“I’m twenty minutes away,” Tomasetti said. “Meet me at the station.”

“What the hell’s going on? Where’s Kate?”

“I’ll explain when I get there. Do me a favor and see if you can get Detrick on the line. See where he’s at, what he’s doing. Don’t let on that you’re suspicious about anything.”

“What does Detrick have to do with this?”

“I think he might be . . . involved.”

“Involved in what?”

“The murders.”

“What? You gotta be fuckin’ kidding me. Detrick?”

“Look, I don’t know for sure. Just call him, okay?”

“What if he’s at the station?”

“If he is, that’ll be the best news I had all day. If he’s not, then I’m pretty sure Kate’s in trouble.”

Awareness returns slowly. The first thing I become aware of is the cry of the wind. I hear snow battering the windows. I lay on my side with my knees drawn up to my chest. My wrists are bound behind my back. The arm I’m lying on is numb. My ankles are still bound. I’m shivering with cold. The crotch of my jeans is wet, and I remember peeing when Detrick hit me with the stun gun.

I open my eyes. Yellow light from the heater dances on the ceiling. I feel cold air flowing over me, and I remember the window is broken. I look around. My heart jigs when I spot Detrick, standing in the doorway. At some point, he removed his coat. He wears a denim shirt over a turtleneck and a nicely cut pair of trousers.

“You broke my nose,” he says.

I notice the blood on the turtleneck. “How are going to explain that?”

“People fall when the sidewalks are icy.” His eyes run over me. His smile chills me. “You’re shivering. Cold?”

I say nothing.

“You shouldn’t have broken that window. Heater would have had it comfortable in here by now.”

The hopelessness of the situation is like a dark hole and I’m about to get sucked into it. This man is going to kill me. It’s just a matter of when. And how. Time is on my side, but I know it’s running out.

“You going to behave yourself if I cut the rope on your ankles?”

“Probably not.”

He laughs. “You try anything stupid, and I’ll hurt you bad this time, you understand?”

He looks at me the way a starving dog looks at a piece of meat before devouring it. He’s going to rape me. I see it in his eyes. The thought repels me, but I remind myself I’ve already survived it once. I can survive it again. I want to live. That interminable will pulses through me with every rapid-fire beat of my heart.

He starts toward me. I notice the stun gun in his hand. “Don’t use the gun,” I say.

“You going to cooperate?”

Unless I get the chance to kill you. “I’ll do whatever you want.”

He kneels next to me. The knife glints like quicksilver in the light from the kerosene heater. The scrap of fabric binding my ankles falls away. I feel his eyes on me, but I can’t bring myself to look at him. I know he’ll see my fear. I know he feeds on that.