They were young patrol officers. A couple of Cairns boys, it looked like. I knew all of the cops in Crimson Lake and Holloways Beach by sight, some of them from working cases in the area as a private investigator with my partner, Amanda. A continued career in the police force had been out of the question after my arrest, but Amanda Pharrell had employed me on two murder investigations and a smattering of the private-eye jobs small towns seem to generate—poisoned family pets, cheating husbands, injury insurance fraud.

The young officers strode down the small incline toward me, and their lifted chins and smirks didn’t give me much confidence that this was a friendly visit. I turned on my heel and started walking back around the side of the house.

“Hold up, Conkaffey!”

I went straight to my phone, which I’d left on the cane lounge on the porch. Celine ran over to the officers and did a tight circle of them, sniffing and barking good-naturedly.

I picked up my phone and typed a quick message to Amanda. Three letters.

SOS.

I knew it was all I had time for. And I was right. In seconds the two officers were boxing me in against the wall of the porch.

“Ted Conkaffey?” snapped one of the officers, a square-headed guy with tattoos poking up from his collar, and a name badge that read Frisp.

“You know who I am,” I said.

“We’re here to escort you to Cairns. Please hand me that phone and do not resist arrest.”

This was my nightmare. The moment I had played and replayed a thousand times in my sleep, the moment that pressed into my consciousness sometimes hourly, no matter where I was or what I was doing. Fear of rearrest. It was happening. All I could hope for was that the action plan I had put in place for this very scenario would make the experience as painless as possible.