“I’m sorry if I was short,” Archie said from the doorway.

Susan held up her phone. “I’ve been catching up on a Scrabble game,” she said.

“Sure you have,” he said. He stalked in and took a seat in one of the chairs across from her. Then he folded his hands in his lap and looked at her with a level gaze. She knew a lecture coming when she saw it. “This thing about the kid, we need to keep that quiet,” he said. “We don’t want the parents to know until we’re sure.”

Susan had already thought this all through. “You could check for his fingerprints on the key he left under the bed. I’m sure they got his prints after he disappeared, right?”

He didn’t move. “I know how to do my job, Susan.”

“Right,” she said. He’d thought of that, too.

They were both quiet for what seemed like too long.

“Do you want your chair?” she asked finally.

“It’s a blue-ringed octopus,” he said.

She wasn’t sure she’d heard him. “What?”

“The toxicology report came back early this morning,” he said. “It’s a small cephalopod. Very deadly. Its bite causes respiratory paralysis. There’s no antivenom. They think if Henry makes it twenty-four hours, he’ll be okay. You can look it up on your phone.”

All Susan could say was, “You lied to me at the hospital?”

He sighed and looked away. “We didn’t want it public.”

She remembered the spots on the palms, his concern with inspecting hers. “The marks on the hands,” Susan said.

“Yes.”

“So someone is … is…” She faltered, searching for the words.

“Using an octopus to kill people,” Archie said.

“A blue-ringed octopus,” Susan said.

“Yes.”

She examined his face for some glimmer of humor. “Is this a joke?”

“No.”

“Why are you telling me?”

He spread his fingers. “You can have the story.”

“You said you didn’t want it public.”

“I didn’t,” he said. “Now I do.”

It was the kid. Archie’s bosses didn’t want the octopus story out there. People were going to freak out. The city was flooding. They had enough to deal with. But Archie had decided that it was worth upping their chances of catching the guy, and saving the kid.

“I’m not a journalist,” Susan said. “I was fired.”

“You’re a freelance journalist.”

Henry. Archie had said there was no antivenom.

“Twenty-four hours?” Susan looked around the office for a clock. “What time is it?” she asked.

He didn’t even have to glance at his watch. “It’s almost noon. Six hours to go, give or take.”

Susan spun around again slowly in the chair. “This guy takes a kid and keeps him for a year and a half. Then uses a poisonous octopus to kill three people, put a fourth in the hospital, and he leaves keys on all of them.”