“You’re safe here, Dennis,” she said softly. “I want you to know that. You can come to me and tell me anything you need to, anything at all. I won’t get mad at you. I won’t punish you. I’ll just listen, and then we’ll figure out what to do about it.”

His sobs quieted slowly to hiccups and sniffles. He wiped his nose on the sleeve of his already dirty sweatshirt. He was embarrassed now. At eleven—a year older than the rest of her charges—he was already edging into that awkward space between childhood and adolescence, further complicating his emotions.

“It’s okay,” Anne said. “This is between you and me. Nobody else. If anybody asks what went on in here while the rest of the class was out, tell them I yelled at you and gave you extra homework. Does that sound like a plan?”

He didn’t look at her, but he nodded. Anne stood up and put her chair back at Cody’s desk. “Good. Now go to the lavatory and wash your face, then go to lunch.”

All the aggression had gone out of him. He put his notebook back in his desk and walked away.

She would leave it at that, Anne decided as she watched him go out the door. She wouldn’t force the issue. He could think about it, hopefully decide to trust her, and come spill his story when he was ready.

Either that was a great plan, or she was a coward. She didn’t know which. If she never pressed him, if he never told her, what happened the next time his father punished him for something?

She wished Mendez would return her calls. He could deal with Frank Farman, and it would be out of her hands.

Almost as an afterthought she turned and looked at Dennis’s desk. Guilt scratched at her nerves, but she lifted the desktop anyway, and glanced down at Dennis’s notebook, still opened to the last page he had scribbled on.

The paper was tear-stained and some of the ink had smeared on drawings of what looked like thick, angry lightning bolts. Then she turned the page back to the one he had been working on all morning, and her blood ran cold.

He had almost filled the page with childish drawings of naked women with knives in their chests.

Chapter 26

26

“Tell me about Deputy Farman,” Vince said before Mendez could ask him about his health.

They walked across the lot to a car parked under the shade of an oak tree. Vince got in and rolled the window down so he could continue to take in the fresh air and the smells of California nature.

“He’s an old-school tight ass,” Mendez said.