“Andy, it’s Sookie,” I said, taking care to keep my voice quiet. “Listen, there are two guys in Arlene’s trailer with her, and there’re some long pieces of wood in the back of their pickup. They don’t realize I know they’re in the trailer with Arlene. They’re planning on doing the same thing to me that was done to Crystal.”

“You got anything I could take to court?” he asked cautiously. Andy had always been a closet believer in my telepathy, though that didn’t mean he was necessarily a fan of mine.

“No,” I said, “they’re waiting for me to show up.” I crept closer, hoping like hell they weren’t looking out the back windows. There was a box of extra-long nails in the pickup bed, too. I had to close my eyes for second as the horror crawled all over me.

“I’ve got Weiss and Lattesta with me,” Andy said. “Would you be willing to go in if we were there to back you up?”

“Sure,” I said, feeling anything but. I simply knew I was going to have to do this. It could be the end of any lingering suspicion of Jason. It could mean recompense or at least retribution for the death of Crystal and the baby. It could put at least a few of the Fellowship fanatics behind bars and maybe serve as a good lesson to the rest. “Where are you?” I asked, shaking with fear.

“We were already in the car to go to the motel. We can be there in seven minutes,” Andy said.

“I parked behind the Freer house,” I said. “I gotta go. Someone’s coming out the back of the trailer.”

Whit Spradlin and his buddy, whose name I couldn’t recall, came down the steps and unloaded the wood beams from the pickup. The pieces were already formed into the correct lengths. Whit turned to the trailer and called something, and Arlene opened the door and came down the back steps, her purse over one shoulder. She walked toward the cab of the pickup.

Dammit, she was going to get in and drive away, leaving her car parked in front as though she were there! Any lingering tenderness I’d harbored in my heart burned away at that moment. I looked at my watch. Maybe three more minutes until Andy arrived.

She kissed Whit and waved at the other man, and they went into the trailer to hide so I wouldn’t see them. According to their plan, I’d come to the front, knock on the door, and one of them would fling it open and drag me in.

Game over.

Arlene opened the truck door, the keys in her hand.

She had to stay. She was the weak link. I knew this in every way I could know it—intellectually, emotionally, and with my other sense.

This was going to be awful. I braced myself.