He showed her the trailer more closely. The place was a shrine to her, of course. Posters and memorabilia, clothing and photos.

Kayleigh Towne everywhere.

But no weapons.

No sharp knives in the kitchen—the first thing she looked for. Also, no glass or ceramic. It was all metal and plastic. She noticed a pack of cigarettes and looked for a lighter. But there was none.

He followed her gaze. Edwin said quickly, “Don’t worry. I don’t smoke, not anymore. Just needed a few of those to point the finger at that bitchy Alicia. For you, Kayleigh, no cigarettes and no liquor. I’m clean. And I never did drugs—like that friend of yours Mr. Bobby Prescott.”

Sweat poured, her skin crawled. “This is hopeless, Edwin. You don’t think ten thousand people are going to be looking for me?”

“Maybe not. They might think you ran off with somebody you realized loved you and cared for you. They’ll still be thinking Alicia was behind it all, killed Bobby and tried to kill you.”

Was he that far removed from reality?

“But even if they are looking, they aren’t going to find us. They think we’re in Monterey, hiding out. Two hundred miles away. This bitch I went out with for a while told them that’s where we’d be. I knew she’d turn me in. I set that up a long time ago. We’re completely alone here…. On the drive? There wasn’t a single helicopter or roadblock all the way from Fresno. If they thought we were headed here, they could’ve shut down Forty-one in a minute. No, Kayleigh, they’ll never find us.”

“You put this all together … to, what? Win me over?”

“To make you see reason. Who else would go to all this trouble, except somebody who loved you?”

“But … the congressman? I don’t understand.”

He laughed. “Oh, yeah, that was interesting. I learned a lesson there. I’ve stopped posting things online. That’s how Simesky found out about you and me. You didn’t believe me when I said the whole world was trying to exploit you.”

You and me …

“But something good came out of that. I did see somebody outside my house on Saturday night. It was Simesky or that Babbage woman but at the time I thought it was just kids. But that got me thinking. I’d set it up so that it looked like Alicia had been spying on me. I planted some evidence that’d make the police think she was the stalker. Sometimes it’s lucky how things work.”

Then Edwin grew impatient. He looked at her hair, her breasts, her legs. “Well, come on. You know what it’s time for.” He glanced toward the rumpled bed, beside which was a Bose iPod player. “You see that? I’ve got fifty of your concerts I recorded. I have a nice recorder. I saved up to buy it. We’ll play your concerts while we, you know….” His face blossomed with concern. “Oh, don’t worry. Yeah, I recorded them but I never sold the songs or shared them with anybody. It was just for me … and now for us.”