because of whom Dance had brought with her: Kayleigh Towne, hair looped in an elaborately braided bun atop her head, in faded jeans, T-shirt and denim vest.

The musicians had been awed and two had scurried into the house to return with wives and children for autographs. One of the women had tearfully said, “You know, your song ‘Leaving Home’-we all love it. God bless you for writing it.”

This was a ballad about an older woman who’s packing up her belongings and leaving the house where she and her husband raised their children. The listener wonders if she’s just become a widow or if the house has been foreclosed on by the bank.

Now I’m starting over, starting over once again,

To try to make a new life, without family or friends.

In all my years on earth, there’s one thing that I know:

Nothing can be harder than to leave behind your home.

Only at the end is it revealed that she’s undocumented and is being deported, though she’s spent her whole life in the United States. Just after the woman is dropped off alone at a bus station in Mexico, she sings the coda: “America The Beautiful” in Spanish. It was Kayleigh’s most controversial song, earning her the anger of those taking a hard line on immigration reform. But it was also hugely popular and had become an anthem among Latino workers and those preaching a more open border policy.

As they were packing up, Dance explained how the songs would be uploaded onto her and Martine’s website. She couldn’t guarantee what might happen but given that the band was so good they’d probably sell a fair number of downloads. And it was possible, with the growth of Latino radio throughout the United States and independent record labels specializing in that sound, that they might draw some producers’ or ad agencies’ attention.

Curiously, becoming successful didn’t interest them in the least. Oh, they wouldn’t mind making some money with their music but with the downloads only. Villalobos said, “Yeah, we don’t want that kind of life-on the road. We won’t travel. We have jobs, families, bebés. Jesus has twins-he got to go change diapers now.” A glance toward the grinning, handsome young man who was packing away his old battered Gibson Hummingbird guitar.

They said good-bye and Dance and Kayleigh climbed into her dark green Suburban. Dance had left her Pathfinder at the Mountain View and had ridden here with Kayleigh in her SUV. Darthur Morgan began the drive back to Dance’s motel. He’d stayed out in the SUV to keep an eye on the street. Six or seven small hardcover books, leather bound, were in the front seat. The titles were stamped in gold, on the spine only. Classics, Dance guessed. He didn’t seem to read them when he was on guard duty itself. Maybe they were his pleasure when he was in his room at night. A portal to take him away from the persistence of threat.

Kayleigh was looking out the window at the dimly lit or black landscape. “I envy them,” she said.

“How’s that?”

“It’s like a lot of the musicians on your website. They play at night and on weekends for their friends and families. It’s not for the money. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t so good. Ha, modesty alert… But you know what I mean. I never really wanted to be a star. I wanted to have a husband and”-she nodded back toward Villalobos’s-“babies and sing to them and friends… It just all got away from me.”

She was silent and Dance supposed she was thinking: If I wasn’t famous I wouldn’t have Edwin Sharp in my life.

Dance could see Kayleigh’s reflection and noted her jaw was set and there were possibly tears in her eyes. Then Kayleigh turned back, shoving her troubled thoughts away, it seemed, and said with a sly grin, “So. Tell me. Dish.”

“Men?”

“Like yeah!” Kayleigh said. “You mentioned Jon somebody?”

“The greatest guy in the world,” Dance said. “Brilliant. Used to be in Silicon Valley, now he teaches and does consulting. The most important thing is that Wes and Maggie like him.” She added that her son had had a very difficult time with his mother’s dating. He hadn’t liked anybody until Boling.

“Of course it didn’t help that one guy I introduced them to turned out to be a killer.”

“No!”

“Oh, we weren’t in any danger. He was after the same perp I was. It’s just that I wanted to put him in jail. My friend wanted to kill him.”

“I don’t know,” Kayleigh said ominously. “There’s something to be said for that.”

Thinking again, probably, of Edwin Sharp.

“But the kids love Jon. It’s working out well.”

“And?” the singer asked.

“And what?”

“You going to tell me or not?”

And here, I’m the kinesics pro. Dance debated but in the end demurred. “Oh, nothing… just who knows what’s going to happen? I’ve only been a widow a few years. I’m in no hurry.”

“Sure,” Kayleigh said, not exactly believing the lame explanation.

