The snow came up to my knees. I couldn’t walk or run; it was as if I swam through it, which left me breathless. The entrance road took me to a clearing near the lake. The same huge lake that made a kind of sunflower in the middle of the forest, with rounded inlets like petals, which was how it got its name. The lake continued past the spot where Ben Malloy had seen the Ursulina; it flowed into deep water at its core where the winter ice was thin; and it extended all the way to the place where I’d stood and watched the monster’s moon, and where I’d just seen Jay Brink put a bullet in his head.

Do you believe in signs, sweetheart?

The owl led me to this lake. It led me to what I was destined to find, because when I got there, I discovered that I wasn’t alone. There was a pickup truck parked by the shore, practically buried in snow. It wasn’t going anywhere. And from the steamed-over windows, I realized that the truck wasn’t empty. Someone needed my help.

I had a purpose in life again.

I shouldered my way through the drifts and tapped on the driver’s window. When the window rolled down, I found myself staring at a young man only a few years older than me, no more than thirty, who looked ready to freeze to death. He had no coat; he was actually wearing a short-sleeved shirt. In January! He was a strong, strapping man, with a thick mane of slightly curly brown hair and a perfectly trimmed brown beard. His face, like mine, had a sadness about it, but I couldn’t help but notice how handsome he was.

Seeing me, this man gave me a smile that warmed my insides like the smoothest of whiskeys. What can I tell you? It was a smile without guile or cynicism or lust, just the earnest smile of a decent man. I liked him at once. In fact, sweetheart, you may or may not believe this, but I fell in love with him right then and there in that single moment. I saw his eyes and his smile, and I melted. Maybe it was the situation I was in. Maybe I needed to see a kind face when my nerves were stretched to the breaking point. But regardless, something about this man’s face made my heart soar.

“You must be an angel,” he told me, which was exactly what I was thinking about him. “I wasn’t sure I would make it through the night.”

I found myself at a loss for words, but then I finally recovered and said, “What are you doing out here, sir?”

“I’d tell you if I could, Deputy, but I don’t even know where I am.”

“Are you all right? Do you need a doctor?”