NO SECOND CHANCE Books by Harlan Coben

deal breaker

drop shot

fade away

back spin

one false move

the final detail

darkest fear

tell No one

gone for good NO SECOND CHANCE

A NOVEL BY

HARLAN COBEN This edition published 2003 by BCA

by arrangement with Orion Books

an imprint of The Orion Publishing Group

Hardback CN 114036 Paperback CN 114127

Copyright ÂŠ Harlan Coben 2003 All rights reserved

The right of Harlan Coben to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

Printed and bound in Germany by GGP Media, Possneck

NO SECOND CHANCE chapter 1

Wh(?n the first bullet hit my chest, I thought of my daughter.

At least, that is what I want to believe. I lost consciousness pretty fast. And, if you want to get technical about it, I don't even remember being shot. I know that I lost a lot of blood. I know that a second bullet skimmed the top of my head, though I was probably already out by then. I know that my heart stopped. But I still like to think that as I lay dying, I thought of Tara.

FYI: I saw no bright light or tunnel. Or if I did, I don't remember that either.

Tara, my daughter, is only six months old. She was lying in her crib. I wonder if the gunfire frightened her. It must have. She probably began to cry. I wonder if the familiar albeit grating sound of her cries somehow sliced through my haze, if on some level I actually heard her. But again I have no memory of it.

What I do remember, however, was the moment Tara was born. I remember Monica--that's Tara's mother--bearing down for one last push. I remember the head appearing. I was the first to see my daughter. We all know about life's forks in the road. We all know about opening one door and closing another, life cycles, the changes in seasons. But the moment your child is born . . . it's beyond surreal. You have walked through a Star Tre/fe-like portal, a full-fledged reality transformer. Everything is different. You are different, a simple element hit with a startling catalyst and metamorphosed into one far more complex. Your world is gone; it shrinks down to the dimensions of--in this case, anyway--a six-pound fifteen-ounce mass.

Fatherhood confuses me. Yes, I know that with only six months on I Harlan Coben

the job, I am an amateur. My best friend, Lenny, has four kids. A girl and three boys. His oldest, Marianne, is ten, his youngest just turned one. With his face permanently set on happily harried and the floor of his SUV permanently stained with congealed fast food, Lenny reminds me that I know nothing yet. I agree. But when I get seriously lost or afraid in the realm of raising a child, I look at the helpless bundle in the crib and she looks up at me and I wonder what I would not do to protect her. I would lay down my life in a second. And truth be told, if push came to shove, I would lay down yours too.

So I like to think that as the two bullets pierced my body, as I collapsed onto the linoleum of my kitchen floor with a half-eaten granola bar clutched in my hand, as I lay immobile in a spreading puddle of my own blood, and yes, even as my heart stopped beating, that I still tried to do something to protect my daughter.

I came to in the dark.

I had no idea where I was at first, but then I heard the beeping coming from my right. A familiar sound. I did not move. I merely listened to the beeps. My brain felt as if it'd been marinated in molasses. The first impulse to break through was a primitive one: thirst. I craved water. I had never known a throat could feel so dry. I tried to call out, but my tongue had been dry-caked to the bottom of my mouth.

A figure entered the room. When I tried to sit up, hot pain ripped like a knife down my neck. My head fell back. And again, there was darkness.

When I awoke again, it was daytime. Harsh streaks of sunlight slashed through the Venetian blinds. I blinked through them. Part of me wanted to raise my hand and block the rays, but exhaustion would not let the command travel. My throat was still impossibly parched.

I heard a movement and suddenly there was someone standing over me. I looked up and saw a nurse. The perspective, so different from the one I was used to, threw me. Nothing felt right. I was supposed to be the one standing looking down, not the other way around. A white hat--one of those small, harshly triangular numbers--sat like a bird's nest on the nurse's head. I've spent a great deal of my life working in a wide variety of hospitals, but I'm not sure I've ever seen a hat like that outside of TV or the movies. The nurse was heavyset and black. no second chance 3

"Dr. Seidman?"

Her voice was warm maple syrup. I managed a very slight nod.

The nurse must have read minds because she already had a cup of water in her hand. She put the straw between my lips and I sucked greedily.

"Slow down," she said gently.

I was going to ask where I was, but that seemed pretty obvious. I opened my mouth to find out what had happened, but again she was one step ahead of me.

"I'll go get the doctor," she said, heading for the door. "You just relax now."

I croaked, "My family . . ."

"I'll be right back. Try not to worry."

I let my eyes wander about the room. My vision had that medicated, shower-curtain haze. Still, there were enough stimuli getting through to make certain deductions. I was in a typical hospital room. That much was obvious. There was a drip bag and IV pump on my left, the tube snaking down to my arm. The fluorescent bulbs buzzed almost, but not quite, imperceptibly. A small TV on a swinging arm jutted out from the upper right-hand corner.

A few feet past the foot of the bed, there was a large glass window. I squinted but could not see through it. Still, I was probably being monitored. That meant I was in an ICU. That meant that whatever was wrong with me was something pretty bad.

The top of my skull itched, and I could feel a pull at my hair. Bandaged, I bet. I tried to check myself out, but my head really did not want to cooperate. Dull pain quietly boomed inside me, though I couldn't tell from where it originated. My limbs felt heavy, my chest encased in lead.

"Dr. Seidman?"

I flicked my eyes toward the door. A tiny woman in surgical scrubs complete with the shower cap stepped into the room. The top of the mask was untied and dangled down her neck. I am thirty-four years old. She looked about the same.

"I'm Dr. Heller," she said, stepping closer. "Ruth Heller." Giving me her first name. Professional courtesy, no doubt. Ruth Heller gave me a probing stare. I tried to focus. My brain was still sluggish, but I could 4 Harlan Coben

feel it sputtering to life. "You are at St. Elizabeth Hospital," she said in a properly grave voice.

The door behind her opened and a man stepped inside. It was hard to see him clearly through the shower-curtain haze, but I don't think I knew him. The man crossed his arms and leaned against the wall with practiced casualness. Not a doctor, I thought. You work with them long enough, you can tell.

Dr. Heller gave the man a cursory glance and then she turned her full attention back to me.

"What happened?" I asked.

"You were shot," she said. Then added: "Twice."

She let that hang for a moment. I glanced toward the man against the wall. He hadn't moved. I opened my mouth to say something, but Ruth Heller pressed on. "One bullet grazed the top of your head. The bullet literally scraped off your scalp, which, as you probably know, is incredibly rich with blood."

Yes, I knew. Serious scalp wounds bled like beheadings. Okay, I thought, that explained the itch on top of my head. When Ruth Heller hesitated, I prompted her. "And the second bullet?"

Heller let out a breath. "That one was a bit more complicated."

I waited.

"The bullet entered your chest and nicked the pericardial sac. That caused a large supply of blood to leak into the space between your heart and the sac. The EMTs had trouble locating your vital signs. We had to crack your chest--"

"Doc?" the leaning man interrupted--and for a moment, I thought he was talking to me. Ruth Heller stopped, clearly annoyed. The man peeled himself off the wall. "Can you do the details later? Time is of the essence here."

She gave him a scowl, but there wasn't much behind it. "I'll stay here and observe," she said to the man, "if that's not a problem."

Dr. Heller faded back and now the man loomed over me. His head was too big for his shoulders so that you feared his neck would collapse from the weight of it. His hair was crew cut all around, except in the front, where it hung down in a Caesar line above his eyes. A soul patch, an ugly smear of growth, sat on his chin like a burrowing insect. All in all, he looked like a member of a boy band gone to serious seed. He no second chance ^

smiled down at me, but there was no warmth behind it. "I'm Detective Bob Regan of the Kasselton Police Department," he said. "I know you're confused right now."

"My family--" I began.

"I'll get to that," he interrupted. "But right now, I need to ask you some questions, okay? Before we get into the details of what happened."

He waited for a response. I tried my best to clear the cobwebs and said, "Okay."

"What's the last thing you remember?"

I scanned my memory banks. I remembered waking up that morning, getting dressed. I remembered looking in on Tara. I remembered turning the knob on her black-n-white mobile, a gift from a colleague who insisted it would help stimulate a baby's brain or something. The mobile hadn't moved or bleated out its tinny song. The batteries were dead. I'd made a mental note to put in new ones. I headed downstairs after that.

"Eating a granola bar," I said.

Regan nodded as if he'd expected this answer. "You were in the kitchen?"

"Yes. By the sink."

"And then?"

I tried harder, but nothing came. I shook my head. "I woke up once before. At night. I was here, I think."

"Nothing else?"

I reached out again but to no avail. "No, nothing."

Regan flipped out a pad. "Like the doc here told you, you were shot twice. You have no recollection of seeing a gun or hearing a shot or anything like that?"

"No."

"That's understandable, I guess. You were in a bad way, Marc. The EMTs thought you were a goner."

My throat felt dry again. "Where are Tara and Monica?"

"Stay with me, Marc." Regan was staring down at the pad, not at me. I felt the dread begin to press down on my chest. "Did you hear a window break?"

I felt groggy. I tried to read the label on the drip bag to see what they were numbing me with. No go. Pain medication, at the very least. 6 Harlan Coben

Probably morphine in the IV pump. 1 tried to fight through the effects. "No," I said.

"You're sure? We found a broken window near the rear of the house. It may have been how the perpetrator gained entry."

"I don't remember a window breaking," I said. "Do you know who--"

Regan cut me off. "Not yet, no. That's why I'm here asking these questions. To find out who did this." He looked up from his pad. "Do you have any enemies?"

Did he really just ask me that? I tried to sit up, tried to gain some sort of angle on him, but there was no way that was going to happen. I did not like being the patient, on the wrong end of the bed, if you will. They say doctors make the worst patients. This sudden role reversal is probably why.

"I want to know about my wife and daughter."

"I understand that," Regan said, and something in his tone ran a cold finger across my heart. "But you can't afford the distraction, Marc. Not right yet. You want to be helpful, right? Then you need to stay with me here." He went back to the pad. "Now, what about enemies?"

Arguing with him any further seemed futile or even harmful, so I grudgingly acquiesced. "Someone who would shoot me?"

"Yes."

"No, no one."

"And your wife?" His eyes settled hard on me. A favorite image of Monica--her face lighting up when we first saw Raymondkill Falls, the way she threw her arms around me in mock fear as the water crashed around us--rose like an apparition. "Did she have enemies?"

I looked at him. "Monica?"

Ruth Heller stepped forward. "I think that might be enough for now."

"What happened to Monica?" I asked.

Dr. Heller met up with Detective Regan, standing shoulder to shoulder. Both looked at me. Heller started to protest again, but I stopped her.

"Don't give me this protect-the-patient crap," I tried to shout, fear and fury battling against whatever had put my brain in this fuzz. "Tell me what happened to my wife."

"She's dead," Detective Regan said. Just like that. Dead. My wife. Monica. It was as if I hadn't heard him. The word couldn't reach me. no second chance /

"When the police broke into your home, you had both been shot. They were able to save you. But it was too late for your wife. I'm

sorry."

There was another quick flash now--Monica at Martha's Vineyard, on the beach, tan bathing suit, that black hair whipping across those cheekbones, giving me the razor-sharp smile. I blinked it away. "And Tara?"

"Your daughter," Regan began with a quick throat-clear. He looked at his pad again, but I don't think he planned on writing anything down. "She was home that morning, correct? I mean, at the time of the incident?"

"Yes, of course. Where is she?"

Regan closed the pad with a snap. "She was not at the scene when we arrived."

My lungs turned to stone. "I don't understand."

"We originally hoped that maybe she was in the care of a family member or friend. A baby-sitter even, but..." His voice faded.

"Are you telling me you don't know where Tara is?"

There was no hesitation this time. "Yes, that's correct."

It felt as if a giant hand were pushing down on my chest. I squeezed my eyes shut and fell back. "How long?" I asked.

"Has she been missing?"

"Yes."

Dr. Heller started speaking too quickly. "You have to understand. You were very seriously injured. We were not optimistic you would survive. You were on a respirator. A lung collapsed. You also contracted sepsis. You're a doctor, so I know I don't have to explain to you how serious that is. We tried to slow down the meds, help you wake up--"

"How long?" I asked again.

She and Regan exchanged another glance, and then Heller said something that ripped the air out of me all over again. "You've been out for twelve days." chapter 2

"WeVe doin^ <?ll we can," Regan said in a voice that sounded too rehearsed, as if he'd been standing over my bed while I was unconscious, working on his delivery. "As I told you, we were not sure we had a missing child at first. We lost valuable time there, but we've recovered now. Tara's photo has been sent out to every police station, airport, tollbooth plaza, bus and train station--anything like that within a hundred-mile radius. We've run background profiles on similar abduction cases, see if we can find a pattern or a suspect."

"Twelve days," I repeated.

"We have a trace on your various phones--home, business, cell--"

"Why?"

"In case someone calls in a ransom demand," he said.

"Have there been any calls?"

"Not yet, no."

My head dropped back to the pillow. Twelve days. I'd been lying in this bed for twelve days while my baby girl was ... I pushed the thought away.

Regan scratched at his beard. "Do you remember what Tara was wearing that morning?"