And Dance reflected: Yes, she liked Jon Boling a lot. Hey, she probably loved him and on more than one occasion, lying in bed together during one of the few nights they’d spent out of town, she’d come close to saying so. And she’d sensed that he had too.

He was kind, easygoing, good-looking, with a great sense of humor.

But then there was Michael.

Michael O’Neil was a detective with the Monterey County Office of the Sheriff. He and Dance had worked together for years and, if she was instinctively on anyone’s wavelength, it was O’Neil’s. They worked in timepiece harmony, they laughed, they loved the same foods and wines, they argued like the dickens and never took a word of it personally. Dance believed that he was as perfect for her as anyone could be.

Aside from that little glitch: a wife.

Who had finally left him and their children-naturally, just after Dance started going out with Jon Boling. O’Neil and his wife, Anne, were still married, though she was living in San Francisco now. O’Neil had mentioned divorce papers being prepared but timetables and plans seemed vague.

This would be a topic for another evening with Kayleigh Towne, though.

In ten minutes they’d arrived at the Mountain View, and Darthur Morgan steered the Suburban to the front of the motel. Dance said good night to them both.

It was then that Kayleigh’s phone buzzed and she looked down at the screen, frowning. She hit ANSWER. “Hello?… Hello?” She listened for a moment and then said firmly, “Who is this?”

Hand on the door lever, Dance paused and looked back at the singer.

Kayleigh disconnected, regarding the screen once more. “Weird.”

“What?”

“Somebody just played a verse from ‘Your Shadow.’”

The title track of her latest album and already a huge hit.

“They didn’t say anything, whoever it was. They just played the first verse.”

Dance had downloaded the track and she recalled the words.

You walk out onstage and sing folks your songs.

You make them all smile. What could go wrong?

But soon you discover the job takes its toll,

And everyone’s wanting a piece of your soul.

“The thing is… it was a recording from a concert.”

“You don’t do live albums,” Dance said, recalling that Kayleigh preferred the control of the studio.

She was still staring at the screen. “Right. It’d be a bootleg. But it was really high quality-almost like a real voice, not a recording… But who was playing it, why?”

“You recognize the phone number?”

“No. Not a local area code. You think it was Edwin?” she asked, her voice going tense with stress, looking up at Darthur Morgan, whose dark, still eyes were visible in the rearview mirror. “But, wait, only my friends and family have this number. How could he get it?” She grimaced. “Maybe the same way he got my email.”

“Could it be somebody in the band?” Dance asked. “A practical joke?”

“I don’t know. Nobody’s done anything like that before.”

“Give me the number. I’ll make some calls. And I’ll check out Edwin too. What’s his last name?”

“Sharp. No e. Would you, Kathryn?”

“You bet.”

Dance wrote down the number of the call and climbed out of the Suburban.

They said good night.

“I guess we better get home now, Darthur.”

As the vehicle pulled away, Kayleigh was looking around the empty parking lot as if Edwin Sharp were lurking nearby.

Dance headed inside, aware that she was humming one line to “Your Shadow” as it looped through her thoughts, unstoppable.

What could go wrong… what could go wrong… what could go wrong?

Chapter 6

DANCE STOPPED AT the Mountain View bar and got a glass of Pinot Noir then walked to her room and stepped inside. She’d hung the DO NOT DISTURB sign on the knob earlier and she left it there now, looking forward to that mother’s rarity-sleeping late.

She showered, pulled on a robe and, sipping the wine, plopped down on the bed. She hit speed dial button three.

“Hey, Boss,” TJ Scanlon said cheerfully, answering on a half ring. Odd noises emanated from the background. Ringing, shouts, calliope music, though Dance realized that she didn’t know exactly what a calliope was.

“Are you in an arcade or something?”

“Carnival. Date. We’re in line for the roller coaster but I’ll go around again for you.” His voice faded as he spoke away from the phone. “It’s my boss… Right. You better finish that Slurpee before we get on… No, I’m telling you. Really. Does the word ‘inverted’ mean anything?”

TJ was the most alternative of the agents in the Monterey office of the CBI, who were in general a conservative lot. He was the go-to man when it came to long, demanding assignments, undercover work and any trivia regarding the sixties, Bob Dylan, tie-dye and lava lamps.

