Kate closed her eyes. She listened to Alaska’s deep breathing. Foo Dog’s snores rumbled along the floor. She tried her relaxation techniques: breathe in on one, out on two. Do it for ten. Then repeat. But her mind kept interrupting. Had Hillcroft returned her call? Had Matt? Breathe in on eight…no, seven.

Damn it.

It was one question after another, scrambling around the corners of her mind, trapped in the blind allies of the unknown, adrenalin firing through every cell.

She swung her legs over the bed, and switched on her bedside lamp. Alaska pulled himself to his feet. Foo Dog lifted a bleary eyelid, half-rolled into the warm spot vacated by Alaska, and settled back into his snoring.

Alaska nudged Kate’s leg. She reached down to stroke her dog’s head. For the first time in a long time, the shadows in Kate’s room held no menace.

But then her gaze fell on her closet. Imogen’s belongings sat in a closed box in there. Her little sister. The girl she should have protected. But killed through an act of hurt-induced carelessness. Gone in the flesh for sixteen years. But never gone from her heart. Or her conscience.

You faced killers. Stalkers. Face the damn box.

But if she opened the box, she knew she’d not only be flooded with memories of the girl Kate had lost for the rest of her lifetime, but also the woman who had been the catalyst for the tragedy that had befallen the Lange sisters.

Kenzie Sloane.

The woman who tried to save herself from a sadistic stalker by twice putting a Lange sister in his crosshairs.

She understood what had driven Mel Owen to seek out Leah in her hospital bed, gun in hand, vengeance in his eyes.

For she had felt the same urge to kill only a month before.

She drew her legs up to her chest, hugging her knees.

Alaska leaned against her foot. His fur was silky, his body warm.

Her return from Italy had been so fraught with work-related drama that she had been able to avoid thinking about the bomb that John Hillcroft had dropped on her at their coffee date: the preliminary inquiry for Kenzie Sloane. Kate would face her in four days’ time. But this time, Kenzie would be in the prisoner’s dock. And Kate would be in the witness stand. The thought of seeing those sky-blue eyes made her stomach churn.

Kenzie Sloane had stolen so much from Kate. Her sister. Her peace of mind for the past sixteen years. And then she added more trauma with the involvement of John McNally.

Her gaze slid to the bureau. The bras had been pushed to one side, the panties tumbled to the other. Two pairs were missing. The lacy ones. The ones she had saved for special dates. The ones that had been taken by a stalker.