“You’re in the hospital,” he asked. “I’m Dr. Weiss. Do you remember how you got here?”

“I was pushed out a window. Tased . . . twice. Ben Northcutt tried to kill me.”

“You have no idea how lucky you are,” he said. “You fell three stories and landed on wire mesh. You’ve got serious lacerations, two Taser burns, a broken fifth metatarsal in your left foot, and a fractured wrist. Honestly, you should buy some lottery tickets when you walk out of here.”

“Are you really a doctor?”

He chuckled at that. “Your family’s waiting. Are you ready for a visit?”

“Okay,” I said, hoping he meant Reagan but wondering if he meant my father. I struggled to sit up. Dr. Weiss put his hands on my shoulders, gently pressing me back, then pushed a button to raise the upper half of the bed. “Where are the cops?”

“They’re waiting too.”

“Get them in here.”

A minute later, Reagan was rushing in and hugging me. “You scared us to death! Are you okay? Tiger Mom wanted to be here, but the hospital only lets two family members in.”

Villaverde and Gorey were on her heels. Pulling up the rear was my father, looking pale and anxious.

“You need to haul Ben Northcutt’s ass into jail,” I said. “He’s insane. He tried to kill me.”

“Tell us what happened,” Villaverde said.

I tried to explain as best I could without mentioning the Thraxton criminal enterprise and Caro’s role in it. “He thought he and Caro and Teddy were running away to start a new life, when my sister didn’t want anything to do with him,” I said at the end. “He admitted he had a fight with Caro the morning she died. He shook her, and she fell and hit her head. He insisted she was okay, that she got up after that, but I told him he killed her. That was when he tried to kill me.”

“Which suggests you were onto something,” Villaverde said. “I wonder how Theo will take the news his wife was ditching him.”

“Theo’s already having the worst day of his life,” Gorey added.

“What are you talking about?”

“Teddy’s gone missing,” my father said.

“His stepmother has vanished, and it looks like she took the little kid with her,” Villaverde explained. “You know anything about that?”

I was stunned. “Ursula’s always been sweet . . . and very drunk. Are you sure she took him?”

“Theo is certain she did. She told him the boy needed a different life.”

The hospital wasn’t thrilled about uncaging me so early, but once I’d signed a bunch of forms saying they were off the hook if anything bad happened, they let me go. Dr. Weiss added his own warnings.

“You need to come back in if you vomit or get dizzy,” he said. “You could have problems concentrating, or with balance. You might get angry easily . . .”