He took her hand and led her to the car. He popped the trunk, and when she saw the dead eyes of Frank Macy staring at her, she quivered. It wasn’t fear; it was arousal. She put a finger to the wound and let one of the corpse bugs climb onto her nail. She twisted her hand, making it run in circles around her finger, and when she was done playing with it, she crushed it under her thumb and dropped the carapace back among its brothers.

‘Do you think this will work?’ he asked.

‘Trust me,’ she said.

‘There’s a chance – I mean, it’s possible that I won’t make it. I’ve protected you if that happens. You know that, don’t you?’

‘I do. Thank you.’

That was the limit of her emotion. She’d always known his place in her universe. He was a useful tool to her, but if he died, if he was exposed, she would walk over him like litter in the street.

‘There are days …’ he began, but he couldn’t finish his thought. He couldn’t go there.

‘We all make sacrifices,’ she said.

She heard him try and fail to keep the bitterness from his voice. ‘And what’s yours?’ he asked.

She put her hands on his face. He responded like that blind, dead insect, unable to stay away from her, despite the consequences of what lay ahead.

‘Mine is living with who I am,’ she said.

‘You said you never fired a gun before,’ Cab reminded her. ‘Isn’t that what you told Deacon in the sunroom? All those shots went wild. Except for the last one, which killed him. Dead in the center of the back. Perfect aim.’

‘Luck,’ Caprice said.

‘Yes, you are a very lucky woman. Except I found a shooting range not far from where you grew up. They still remember you. The pretty teenage girl who was as sharp as a sniper. They’re proud of you, by the way.’

‘I hadn’t fired a gun in years,’ Caprice said. ‘And I don’t think I’m under any obligation to tell the truth to a murderer who’s threatening to kill me.’