“Did you talk to Ajax and Jerry?” Darrell asked.

“I did, and they both denied it,” Norm replied. “But I don’t think my witness made it up, and I don’t think she got it wrong. So if everyone’s lying about it, that means they have something big they’re trying to hide.”

*

Darrell kept talking to Norm, but I had to take a bathroom break.

When I was done, I went outside for a smoke. I’d been trying to quit while I was pregnant, but that morning, I really needed a cigarette. I was uncomfortable, I was sleep-deprived, and I was unsettled by the return of the Ursulina. For the first time in months, I found myself listening to the forest again for the hufffffff of the beast.

It was a cold October morning. My boots crunched through frost on the grass. I had no hope of zipping my coat over my stomach, so when the wind whistled at me, I shivered. The gray sky had a winter look about it, as if the sun would never shine again. To tell you the truth, sweetheart, I was thinking about running away. I was tempted to get in my car right then and there and go somewhere else and never come back. Maybe that’s what I should have done. But wherever I went, I knew the monster would find me eventually.

I’ve known that since I was ten years old.

“Hi, Rebecca.”

The voice behind me made me jump. I turned around and saw Will, seemingly not cold at all in a short-sleeved T-shirt and khakis. “Oh. Hi.”

“Are you okay?”

I shrugged as I took a drag on my cigarette. “Sure.”

“When’s the baby due?”

“End of the month,” I said. “But she feels like she’s coming early.”

“She? Is it a girl?”

“I don’t actually know that, but yeah, I think it’s a girl.”

“You got another cigarette?” Will asked me.

“Will your dad kill me if I give you one?”

“Probably.”

I gave him one anyway, and the two of us stood there smoking. We were alone in the big yard, surrounded by soaring evergreens. Will seemed the same as he’d been, charming and strong, but he wasn’t the same at all, not really. He’d discovered that the world can be cruel, and once you discover that, you can’t look at life the same way again. You carry that anxiety with you forever.

“I heard you guys talking,” he said. “I heard about what happened to Ajax.”

“Yeah.”

“I didn’t like him. It sucks that he’s dead, but I didn’t like him.”

“Join the club,” I replied.

“Do you think the same person killed both of them? Ajax and Gordon Brink?”

“I don’t know.”