That was the first good news Lynch had heard all day, but he still had to face the sobering reality that a killer was on the loose, and it was up to his police officers to catch him.

He drove down Germantown Avenue—from his affluent Chestnut Hill neighborhood to the gritty streets leading to Logan—with thoughts of the murderer swirling in his head.

Lynch knew that this killer called himself the angel of death, and seeing as the man had committed three—or was it six?—murders and disappeared without a trace, Lynch supposed the name fit. In truth, though, the killer didn’t need to be an angel to vanish in Philadelphia.

The city’s convoluted network of alleys, vacant lots, abandoned houses, and one-way streets offered refuge to killers and cost cops their lives. In keeping secrets and hiding treasures, providing shelter and hatching plots, the streets of Philadelphia were like heaven and hell, and their inhabitants were the forces that fought on either side.

As Lynch sped toward the crime scene with his black Mercury’s dome light swirling against the darkening sky, he thought of the main lesson those streets had taught him: Things aren’t always what they seem.

He whipped out his cell phone and called the delayed police response unit. When a sergeant answered, he spoke quickly. “This is Commissioner Lynch. Get Detective Mann on the phone.”

A few seconds later, a nervous-sounding Charlie Mann came on the line. “Yes, Commissioner?”

“You’re back on duty,” Lynch said. “Go upstairs and get your gun and badge from internal affairs.”

“Just like that?” Mann asked. “What about—”

“You let me worry about the particulars,” Lynch said. “Right now I need my best detectives on the street. There’s been a triple murder in Logan.”

“I know. That’s all they’ve been talking about down here for the last half hour. They say it’s a copycat trying to make a name on the Confessional Murders.”

“Coletti doesn’t think it’s a copycat, and I’m starting to agree with him, so we’re going to get a stay of execution until we can sort things out.”

“But I thought—”

“Don’t think,” Lynch said. “If you think, you won’t believe. And you’re gonna need some faith on this one.”

“What do you mean?”

There was a long pause. “Coletti believes he’s seen the killer,” Lynch said matter-of-factly. “He’s had dreams—visions, I guess you’d call them—and those dreams match what we’ve heard from witnesses who saw the killer in the flesh.”

“With all due respect, sir, we can’t stop an execution based on dreams.”

“No, we can’t,” the commissioner said. “But we can stop it if we think we’ve got a serial killer on our hands. Get your gun and badge, Detective Mann. I’ll see you at the scene.”