The officer turns. I am ready to do it, ready to look away and press my lips to the wood. But then I see the face of the woman. I think my eyes have gone crazy. But I stare long enough to know that what I am seeing is real.

I do not look away. I do not scream for help.

Because the woman in the car is my daughter.

And the man in the uniform, is Mick.

Chapter Thirty-four

Day seventeen

Nic stared at the house. There was no movement now. No sound. Apple trees lined the driveway, then woods. More woods, as far as the eye could see. Probably all the way to the edge of the fence.

She thought then that if no one was inside the house, they would track down the owners, those investors from New York. Maybe they had someone check on the place the night of the storm. They owned a black truck. Or a gray one. But a truck, like the one Edith Moore had seen her mother get into.

How this fit with Chief Watkins and his truck, his broken taillight, was still a question. But she would follow every lead until it brought her to her mother.

She looked back to the house and noticed a window to a room in the back. It was boarded up—from the storm, she imagined—only it was fortified with steel bars.

She stared at the one boarded window. It was odd. Out of place.

And for a second, she wondered what was behind it.

Chapter Thirty-five

Day seventeen

Terror is now mine to hold as I hear the doorbell and the knocking and the waiting. Then more ringing and knocking until finally the door opens and closes. I look out the hole and pray Nicole is still in that car. That she is still unaware.

Footsteps bound the hallway. Smaller ones scurry behind them.

Then the lock turns. The grate opens.

Mick walks in, wearing a police uniform. He is calm and steady.

He wears a face that is smug and laden with the power he has just acquired over me. Just like the moment when I heard his cell phone ring on the kitchen counter. The moment I knew I was his prisoner.

I have a flash of memory, provoked now, by the uniform. A traffic stop somewhere along Route 7. I don’t remember the name of the town. I only remember now how John hired a lawyer to make it go away because he was worried about our insurance. And how it was never submitted by the officer. It was as though it had never happened. I thought I’d gotten lucky.

I had been traveling twenty miles over the speed limit. I had been trying to get away from these dying towns, trying to get home. I hadn’t noticed how fast I’d been going.

I study his face and know it is the same man.