Quirky, yes. But who was Dance to judge? Here she was taking a week off in Fresno and sitting in a stiflingly hot garage to record obscure songs by a group of cheerful and likely undocumented farmworkers.

“Need you to check out something, TJ.”

She gave him what she knew on Edwin Sharp. She then recited the number of the caller who’d played the song for Kayleigh not long ago.

TJ asked, “Anything in particular? On Sharp?”

“The usual. But civil too. Stalking, lawsuits, restraining orders. Here and Washington state. Throw in Oregon for good measure.”

“Will do. Pine trees, pinot noir, cheese. No, that’s Wisconsin.”

“Have fun.”

“We are. I won Sadie a panda… No, I’m serious. Lose the Slurpee. Centrifugal force will not do it… So long, Boss.”

Dance disconnected. She tried Jon Boling but his phone went to voicemail. Another sip of wine and then she decided it was time for bed. She rose and walked to the window, drawing the drapes shut. Then brushed her teeth, ditched the robe and pulled on boxers and a faded pink T-shirt, way too big; Kathryn Dance was a nightgown girl only on special occasions.

She rolled toward the light, groping for the switch.

And froze.

The window!

Before leaving for Villalobos’s Dance had closed the gauze curtain and the heavy drapes; the first-floor room overlooked the parking lot, a four-lane street and, across it, a small park.

The same drapes she’d just closed once again.

Only she’d never opened them earlier. Someone else had been inside her room and pulled them apart.

Who had breached the DO NOT DISTURB barrier?

It hadn’t been Housekeeping-the room wasn’t straightened up, the bed still mussed from where she’d plopped down to call the children that afternoon.

Nothing seemed to have been disturbed. Her dark green suitcases were where she’d left them. The clothes still in the closet as before, carelessly dangling on theft-proof hangers, and the five pairs of shoes were exactly where she’d set them in a row near the dresser. Her computer bag didn’t seem tampered with and the computer itself was password protected anyway, so no one could have read her files or emails.

Shutting the light off, she walked to the window and looked out. It was eleven-thirty and the park across the road was empty… wait, no. Someone was in the shadows. She couldn’t make out a specific person but she saw the tiny orange glow of a cigarette moving slowly as the smoker would lift it for a drag.

She remembered Edwin Sharp’s slow, patient scan of her face and body in the restaurant that day. How he’d carefully read all the information on her ID card. Stalkers, she knew, were experts at getting information on people-both the objects of their obsession and those who threatened to impede their access. Edwin certainly had shown he was good at such research, knowing what he did about Kayleigh’s associates.

But maybe it was a coincidence. There might have been some electrical or plumbing issue and workers had had to come into the room, despite the sign on the door. She called the front desk but the clerk didn’t know if anyone had been inside.

She made sure all the windows were locked and the chain securely fixed to the door and she conducted one more examination of the park, through a crack in the drapes. The moon had emerged but it was still too dark and hazy to see much.

The orange glow of the cigarette flared as the smoker inhaled deeply. Then the dot dropped to the ground and vanished under a shoe or boot.

She saw no other motion. Had he left because she’d shut the light out and presumably gone to sleep?

Dance waited a moment more then climbed into bed. She closed her eyes.

And wondered why she bothered. Sleep, she knew, would be a long, long time coming.

Chapter 7

REELING THROUGH HIS mind was Jackson Browne’s “The Load-Out” from the seventies album Running on Empty, the tune an homage to roadies.

A sort-of homage. You got the impression the singer came first.

But don’t they always?

Still, nobody else ever wrote a song dedicated to Bobby Prescott’s profession and he hummed it often.

Now, close to midnight, he parked near the convention center and climbed out of the band’s Quest van, stretching after the marathon drive to and from Bakersfield to pick up the custom-built amp. Kayleigh Towne preferred that her musicians use amps with tubes-like old-time TVs and radios. There’d been a huge debate about which was a better sound: solid-state amps versus the tube models, with the tube purists contending that that older technology produced an indescribable “clipping sound” when played in overdrive, which digital amps had never been able to duplicate. Not surprisingly this had been Bishop Towne’s philosophy and when the Old Man, as his own roadies called him, was performing, the stage was filled with Marshall JCM2000 TSL602s, Fender Deluxe Reverb IIs, Traynor Custom Valve YCV20WRs and Vox AC30s.

