The price of divorce, she told herself callously as she shoved the laptop onto the rumpled bedclothes. In her mismatched pajamas, she walked into the kitchen of the small carriage house and dipped her head under the faucet for a drink, then stared through the rains-pattered window at the uneasy New Orleans night.

The air was thick with the coming of summer, sweat dampening her skin. She cranked open the window, allowing the dank smell of the slow-moving river to roll inside. Far away, the hum of traffic could be heard on the freeway, a steady rush that competed with the song of crickets and the low rumble of toads.

Pealing forlornly, the bells of St. Marguerite’s struck off the hours of midnight.

Inexplicably, Val’s skin crawled. Her cop instincts went into overdrive, and she felt, again, as if she were being watched, that hidden eyes were assessing her.

“Too many nights with the sci-fi channel,” she told herself. “Too many nightmares.”

For a fleeting second, a splintered memory with sharp, brittle edges pierced her brain. Looming. Indistinct. But evil.

Her blood chilled with the image. Draped in black, with cruel eyes and a foul odor, the sinister creature grew larger. Threatening. A chain dangling from its clawlike hand.

No one could help her.

No one could save her.

“Husssshhh,” the creature hissed, lowering the silvery noose. “Hush.”

Camille! Val thought in horror. This demon wants Camille. . . .

In a blink, the horrifying image disappeared, shrinking into the corners of her mind. From experience, Val knew it would lurk there until, unbidden, it would rise again.

“Leave me alone,” she muttered under her breath, ignoring the hairs that had risen on the back of her arm. The fiend was a figment of her imagination, nothing more—nothing a sane, stable woman would believe.

Val took a steadying breath as the church bells of St. Marguerite’s continued to toll plaintively through the night. Her insides still cold, she gripped the edge of the counter to steady herself and force the ugly apparition back where it belonged—into the darkest nether regions of her mind, into the crevices where sanity didn’t dare tread.

Don’t go there, she warned herself silently. Do not go there. Dwelling on the insidious pictures in her mind would only create a self-fulfilling and hideous prophecy.

“Everything’s fine,” she said out loud, though her insides were trembling. Quivering with a fear that she tried to keep hidden. No one could know. She was a strong woman. Nightmares or visions conjured by her willing brain weren’t allowed to scare her. “For God’s sake, get a grip!”