“Shhh,” she informed him softly. “This isn’t about you, Mr. Detective Phil. You be quiet now. This is about me and my sister. It’s always been about me and my sister, and unfinished business.”

“What is one hundred and fifty-three?” Adeline demanded.

Shana smiled again. But the expression was devoid of emotion and didn’t do a thing to hide the cool, calculating gleam in her flat brown eyes.

She’d been pretending, D.D. realized slowly. Her show of belligerence. Her attempts to shock them with graphic details of her own self-mutilation. Even her awkward flirtations with Phil. Those hadn’t been real emotions, but simply masks Shana slipped on and off the way other people changed clothes.

This was the real Shana Day. A stone-cold killer, whose gaze now lingered almost tenderly on her sister’s bloodstained fingertip.

“One hundred fifty-three,” Shana whispered. “That’s my proof. I do remember Daddy. And I love him. I’ve always loved him. Now, go home, baby sister. Read your files. Talk to your little cop friends. Then lock your doors. Just because you can’t feel pain, doesn’t mean that when he comes for you, it won’t hurt anyway.”

Chapter 17

I LEFT THE INTERVIEW ROOM, struggling for composure, but in truth, rattled to the core. My adoptive father had been right; reconnecting with my sister merely returned me to the house of horrors I’d been lucky to escape the first time.

Now I dropped my bloodstained finger to my side, aware of D.D.’s gaze upon me, as Phil and the superintendent continued speaking in the background.

“Come on,” D.D. said abruptly, gesturing to my hand. “Let’s find a washroom, clean up.”

She was already moving, so I followed. From a doctor’s point of view, I thought D.D. appeared to be feeling better this morning. Whether that came from effective use of approved pain management techniques or simply the adrenaline rush of once more being a detective on the chase . . .

While the interview with my sister had wrung me out, D.D. seemed almost giddy.

“You played her,” she said now. “First you were all cold clinician, then suddenly you were on the attack, belittling her memories, stealing her glory. Acting all, well, sisterly. Then, that whole bit, waving around Phil’s blood on your fingertip. Pure genius.”

I didn’t say anything, but tucked my red-stained finger into my fist. The problem with talking to my sister was never her obsession with violence; it was the way her appetites called to my own. Beast to beast, family member to family member, until I really did want to lift my finger to my lips, take a quick, delicate taste . . .