I did. I had developed something of a morning routine--wake up early, tiptoe toward Tara's crib, stare down. A baby is not all joy. I know that. I know that there are moments of mind-numbing boredom. I know that there are nights when her screams work on my nerve endings like a cheese grater. I don't want to glorify life with an infant. But I liked my new morning routine. Looking down at Tara's tiny form fortified me somehow. More than that, this act was, I guess, a form of rap no second chance 9

ture. Some people find rapture in a house of worship. Me--and yeah, I know how corny this sounds--I found rapture in that crib.

"A pink one-piece with black penguins," I said. "Monica got it at Baby Gap."

He jotted it down. "And Monica?"

"What about her?"

His face was back in the pad. "What was she wearing?"

"Jeans," I said, remembering the way they slid over Monica's hips, "and a red blouse."

Regan jotted some more.

I said, "Are there--I mean, do you have any leads?"

"We're still investigating all avenues."

"That's not what I asked."

Regan just looked at me. There was too much weight in that stare.

My daughter. Out there. Alone. For twelve days. I thought of her eyes, the warm light only a parent sees, and I said something stupid. "She's alive."

Regan tilted his head like a puppy hearing a new sound.

"Don't give up," I said.

"We won't." He continued with the curious look.

"It's just that . . . are you a parent, Detective Regan?"

"Two girls," he said.

"It's stupid, but I'd know." The same way I knew the world would never be the same when Tara was born. "I'd know," I said again.

He did not reply. I realized that what I was saying--especially coming from a man who scoffs at notions of ESP or the supernatural--was ridiculous. I knew that this "sense" merely came from want. You want to believe so badly that your brain rearranges what it sees. But I clung to it anyway. Right or wrong, it felt like a lifeline.

"We'll need some more information from you," Regan said. "About you, your wife, friends, finances--"

"Later." It was Dr. Heller again. She moved forward as if to block me from his gaze. Her voice was firm. "He needs to rest."

"No, now," I said to her, upping the firm-o-meter a notch past hers. "We need to find my daughter."

Monica had been buried at the Portman family plot on her father's estate. I missed her funeral, of course. I don't know how I felt about 10 Harlan Coben

that, but then again, my feelings for my wife, in those stark moments when I was honest with myself, have always been muddled. Monica had that beauty of privilege, what with the too-fine cheekbones, straight silk-black hair, and that country-club lockjaw that both annoyed and aroused. Our marriage was an old-fashioned one--shotgun. Okay, that's an exaggeration. Monica was pregnant. I was fence-sitting. The upcoming arrival tilted me into the matrimonial pasture.

I heard the funeral details from Carson Portman, Monica's uncle and the only member of her family who kept in touch with us. Monica had loved him dearly. Carson sat at my hospital bedside with his hands folded in his lap. He looked very much like your favorite college professor--the thick-lensed spectacles, the nearly shedding tweed coat, and the overgrown shock of Albert Einstein-meets-Don King hair. But his brown eyes glistened as he told me in his sad baritone that Edgar, Monica's father, had made sure that my wife's funeral was a "small, tasteful affair."

Of that, I had no doubt. The small part, at least.

Over the next few days I had my share of visitors at the hospital. My mother--everyone called her Honey--exploded into my room every morning as if fuel propelled. She wore Reebok sneakers of pure white. Her sweatsuit was blue with gold trim, as if she coached the St. Louis Rams. Her hair, though neatly coifed, had the brittle of too many colorings, and there was the whiff of a last cigarette about her. Mom's makeup did little to disguise the anguish of losing her only grandchild. She had amazing energy, staying by my bedside day after day and managing to exude a steady stream of hysteria. This was good. It was as though she was, in part, being hysterical for me, and thus, in a strange way, her eruptions kept me calm.

Despite the room's nearly supernova heat--and my constant protestations--Mom would put an extra blanket over me when I was asleep. I woke up one time--my body drenched in sweat, naturally--to hear my mother telling the black nurse with the formal hat about my previous stay at St. Elizabeth's when I was only seven.

"He had salmonella," Honey stated in a conspiratorial whisper that was only slightly louder than a bullhorn. "You never smelled diarrhea like that. It was just pouring out of him. His stench practically seeped into the wallpaper."

"He ain't all roses now either," the nurse replied. no second chance 11

The two women shared a laugh.

On Day Two of my recovery, Mom was standing over my bed when I awoke.

"Remember this?" she said.

She was holding a stuffed Oscar the Grouch someone had given me during that salmonella stay. The green had faded to a light mint. She looked at the nurse. "This is Marc's Oscar," she explained.

"Mom," I said.

She turned her attention back to me. The mascara was a little too heavy today, crinkling into the wrinkle lines. "Oscar kept you company back then, remember? He helped you get better."

I rolled and then closed my eyes. A memory came to me. I had gotten the salmonella from raw eggs. My father used to add them into milkshakes for the protein. I remember the way pure terror had gripped me when I'd first learned that I would have to stay in the hospital overnight. My father, who had recently ruptured his Achilles tendon playing tennis, was in a cast and constant pain. But he saw my fear and as always, he made the sacrifice. He worked all that day at the plant and spent all night in a chair by my hospital bed. I stayed at St. Elizabeth's for ten days. My father slept in that chair every night of them.

Mom suddenly turned away, and I could see she was remembering the same thing. The nurse quickly excused herself. I put a hand on my mother's back. She didn't move, but I could feel her shudder. She stared down at the faded Oscar in her hands. I slowly took it from her.

"Thank you," I said.

Mom wiped her eyes. Dad, I knew, would not come to the hospital this time, and while I am sure my mother had told him what had happened, there was no way to know if he even understood. My father had had his first stroke when he was forty-one years old--one year after staying those nights with me at the hospital. I was eight at the time.

I also have a younger sister, Stacy, who is either a "substance abuser" (for the more politically correct) or "crack-head" (for the more accurate). I sometimes look at old pictures from before my dad's stroke, the ones with the young, confident family of four and the shaggy dog and the well-groomed lawn and the basketball hoop and the coal-overloaded, lighter fluid-saturated barbecue. I look for hints of the future in my sister's front-teeth-missing smile, her shadow self perhaps, a sense of foreboding. But I see none. We still have the house, but it's like a sagging 12 Harlan Coben

movie prop. Dad is still alive, but when he fell, everything shattered Humpty-Dumpty style. Especially Stacy.

Stacy had not visited or even called, but nothing she does surprises me anymore.

My mother finally turned to face me. I gripped the faded Oscar a little tighter as a thought struck me anew: It was just us again. Dad was pretty much a vegetable. Stacy was hollowed out, gone. I reached out and took Mom's hand, feeling both the warmth and the more recent thickening of her skin. We stayed like that until the door opened. The same nurse leaned into the room.

Mom straightened up and said, "Marc also played with dolls,"

"Action figures," I said, quick on the correction. "They were action figures, not dolls."

My best friend, Lenny, and his wife, Cheryl, also stopped by the hospital every day. Lenny Marcus is a big-time trial lawyer, though he also handles my small-time stuff like the time I fought a speeding ticket and the closing on our house. When he graduated and began working for the county prosecutor, friends and opponents quickly dubbed Lenny "the Bulldog" because of his aggressive courtroom behavior. Somewhere along the line, it was decided that the name was too mild for Lenny, so now they called him "Cujo." I've known Lenny since elementary school. I'm the godfather of his son Kevin. And Lenny is Tara's godfather.

I haven't slept much. I lie at night and stare at the ceiling and count the beeps and listen to the hospital night sounds and try very much not to let my mind wander to my little daughter and the endless array of possibilities. I am not always successful. The mind, I have learned, is indeed a dark, snake-infested pit.

Detective Regan visited later with a possible lead.

"Tell me about your sister," he began.

"Why?" I said too quickly. Before he could elaborate, I held up my hand to stop him. I understood. My sister was an addict. Where drugs roamed, so too did a certain criminal element. "Were we robbed?" I asked.

"We don't think so. Nothing seems to be missing, but the place was tossed."

"Tossed?"

"Someone made a mess. Any thoughts on why?"

"No." no second chance 13

"So tell me about your sister."

"You have Stacy's record?" I asked.

"We do."

"I'm not sure what I can add."

"You two are estranged, correct?"

Estranged. Did that apply to Stacy and me? "I love her," I said slowly.

"And when was the last time you saw her?"

"Six months ago."

"When Tara was born?"

"Yes."

"Where?"

"Where did I see her?"

"Yes."

"Stacy came to the hospital," I said.

"To see her niece?"

"Yes."

"What happened during that visit?"

"Stacy was high. She wanted to hold the baby."

"You refused?"

"That's right."

"Did she get angry?"

"She barely reacted. My sister is pretty flat when she's stoned."

"But you threw her out?"

"I told her she couldn't be a part of Tara's life until she was clean."

"I see," he said. "You were hoping that would force her back into rehab?"

I might have chuckled. "No, not really."

"I'm not sure I understand."

I wondered how to put this. I thought of the smile in the family photo, the one without the front teeth. "We've threatened Stacy with worse," I said. "The truth is that my sister won't quit. The drugs are part of her."

"So you hold out no hope for recovery?"

There was no way I was about to voice that. "I didn't trust her with my daughter," I said. "Let's leave it at that."

Regan headed over to the window and looked out. "When did you move into your current residence?" 14 Marian Coben

"Monica and I bought the house four months ago."

"Not far from where you both grew up, no?"

"That's right."

"Had you two known each other long?"

I was puzzled by the line of questioning. "No."

"Even though you grew up in the same town?"

"We traveled in different circles."

"I see," he said. "And just so I have it straight, you bought your house four months ago and you hadn't seen your sister in six months, correct?"

"Correct."

"So your sister has never visited you at your current residence?"

"That's right."

Regan turned to me. "We found a set of Stacy's fingerprints at your house."

I said nothing.

"You don't seem surprised, Marc."

"Stacy is an addict. I don't think she's capable of shooting me and kidnapping my daughter, but I've underestimated how low she could sink before. Did you check her apartment?"

"No one has seen her since you were shot," he said.

I closed my eyes.

"We don't think your sister could pull off something like this by herself," he went on. "She might have had an accomplice--a boyfriend, a dealer, someone who knew your wife was from a wealthy family. Do you have any thoughts?"

"No," I said. "So, what, you think this whole thing was a kidnapping plot?"

Regan started clawing at his soul patch again. Then he gave a small shrug.

"But they tried to kill us both," I went on. "How do you collect ransom from dead parents?"

"They could have been so doped up that they made a mistake," he said. "Or maybe they thought they could extort money from Tara's grandfather."

"So why haven't they yet?"

Regan did not reply. But I knew the answer. The heat, especially after no second chance 1^

the shooting, would be too much for crack-heads. Crack-heads don't handle conflict well. It is one of the reasons they snort or shoot themselves up in the first place--to escape, to fade away, to avoid, to dive down into the white. The media would be all over this case. The police would be making inquiries. Crack-heads would freak under that kind of pressure. They would flee, abandon everything. And they would get rid of all the evidence.

But the ransom demand came two days later.

Now that I had regained consciousness, my recovery from the gunshot wounds was proceeding with surprising smoothness. It could be that I was focused on getting better or that lying in a quasi-catatonic state for twelve days had given my injuries time to heal. Or it could be that I was suffering from a pain way beyond what the physical could inflict. I would think of Tara and the fear of the unknown would stop my breath. I would think of Monica, of her lying dead, and steel claws would shred me from within.

I wanted out.

My body still ached, but I pressed Ruth Heller to release me. Noting that I was proving the adage about doctors making the worst patients, she reluctantly gave me the okay to go home. We agreed that a physical therapist would come by every day. A nurse would pop by periodically, just to be on the safe side.

On the morning of my departure from St. Elizabeth, my mother was at the house--the former crime scene--getting it "ready" for me, whatever that meant. Oddly enough, I wasn't afraid to go back there. A house is mortar and brick. I didn't think the sight of it alone would move me, but maybe I was just blocking.

Lenny helped me pack and get dressed. He is tall and wiry with a face darkened by a Homer Simpson five-o'clock shadow that pops up six minutes after he shaves. As a child Lenny wore Coke-bottle glasses and too-thick corduroy, even in the summer. His curly hair had a habit of getting outgrown to the point where he'd start resembling a stray poodle. Now he keeps the curls religiously close cropped. He had laser eye surgery two years ago, so the glasses are gone. His suits lean toward the upscale side.

"You sure you won't stay with us?" Lenny said. 16 Harlan Coben

"You have four kids," I reminded him.

"Oh yeah, right." He paused. "Can I stay with you?"

I tried to smile.

"Seriously," Lenny said, "you shouldn't be alone in that house."

"I'll be fine."

"Cheryl cooked you some dinners. She put them in the freezer."

"That was nice of her."

"She's still the world's most godawful cook," Lenny said.

"I didn't say I was going to eat them."

Lenny looked away, busying himself with the already packed bag. I watched him. We have known each other a long time, since Mrs. Rob erts's first-grade class, so it probably did not surprise him when I said, "You want to tell me what's up?"

He'd been waiting for the opening and thus quickly exploited it. "Look, I'm your lawyer, right?"

"Right."

"So I want to give you some legal advice."

"I'm listening."

"I should have said something earlier. But I knew you wouldn't listen. Now, well, now it's a different story, I think."

"Lenny?"

"Yeah?'

"What are you talking about?"

