He knew exactly what Flint was doing, and it wouldn’t work. Maybe they felt he would be the easiest to crack, but he would not be intimidated.

None of this made any sense. The FERC wasn’t the Mafia. Since when did they use spying and scare tactics to get their way? No, something was going on here, something that he didn’t understand quite yet.

That was when he finally glanced out the large picture window in the kitchen and saw Jessica.

He didn’t wait to pull on his boots. As he jumped from the porch, the cold snow shocked his bare feet, but he kept moving.

Jessica lay on the outskirts of the woods near the shed. He called her name. She did not stir. He struggled through the knee-deep snow, feeling the icy crust cut at his bare shins, and kneeled next to her.

“Jessica,” he whispered, touching her cheek. “Jessie, please. Talk to me.”

She opened her eyes, and they were calm and ques- tioning.

“Daddy,” she said. “I saw him.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Helen arrived back at the house at two o’clock. David heard the car in the driveway but it didn’t register to his preoccupied mind until the front door opened.

He had Jessie lying on the couch, a blanket over her feet. She had insisted that he get Johnny Bear from her room and bring him to her immediately. After David had carried her back into the house, she had seemed to be unharmed, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that had come over him. Something was very wrong.

She had seen him, she said. In her head. He was a big, bad man, a mean man, and he wore blue trousers. The way she said those words, so calmly and truthfully, sent chills down his spine.

By the time Helen walked in, Jessie was dozing off. David pulled her into the office room and shut the door. “She’s had another problem,” he said, unsure of any other way to say it.

“What do you mean, another problem?”

David told her about the incident as simply as he could.

“Jesus,” she said. “I’m scared.”

“Me too—”

She took him by both forearms. “David, someone died here. A little girl.”

He stood there for a long minute, wondering how to respond. “I know,” he said finally. He felt her push away from him, and there was anger in her eyes.

“You knew?” Her voice went up a notch.

“Helen…I didn’t want to upset you. It doesn’t have anything to do with us or the house.”

“It has everything to do with us, damn it!” Her voice rose still further, and David began to worry about Jessie waking up.

“Helen, please,” he said, reaching for her hands.