He was bullied mercilessly at school, but still preferred it to being at home, where Mom—crippled by an anxiety disorder and left to raise two kids alone—cut Bram’s hair with a paring knife and forbade him from brushing his teeth. Once, he got up the courage to go looking for his estranged father at the manufacturing company where he worked, only to be told his dad had quit and left town. Bram dragged his cousin along on that adventure, and when he got home again his mother hit him with a jug of expired milk. For eight days I was Bram’s captive and his confidante. I hoarded those glimpses into his past and prayed I’d live long enough to use them against him.

“I read about that case,” Tim said, his voice flat as farmland. “It made the news here. Everywhere, I guess.”

“The NYPD petitioned to keep me anonymous. The articles never used my name.”

“Did he . . . hurt you?”

I shook my head. “Not like you think.”

His eyes traveled to my scar.

“No,” I said. “That was something else. A long time ago.”

I saw the bewilderment in Tim’s face and knew what he was thinking. Eight days was a long time. Bram killed those other girls within hours of taking them. Why didn’t he do the same to me? Mercifully he didn’t ask. Instead, he said, “I remember a cop found you. That’s how you got out?”

I nodded. “A rookie who shouldn’t have been there. One day a tenant wandered downstairs looking for Bram to help her unclog a sink—Bram worked in the building, that’s how he had access to the cellar. She heard him talking to me, and between his new hair color and his evasiveness, she got suspicious and grabbed the first cop she could find on the street. Jay Lopez was his name. His partner was getting them coffees. Lopez went into the basement alone.

“I’m sure he didn’t expect to find anything down there. Must have been the shock of his life to round the corner and see Bram closing the door on a stunned, unwashed woman crouching on the floor. Lopez tried to draw his weapon, but Bram was faster. He took the guy down. There was a struggle. Then I heard the shots.”

Tim swallowed, and I went on. “Lopez took two bullets to the stomach at close range from his own Glock 17. He had a wife and three kids at home, was up for a promotion. He shouldn’t have been down there, but he was. Because of me.”

Tim’s anger surprised me. “You didn’t ask to be taken. Nothing about this is your fault.”

“There’s a lot of stuff those news stories left out, Tim. Like that after Bram shot Lopez and made sure he was dead, right before he realized he was screwed and had no choice but to leave me, he came back into my cell. Like the fact that I held his bloody hands in mine.”