Despite his physical enhancements, I still saw Lenny as a kid. It made it hard to take his advice too seriously. Don't get me wrong. I knew that he was smart. I had celebrated with him when he got his acceptance to Princeton and then Columbia Law. We took the SATs together and were in the same AP chemistry class our junior year. But the Lenny I saw was the one I desperately cruised with on muggy Friday and Saturday nights. We used his dad's wood-paneled station wagon-- not exactly a "babe trawler"--and tried to hit the parties. We were always let in but never really welcome, members of that high school majority I call the Great Unseen. We would stand in corners, holding a beer, bopping our heads to the music, trying hard to be noticed. We never were. Most nights we ended up eating a grilled cheese at the Heritage Diner or, better, at the soccer field behind Benjamin Franklin Middle School, lying on our backs, checking out the stars. It was easier to talk, even with your best friend, when you were looking at the stars. no second chance 17

"Okay," Lenny said, overgesturing as was his custom, "it's like this: I don't want you talking to the cops anymore without my being present."

I frowned. "For real?"

"Maybe it's nothing, but I've seen cases like this. Not like this, but you know what I mean. The first suspect is always family."

"Meaning my sister."

"No, meaning close family. Or closer family, if possible."

"Are you saying the police suspect me?"

"I don't know, I really don't." He paused but not for very long. "Okay, yeah, probably."

"But I was shot, remember? My kid was the one taken."

"Right, and that cuts both ways."

"How do you figure that?"

"As the days pass, they're going to start suspecting you more and more."

"Why? "I asked.

"I don't know. That's just how it works. Look, the FBI handles kidnappings. You know that, right? Once a child is gone twenty-four hours, they assume it's interstate and the case is theirs."

"So?"

"So for the first, what, ten days or so, they had a ton of agents here. They monitored your phones and waited for the ransom call, that kinda thing. But the other day, they pretty much pulled up stakes. That's normal, of course. They can't wait indefinitely, so they scale back to an agent or two. And their thinking shifted too. Tara became less a possible kidnapping-for-ransom and more a straight-on abduction. But my guess is, they still have the taps on the phones. I haven't asked yet, but I will. They'll claim they're leaving them there in case a ransom demand is eventually made. But they'll also be hoping to hear you say something incriminating."

"So?"

"So be careful," Lenny said. "Remember that your phones--home, biz, cell--are probably tapped."

"And again I ask: So? I didn't do anything."

"Didn't do ... ?" Lenny waved his hands as if preparing to take flight. "Look, just be careful is all. This might be hard for you to believe, but--and try not to gasp when I say this--the police have been known to twist and distort evidence." 18 Harlan Coben

"You're confusing me. Are you saying I'm a suspect simply because I'm the father and husband?"

"Yes," Lenny said. "And no."

"Well, okay, thanks, that clears it up."

A phone next to my bed rang. I was on the wrong side of the room. "You mind?" I said.

Lenny picked it up. "Dr. Seidman's room." His face clouded over as he listened. He spat out the words "Hold on," and handed the phone to me, as if it might have germs. I gave him a puzzled look and said, "Hello?"

"Hello, Marc. This is Edgar Portman."

Monica's father. That explained Lenny's reaction. Edgar's voice was, as always, way too formal. Some people weigh their words. A select few, like my father-in-law, take each one and put it on a scale before letting it leave their mouths.

I was momentarily taken aback. "Hello, Edgar," I said stupidly. "How are you?"

"I'm fine, thank you. I feel remiss, of course, for not having called you earlier. I understood from Carson that you were busy recuperating from your wounds. I felt it best if I let you be."

"Thoughtful," I said with nary a whiff of sarcasm.

"Yes, well, I understand you're being released today."

"That's right."

Edgar cleared his throat, which seemed out of character for him. "I was wondering if perhaps you could stop by the house."

The house. Meaning his. "Today?"

"As soon as possible, yes. And alone please."

There was silence. Lenny gave me a puzzled look.

"Is something wrong, Edgar?" I asked.

"I have a car waiting downstairs, Marc. We'll talk more when you arrive."

And then, before I could say another word, he was gone.

The car, a black Lincoln Town Car, was indeed waiting.

Lenny wheeled me outside. I was familiar with this area, of course. I had grown up scant miles from St. Elizabeth. When I was five years old, my father had rushed me to the emergency room here (twelve stitches) no second chance 19

and when I was seven, well, you already know too much about my salmonella visit. I'd gone to medical school and did my residency at what was then called Columbia Presbyterian in New York, but I returned to St. Elizabeth for a fellowship in ophthalmology for reconstruction.

Yes, I am a plastic surgeon, but not in the way you think. I do the occasional nose job, but you won't find me working with sacks of silicone or any of that. Not that I'm judging. It just isn't what I do.

I work in pediatric reconstructive surgery with my former medical school classmate, a fireball from the Bronx named Zia Leroux. We work for a group called One World WrapAid. Actually, Zia and I founded it. We take care of children, mostly overseas, who suffer deformities either through birth, poverty, or conflict. We travel a lot. I have worked on facial smashes in Sierra Leone, on cleft palates in Upper Mongolia, on Crouzon's in Cambodia, on burn victims in the Bronx. Like most people in my field, I've done extensive training. I've studied ENT--ears, nose, and throat--with a year of reconstructive, plastics, oral, and, as I mentioned above, ophthalmology. Zia's training history is similar, though she's stronger with the maxillofacial.

You may think of us as do-gooders. You'd be wrong. I had a choice. I could do boob jobs or tuck back the skin of those who were already too beautiful--or I could help wounded, poverty-stricken children. I chose the latter, not so much to help the disadvantaged, but alas, because that is where the cool cases lie. Most reconstructive surgeons are, at heart, puzzle lovers. We're weird. We get jazzed on circus-sideshow congenital anomalies and huge tumors. You know those medical textbooks that have hideous facial deformities that you have to dare yourself to look at? Zia and I love that stuff. We get off on repairing it--taking what's shattered and making it whole--even more.

The fresh air tickled my lungs. The sun shone as if it were the first day, mocking my gloom. I tilted my face toward the warmth and let it soothe me. Monica used to like to do that. She claimed that it "de stressed" her. The lines in her face would disappear as if the rays were gentle masseurs. I kept my eyes closed. Lenny waited in silence, giving me the time.

I have always thought of myself as an overly sensitive man. I cry too easily at dumb movies. My emotions are easily manipulated. But with my father, I never cried. And now, with this terrible blow, I felt--I don't 20 Harlan Coben

know--beyond tears. A classic defense mechanism, I assumed. 1 had to push forward. It's not so different from my business: When cracks appear, I patch them up before they become full-fledged fissures.

Lenny was still fuming from the phone call. "Any idea what that old bastard wants?"

"Not a one."

He was quiet a moment. I know what he was thinking. Lenny blamed Edgar for his father's death. His old man had been a middle manager at ProNess Foods, one of Edgar's holdings. He had slaved for the company twenty-six years and had just turned fifty-two years old when Edgar orchestrated a major merger. Lenny's father lost his job. I remember seeing Mr. Marcus sitting slump shouldered at the kitchen table, meticulously stuffing his resume into envelopes. He never found work and died two years later of a heart attack. Nothing could convince Lenny that the two events were unrelated.

He said, "You sure you don't want me to come?"

"Nah, I'll be all right."

"Got your cell?"

I showed it to him.

"Call me if you need anything."

I thanked him and let him walk away. The driver opened the door. I winced my way in. The drive was not far. Kasselton, New Jersey. My hometown. We passed the split-levels of the sixties, the expanded ranches of the seventies, the aluminum sidings of the eighties, the McMansions of the nineties. Eventually the trees grew denser. The houses sat farther back from the road, protected by the lush, away from the great unwashed who might happen by. We were nearing old wealth now, that exclusive land that always smelled of autumn and woodsmoke.

The Portman family had first settled in this thicket immediately following the Civil War. Like most of suburban Jersey, this had been farmland. Great-great-grandfather Portman slowly sold off acreage and made a fortune. They still had sixteen acres, making their lot one of the largest in the area. As we climbed the drive, my eyes drifted left-- toward the family burial plot.

I could see a small mound of fresh dirt.

"Stop the car," I said. no second chance 21

"Sorry, Dr. Seidman," the driver replied, "but 1 was told to bring you right up to the main house."

I was about to protest but thought better of it. I waited until the car stopped by the front door. I got out and headed back down the drive. I heard the driver say, "Dr. Seidman?" I kept going. He called after me again. I ignored him. Despite the lack of rain, the grass was a green usually reserved for rain forests. The rose garden was in full bloom, an explosion of color.

I tried to hurry on, but my skin still felt as if it might rip. I slowed. This was only my third visit inside the Portman family estate--I had seen it from the outside dozens of times in my youth--and I had never visited the family plot. In fact, like most rational people, I did my best to avoid it. The idea of burying your kin in your backyard like a family pet ... it was one of those things that rich people do that we regular folk could never quite grasp. Or would want to.

The fence around the plot was maybe two feet high and blindingly white. I wondered if it'd been freshly painted for the occasion. I stepped over the superfluous gate and walked past the modest gravestones, keeping my eye on the dirt mound. When I reached the spot, a shudder tore through me. I looked down.

Yep, a recently dug grave. No stone yet. The marker on it, printed up in wedding-invitation calligraphy, read simply: OUR MONICA.

I stood there and blinked. Monica. My wild-eyed beauty. Our relationship had been turbulent--a classic case of too much passion in the beginning and not enough near the end. I don't know why that happens. Monica was different, no question. At first that crackle, that excitement, had been a draw. Later, the mood swings simply made me weary. I didn't have the patience to dig deeper.

As I looked down at the pile of dirt, a painful memory jabbed at me. Two nights before the attack, Monica had been crying when I came to the bedroom. It was not the first time. Not even close. Playing my part in the stage show that was our lives, I asked her what was wrong, but my heart was not in it. I used to ask with more concern. Monica never replied. I would try to hold her. She would go rigid. After a while the nonresponsiveness got tiresome, taking on a boy-who-cried-wolf aspect that eventually frosts the heart. Living with a depressive is like that. You can't care all the time. At some point, you have to start to resent. tt Harlan Coben

At least, that was what I told myself.

But this time, there was something different: Monica did indeed reply to me. Not a long reply. One line, actually. "You don't love me," she said. That was it. There was no pity in her voice. "You don't love me." And while I managed to utter the necessary protestations, I wondered if maybe she was right.

I closed my eyes and let it all wash over me. Things had been bad, but for the past six months anyway, there had been an escape for us, a calm and warm center in our daughter. I glanced at the sky now, blinked again, and then looked back down at the dirt that covered my volatile wife. "Monica," I said out loud. And then I made my wife one last vow.

I swore on her grave that I would find Tara.

A servant or butler or associate or whatever the current term was led me down the corridor and into the library. The decor was understated though unequivocally rich--finished dark floors with simple oriental carpets, old-Americana furniture that was solid rather than ornate. Despite his wealth and large plot of land Edgar was not one for show wealth. The term nouveau riche was to him profane, unspeakable.

Dressed in a blue cashmere blazer, Edgar rose from behind his expansive oak desk. There was a feather quill pen on the top--his greatgrandfather's, if I recall--and two bronze busts, one of Washington and one of Jefferson. I was surprised to see Uncle Carson sitting there too. When he'd visited me in the hospital, I had been too frail to embrace. Carson made up for that now. He pulled me close. I held on to him in silence. He, too, smelled of autumn and woodsmoke.

There were no photographs in the room--no family-vacation snapshots, no school portraits, no shot of the man and his missus decked out at a charity formal. In fact, I do not think I had ever seen a photograph anywhere in the house.

Carson said, "How are you feeling, Marc?"

I told him that I was as well as could be expected and turned toward my father-in-law. Edgar did not come around the desk. We did not embrace. We did not, in fact, even shake hands. He gestured toward the chair in front of the desk.

I did not know Edgar very well. We had only met three times. I do not know how much money he has, but even out of these dwellings, even on a city street or at a bus depot, hell, even naked, you could tell no second chance ^3

that the Portmans were from money. Monica had the bearing too, the one ingrained over generations, the one that cannot be taught, the one that may literally be genetic. Monica's choice to live in our relatively modest dwelling was probably a form of rebellion.

She had hated her father.

I was not a big fan of his either, probably because I had met his type before. Edgar thinks himself a pull-up-by-the-bootstraps sort, but he himself earned his money the old-fashioned way: He inherited it. I don't know many superwealthy people, but I noticed that the more things were handed to you on a silver platter, the more you complain about welfare mothers and government handouts. It is bizarre. Edgar belongs to that unique class of the entitled who have deluded themselves into believing that they somehow earned their status through hard work. We all live with self-justification, of course, and if you have never fended for yourself, if you live in luxury and have done nothing to deserve it, well, that is going to compound your insecurities, I guess. But it shouldn't make you such a prig, to boot.

I sat. Edgar followed suit. Carson remained standing. I stared at Edgar. He had the plump of the well fed. His face was all soft edges. The normal ruddy on his cheeks, so far from anything rawbone, was gone now. He laced his fingers and rested them on his paunch. He looked, I was somewhat surprised to see, devastated, drawn, and sapless.

I say surprised, because Edgar always struck me as pure id; a person whose own pain and pleasure trumped all others', who believed those who inhabited the space around him were little more than window dressing for his own bemusement. Edgar had now lost two children. His son, Eddie the Fourth, had died while speeding under the influence ten years ago. According to Monica, Eddie veered across the double yellow line and plowed into the semi on purpose. For some reason, she blamed her father. She blamed him for a lot of things.

