Richie closed the door behind us, and her eyes opened.

She stared, dazed and dull-eyed, trying to figure out whether we were real. She was fathoms deep in the painkillers. “Mrs. Spain,” I said, gently, but she still flinched, hands jerking up to defend herself. “I’m Detective Michael Kennedy, and this is Detective Richard Curran. Would you be able to talk to us for a few minutes?”

Slowly Jenny’s eyes focused on mine. She whispered—it came out thick and clotted, through the damage and the bandage—“Something happened.”

“Yes. I’m afraid so.” I turned a chair to the side of the bed and sat down. Across from me, Richie did the same.

“What happened?”

I said, “You were attacked, in your home, two nights ago. You were seriously wounded, but the doctors have been taking good care of you, and they say you’re going to be fine. Can you remember anything about the attack?”

“Attack.” She was struggling to swim to the surface, through the vast weight of drugs bearing down on her mind. “No. How … what …” Then her eyes came alive, flaring incandescent blue with pure terror. “The babies. Pat.”

Every muscle in my body wanted to fling me out the door. I said, “I’m so sorry.”

“No. Are they—where—”

She was fighting to sit up. She was much too weak to do it, but not too weak to rip stitches trying. “I’m so sorry,” I said again. I cupped a hand around her shoulder and pressed down, as gently as I could. “There was nothing we could do.”

The moment after those words has a million shapes. I’ve seen people howl till their voices were scraped away, or freeze like they were hoping it would pass them over, prowl on to rip out someone else’s rib cage, if they just stayed still enough. I’ve held them back from smashing their faces off walls, trying to knock out the pain. Jenny Spain was beyond any of that. She had done all her defending two nights before; she had none left for this. She dropped back on the worn pillowcase and cried, steadily and silently, on and on.

Her face was red and contorted, but she didn’t move to cover it. Richie leaned over and put a hand on hers, the one without the IV line, and she gripped it till her knuckles whitened. Behind her a machine beeped, faintly and steadily. I focused on counting the beeps and wished to God I had brought water, gum, mints, anything that would let me swallow.

After a long time, the crying wore itself away and Jenny lay still, cloudy red eyes staring at the flaking paint on the wall. I said, “Mrs. Spain, we’re going to do everything we can.”

She didn’t look at me. That thick, ragged whisper: “Are you sure? Did you … see them yourself?”

“I’m afraid we’re sure.”

Richie said gently, “Your babies didn’t suffer, Mrs. Spain. They never knew what was happening.”

Her mouth started to convulse. I said quickly, before she could get lost in it again, “Mrs. Spain, can you tell us what you remember about that night?”