“When was this?”

“December, last year.”

The second stressor event, the one that had initiated his stalking Kayleigh.

Dance made a decision. “He’s kidnapped her, Sally.”

“Who, Kayleigh Towne?” she whispered. And yet she didn’t seem too shocked.

“We’ll protect you and your family, Sally. I promise. And we’ll get him and put him in jail for the rest of his life—he’s also killed some people.”

“Oh, no. My God, no.”

“But we can only do that if you help us. Do you have any idea where he might go?”

Another debate raged within her.

She knows something. Come on, Dance thought. Come on….

“I …”

“We’ll get the police to your family, Sally. But you have to meet us halfway.”

“Well, he said he had this, like, religious experience, seeing Kayleigh sing for the first time. An outdoor concert, a couple years ago. He said if he could live anywhere, that’s where it would be. In a cabin in the woods near there.”

“Where?” Dance asked.

“Some town in California, on the ocean. Monterey. I don’t know exactly where it is.”

Dance finally looked away from the screen and caught Madigan’s eye. She looked back at the tearstained face of her subject. “That’s all right, Sally. I do.”

Chapter 73

AS THEY DROVE along, Edwin Sharp was singing, loud and more or less in key.

She gets gallons to the mile, not the other way round,

And the tailpipe, it really makes a pretty nasty sound,

The heater hardly works at all and forget about the air.

Duct tape’s been involved in most of her repairs.

But she’s big and fast and solid and I know I can depend

On her to always be there … unlike a lot of men.

She’s my red Cadillac … my red Cadillac.

She gets me where I’m going, and she always gets me back.

I love her like a sister, she’s my red Cadillac.

“We had to say good-bye to her,” he called into the back of the van. “My red Buick. Sorry.”

Kayleigh was concentrating on not crying. This was a survival, not an emotional, issue. Her nose was already perilously stuffed up and she was sure if she started sobbing she’d suffocate. The tape on her mouth was a tight seal. She wasn’t blindfolded but she was in the far back of the windowless van, on the floor. He’d pulled her boots off. Lovingly smelled the leather. Sick.

They were about an hour from Fresno, though she didn’t know which direction, probably in the foothills toward Yosemite or the Sierras because the road seemed to be at an incline. West or south, the landscape was flat. They stopped once, after Edwin had glanced into the rearview mirror at her and he’d frowned. He pulled off the road and climbed into the back; she’d shied away. He’d said, “No, no, made a mistake there.” A thick strand of her hair had been imprisoned by the duct tape and Edwin had carefully loosened it and worked the hair free from the adhesive. “Can’t have that.” And he recited again how long it had been since she’d cut it. “Ten years, four months … You could write a song. That’d be a good title.”