There is also Monica's mother. She "rests" a lot. She takes "extended vacations." In short, she is in and out of institutions. Both times we met, my mother-in-law was propped up for some social affair, well dressed and powdered, lovely and too pale, a vacancy in her eyes, a slur in her speech, a sway in her stance.

Except for Uncle Carson, Monica had been estranged from her family. As you might imagine, I hardly minded.

"You wanted to see me?" I said. 24 Harlan Coben

"Yes, Marc. Yes, 1 did."

I waited.

Edgar put his hands on his desk. "Did you love my daughter?"

I was caught off guard, but I still said, "Very much," with no hesitation.

He seemed to see the lie. I worked hard to keep my gaze steady. "She still wasn't happy, you know."

"I'm not sure you can blame me for that," I said.

He nodded slowly. "Fair point."

But my own pass-the-buck defense didn't really work on me. Edgar's words were a fresh body blow. The guilt came roaring back.

"Did you know that she was seeing a psychiatrist?" Edgar asked.

I turned toward Carson first, then back to Edgar. "No."

"She didn't want anyone to know."

"How did you find out?"

Edgar did not reply. He stared down at his hands. Then he said: "I want to show you something."

I sneaked another look at Uncle Carson. His jaw was set. I thought I saw a tremble. I turned back to Edgar. "Okay."

Edgar opened his desk drawer, reached in, and pulled out a plastic bag. He raised it into view, gripping the bag at the corner between his forefinger and thumb. It took a moment, but'when I realized what I was looking at, my eyes went wide.

Edgar saw my reaction. "You recognize it then?"

I couldn't speak at first. I glanced over at Carson. His eyes were red. I looked back at Edgar and nodded numbly. Inside the plastic bag was a small swatch of clothing, maybe three inches by three inches. The pattern was one I had seen two weeks ago, moments before being shot.

Pink with black penguins.

My voice was barely a hush. "Where did you get this?"

Edgar handed me a large brown envelope, the kind with bubble wrap on the inside. This too, was protected in plastic. I turned it around. Edgar's name and address had been printed on a white label. There was no return address. The postmark read New York City.

"It came in today's mail," Edgar said. He gestured to the swatch. "Is it Tara's?"

I think I said yes.

"There's more," Edgar said. He reached into the drawer again. "I no second chance <?*>

took the liberty of putting everything in plastic bags. In case the authorities need to test it."

Again he handed me what looked like a Ziploc bag. Smaller this time. There were hairs inside. Little wisps of hair. With mounting dread, I realized what I was looking at. My breath stopped.

Baby hair.

From far away, I heard Edgar ask, "Are they hers?"

I closed my eyes and tried to picture Tara in the crib. The image of my daughter, I was horrified to realize, was already fading in the mind's eye. How could that be? I could no longer tell if I was seeing memory or something I conjured up to replace what I was already forgetting. Damn it. Tears pressed against my eyelids. I tried to bring back the feel of my daughter's soft scalp, the way my finger would trace the top.

"Marc?"

"They could be," I said, opening my eyes. "There's no way for me to know for sure."

"Something else," Edgar said. He handed me another plastic bag. Gingerly, I put down the bag with her hair on the desk. I took the new bag. There was a sheet of white paper in it. A note from some kind of laser printer.

If you contact the authorities, we disappear. You will never know what happened to her. We will be watching. We will know. We have a man on the inside. Your calls are being monitored. Do not discuss this over the phone. We know that you, Grandpa, are rich. We want two million dollars. We want you, Daddy, to deliver the ransom. You, Grandpa, will get the money ready. We are enclosing a cell phone. It is untraceable. But if you dial out or use it in any way, we will know. We will disappear and you will never see the child again. Get the money ready. Give it to Daddy. Daddy, keep the money and phone near you. Go home and wait. We will call and tell you what to do. Deviate from what we ask, and you will never see your daughter again. There will be no second chance.

The syntax was odd, to put it mildly. I read the note three times and then I looked up at Edgar and Carson. A funny calm spread over me. Yes, this was terrifying, but receiving this note ... it was also a relief. Something had finally happened. We could act now. We could get Tara back. There was hope.

Edgar stood and headed toward the corner of the room. He opened 26 Harlan Coben

a closet door and pulled out a gym bag with a Nike logo on it. Without preamble, he said, "It's all here."

He dropped the bag onto my lap. I stared down at it. "Two million dollars?"

"The bills are not sequential, but we have a list of all the serial numbers, just in case."

I looked at Carson and then back at Edgar. "You don't think we should contact the FBI?"

"Not really, no." Edgar perched himself on the lid of the desk, folding his arms across his chest. He smelled of barbershop bay rum, but I could sense something more primitive, more rancid, that lay just beneath. Up close, his eyes had the dark rings of exhaustion. "It's your decision, Marc. You're the father. We'll respect whatever you do. But as you know, I have had some dealings with the federal authorities. Perhaps my views are colored by my own sense of their incompetence, or perhaps I am biased because I've witnessed the degree to which they are ruled by personal agendas. If it were my daughter, I'd rather trust my own judgment than theirs."

I was not sure what to say or do. Edgar took care of that. He clapped his hands once and then gestured toward the door.

"The note says that you should go home and wait. I think it's best if we obey." chapter 3

The Same driver was there. I slid into the backseat, the Nike bag pressed against my chest. My emotions rocketed between abject fear and the strangest tinge of elation. I could get my daughter back. I could blow it all.

But first things first: Should I tell the police?

I tried to calm myself, to look at it coldly, at a distance, weigh the pros and cons. That was impossible, of course. I am a doctor. I have made life-altering decisions before. I know that the best way to do that is to remove the baggage, the ardent excess, from the equation. But my daughter's life was at stake. My own daughter. To echo what I said in the beginning: my world.

The house Monica and I bought is literally around the corner from the house I grew up in and where my parents still reside. I am ambivalent about that. I really don't like living so close to my parents, but I dislike the guilt of abandoning them even more. My compromise: Live near them and then travel a lot.

Lenny and Cheryl live four blocks away, near the Kasselton Mall, in the house where Cheryl's parents had raised her. Cheryl's parents moved to Florida six years ago. They keep a condo up here in neighboring Roseland so they can visit their grandchildren and escape the molten lava summers of the Sunshine State.

I don't particularly like living in Kasselton. The town has changed very little over the past thirty years. In our youth, we scoffed at our parents, their materialism, their seemingly aimless values. Now we are our parents. We have simply replaced them, pushed Mom and Dad into whatever retirement village would have them. And our children have <?8 Harlan Coben

replaced us. But Maury's Luncheonette is still on Kasselton Avenue. The fire department is still mostly volunteer. The Little League still plays at Northland Field. The high-tension wires are still too close to my old elementary school. The woods behind the Brenners' house on Rockmont Terrace is still a place where kids hang out and smoke. The high school still gets between five and eight national merit finalists a year, though when I was younger the list was more Jewish while today it tilts toward the Asian community.

We turned right on Monroe Avenue and drove past the split-level where I was raised. With its white paint and black shutters, with its kitchen, living room, and dining room up three steps on the left and its den and garage entrance two steps down on the right, our house, though a bit more threadbare than most, was pretty much indistinguishable from the other cookie-cutters on the block. What did make it stand out, the only thing really, was the wheelchair ramp. We put it in after my dad's third stroke when I was twelve years old. My friends and I liked to skateboard down it. We built a jump out of plywood and cinder blocks and put it at the bottom.

The nurse's car was in the driveway. She comes in during the days. We don't have someone full time. My father has been confined to a wheelchair for more than two decades now. He cannot speak. His mouth has an ugly down-hook curve on the left side of it. Half his body is totally paralyzed and the other half is not that much better.

When the driver made the turn at Darby Terrace, I saw that my house--our house--looked the same as it had a few weeks before. I didn't know what I'd expected. Yellow crime-scene tape maybe. Or a big bloodstain. But there was nothing hinting at what had occurred two weeks earlier.

When I'd bought the house, it'd been in foreclosure. For thirty-six years the Levinsky family had lived there, but no one really knew them. Mrs. Levinsky had been a seemingly sweet woman with a facial tic. Mr. Levinsky was an ogre who always yelled at her out on the lawn. He scared us. One time, we saw Mrs. Levinsky run out of the house in a nightgown, Mr. Levinsky chasing her with a shovel. Kids cut through every yard but theirs. When I was fresh out of college, rumors surfaced that he had abused his daughter Dina, a sad-eyed, stringy-haired waif I'd gone to school with since the first grade. Looking back on it, I must no second chance 29

have been in a dozen classes with Dma Levinsky and I don't remember ever hearing her speak above a whisper and only then when forced to by well-meaning teachers. I never reached out to Dina. I don't know what I could have done, but I still wished that I'd tried.

Sometime during that year out of college, when the rumors of Dina's abuse began to take root, the Levinskys had upped and moved away. No one knew where. The bank took over the house and began to rent it out. Monica and I made an offer a few weeks before Tara was born.

Months later, when we first settled in, I'd stay awake at night and listen for--I don't know--sounds of some sort, for signs of the house's past, of the unhappiness within. I would try to figure out which bedroom had been Dina's and try to imagine what it'd been like for her, what it was like now, but there were no clues here. As I said earlier, a house is mortar and brick. Nothing more.

Two strange cars were parked in front of my house. My mother was standing by the front door. When I got out, she rushed me like those newscasts of returning POWs. She hugged me hard, and I got a whiff of too much perfume. I was still holding the Nike bag with the money, so it was hard for me to reciprocate.

Over my mother's shoulder, Detective Bob Regan stepped out of my house. Next to him stood a large black man with a gleaming shaved head and designer sunglasses. My mother whispered, "They've been waiting for you."

I nodded and moved toward them. Regan cupped a hand over his eyes, but only for effect. The sun was not that strong. The black man remained stonelike.

"Where have you been?" Regan asked. When I didn't reply right away, he added, "You left the hospital more than an hour ago."

I thought about the cell phone in my pocket. I thought about the bag of money in my hand. For now, I'd go for the semitruth. "I visited my wife's grave," I said.

"We need to talk, Marc."

"Step inside," I said.

We all moved back into the house. I stopped in the foyer. Monica's body had been found less than ten feet from where I now stood. Still in the entranceway, my eyes scanned the walls, looking for any telltale sign of violence. There was only one. I found it fairly quickly. Above the 30 Harlan Coben

Behrens lithograph near the stairwell, a bullet hole--one created from the only bullet that had not hit either Monica or me--had been spack led over. The spackle was too white for the wall. It would need a coat of paint.

I stared at it for a long moment. I heard a throat being cleared. It snapped me out of it. My mother rubbed my back and then headed to the kitchen. I showed Regan and his buddy to the living room. They took the two chairs. I took the couch. Monica and I hadn't truly decorated yet. The chairs dated back to my college dorm and looked it. The couch had come from Monica's apartment, a too-formal hand-me down that looked like something kept in storage at Versailles. It was heavy and stiff and, even in its heyday, had had very little padding.

"This is Special Agent Lloyd Tickner," Regan began, motioning toward the black man. "He's with the FBI."

Tickner nodded. I nodded back.

Regan tried to smile at me. "Good to see you're feeling better," he began.

"I'm not," I said.

He looked puzzled.

"I won't be better until I have my daughter back."

"Right, of course. About that. We have a few follow-up questions, if you don't mind."

I let them know I didn't.

Regan coughed into his fist, buying himself time. "You have to understand something. We need to ask these questions. I don't necessarily like it. I'm sure you don't either, but these questions need to be asked. You understand?"

I didn't really, but this was no time to encourage elaboration. "Go ahead," I said.

"What can you can tell us about your marriage?"

A warning light flashed across my cortex. "What does my marriage have to do with anything?"

Regan shrugged. Tickner remained still. "We're just trying to put some pieces together, that's all."

"My marriage has nothing to do with any of this."

"I'm sure you're right, but look, Marc, the truth is, the trail is getting cold here. Every day that passes hurts us. We need to explore every avenue." no second chance 31

"The only avenue I'm interested in is the one that leads to my daughter."

"We understand that. That's the main focus of our investigation. Finding out what happened to your daughter. And you too. Let's not forget that someone tried to kill you too, am I right?"

"I guess."

"But, see, we can't just ignore these other issues."

"What other issues?"

"Your marriage, for example."

"What about it?"

"When you got married, Monica was already pregnant, right?"

"What does that ... ?" I stopped myself. I wanted to attack with both barrels, but Lenny's words roared back at me. Don't talk to the cops without him present. I should call him. I knew that. But something about their tone and posture ... if I stopped now and said I wanted to call my lawyer, it would make me look guilty. I had nothing to hide. Why feed into their suspicions? It would only distract them. Of course, I also knew that this was how they worked, how the police played the game, but I'm a doctor. Worse, a surgeon. We often make the mistake of thinking we're smarter than everyone else.

I went with honesty. "Yes, she was pregnant. So?"

"You're a plastic surgeon, correct?"

The change of subjects threw me. "That's right."

"You and your partner travel overseas and repair cleft palates, serious facial trauma, burns, that kind of thing?"

"Something like that, yes."

"You travel a lot then?"

"A fair amount," I said.

"In fact," Regan said, "in the two years before your marriage, isn't it fair to say that you were probably out of the country more than you were in it?"

"Possibly," I said. I squirmed against the padless cushion. "Could you tell me what the relevance of any of this is?"

Regan gave me his most disarming smile. "We're just trying to get a complete picture here."

