Aidan fell to the floor.

Dying took longer than he thought. That made him mad, so at the last moment, he flipped onto his belly, tried to crawl to the phone.

Second shot took him in the back, between the shoulder blades.

Well, fuck me, Aidan thought. He didn’t move again.

Jason turned off his flashlight. He clutched the heavy metal object as a weapon and eased himself carefully toward the rickety attic stairs. The lit hallway provided a pool of illumination spilling across the bedroom floor. He used it as his target, placing his left foot on the top rung of the ladder, then his right. The top step creaked, the attic ladder trembling unsteadily beneath his weight.

Screw it. He slid down in a rush, landing with a solid thud and rolling low into the darkened master bedroom. Then he was up on his feet, preparing to dash into his daughter’s bedroom and fight for her life.

He discovered his wife standing in front of him instead.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

“I don’t understand,” he faltered.

“I know.”

“Are you alive? Is this for real? Where have you been?”

She took the flashlight from him. Belatedly Jason realized that he’d been brandishing it before him, threatening his wife, who, apparently, had just returned from the dead.

She wore all black. Black trousers, black shirt. It wasn’t an outfit he recognized, cheap, ill-fitting. He saw now that there was also a dark baseball cap on the bed. The perfect outfit for stealth. Was she stealing in, or stealing away? Why couldn’t he understand what was going on?

“I saw the news,” she said quietly.

Jason stared at her.

“My father made the five o’clock broadcast, claiming he deserves custody of Ree. I realized then that I had to come back.”

“He claims you’re a liar,” Jason murmured. “Your mother was a fine, upstanding woman, and your father’s only sin was loving his wife more than his daughter.”

“He said what?” Sandy asked sharply.

“You’re troubled, have a history of drinking, promiscuity, perhaps multiple abortions.”

She colored, didn’t say a word.

“But your parents were solid. You were just jealous of your mother, then furious about her untimely death. So you ran away from your father, and then … you ran away from me. You left us.” He was surprised, now that he was saying the words out loud, how much they hurt him. “You left me, and you left Ree.”

“I didn’t want to go,” Sandy said immediately. “You have to believe me. Something bad happened. And maybe he didn’t kill me Wednesday night, but it was only a matter of time. If I stayed, if he could find me. I … I didn’t know what to do. It seemed better if I disappeared for a bit. If I was gone, he couldn’t want me anymore. It would make things all right.”