It occurred to me that in all the years we’d been working together to best manage my sister, the superintendent and I had become more than colleagues; we’d become friends. I wondered if Officer Maria Lopez or Chris or Bob thought the same. I wondered what it would do to them when, if, they discovered I was the one who’d broken my sister out of prison. I was the one who’d betrayed their trust.

I thought I should say something. An outreach of sorts, a cryptic apology she might not understand now but that might give her comfort later. But then she turned and looked at me with such blazing dark eyes I couldn’t help but lean away.

“A smart woman would change her locks, Adeline,” she stated, her tone less helpful than challenging. “Are you a smart woman?”

I didn’t answer.

“A smarter woman would go on vacation. Say, to Bermuda. Someplace far, far away from here.”

“If my sister wanted to hurt me, I’d already be dead,” I replied steadily.

She eyed me with that intent expression again. “You’re assuming your sister is all you have to fear.”

“What do you mean?” I asked sharply.

But she’d turned away, was watching the road, and we didn’t speak again.

At the car agency, the desk clerk took one look at my heavily bandaged face, my oven mitt of a left hand and immediately recoiled. McKinnon, however, wasn’t having any of it. She started barking commands, and in twenty minutes or less I had a midsize sedan in deep blue.

“I’ll follow you home,” she announced briskly. “Help get you settled.”

“No, thank you. I’ll be fine. I just need rest.”

“Can you even open your front door with that thing? Work a key, undo a lock?” She gestured to my heavily wrapped and padded left hand, which looked more like a baseball glove than a body part. “Let alone drive the car, change into comfortable clothes, fix yourself some food.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“Adeline—”

“Kimberly.”

She huffed at the rare use of her first name. She tried her stern glare again. Then, when that didn’t work: “Don’t take this the wrong way, Adeline. But when it comes to Shana, you can be a damn fool.”

I touched the bandages on my face. “And this is my punishment?”

“I’m not saying that. Shana is clearly the one in the wrong here, but . . . You are her sister. And you seem determined to find some good in her, whether any exists or not.”

“Duly noted.”

“I’ve supervised her for nearly ten years, remember. You’re not the only one who knows her, who can anticipate her every move. I’ll come with you to your apartment. Between the two of us, she’ll never stand a chance.”