"Picture of what?"

"Your work partner"--he checked his notes--"a Ms. Zia Leroux."

"Dr. Leroux," I corrected. 32 Harlan Coben

"Dr. Leroux, yes, thank you. Where is she now?"

"Cambodia."

"She's performing surgery on deformed children over there?"

"Yes."

Regan tilted his head, feigning confusion. "Weren't you originally scheduled to take that trip?"

"A long time ago."

"How long ago?"

"I'm not sure I follow."

"How long ago did you take yourself off the schedule?"

"I don't know," I said. "Eight, nine months ago maybe."

"And so Dr. Leroux went instead, correct?"

"Yes, that's correct. And the point of that is ... ?"

He wouldn't bite. "You like your job, don't you, Marc?"

"Yes."

"You like traveling overseas? Doing this commendable work?"

"Sure."

Regan scratched his head too dramatically, pretending in the most obvious way to be bewildered. "So if you like the traveling, why did you cancel and let Dr. Leroux go in your place?"

Now I saw where he was heading. "I was cutting back," I said.

"On travel, you mean."

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because I had other obligations."

"Those obligations being a wife and daughter, am I correct?"

I sat up and met his eye. "Point," I said. "Is there a point to all this?"

Regan settled back. The silent Tickner did likewise. "Just trying to get a complete picture, that's all."

"You said that already."

"Yeah, hold on, give me a second here." Regan flipped through the pages of his notebook. "Jeans and a red blouse."

"What?"

"Your wife." He pointed at his notes. "You said that she was wearing jeans and a red blouse that morning."

More images of Monica flooded me. I tried to stem the tide. "So?"

"When we found her body," Regan said, "she was naked." no second chance 33

The tremors began in my heart. They spread down my arms, tingling my fingers.

"You didn't know?"

I swallowed. "Was she . . . ?" My voice died in my throat.

"No," Regan said. "Not a mark on her, other than the bullet holes." He did that help-me-understand head-tilt again. "We found her dead in this very room. Did she often parade in here with no clothes on?"

"I told you." Overload. I tried to process this new data, keep up with him. "She was wearing jeans and a red blouse."

"So she was dressed already?"

I remembered the sound of the shower. I remembered her coming out, throwing her hair back, lying on the bed, working the jeans over the hips. "Yes."

"Definitely?"

"Definitely."

"We've been through the whole house. We can't find a red blouse. Jeans, sure. She had several pairs. But no red blouse. Don't you think that's odd?"

"Wait a second," I said. "Her clothes weren't near her body?"

"Nope."

This made no sense. "I'll look in her closet, then," I said.

"We already did that, but sure, go ahead. Of course, I'd still like to know how clothes she was wearing ended up back in her closet, wouldn't you?"

I had no answer.

"Do you own a gun, Dr. Seidman?"

Another subject shift. I tried to keep up, but my head was spinning. "Yes."

"What kind?"

"A Smith and Wesson thirty-eight. It belonged to my father."

"Where do you keep it?"

"There's a compartment in the bedroom closet. It's on the top shelf in a lockbox."

Regan reached behind him and pulled out the metal lockbox. "This it?"

"Yes."

"Open it." 34 Harlan Coben

He tossed it to me. I caught it. The gray-blue metal was cold. But more than that, it felt shockingly light. I moved the wheels to the right combination and flipped it open. I poked through the legal documents--the car title, the deed on the house, the property survey-- but that was just to get my bearings. I knew right away. The gun was gone.

"You and your wife were both shot with a thirty-eight," Regan said. "And yours seems to be missing."

I kept my eyes on the box, as if I expected the weapon to suddenly materialize in it. I tried to put it together, but nothing was coming to me.

"Any idea where the gun is?"

I shook my head.

"And something else strange," Regan said.

I looked up at him.

"You and Monica were shot with different thirty-eights."

"Excuse me?"

He nodded. "Yeah, I found it hard to believe too. I made ballistics check it twice. You and your wife were shot with two different guns, both thirty-eights--and yours seems to be missing." Regan shrugged theatrically. "Help me understand, Marc."

I looked at their faces. I didn't like what I saw. Lenny's warning came back to me again, firmer this time. "I'want to call my lawyer," I said.

"You sure?"

"Yes."

"Go ahead."

My mother had been standing by the kitchen door, wringing her hands. How much had she heard? Judging by her face, too much. Mom looked at me expectantly. I nodded, and she went to call Lenny. I folded my arms, but that didn't feel right. I tapped my foot. Tickner took off the sunglasses. He met my eye and spoke for the first time.

"What's in the bag?" he asked me.

I just looked at him.

"That gym bag you been groping." Tickner's voice, belying his tough looks, had a nerdy cadence to it, a quasi-whine quality. "What's in it?"

This had all been a mistake. I should have listened to Lenny. I should have called him right away. Now I was not sure how to reply. In the no second chance 3I>

background, I heard my mother urging Lenny to hurry. I was sifting through a response that might work as a semitruthful stall--none were convincing--when a sound ripped my attention away.

The cell phone, the one the kidnappers had sent to my father-in-law, began to ring. chapter 4

Tickner dfld Regdn waited for me to answer.

I excused myself, rising before they had a chance to react. My hand fumbled with the phone as I hurried outside. The sun hit me full in the face. I blinked and looked down at the keypad. The phone's answer button was located in a different spot from mine. Across the street, two girls donning brightly hued helmets were riding neon bikes. Ribbon strips of pink cascaded out of the handlebars of one.

When I was little, this neighborhood sheltered more than a dozen kids my age. We used to meet up after school. I don't remember what games we played--we were never organized enough for, say, a real game of baseball or anything like that--but they all involved hiding and chasing and some form of feigned (or borderline-real) violence. Childhood in suburbia is purportedly a time of innocence, but how many of those days ended in tears for at least one kid? We would argue, shift alliances, make declarations of friendship and war, and like some short term memory case, it was all forgotten the next day. A clean slate every afternoon. New coalitions forged. A new kid running home in tears.

My thumb finally touched down on the right button. I pressed it and brought the phone to my ear, all in one move. My heart thumped against my rib cage. I cleared my throat and, feeling like a total idiot, I simply said, "Hello?"

"Answer yes or no." The voice had the robotic hum of one of those customer-care phone systems, the ones that tell you to press one for service, press two to check the status of an order. "Do you have the money?"

"Yes." no second chance 37

"You know the Garden State Plaza?"

"In Paramus," I said.

"In exactly two hours from now, I want you parked at the north lot. That's near Nordstrom's. Section Nine. Someone will approach your car."

"But--"

"If you're not alone, we disappear. If you're being followed, we disappear. If I smell a cop, we disappear. There will be no second chances. Do you understand?"

"Yes, but when--"

Click.

I let my hand drop to my side. Numbness seeped in. I did not fight it. The little girls across the street were quarreling now. I couldn't hear the specifics, but the word my popped up a lot, that simple syllable accentuated and drawn out. An SUV sped around the corner. I watched it as though from above. The brakes shrieked. The driver-side door was open before the car had come to a complete stop.

It was Lenny. He took one look at me and picked up his pace. "Marc?"

"You were right." I nodded toward the house. Regan was standing by the door now. "They think I'm involved."

Lenny's face darkened. His eyes narrowed, his pupils shrinking to pinpoints. In sports, you call it putting on your "game face." Lenny was becoming Cujo. He stared at Regan as if deciding which limb to chew off. "You talked to them?"

"A little."

Lenny jerked his gaze toward me. "Didn't you tell them you wanted counsel?"

"Not at first."

"Damn it, Marc, I told you--"

"I got a ransom demand."

That made Lenny pull up. I checked my watch. Paramus was a forty minute ride. With traffic, it could take as much as an hour. I had time, but not much. I started filling him in. Lenny gave Regan another glare and led me farther away from the house. We stopped at the curb, those familiar cloud-gray stones that lie on property lines like sets of teeth, and then, like two children, we squatted deep and sat on them. Our knees were at our chins. I could see Lenny's skin between the argyle 38 Harlan Coben

sock and tapered cuff. Squatting like this was uncomfortable as hell. The sun was in our eyes. We both looked off rather than at each other, again just like in our youths. It made it easier to spill it all out.

I spoke quickly. Midway through my recap, Regan began to move toward us. Lenny turned to him and shouted, "Your balls."

Regan stopped. "What?"

"Are you arresting my client?"

"No."

Lenny pointed toward Regan's crotch. "Then I'm going to have them bronzed and hanging from my rearview mirror, if you take another step."

Regan straightened his spine. "We have some questions for your client."

"Tough. Go abuse the rights of someone with a lesser lawyer."

Lenny made a dismissive gesture and nodded at me to continue. Regan did not look happy, but he took two steps back. I glanced at my watch again. Only five minutes had passed since the ransom call. I finished up while Lenny kept the laser glare aimed at Regan.

"You want my opinion?" he said.

"Yes."

Still glaring. "I think you should tell them."

"You sure?"

"Hell, no."

"Would you?" I said. "I mean, if it was one of your kids?"

Lenny gave it a few seconds. "I can't put myself in your place, if that's what you mean. But yeah, I think I would. I play the odds. The odds are better when you tell the cops. Doesn't mean it works out every time, but they're experts at this. We're not." Lenny put his elbows on his knees and rested his chin in his hands--a pose from his youth. "That's the opinion of Lenny the Friend," he went on. "Lenny the Friend would encourage you to tell them."

"And Lenny the Lawyer?" I asked.

"He would be more insistent. He would strongly urge you to come forward."

"Why?"

"If you go off with two million dollars and it vanishes--even if you get Tara back--their suspicions will be, to put it mildly, aroused." no second chance 39

"I don't care about that. I just want Tara back."

"Understood. Or should I say, Lenny the Friend understands."

Now it was Lenny's turn to check his watch. My insides felt hollow, scooped out canoe-style. I could almost hear the tick-tick. It was maddening. I tried again to do the rational thing, to list the pros on the right, the cons on the left, and then add them up. But the tick-tick would not stop.

Lenny had talked about playing the odds. I don't gamble. I'm not a risk taker. Across the street one of the little girls shouted, "I'm telling!" She stormed down the street. The other girl laughed at her and got back on her bike. I felt my eyes well up. I wished like hell Monica were here. I shouldn't be making this decision alone. She should be in on this, too.

I looked back at the front door. Regan and Tickner were both outside now. Regan had his arms folded across his chest, bouncing on the balls of his feet. Tickner did not move, his face the same placid pool. Were these men I could trust with my daughter's life? Would they put Tara first, or as Edgar had suggested, would they follow some unseen agenda?

The tick-tick grew louder, more insistent.

Someone had murdered my wife. Someone had taken my child. For the past few days, I had asked myself why--why us?--trying again to stay rational and not allowing myself extended forays in the deep end of the pity pool. But no answer came. I could see no motive and maybe that was most frightening of all. Maybe there was no reason. Maybe it was just pure bad luck.

Lenny stared straight ahead and waited. Tick, tick, tick.

"Let's tell them," I said.

Their reaction surprised me. They panicked.

Regan and Tickner tried to hide it, of course, but their body language was suddenly all wrong--the flutter in the eyes, the tightness at the corners of their mouths, the unduly modulated, FM-soft-rock timbre in their tones. The time frame was simply too close for them. Tickner quickly dialed up the FBI specialist on kidnapping negotiations to enlist his help. He cupped his hand around the mouthpiece while he spoke into it. Regan got hold of his police colleagues in Paramus. 40 Harlan Coben

When Tickner hung up, he said to me, "We'll get people to cover the mall. Discreetly, of course. We're going to try to get men in cars near every exit and on Route Seventeen in both directions. We'll have people inside the mall by all the entrances. But I want you to listen to me closely, Dr. Seidman. Our expert tells us that we should try to stall him. Maybe we can get the kidnapper to postpone--"

"No," I said.

"They won't just run away," Tickner said. "They want the money."

"My daughter has been with them for almost three weeks," I said. "I'm not putting this off."

He nodded, not liking it, trying to keep up with the placid. "Then I want to put a man in the car with you."

"No."

"He can duck down in the back."

"No," I said again.

Tickner tried another avenue. "Or better yet--we've done this before--we tell the kidnapper that you can't drive. Hell, you're just out of the hospital. We have one of our men drive instead. We say it's your cousin."

I frowned and looked at Regan. "Didn't you say you thought my sister might be involved?"

"It's possible, yes."

"Don't you think she'd know if this guy was a cousin or not?"

Tickner and Regan both hesitated and then nodded in unison. "Good point," Regan said.

Lenny and I exchanged a glance. These were the professionals I was trusting with Tara's life. The thought was not comforting. I started for the door.

Tickner put a hand on my shoulder. "Where are you going?"

"Where the hell do you think?"

"Sit down, Dr. Seidman."

"No time," I countered. "I have to start heading up there. There could be traffic."

"We can clear the traffic."

"Oh, and that won't look suspicious," I said.

"I highly doubt he's going to follow you from here."

I spun on him. "And you'd be willing to risk your child's life on that?"

He paused just long enough. no second chance 41

"You don't get it," I went on, in his face now. "I don't care about the money or if they get away. I just want my daughter back."

"We understand that," Tickner said, "but there is something you're forgetting."

"What?"

"Please," he said. "Sit down." "Look, do me a favor, okay? Just let me stand. I'm a doctor. I know the delivering-bad-news drill as well as anyone. Don't try to play me."

