Her impatience raced through her body and made her insides tingle.

Where was he? she wondered with a lover’s longing intensity. What was he doing right now? Had he sailed out to Catalina? It was 2 A.M. there now. Was he sound asleep, the Valkyrie bobbing gently at anchor in the secure anchorage at Cherry Cove?

She saw his sleeping face in her mind and felt tears well up from the tender breakings in her chest. He looked like such a little boy when he slept. Respected professor, tough cop—they were all vanquished by the relaxed face of a man who she knew was still a boy at heart. She remembered how he would smile in his sleep, have little puppy twitches like a dog chasing a rabbit in its dreams, and the way the tough, lean former cop with the hard muscles and long leathery scars he didn’t like to talk about would cuddle next to her and fall asleep.

Where are you, Seth?

Her longing was complete, completely coloring her thoughts and emotions. Where was he? The only thing in the world she wanted more than knowing where he was, was to be there with him.

TWENTY-TWO

The light along the far shore of the Zurichsee painted long white and yellow shimmers on the glassy surface of the water. The wind had died at sunset Outside the air was crystalline clear.

“Damn you, God,” Seth Ridgeway raged as he gazed at a scene that looked so much like the same view that he and Zoe had enjoyed so intensely the last time he had seen her alive.

Damn you! Damn me for being such a sucker to believe in you.

He turned from the window and walked toward the door of his room at the Eden au Lac. He stopped by the door and pulled the Magnum from his parka pocket. He checked to be sure that every chamber in the revolver’s cylinder had a fresh .357 in it, set the safety on, and stuck the weapon back in the pocket. Then he patted the other pocket to make sure the handful of ammunition was still there. He hesitated, going over Jacob Yost’s instructions in his mind. Any deviation and he might be killed.

Once he was sure of his orders, Seth opened the door to his room, stepped across the threshold, and pulled the door shut behind him. He walked to the elevator and pressed the down button.

Zoe walked across her room dressed in a bulky sweater pulled over new Levi’s. Stratton walked out of the room first, his eyes scouring the corridor for signs of danger. Zoe followed him. Behind her, Cartiere closed the door to the suite; using his saliva, he carefully placed one of his own hairs across the space between the jamb and the door. They’d know whether or not someone had entered.

The trio walked to the elevator and pushed the button. They stood silently and looked at the floor indicator as the car went past them and stopped one floor above.