“It’s not like that. This is my choice, a job I have to finish. She was my case from the start, and as far as I’m concerned, she still is. I can’t just relax at the beach knowing she’s loose and going to kill again. How can I just look the other way when you, Lucy, Marino—when all of us are very possibly in danger?”

“Benton, don’t turn into a Captain Ahab, okay? Don’t let this become your obsession. Please.”

He laughed.

“Take me seriously, goddamn it.”

“I promise I’ll stay away from white whales.”

“You’re already chasing the hell out of one.”

“I love you, Kay.”

As I followed the hallway to my office, I wondered why I bothered saying the same old words to him. I knew his behavior almost as well as I knew my own, and the idea that he wouldn’t be doing exactly what he was right now was about as unthinkable as my letting another forensic pathologist take over the Warrenton case because it was my right to take it easy at this stage in my life.

I turned on the light in my spacious paneled office, and opened the blinds to let the morning in. My work space adjoined my bedroom, and not even my housekeeper knew that all of the windows in my private quarters, like those in my downtown office, were bulletproof glass. It wasn’t just the Carries of the world who worried me. Unfortunately, there were the countless convicted killers who blamed me for their convictions, and most of them did not stay locked up forever. I had gotten my share of letters from violent offenders who promised to come see me when they got out. They liked the way I looked or talked or dressed. They would do something about it.

The depressing truth, though, was that one did not have to be a detective or profiler or chief medical examiner to be a potential target of predators. Most victims were vulnerable. They were in their cars or carrying groceries into their homes or walking through a parking lot, simply, as the saying goes, in the wrong place at the wrong time. I logged onto America Online and found Lucy’s ATF repository research files in my mailbox. I executed a print command and returned to the kitchen for more coffee.

Marino walked in as I was contemplating something to eat. He was dressed, his shirttail hanging out, his face dirty with stubble.

“I’m outta here,” he said, yawning.

“Would you like coffee?”

“Nope. Something on the road. Probably stop at Liberty Valance,” he said as if we’d never had our discussion about his eating habits.

“Thanks for staying over,” I said.

“No problem.”