Tickner held his palms up and said, "Fair enough." He proceeded to take a long, lingering breath. Stall tactic. I was not in the mood.

"So what is it?" I said.

"Whoever did this," he began, "they shot you. They killed your wife."

"I understand that."

"No, I don't think you do. Think about it a second. We can't just let you go in on your own. Whoever did this tried to end your life. They shot you twice and left you for dead."

"Marc," Regan said, moving closer, "we threw some wild theories at you before. The problem is, that's all they are. Theories. We don't know what these guys are really after. Maybe this is just a simple kidnapping, but if it is, it's not like any we've seen before." His interrogation face was gone now, replaced with an aw-shucks, eyebrow-raised attempt at openness. "What we do know with certainty is that they tried to kill you. You don't try to kill the parents, if you're just after ransom."

"Maybe they planned on getting the money from my father-in-law," I said.

"Then why did they wait so long?"

I had no answer.

"Maybe," Tickner went on, "this isn't about kidnapping at all. At least, not at first. Maybe that's become a sideline. Maybe you and your wife were the targets all along. And maybe they want to finish the job."

"You think this is a setup?"

"It's a strong possibility, yes."

"So what are you advising?"

Tickner took that one. "Don't go alone. Buy us some time so we can prepare properly. Let them call you back."

I looked at Lenny. He saw it and nodded. "That's not possible," Lenny said. 42 Harlan Coben

Tickner turned at him hard. "'With all due respect, your client is in grave danger here."

"So is my daughter," I said. Simple words. This decision was a no brainer when you kept it simple. I pulled away and started toward my car. "Keep your people at a distance." chapter 5

ThPfP WdS (10 traffic, so I made it to the mall with plenty of time to spare. I turned the engine off and sat back. I glanced around. I figured that the feds and cops were probably still on me, but I couldn't see them. That was a good thing, I guess.

Now what?

No idea. I waited some more. I fiddled with the radio, but nothing caught my attention. I turned on the CD player/tape deck. When Donald Pagan of Steely Clan began singing "Black Cow," I felt a slight jerk. I had not listened to this particular tape since, what, my college days. Why did Monica have it? And then, with a renewed pang, I realized that Monica had been the last to use this car, that this may have been the last song she ever heard.

I watched the shoppers prepare for mall entry. I concentrated on the young mothers; the way they flipped open the back door of the mini van; the way they unfolded the baby strollers midair with a magician's flourish; the way they struggled to release their offspring from safety seats that reminded me of Buzz Aldrin's on Apollo 11; the way the mothers skirted forward, heads high, smartly pressing the remote control that slid the minivan door to a close.

The mothers, all of them, looked so blase. Their children were with them. Their safety, what with the five-star side-collision rating and NASA-sleek car seats, was a given. And here I sat with a bag of ransom money, hoping to get my daughter back. The thin line. I wanted to roll down the window and shout out a warning.

We were getting close to drop time. The sun beat down on my windshield. I reached for my sunglasses but then thought better of it. I don't 44 Harlan Coben

know why. Would putting on my sunglasses somehow make the kidnapper uneasy? No, I don't think so. Or maybe it would. Better to just leave them off. Take no chances.

My shoulders bunched up. I kept trying to look around without, for some odd reason, looking conspicuous about it. Whenever someone parked near me or walked anywhere in the vicinity of my car, my stomach tightened and I wondered:

Was Tara nearby?

We were at the two-hour mark now. I wanted this over. The next few minutes would decide everything. I knew that. Calm. I needed to stay calm. Tickner's warning reverberated in my head. Would someone simply walk up to my car and blow my brains out?

It was, I realized, a very real possibility.

When the cell phone rang, I started forward. I brought it to my ear and barked a too-quick hello.

The robotic voice said, "Pull out by the west exit."

I was confused. "Which way is west?"

"Follow the signs for Route Four. Take the overpass. We're watching. If someone follows, we disappear. Keep the phone near your ear."

I obeyed with gusto; my right hand pressed the phone against my ear to the point where I started losing circulation. My left hand gripped the wheel as if preparing to tear it off.

"Get on Route Four heading west."

I took the right turn and jug-handled onto the highway. I looked in my rearview mirror to see if anyone was following me. Hard to tell.

The robotic voice said, "You'll see a strip mall."

"There's a million strip malls," I said.

"It's on the right, next to a store selling baby cribs. In front of the Paramus Road exit."

I saw it. "Okay."

"Pull in there. You'll see a driveway on the left. Take it to the back and kill the engine. Have the money ready for me."

I understood immediately why the kidnapper had picked this spot. There was only one way in. The stores were all for rent, except for the baby-crib place. That was on the far right. In other words, it was self contained and directly off a highway. There was no way anyone could come around back or even slow down without being noticed.

I hope the feds understood that. no second chance 4^

When I reached the back of the building, I saw a man standing by a van. He wore a red-and-black flannel shirt with black jeans, dark sunglasses, and a Yankee baseball cap. I tried to find something distinct, but the word that came to mind was average. Average height, average build. The only thing was his nose. Even from this distance I could see it was misshapen, like an ex-boxer's. But was that real or some kind of disguise? I didn't know.

I checked out the van. There was a sign for "B & The Electricians" of Ridgewood, New Jersey. No phone number or address. The license plate was from New Jersey. I memorized it.

The man raised a cell phone to his lips walkie-talkie style, and I heard the mechanical voice say, "I'm going to approach. Pass the money through the window. Do not get out of the car. Do not say a word to me. When we're safely away with the money, I'll call and tell you where to pick up your daughter."

The man in red flannel and black jeans lowered the phone and approached. His shirt was untucked. Did he have a gun? I couldn't tell. And even if he did, what could I do about it now? I hit the button to open the windows. They didn't budge. The key needed to be turned. The man was getting closer. The Yankee cap Was pulled down until the brim touched the sunglasses. I reached for the key and gave it a tiny twist. The lights on the dashboard sprung to life. I pressed the button again. The window slid down.

Again I tried to find something about the man that was distinct. His walk was slightly off balance, as though maybe he'd had a drink or two, but he didn't look nervous. His face was unshaven and patchy. His hands were dirty. His black jeans were ripped in the right knee. His sneakers, canvas high-tops from Converse, had seen better days.

When the man was only two steps from the car, I pushed the bag up to the window and braced myself. I held my breath. Without breaking stride, the man took the money and swirled toward the van. He hurried his step now. The van's back doors opened and he leapt in, the door immediately closing behind him. It was as if the van had swallowed him whole.

The driver gunned the engine. The van sped off and now, for the first time, I realized that there was a back entrance onto a side road. The van shot down it and was gone.

I was alone. 46 Harlan Coben

I stayed where 1 was and waited for the cell phone to ring. My heart pounded. My shirt was drenched in sweat. No other car traveled back here. The pavement was cracked. Cardboard boxes jutted out of the garbage Dumpster. Broken bottles littered the ground. My eyes stared hard at the ground, trying to make out the words on faded beer labels.

Fifteen minutes passed.

I kept picturing my reunion with my daughter, how I would find her and pick her up and cradle her and hush her with gentle sounds. The cell phone. The cell phone was supposed to ring. That was part of what I was picturing. The phone ringing, the robotic voice giving me instructions. Those were parts one and two. Why wasn't the damn phone cooperating?

A Buick Le Sabre pulled into the lot, keeping a decent distance away from me. I did not recognize the driver, but Tickner was in the passenger seat. Our eyes met. I tried to read something in his expression, but he was still pure stoic.

I stared now at the cell phone, not daring to look away. The tick-tick was back, this time slow and thudding.

Ten more minutes passed before the phone grudgingly issued its tinny song. I had it to my ear before the sound had a chance to travel.

"Hello?" I said.

Nothing.

Tickner watched me closely. He gave me a slight nod, though I had no idea why. His driver still had both hands on the wheel at ten and two o'clock.

"Hello? "I tried again.

The robotic voice said, "I warned you about contacting the cops."

Ice flooded my veins.

"No second chance."

And then the phone went dead. chapter 6

There was no escape.

I longed for the numb. I longed for the comatose state of the hospital. I longed for that IV bag and the free flow of anesthetics. My skin had been torn off. My nerve endings were exposed now. I could feel everything.

Fear and helplessness overwhelmed me. The fear locked me in a room, while the helplessness--the awful knowing that I had blown it and could do nothing to alleviate my child's pain--wrapped me in a straitjacket and turned out the lights. I may very well have been losing my mind.

Days passed in a syrupy haze. Most of the time I sat by the phone-- by several phones, actually. My home phone, my cell phone, and the kidnapper's cell phone. I bought a charger for the kidnapper's cell, so I could keep it working. I stayed on the couch. The phones sat on my right. I tried to look away, to watch television even, because I remembered that old saying about a watched kettle never boiling. I still stole glances at those damn phones, fearing that they, might somehow flee, willing them to ring.

I tried to mine that supernatural father-daughter connection again, the one that had insisted earlier that Tara was still alive. The pulse was still there, I thought (or at least, made myself believe), beating faintly, the connection now tenuous at best.

"No second chance..."

To add to my guilt, I had dreamt last night of a woman other than Monica--my old love, Rachel. It was one of those time-and-reality warp dreams, the ones where the world is totally alien and even contradictory 48 Harlan Coben

and yet you don't question any of it. Rachel and I were together. We had never broken up yet we had been apart all these years. I was still thirty-four, but she hadn't aged since the day she left me. Tara was still my daughter in the dream--she had, in fact, never been kidnapped-- but somehow she was also Rachel's, though Rachel wasn't the mother. You've probably had dreams like this. Nothing really makes sense, but you don't challenge what you see. When I woke up, the dream faded into smoke the way dreams always do. I was left with an aftertaste and a longing that pulled with unexpected force.

My mother hung around too much. She had just plopped another tray of food in front of me. I ignored it and for the millionth time, Mom repeated her mantra: "You have to keep up your strength for Tara."

"Right, Mom, strength is the key here. Maybe if I do enough bench presses, that'll bring her back."

Mom shook her head, refusing to rise to the bait. It was a cruel thing to say. She was hurting too. Her granddaughter was missing and her son was in horrific shape. I watched her sigh and head back to the kitchen. I didn't apologize.

Tickner and Regan visited frequently. They reminded me of Shakespeare's sound and fury signifying nothing. They told me about all the technological wonders that were being utilized in the quest to find Tara--stuff involving DNA and latent prints and security cameras and airports and tollbooths and train stations and tracers and surveillance and labs. They trotted out the tried-and-true cop cliches like "no stone unturned" and "every possible avenue." I nodded at them. They had me look at mug shots, but the bagman in flannel was not in any of the books.

"We ran a trace on B and The Electricians," Regan told me that first night. "The company exists, but they use magnetic signs, the kind you can just peel off a truck. Someone stole one two months ago. They never thought it was worth reporting."

"What about the license plate?" I asked.

"The number you gave us doesn't exist."

"How can that be?"

"They used two old license plates," Regan explained. "See, what they do is, they cut the license plates in half and then they weld the left half of one with the right half of the other."

I just stared at him. no second chance 49

"There is something of a bright side to that," Regan added.

"Oh?"

"It means we're dealing with professionals. They knew that if you contacted us, we'd be set up at the mall. They found a drop spot that we couldn't get to without being seen. They have us tracking down useless leads with the fake sign and welded license plates. Like I said, they're pros."

"And that's good because . . . ?"

"Pros usually aren't bloodthirsty."

"So what are they doing?"

"Our theory," Regan said, "is that they're softening you up, so they can ask for more money."

Softening me up. It was working.

My father-in-law called after the ransom fiasco. I could hear the disappointment in Edgar's voice. I don't want to sound unkind here-- Edgar was the one who provided the money and made it clear he would do so again--but the disappointment sounded more aimed at me, at the fact that I had not taken his advice about not contacting the police, than at the final outcome.

Of course, he was right about that. I had messed up big time.

I tried to participate in the investigation, but the police were far from encouraging. In the movies the authorities cooperate and share information with the victim. I naturally asked Tickner and Regan a lot of questions about the case. They didn't answer. They never discussed specifics with me. They treated my interrogatories with near disdain. I wanted to know, for example, more about how my wife was found, about why she'd been naked. They stonewalled.

Lenny was at the house a lot. He had trouble meeting my eye because he, too, blamed himself for encouraging me to come forward. The faces of Regan and Tickner fluctuated between guilt because everything had gone so wrong and guilt of another kind, like maybe I, the grieving husband and father, had been behind this from the get-go. They wanted to know about my shaky marriage to Monica. They wanted to know about my missing gun. It was exactly as Lenny had predicted. The more time passed, the more the authorities aimed their sights on the only available suspect.

Yours truly.

After we hit the one-week mark, the police and FBI presence started ^0 Harlan Coben

fading. Tickner and Regan no longer came by very much. They checked their watches more often. They excused themselves for phone calls involving other cases. I understood that, of course. There had been no new leads. Things were quieting down. Part of me welcomed the respite.

And then, on the ninth day, everything changed.

At ten o'clock, I began to get undressed and ready for bed. I was alone. I love my family and friends, but they began to realize that I needed some time by myself. They had all left before dinner. I ordered delivery from Hunan Garden and, per Mom's earlier instructions, ate for strength.

I looked at the bedside alarm clock. That's how I knew that the time was exactly 10:18 P.M. I glanced at the window, just a casual land sweep. In the dark, I almost missed it--nothing consciously registered anyway--but something snagged my gaze. I stopped and looked again.

