“Sarah, stop! Are you stopped?”

A pause from upstairs. “Okay, yes. I’m not moving. Zack, Trixie phoned. She told me to come out here, that something had happened and—”

“Sarah! Listen to me!”

“Okay.”

“First of all, I’m okay. I’m going to need your help, but before you come downstairs, I have to prepare you for what you’re going to see.”

“Oh my God. Don’t tell me you’re trapped in some sort of leather thing. You’ve been coming to Trixie, paying her to—”

“No, Sarah. Please just listen and don’t interrupt. I’m not hurt, but I am handcuffed to the stair railing and I need you to get the keys.”

Even from where I stood, I could hear her intake of breath upstairs.

“But Sarah, what I have to tell you is, I’m not exactly alone down here.” I took a breath of my own. “I’m down here in the midst of a…I’m in a crime scene, Sarah.”

“A crime scene.”

“A man has been killed, he’s been murdered, and I’m down here with his body.” I paused. “It’s very, very…bad.”

From Sarah, almost a whisper: “Who is it, Zack?”

“Martin Benson. The reporter from the Suburban. Somebody’s…oh man.”

“Tell me you’re okay.”

“I’m okay. Are you ready?”

Sarah paused a second before she said, “I’m ready.”

And then she appeared at the doorway at the top of the stairs, assessing my situation in a glance. She came down the steps slowly, and as she was able to see more of the room, she saw Benson at the far end of it.

“Dear God,” she said. She stayed on the last step, next to me, as if putting a foot on the floor would be an admission that what she was seeing was really true.

“The keys are right there,” I said softly, nodding at the table a few feet away. “If you give them to me, I can get these off and call the police.”

“Zack, his throat’s been slit clear across.”

“I know. The keys. Hand me the keys.”

She was holding it together fairly well, considering. She’d been a police reporter back in her early days and had seen the odd corpse here and there. Usually after the police had arrived.

She looked at the keys on the table. She’d have to put both feet on the floor to get there. As if she were putting her toe into icy cold water, she came down the last step and approached the table hesitantly. She delicately picked up the keys in her fingers, turned, and handed them to me.