And no matter how desperately he wished things were different, she had gone through repeated trauma.

Having almost lost her, he now knew what he wanted, but he needed to be clear headed and practical about the whole thing. Urging her into a relationship at this point was unfair and she might push him away. He couldn’t risk that. Not with a killer on the prowl. The most important thing right now was making sure she was safe. She’d already suffered enough.

He snapped out of his thoughts, the same sort of concerns that had been circling in his brain and making him a morose son of a bitch for months now. Instead, he pulled a suitcase from her wardrobe and started filling it with clothing, footwear, toiletries, and anything that looked like it was something important. He picked up a planner he was surprised the cops hadn’t confiscated.

A photograph fell out. It was a picture of him. A screenshot of him laughing during one of their many calls.

The fact she’d kept this even though he’d repeatedly told her they could only ever be friends tore him up. He hadn’t meant to hurt her, but he knew he had.

He swore to himself. He was wasting time again.

He grabbed an ereader. An iPad. Camera. Chargers. A few textbooks and papers on her desk. He found her passport in a drawer, her birth certificate, other official documents. Along with the photo of Quentin and Haley, he grabbed a framed picture of her and her dad smiling at her graduation and slid them all into another bag.

Eban checked the small bathroom for meds and more basics and tossed everything into a washbag.

A noise in another room had him freezing.

“Armed FBI agent through here in the bedroom,” he shouted. Getting shot by a cop taken by surprise was not on his to-do list. He headed toward the living room but heard the front door slam.

He put his hand on his Glock as he checked the peephole and then opened the door and looked quickly in both directions.

“Hey, you there. FBI. Stop!”

A young woman froze in the act of running away. Eban strode down the corridor toward her and she spun around, clutching her arms in a cross against her chest. She was dressed for the outdoors. Snow boots. Down jacket. Woolen hat. Mitts tucked under her arm.

“Name?”

“Lenny.” She swallowed. “Leonora Serkoak.”

“You have any ID, Lenny?” He didn’t recall Darby ever mentioning a Lenny.

“Sure. Sure.” She reached into her pocket and he watched her carefully, hoping she wasn’t about to pull a knife or gun on him.

“What are you doing here?”

She pulled out her wallet and flashed her driver’s license. “I came to grab one of Darby’s books.” Her mouth opened and closed as if to say more but she refrained.

“You have Darby’s permission to take her books?”

“Er, no, not exactly, but I know she wouldn’t mind. We lend each other things all the time and it’s not like…” She swallowed noisily again.