There, standing on my walk like a stone, staring at my house, was a woman. I assume that she was staring. I did not know for certain. Her face was lost in the shadows. She had long hair--that much I could see in the silhouette--and she wore a long coat. Her hands were jammed into her pockets.

She just stood there.

I was not sure what to make of it. We were in the news, of course. Reporters stopped by at all hours. I looked up and down the street. No cars, no news vans, nothing. She had come on foot. Again that was not unusual. I live in a suburban neighborhood. People take walks all the time, usually with a dog or spouse or both, but it was hardly earth shattering for a woman to be walking alone.

Then why had she stopped?

Morbid curiosity, I figured.

She looked tall from here, but that was pretty much a guess. I wondered what to do. An uneasy feeling slithered up my back. I grabbed my sweatshirt and threw it over my pajama top. Ditto with a pair of sweatpants and the bottoms. I looked out the window again. The woman stiffened.

She had seen me.

The woman turned and began to hurry away. My chest felt tight. I tried to open the window. It was stuck. I hit the sides to loosen it and no second chance 1J

tried again. It grudgingly gave me an inch. 1 lowered my mouth to the opening.

"Wait!"

She picked up the pace.

"Please, hold up a second."

She broke into a run. Damn. I turned away and sprinted after her toward the door. I had no idea where my slippers were and there was no time for shoes. I ran outside. The grass tickled my feet. I sprinted in the direction she had gone. I tried to follow, but I lost her.

When I got back inside my house, I called Regan and told him what had happened. It sounded stupid even as I said it. A woman had been standing in front of my house. Big deal. Regan, too, sounded thoroughly unimpressed. I convinced myself that it was nothing, just a nosy neighbor. I climbed back into bed, flipped the television, and eventually I closed my eyes.

The night, however, was not over.

It was four in the morning when my phone rang. I was in the state I now refer to as sleep. I never fall into true slumber anymore. I hang above it with my eyes shut. The nights struggle by like the days. The separation between the two is the flimsiest of curtains. At night, my body manages to rest, but my mind refuses to shut down.

With my eyes closed, I was replaying the morning of the attack for the umpteenth time, hoping to stir a new memory. I started where I am now: in the bedroom. I remembered my alarm clock going off. Lenny and I were going to play racquetball that morning. We'd started playing every Wednesday about a year before, and so far, we had progressed to the point where our games had improved from "pitiful" to "almost remedial." Monica was awake and in the shower. I was scheduled for surgery at 11:00 A.M. I got up and looked in on Tara. I headed back to the bedroom. Monica was out of shower now and putting on her jeans. I went down to the kitchen, still in my pajamas, opened the cabinet to the right of the Westinghouse refrigerator, chose the raspberry granola bar over the blueberry (I had actually told this detail to Regan recently, as if it might be relevant), and bent over the sink while I ate. . . .

Barn, that was it. Nothing until the hospital.

The phone rang a second time. My eyes opened.

My hand found the phone. I picked it up and said, "Hello?" ">!> Harlan Coben

"It's Detective Regan. I'm with Agent Tickner. We'll be over in two minutes."

I swallowed. "What is it?"

"Two minutes."

He hung up.

I got out of bed. I glanced out the window, half expecting to see that woman again. No one was there. My jeans from yesterday were crumpled on the floor. I slid them on. I pulled a sweatshirt over my head and made my way down the stairs. I opened the front door and peered out. A police car turned the corner. Regan was driving. Tickner was in the passenger seat. I don't think that I had ever seen them arrive in the same vehicle.

This, I knew, would not be good news.

The two men stepped out of the car. Nausea swept over me. I had prepared myself for this visit since the ransom had gone wrong. I'd even gone so far as to rehearse in my mind how it would all happen--how they would deliver the hammer blow and how I would nod and thank them and excuse myself. I practiced my reaction. I knew precisely how it would all go down.

But now, as I watched Regan and Tickner head toward me, those defenses fled. Panic set in. My body began to shiver. I could barely stand. My knees wobbled, and I leaned against the door frame. The two men moved in step. I was reminded of an old war movie, the scene where the officers come to the mother's house with solemn faces. I shook my head, wishing them away.

When they reached the door, the two men pushed inside.

"We have something to show you," Regan said.

I turned and followed. Regan flicked on a lamp, but it didn't provide much light. Tickner moved to the couch. He opened his laptop computer. The monitor sprang to life, bathing him in an LCD-blue.

"We had a break," Regan explained.

I moved closer.

"Your father-in-law gave us a list of the serial numbers on the ransom bills, remember?"

"Yes."

"One of those bills was used at a bank yesterday afternoon. Agent Tickner is bringing up a video feed right now."

"From the bank?" I asked. no second chance *Âť3

"Yes. We downloaded the video onto his laptop. Twelve hours ago, someone brought a hundred-dollar bill to this bank in order to get smaller notes. We want you to take a look at the video."

I sat next to Tickner. He pressed a button. The video started up immediately. I expected black-and-white or poor, grainy quality. This feed had neither. The angle was shot from above in almost too-brilliant color. A bald man was talking to a teller. There was no sound.

"I don't recognize him," I said.

"Wait."

The bald man said something to the teller. They appeared to be sharing a good-natured chuckle. He picked up a slip of paper and waved a good-bye. The teller gave a small wave back. The next person in line approached the booth. I heard myself groan.

It was my sister, Stacy.

The numb I had longed for suddenly flooded me. I don't know why. Perhaps because two polar emotions pulled at me simultaneously. One, dread. My own sister had done this. My own sister, whom I loved dearly, had betrayed me. But, two, hope--we now had hope. We had a lead. And if it was Stacy, I could not believe that she would harm Tara.

"Is that your sister?" Regan asked, pointing his ringer at her image.

"Yes." I looked at him. "Where was this taken?"

"The Catskills," he said. "A town called--"

"Montague," I finished for him.

Tickner and Regan looked at each other. "How do you know that?"

But I was already heading for the door. "I know where she is." chapter 7

MlJ grandfather had loved to hunt. I always found this strange because he was such a gentle, soft-spoken soul. He never talked about his passion. He didn't hang deer heads over the fireplace mantel. He did not keep trophy pictures or souvenir antlers or whatever else hunters liked to do with carcasses. He did not hunt with friends or family members. Hunting was a solitary activity for my grandfather; he did not explain, defend, or share it with others.

In 1956, Grandpa purchased a small cabin in the hunting woods of Montague, New York. The cost, or so I am told, was under three thousand dollars. I doubt that it would fetch much more today. There was only one bedroom. The structure managed to be rustic without any of the charm associated with that term. It was almost impossible to find-- the dirt road stopped two hundred yards before the cabin. You had to hike along a root-infested trail the rest of the way.

When he died four years ago, my grandmother inherited it. At least, that is what I assumed. No one really thought about it much. My grandparents had retired to Florida almost a decade before. My grandmother was in the murky throes of Alzheimer's now. The old cabin, I guessed, was part of her estate. In terms of taxes and whatever expenses, it was probably deep in arrears.

When we were children, my sister and I spent one weekend each summer with our grandparents at the cabin. I did not like it. Nature to me was boredom occasionally broken up by an onslaught of mosquito bites. There was no TV. We went to bed too early and in too much darkness. During the day, the deep silence was too often shattered by the charming echo of shotgun blasts. We spent most of our time taking no second chance ^

walks, an activity I find tedious to this very day. One year, my mother packed me only khaki-colored clothes. I spent two days terrified that a hunter would mistake me for a deer.

Stacy, on the other hand, found solace out there. Even as a young child, she seemed to revel in the escape from our suburban rat-maze of school and extracurricular activities, of sport teams and popularity. She would wander for hours. She would pick leaves off the trees and collect inchworms in a jar. She would shuffle her feet across carpets of fallen pine needles.

I explained about the cabin to Tickner and Regan as we sped up Route 87. Tickner radioed the police department in Montague. I still remembered how to find the cabin, but describing it was harder. I did my best. Regan kept his foot on the gas pedal. It was four-thirty in the morning. There was no traffic and no need for the siren. We reached Exit 16 on the New York Thruway and sped past the Woodbury Common Outlet Center.

The woods were a blur. We were not far now. I told him where to turn off. The car wound up and down back roads that had not changed one iota in the past three decades.

Fifteen minutes later, we were there.

Stacy.

My sister had never been very attractive. That may have been part of her problem. Yes, that sounds like nonsense. It is silly, really. But I lay it out for you anyway. No one asked Stacy to any prom. Boys never called. She had very few friends. Of course, there are many adolescents with such hardships. Adolescence is always a war; no one gets out unscathed. And yes, my father's illness was a tremendous burden on us. But that doesn't explain it.

In the end, after all the theories and psychoanalyzing, after all the combing through her childhood traumas, I think what went wrong with my sister was more basic. She had some kind of chemical imbalance in her brain. Too much of one compound flowing here, not enough of another flowing there. We did not recognize the warning signs soon enough. Stacy was depressed in an era when such behavior was mistaken for sullen. Or maybe, yet again, I use this sort of convoluted rationale to justify my own indifference to her. Stacy was just my weird younger sister. I had my own problems, thank you very much. % Harlan Coben

I had the selfishness of a teenager, a truly redundant description if ever I've heard one.

Either way, be the origins of my sister's unhappiness physiological, psychological, or the deluxe combo plan, Stacy's destructive journey was over.

My little sister was dead.

We found her on the floor, curled up in a tight fetal position. That was how she had slept when she was a child, her knees up to her chest, her chin tucked. But even though there was not a mark on her, I could see that she was not sleeping. I bent down. Stacy's eyes were open. She stared straight at me, unblinking, questioning. She still looked so very lost. That wasn't supposed to be. Death was supposed to bring solitude. Death was supposed to bring the peace she had found so elusive in life. Why, I wondered, did Stacy still look so damn lost?

A hypodermic needle lay on the floor by her side, her companion in death as in life. Drugs, of course. Intentional or otherwise, I did not yet know. I had no time to dwell on it either. The police fanned out. I wrested my eyes away from her.

Tara.

The place was a mess. Raccoons had found their way in and made a little home for themselves. The couch where my grandfather had taken his naps, always with his arms folded, was torn up. The stuffing had bled onto the floor. Springs popped up looking for someone to stab. The entire place smelled like urine and dead animals.

I stopped and listened for the sound of a crying baby. There was none. Nothing in here. Only one other room. I dived into the bedroom behind a policeman. The room was dark. I hit the light switch. Nothing happened. Flashlights sliced through the black like saber swords. My eyes scanned the room. When I saw it, I nearly cried out.

There was a playpen.

It was one of those modern Pack "N Plays with the mesh sides that fold up for easy transport. Monica and I have one. I don't know anyone with a baby who doesn't. The product tag dangled off the side. It had to be new.

Tears came to my eyes. The flashlight cut past the Pack 'N Play, giving it a strobe-light effect. It appeared to be empty. My heart sank. I ran over anyway, in case the light had caused an optical illusion, in case Tara was nestled so sweetly that she--I don't know--barely made a bump. no second chance ">7

But there was only a blanket inside.

A soft voice--a voice from a whispery, inescapable nightmare-- floated across the room: "Oh Christ."

I swiveled my head toward the sound. The voice came again, weaker this time. "In here," a policeman said. "In the closet."

Tickner and Regan were already there. They both looked inside. Even in the dim glow, I saw their faces lose color.

My feet stumbled forward. I crossed the room, nearly falling, grabbing the closet doorknob at the last moment to regain my balance. I looked through the doorway and saw it. And then, as I looked down at the frayed fabric, I could actually feel my insides implode and crumble into ash.

There, lying on the floor, torn and discarded, was a pink one-piece outfit with black penguins. eighteen months later chapter 8

Lydid SdVV the widow sitting alone at Starbucks.

The widow was on a stool seat, gazing absently at the gentle trickle of pedestrians. Her coffee was near the window, the steam forming a circle on the glass. Lydia watched her for a moment. The devastation was still there--the battle-scarred, thousand-yard stare, the posture of the defeated, the hair with no sheen, the shake in the hands.

Lydia ordered a grande skim latte with an extra shot of espresso. The barista, a too-skinny black-clad youth with a goatee, gave her the shot "on the house." Men, even ones this young, did stuff like that for Lydia. She lowered her sunglasses and thanked him. He nearly wet himself.

Lydia moved toward the condiment table, knowing he was checking out her ass. Again she was used to it. She added a packet of Equal to her drink. The Starbucks was fairly empty--there were plenty of seats--but Lydia slid up on the stool immediately next to the widow. Sensing her, the widow startled out of her reverie.

"Wendy?" Lydia said.

Wendy Burnet, the widow, turned toward the soft voice.

"I'm very sorry for your loss," Lydta said.

Lydia smiled at her. She had, she knew, a warm smile. She wore a tailored gray suit on her petite, tight frame. The skirt was slit fairly high. Business sexy. Her eyes had that shiny-wet thing going, her nose small and slightly upturned. Her hair was auburn ringlets, but she could-- and often did--change that.

Wendy Burnet stared just long enough for Lydia to wonder if she'd 6<? Harlan Coben

been recognized. Lydia had seen that stare plenty of times before, that unsure I-know-you-from-somewhere expression, even though she had not been on TV since she turned thirteen. Some people would even comment, "Hey, you know who you look like?" but Lydia--she had been billed as Larissa Dane back then--would shrug it away.

