“Hello, Mr. Findley,” Orrin said sadly.

“I’m sorry to see you here, Orrin. That’s not good news for either of us. Why don’t you and Dr. Cole get in back, so we can talk.”

*   *   *

The driver kept his engine idling but didn’t drive away. Sandra prayed he wouldn’t. As long as she was within sight of this ugly road, the bus stop, the coffee shop across the street with its yellow lighted windows, it was possible to believe she might still get away unhurt. But if the car began to move it would carry her out of the familiar world, into that unlit land where unspeakable things happen.

She knew about the unlit land. Often enough, at State, she had interviewed candidates who had been routinely beaten, abused, abandoned, or degraded. They were refugees from the land of unspeakable things, and through their eyes she had begun to sense the vastness and emptiness of its geography.

Findley looked at her from the front seat, his face lined and pockmarked, his eyes deceptively mild. “First things first,” he said. “One of you is missing. What happened to Officer Bose, Dr. Cole?”

She doubted she could have answered even had she wanted to. All the moisture in her mouth had dried up. The world was drenched in rain, and she couldn’t even spit.

“Come on,” Findley said impatiently.

She managed, “I don’t know.”

“Please.”

“He’s not with me. I don’t know where he is.”

Findley sighed. “You should have accepted the offer I made you, Dr. Cole. It was perfectly authentic. A second life for your brother, in exchange for nothing important. There was no downside to it. It was generous. You were stupid.” He paused. “Over there across the street, parked in back, that’s Bose’s car. So where is he, Dr. Cole?”

She closed her mouth firmly and shook her head.

The driver—the gunman—turned in his seat to look at her. He didn’t look like a criminal, Sandra thought. His face wasn’t unpleasant. He looked like a high school English teacher, tired after a long day.

He showed her the gun. She didn’t know anything about guns and she couldn’t say what kind it was. It was as if he was saying, “Here is the source of my power over you.” As if he wanted her to acknowledge and understand it. Then he struck her in the face with the grip clenched in his fist.

The blow glanced off her cheekbone and loosened a tooth. The pain was literally sickening. She wanted to vomit. Her eyes clenched shut and she felt tears leaking out of them.

“Don’t do that,” Orrin said.

Findley turned to face him. “Look at all this trouble you caused, Orrin. And why? What did I ever do to you but take you off the street and give you respectable work?”

“None of this is my fault, Mr. Findley.”