She had already encountered Farman at a parent-teacher conference. He was the kind of man who only heard the sound of his own voice and would likely have gone to his grave swearing the sun rose in the west rather than agree with a woman.

Just like her father.

For the moment she couldn’t examine the deeper cause of the trembling: seeing a murder victim—a woman killed and discarded like a broken doll—and knowing her students had seen it too.

She led Wendy and Tommy out of the park and back to the school, where she sat them down in the office and used a phone to call their parents.

Anne told Wendy’s mother as little as possible, just that there had been an incident in the park and that she was bringing Wendy home.

The Cranes’ phone was answered by a machine. She left the same message with as little detail as possible.

The children were quiet as Anne drove. She didn’t know what to say to them. That everything would be all right? Their lives had just been changed. That was the truth. They would be seeing a dead woman’s face in their dreams for years to come.

Anne scrambled through her memory for some kind of guidance. Her studies in child psychology seemed gone from her head now. She had never finished her graduate work, had never worked in a clinical setting. She had no frame of reference for this situation. Five years of teaching fifth grade hadn’t prepared her for this.

Maybe she should have been asking them questions, drawing them out, encouraging them to release their emotions. Maybe she was too busy holding on to her own.

Sara Morgan was waiting on the front step when Anne pulled into the driveway. Wendy’s mother was a tall and athletic adult version of her daughter, with cornflower blue eyes and a thick mane of wavy blonde hair. She was in a blue T-shirt and faded denim overalls with the legs rolled up to reveal white socks with lace cuffs. There were tears in her eyes and uncertainty in her expression.

“Oh my God,” she said as Anne and Wendy got out of the car. “My neighbor told me there was a murder in the park. He’s eighty-five and he’s in a wheelchair, and he listens to a police scanner,” she rambled. “Was Wendy there? Did she see what happened? Wendy!”

Wendy trotted into her mother’s arms as Sara Morgan dropped down on one knee.

“Are you all right, baby?” She scanned her daughter for any sign of damage.

“We were running, and then we fell down a hill, and then—and then—” Wendy gulped for air. “Tommy fell right on her! He fell right on a dead lady! It was so gross!”

“Oh my God!”

“And Dennis kept trying to touch her. He’s so sick!”