Love me to death

here?”

“Nothing. No other houses. I couldn’t even see the road.”

“I’ll find a way.”

“No shoes.” She gestured to their feet. “There’s snow.”

“I’d rather die out there than live in here,” Lucy said. She stared at her handcuff. Getting out wasn’t going to be easy.

* * *

I hate that female.

She is defiant. Others had been defiant on occasion, but there is something in this one that grates on me.

I walk through the snow to the barn. The cold clears my head. Memories of punishment relax me.

I want to break her. I do not know if it’s possible. The way she looked at me … something in her eyes. She is not like the others.

I knew all along that she was different. For years I had picked very specific women. Of the twelve, ten were broken before they died. Two died during training.

I suspect this new one will not get to training. I do not like her.

My father may have been right. Some women should never have been born.

My father tried to act like a man, but he wasn’t. He let his wife get a job, and where did that get him? She left. She left because she didn’t need him.

I remember that morning. She woke me from sleep and told me to pack. That we were leaving Dad. I asked why. She said he’d hit her and she was afraid of him. I told her she deserved it. She thought she was better than Dad and that’s why he hit her. She cried and told me I was not her son.

I wish I were not. She was an aberration. She used to be happy cooking dinner, cleaning the house, walking me to school. Then she got a job. And made friends that didn’t include me and Dad. She left us in her heart before she left us in life.

Good riddance. I’m glad she died. The cancer ate her heart, ate her soul, took her body and made it hurt.

I went to the funeral and told her bitch that I was glad she was dead. The woman screamed at me and tried to have me arrested. I walked out.

My father was weak. Drinking. A foolish man’s elixir. Had he been a real man, he would have kept his job and provided for his family. Mom would never have worked; she would never have left me.

FORTY-ONE

“Twenty-six unsolved residential arson fires in Baltimore during those years,” Sean told Hans. “Two fatalities.”

“How many were within five miles of the first Wilmington house or his second house after his mother left?”

Sean typed rapidly. “One five miles from his mother’s house; fourteen within five miles of his father’s rental.”

“I’m surprised the investigators didn’t nail him. They look at teen boys in the area when there are clusters like this.”

Sean was growing increasingly frustrated. His head ached and he itched to get in his car and look for Lucy- even though he knew it was futile. He had always been a slave to computer science; anything could be found using the Internet. And normally, he was patient with research. But today? After Lucy had been missing for fourteen hours? He felt helpless and hopelessly lost. He wanted Lucy back safe, and he didn’t see them getting any closer to finding her.

Dillon came downstairs. He walked to the coffeepot and poured a cup. “You should have woke me,” he told Sean, then asked, “Any news?”

“No. I want to find out more about his ex-wife, but can’t find her anywhere,” Hans said.

“If she came to realize that she’d married a psycho,” Sean said, “she probably changed her name and moved far away.”

“You’re right.”

Sean didn’t want to be right.

Hans flipped through files. “It’s odd that he went into teaching, which is considered by many to be a female profession unless you’re a college professor. I would think his misogynist tendencies coupled with his computer science background would put him in the science and technology field.”

Sean could hold it in no longer. “How the fuck is this going to help us find Lucy?” He jumped up and left the room.

Dillon watched Sean as he slammed the front door, and his face fell. “He’s right,” Dillon said, pained. “But I don’t know what else to do until Noah gets Miller’s financials.”

“He reminds me of your brother Jack,” Hans said.

Dillon frowned. He didn’t see that at all. “Jack?”

“A man of action. His reliance on technology is because he understands it. For him, it’s usually expedient-he can find anything he wants. Until now.”

“I still don’t see Jack in Sean,” Dillon said. “Jack is a mercenary. A soldier. He takes orders and gives them. Sean is not a soldier.”

“No, he doesn’t take orders well. I didn’t say he was Jack’s twin brother.”

Dillon raised his eyebrow. “Touche.”

“You and I find answers in the give and take of psychology. We figure it out based on what we know about people and human nature. Sean and Jack? They see facts, they act. Sean is just … more modern and refined than your brother.”

“But he’s right about this-none of this is getting us closer to finding Lucy.”

“It is. We’re close.”

Sean stood in the cold, the air thick but the snowfall light. It would get worse. He called Duke, who answered on the first ring.

“Any news?”

“We don’t know where Lucy is,” Sean said.

“I’m doing everything I can-”

“Any way I can, legal or otherwise, I need to find out about Miller’s ex-wife. She was Rosemarie Nylander, then-”

“I have her stats here. We haven’t been able to find her under her maiden or married name.”

“She very likely changed her name.”

“I’m sure you know this, but-” He stopped. “The FBI isn’t going to appreciate our involvement.”

“Who cares? Hans Vigo thinks if we can find and talk to Nylander we’ll find out where this freak is. I need your help.”

“I won’t be able to get you out of this if you get caught with information that you shouldn’t legally have.”

“I never asked you to.”

“What state?”

“Virginia, where Nylander was born and went to college, or Delaware, where they lived during their marriage.”

“I’ll call back in ten minutes.”

Sean hung up. Duke knew what Sean needed-the technical specs on the court computers. Once he knew