Chapters (78)
- Cover Page
- TITLE PAGE
- DEDICATION
- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
- Mary
- CHAPTER ONE
- CHAPTER TWO
- CHAPTER THREE
- CHAPTER FOUR
- CHAPTER FIVE
- Joyce
- CHAPTER SIX
- CHAPTER SEVEN
- CHAPTER EIGHT
- CHAPTER NINE
- CHAPTER TEN
- CHAPTER ELEVEN
- CHAPTER TWELVE
- CHAPTER THIRTEEN
- Russ
- CHAPTER FOURTEEN
- CHAPTER FIFTEEN
- CHAPTER SIXTEEN
- CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
- Jaxson
- CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
- CHAPTER NINETEEN
- CHAPTER TWENTY
- HSK
- CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
- CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
- CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
- CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
- CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
- CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
- HSK
- CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
- CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
- CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
- CHAPTER THIRTY
- Lyndsay
- CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
- CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
- CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
- Grace
- CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
- CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
- HSK
- CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
- CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
- CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
- CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
- Wilkes
- CHAPTER FORTY
- CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
- CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
- CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
- CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
- CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
- CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
- CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
- CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
- Dubois
- CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
- CHAPTER FIFTY
- Dubois
- Wilkes
- CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
- CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
- ABOUT THE AUTHOR
- ALSO BY DEAN KOONTZ
- PREVIEWS
- DIME STORE MAGIC
- INDUSTRIAL MAGIC
- HAUNTED
- BROKEN
- NO HUMANS INVOLVED
- COPYRIGHT
“I’m not sure. Something…Irish? Maybe English. Probably an older brand, been around awhile. I know what the logo looks like…”
“Then we’ll find it.”
When I climbed into the car, Jack was already back. I put down the bag with the papers and took out a smaller one, then did up my seat belt.
“Candy?” Jack asked with a small smile.
“Uh-uh.” I pulled off the bag with a flourish.
His brows arched. “How’d you figure out—”
“Keen detective work. You seemed a little stressed after that flight, so I figured it might not be unwelcome. We’re not really ‘on the job’ right now so…”
“Appreciate it. Better not smoke in here, though. Bring the papers.”
We found a picnic table behind the strip mall. Jack shook out a cigarette and had it lit before we were seated, and went through another before we finished our reading.
The killer’s last known victim had been killed at noon the day before. William (Billy) Curtis, a twenty-eight-year-old Nebraska construction worker, pushed off the high-rise he’d been working on. At first, police thought it had been an accident…until the coroner found the lone dollar bill in his pocket. While the papers spent little time dwelling on the victim, they were speculating over one thing: had the Feds been tipped off about the killing?
I slapped down the paper. “Just because he forewarned the Feds of the opera house plan doesn’t mean he’s going to keep doing that. He can’t. It’d be stupid.”
Jack took out his third cigarette and lit it.
“My guess is that the opera house was tougher than he expected, and that’s the last time he’s going to pull something like that.”
Jack nodded, head tilted, holding the lit cigarette a hairsbreadth from his lips.
“And the problem with that theory is…?” I said.
He took his time tapping off the ash on the picnic table before responding. “Wasn’t a warning for Nebraska. Couldn’t have been. An occupied building? Sure. Just a construction crew. Nah. They’d have caught him.”
“Which proves my point. There was no warning.”
Jack stared out across the trash-strewn strip of grass, smoked half the cigarette, then stood.
“Gotta call Quinn.”
When Jack returned, he sat down across the table, hand going out for the spot where he’d left his cigarettes, then shaking it off and stuffing the pack into his pocket.
“There was a tip-off, wasn’t there?” I said.
“Train. Last night. Promised to kill a passenger.”
“But he didn’t?”
“Everyone accounted for.”
“So either the tip-off was a fake—”
“Quinn says no.”
“Then he failed. I can see that. It’d be very hard to pull a hit on an enclosed vehicle. He must have realized he’d overshot and backed off.”