“So let’s talk about Carrie just long enough for you to put your mind at ease,” Lucy matter-of-factly stated, taking a swallow. “I have a Browning High-Power, and my Sig from ATF, and a shotgun—twelve gauge, seven rounds. You name it, I can get it. But you know? I think my bare hands would be enough if she dared to come around. I’ve had enough, you know?”

She lifted the bottle again. “Eventually you just make a decision and move on.”

“What sort of decision?” I asked.

She shrugged.

“You decide you can’t give someone any more power than you already have. You can’t spend your days in fear of them or hating them,” she explained her mindset. “So you give it up, in a sense. You go about your business, knowing that if the monster ever steps into your path, she’d better be ready for life or death.”

“I think that’s a pretty good attitude,” I said. “Maybe the only attitude. I’m just not sure you really feel that way, but I hope so.”

She stared up at an irregular moon, and I thought she was blinking back tears, but I couldn’t be sure.

“The truth is, Aunt Kay, I could do all their computer stuff with one arm. You know?”

“You could probably do all the Pentagon’s computer stuff with one arm,” I gently said as my heart hurt more.

“I just don’t want to push it.”

I did not know how to answer her.

“I pissed off enough people because I can fly a helicopter and . . . Well, you know.”

“I know all the things you can do, and that the list will probably only grow longer, Lucy. It’s very lonely being you.”

“Have you ever felt like that?” she whispered.

“Only all my life,” I whispered back. “And now you know why I’ve always loved you the way I do. Maybe I get it.”

She looked over at me. She reached out and sweetly touched my wrist.

“You’d better go,” she said. “I don’t want you driving when you’re tired.”

10

IT WAS ALMOST midnight when I slowed at the guard booth in my neighborhood, and the security officer on duty stepped out to stop me. This was highly unusual, and I feared he would tell me that my burglar alarm had been going half the night or yet one more oddball had tried to drive through to see if I was at home. Marino had been dozing for the past hour and a half, and he came to as I rolled down my window.

“Good evening,” I said to the guard. “How are you doing, Tom?”

“I’m fine, Dr. Scarpetta,” he said, leaning close to my car. “But you’ve had a few unusual events within the past hour or so, and I figured something wasn’t right when I kept trying to reach you and you weren’t home.”