His legs are outside my legs, pinning them together. His left hand holds both of my wrists as he props himself up and looks at the phone. I try to lift my head, teeth ready to clamp down on his flesh, but he is just out of reach. And he knows this. I can see on his face the satisfaction that he has secured his prey.

He uses his thumb to stop the call before it can be answered.

He slides the phone out of reach, across the kitchen floor. He leans his head in close to mine, his mouth brushes my ear.

“Are you wondering if that was your daughter? The one you didn’t kill?”

I freeze now. Terror. They know everything.

Not another word is spoken as he slides me across the floor, pieces of the plates digging into my skin.

He drags me by my arms, even as my legs kick and my body writhes to break free, twisting and turning in futility.

He drags me down the hall, past the guest room. Past Alice’s room and his room to the very end.

A door opens to the room that is cold and dark and has a hard tile floor.

The fear descends as he drags me inside and closes the door. I hear a deadbolt click into position on the other side.

It is then I know.

I am never leaving this house.

Chapter Twelve

Day fourteen

Daisy Hollander.

Another woman who’d disappeared. Another woman who’d written notes to loved ones, telling them she’d walked away from her life. Nic thought about Daisy Hollander as she cradled a cup of coffee in her hands, looking out at the bar across the street.

Kurt had told her what he knew about the missing girl and her family. Eight children. Poverty. Dismal enough to draw out social services, and that was saying a lot for this part of the state, he’d said. Parents were long gone. He didn’t know where. All of the children had left as well. Except for one. A sister named Vivian.

She lived in the family’s old house in the deep part of the woods near the river, on land that was owned by the state. No one had tried to chase them off. He’d said he wondered if anyone from the state actually realized it. Nothing that happened in Hastings made much of a difference one way or another.

You’ll never find it, he’d told her.

Kurt had promised to take her when his shift ended.

Was that strange, she wondered now? That he didn’t just give her directions? That he’d brought it up at all? No one else had mentioned Daisy Hollander. Not even Chief Watkins.