Bobby was a guitarist as well (there weren’t many roadies, techs or personal assistants in the music world who couldn’t sit in at a show if they absolutely had to). He himself thought the richness of tubes was noticeable but only when playing blues.

He now unlocked the stage door at the convention center and wheeled the big unit inside. He also had a box of light mounts and safety cables.

Thinking again of the strip light falling that morning.

Jesus…

Performing could be a dangerous business. His father had been a recording engineer in London in the sixties and seventies. Back then, the serious-minded professionals Robert Senior worked with-the Beatles and Stones, for instance-were outnumbered by crazy, self-destructive musicians who managed to kill themselves pretty frequently with drugs, liquor, cars and aggressively poor judgment. But even taking bad behavior out of the picture, performing could be dangerous. Electricity was the biggest risk-he’d known of three performers electrocuted onstage and two singers and a guitarist hit by lightning. One roadie had fallen from a high stage and broken his neck. A half dozen had died in traffic accidents, often because they fell asleep, and several had been crushed to death when gear trucks’ brakes failed and the vehicles jumped the chocks.

But a light coming unfixed? That was weird and had never happened in his years as a roadie.

And endangering Kayleigh?

He actually shivered, thinking about that.

Tonight the cavernous hall was filled with shadows cast by the exit lights. But rather than the ill ease Kayleigh had described that morning, Bobby felt a low twist of pleasure being here. He and Kayleigh had always been in near-total harmony, except for one thing. To her music was a business, a task, a profession. And concert halls were about acoustics only. For Bobby, the romantic, these places were special, almost sacred. He believed that halls like this continued to echo with the sounds of all the musicians who’d performed there. And this ugly, concrete venue in Fresno had one hell of a history. A local boy himself, Bobby had seen Dylan here and Paul Simon and U2 and Vince Gill and Union Station and Arlo Guthrie and Richard Thompson and Rosanne Cash and Sting and Garth Brooks and James Taylor and Shania and, well, the list was endless… And their voices and the ringing sound of their guitars and horn sections and reeds and drums changed the very fiber of the place, he believed.

As he approached the strip light that had fallen he noticed that someone had moved it. He had left instructions that the heavy black light fixture shouldn’t be touched, after he’d lowered it to the stage. But now it sat on the very edge, above the orchestra pit, a good thirty feet from where it had stopped swinging after it fell.

He’d ream somebody for that. He’d wanted to see exactly what had happened. Crouching down, Bobby examined the unit. What the hell had gone wrong?

Could it be that asshole, Edwin Sharp?

Maybe-

Bobby Prescott never heard the footsteps of whoever came up behind him. He simply felt the hands slam into his back and he went forward, barking a brief scream as the concrete floor of the orchestra pit, twenty feet below, raced up to break his jaw and arm.

Oh, Jesus, Jesus…

He lay on his belly, staring at the bone, starkly white and flecked with blood, that poked through his forearm skin.

Bobby moaned and screamed and cried out for help.

Who? Who did it?

Edwin?… He might’ve heard me tell Kayleigh in the café that I was going to be here late.

“Help me!”

Silence.

Bobby tried to reach into his pocket for his mobile. The pain was too great. He nearly fainted. Well, try again! You’re going to bleed to death!

Then, over his gasping breath, he heard a faint sound above him, a scraping. He twisted his head and looked up.

No… God no!

He watched the strip light, directly above him, easing toward the edge of the stage.

“No! Who is that? No!”

Bobby struggled to crawl away, clawing at the concrete floor with the fingers of his unbroken arm. But his legs weren’t working either.

One inch, two…

Move, roll aside!

But too late.

The light slammed into his back, going a hundred miles an hour. He felt another snap high in his body and all the pain went away.

My back… my back…

His vision crinkled.

Bobby Prescott came to sometime later-seconds, minutes, hours… he didn’t know. All he knew was that the room was bathed in astonishing light; the spotlight sitting on his back had been turned on.

All thousand watts, pouring from the massive lamps.

He then saw on the wall the flicker of shadows, cast by flames. At first he didn’t know what was on fire-he felt no heat whatsoever. But then the repulsive scent of burning hair, burning flesh filled the small space.

And he understood.