But alas, this hesitation was not like that. Wendy Burnet was still shell-shocked from the horrible death of her beloved. It simply took her a while to register and assimilate unfamiliar data. She was probably wondering how to react, if she should pretend she knew Lydia or not.

After another few seconds, Wendy Burnet went for the noncommittal. "Thank you."

"Poor Jimmy," Lydia followed up. "Such an awful way to go."

Wendy fumbled for the paper coffee cup and downed a healthy sip. Lydia checked out the little boxes on the side of the cup and saw that the Widow Wendy had ordered a grande latte too, though she'd chosen half decaf and soy milk. Lydia slid a little closer to her.

"You don't know who I am, do you?"

Wendy gave her a weak got-me smile. "I'm sorry."

"No need to be. I don't think we ever met."

Wendy waited for Lydia to introduce herself. When she didn't, Wendy said, "You knew my husband then?"

"Oh yes."

"Are you in the insurance business too?"

"No, I'm afraid not."

Wendy frowned. Lydia sipped her beverage. The awkwardness grew, at least for Wendy. Lydia was fine with it. When it became too much, Wendy rose to leave.

"Well," she said, "it was nice meeting you."

"I ..." Lydia began, hesitating until she was sure that she had Wendy's full attention, "I was the last person to see Jimmy alive."

Wendy froze. Lydia took another sip and closed her eyes, "Nice and strong," she said, gesturing toward the cup. "I love the coffee here, don't you?"

"Did you say . . . ?"

"Please," Lydia said with a small sweep of her arm. "Have a seat so I can explain properly." no second chance 63

Wendy glanced over at the baristas. They were busy gesticulating and whining about what they thought was the great world conspiracy that kept them from the most amazing of lives. Wendy slid back onto the stool. For a few moments, Lydia just stared at her. Wendy tried to hold her gaze.

"You see," Lydia began, offering up a fresh, warm smile and tilting her to the side, "I'm the one who killed your husband."

Wendy's face went pale. "That isn't funny."

"True, yes, I'd have to agree with you on that, Wendy. But then again humor was not really my aim. Would you like to hear a joke instead? I'm on one of those joke e-mail lists. Most are duds, but every once in a while, they send a howler."

Wendy sat stunned. "Who the hell are you?"

"Calm down a second, Wendy."

"I want to know--"

"Shhh." Lydia put her finger to Wendy's lip with too much tenderness. "Let me explain, okay?"

Wendy's lips trembled. Lydia kept her finger there for a few more seconds.

"You're confused. I understand that. Let me clarify a few things for you. First off, yes, I'm the one who put the bullet in Jimmy's head. But Heshy"--Lydia pointed out the window in the direction of an enormous man with a misshapen head--"he did the earlier damage. Personally, by the time I shot Jimmy, well, I think I might have been doing him in a favor."

Wendy just stared.

"You want to know why, am I right? Of course, you do. But deep down inside, Wendy, I think you know. We're women of the world, aren't we? We know our men."

Wendy said nothing.

"Wendy, do you know what I'm talking about?"

"No."

"Sure you do, but I'll say it anyway. Jimmy, your dearly departed husband, owed a great deal of money to some very unpleasant people. As of today, the amount is just under two hundred thousand dollars." Lydia smiled. "Wendy, you're not going to pretend you know nothing about your husband's gambling woes, are you?" 64 Harlan Coben

Wendy had trouble forming the words in her mouth. "I don't understand. ..."

"I hope your confusion has nothing to do with my gender."

"What?"

"That would be really narrow and sexist on your part, don't you think? This is the twenty-first century. Women can be whatever they want."

"You"--Wendy stopped, tried again--"you murdered my husband?"

"Do you watch much television, Wendy?"

"What?"

"Television. You see, on television, whenever someone like your husband owes money to someone like me, well, what happens?"

Lydia stopped as if she really expected her to answer. Wendy finally said, "I don't know."

"Sure you do, but again I'll answer for you. The someone-like-me-- okay, usually the male someone-like-me--is sent to threaten him. Then maybe my cohort Heshy out there would beat him up or break his legs, something like that. But they never kill the guy. That's one of those TV bad-guy rules. 'You can't collect from a dead man.' You've heard that, haven't you, Wendy?"

She waited. Wendy finally said, "I guess."

"But, see, that's wrong. Let's take Jimmy, for example. Your husband had a disease. Gambling. Am I right? It cost you everything, didn't it? The insurance business. That had been your father's. Jimmy took it over for him. It's gone now. Wiped out. The bank was ready to foreclose on your house. You and the kids barely had enough money for groceries. And still Jimmy didn't stop." Lydia shook her head. "Men. Am I right?"

There were tears in Wendy's eyes. Her voice, when she was able to speak, was so weak. "So you killed him?"

Lydia looked up, shaking her head gently. "I'm really not explaining this well, am I?" She lowered her gaze and tried again. "Have you ever heard the expression that you can't squeeze blood from a stone?"

Again Lydia waited for an answer. Wendy finally nodded. Lydia seemed pleased.

"Well, that's the case here. With Jimmy, I mean. I could have Heshy out there work him over--Heshy is good at that--but what good would no second chance 6"ÂŤ

that do? Jimmy didn't have the money. He would never be able to get his hands on that kind of cash." Lydia sat a little straighter and put out her hands. "Now, Wendy, I want you to think like a businessman-- check that, a businessperson. We don't have to be raving feminists, but I think we should at least keep ourselves on equal footing."

Lydia gave Wendy another smile. Wendy cringed.

"Okay, so what am I--as a wise businessperson--what am I supposed to do? I can't let the debt go unpaid, of course. In my line of work, that's professional suicide. Someone owes my employer money, they have to pay. No way around that. The problem here is, Jimmy doesn't have a cent to his name but"--Lydia stopped and widened her smile--"but he does have a wife and three kids. And he used to be in the insurance business. Do you see where I'm going with this, Wendy?"

Wendy was afraid to breathe.

"Oh, I think you do, but again I'll say it for you. Insurance. More specifically, life insurance. Jimmy had a policy. He didn't admit it right away, but eventually, well, Heshy can be persuasive." Wendy's eyes drifted toward the window. Lydia saw the shiver and hid a smile. "Jimmy told us he had two policies, in fact, with a total payout of nearly a million dollars."

"So you"--Wendy was struggling to comprehend--"you killed Jimmy for the insurance money?"

Lydia snapped her fingers. "You go, girlfriend."

Wendy opened her mouth but nothing came out.

"And, Wendy? Let me make this crystal clear. Jimmy's debts don't die with him. We both know that. The bank still wants you to pay the mortgage, am I right? The credit-card companies don't stop mounting the interest." Lydia shrugged her small shoulders, palms to the sky. "Why should my employer be any different?"

"You can't be serious."

"Your first insurance check should come in about a week. By that time, your husband's debt will be two hundred eighty thousand dollars. I'll expect a check for that amount on that day."

"But the bills he left alone--"

"Shhh." Again Lydia silenced her with a finger to her lips. Her voice dropped to an intimate whisper. "That doesn't really concern me, 66 Harlan Coben

Wendy. 1 have given you the rare opportunity to get out from under. Declare bankruptcy, if you must. You live in a ritzy area. Move out. Have Jack--that's your eleven-year-old, correct?"

Wendy jolted at the sound of her son's name.

"Well, no summer camp for Jack this year. Have him get a job after school. Whatever. None of that concerns me. You, Wendy, will pay what you owe, and that will be the end of this. You will never see or hear from me again. If you don't pay, however, well, take a good look at Heshy over there." She paused, letting Wendy do just that. It had the desired effect.

"We'll kill little Jack first. Then, two days later, we'll kill Lila. If you report this conversation to the police, we'll kill Jack and Lila and Darlene. All three, in age order. And then, after you bury your children--please listen, Wendy, because this is key--I'll still make you pay."

Wendy couldn't speak.

Lydia followed up a deep, caffeinated sip with an "Ahh" of satisfaction. "Dee-lightful," she said, rising from her seat. "I really enjoyed our little girl chat, Wendy. We should get together again soon. Say, your house at noon on Friday the sixteenth?"

Wendy kept her head down.

"Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to pay the debt," Wendy said.

Lydia smiled at her. "Again, my sincerest condolences."

Lydia headed outside and breathed in the fresh air. She looked behind her. Wendy Burnet had not moved. Lydia waved goodbye and met up with Heshy. He was nearly six six. She was five one. He weighed 275 pounds. She was 105. He had a head like a misshapen pumpkin. Her features seemed to have been made in the Orient out of porcelain.

"Problems?" Heshy asked.

"Please," she said with a dismissive wave. "On to more profitable ventures. Did you find our man?"

"Yes."

"And the package is already out?"

"Sure, Lydia."

"Very good." She frowned, felt a gnawing. no second chance 67

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"I have a funny feeling, that's all."

"You want to back out?"

Lydia smiled at him. "Not on your life, Pooh Bear."

"Then what do you want to do?"

She thought about it. "Let's just see how Dr. Seidman reacts." chapter 9

"Don't drink dny more apple juice," Cheryl told her two-year-old, Conner.

I stood on the sidelines with my arms folded. It was a bit nippy, the frosty, damp chill of late New Jersey autumn, so I pulled the hood of my sweatshirt over my Yankee cap. I also had on a pair of Ray-Bans. Sunglasses and hood. I looked very much like the police sketch of the Unabomber.

We were at a soccer game for eight-year-old boys. Lenny was the head coach. He needed an assistant and recruited me because, I assume, I am the only one who knows even less about soccer than he does. Still our team was winning. I think the score was about eighty-three to two, but I am not certain.

"Why can't I have more juice?" Conner asked.

"Because," Cheryl answered with the patience of a mother, "apple juice gives you diarrhea."

"It does?"

"Yes."

To my right, Lenny drowned the kids in a steady stream of encouragement. "You're the best, Ricky." "Way to go, Petey." "Now that's what I call hustle, Davey." He always added a y to the end of their names. And yes, it is annoying. Once, in a pitch of overexcitement, he called me Marky. Once.

"Uncle Marc?"

I feel a tug at my leg. I look down at Conner, who is twenty-six months old. "What's up, pal?" no second chance 69

"Apple juice gives me a diarrhea."

"Good to know," I said,

"Uncle Marc?"

"Yeah?"

Conner gave me his gravest look. "Diarrhea," he said, "is not my friend."

I glanced at Cheryl. She smothered a smile, but I saw the concern there too. I looked back at Conner. "Words to live by, kid."

Conner nodded, pleased by my response. I love him. He breaks my heart and brings me joy in equal measure and at exactly the same time. Twenty-six months old. Two months older than Tara. I watch his development with awe and a longing that could heat a furnace.

He turned back to his mother. Littered about Cheryl was the product of her mommy-as-pack-mule harvest. There were Minute Maid juice boxes and Nutri-Grain bars. There were Pampers Baby-Dry diapers (as opposed to Baby-Wet?) and Huggies wipes containing aloe vera for the discriminating buttock. There were angled baby bottles from Evenflo. There were cinnamon Teddy Grahams and well-scrubbed baby carrots and sectioned oranges and cut-up grapes (sliced the long way so as to make them chokeproof) and cubes of what I hoped was cheese, all hermetically sealed in their own Ziploc bags.

Lenny, the head coach, was yelling out key, game-winning strategy to our players. When we are on offense, he tells them to "Score!" When we are on defense, he advises them to "Stop him!" And then sometimes, like right now, he offers keen insight into the subtleties of the game:

"Kick the ball!"

Lenny glanced at me after he'd shouted that for the fourth time in a row. I gave him a thumbs-up and way-to-go nod. He wanted to give me the finger, but there were too many underage witnesses. I refolded my arms and squinted at the field. The kids were geared up like the pros. They wore cleats. Their socks were pulled up over their shin guards. Most wore that black grease under their eyes, even though there was nary a hint of sunshine. Two even had those breathing strip-bandages across their noses. I watched Kevin, my godson, try, per his father's instructions, to kick the ball. And then it hit me like a body blow.

I staggered back.

That was how it always happened. I will be watching the game or I'll 70 Harlan Coben

be having dinner with friends or I'll be working on a patient or listening to a song on the radio. I'll be doing something normal, average, feeling pretty decent, and then, wham, I get blindsided.

My eyes welled up. That never used to happen to me before the murder and kidnapping. I am a doctor. I know how to play poised in both my professional and personal life. But now I wear sunglasses all the time like some self-important B movie star. Cheryl looked up at me and again I saw the concern. I straightened and forced a smile. Cheryl was becoming beautiful. That happened sometimes. Motherhood agreed with certain women. It gave their physical appearance a wonder and richness that borders on the celestial.

I don't want to give you the wrong impression. I don't spend every day crying. I still live my life. I am bereaved, sure, but not all the time. I am not paralyzed. I work, though I haven't yet had the courage to travel overseas. I keep thinking that I need to stay close by, in case there is a new development. That kind of thinking is, I know, not rational and perhaps even delusional. But I am still not ready.

What gets me--what gives me that surprise wham--is the way grief seems to relish in catching you unawares. Grief, when spotted, can be, if not handled, somewhat manipulated, finessed, concealed. But grief likes to hide behind bushes. It enjoys leaping out of nowhere, startling you, mocking you, stripping away your pretense of normalcy. Grief lulls you to sleep, thus making that blindside hit all the more jarring.

"Uncle Marc?"

It was Conner again. He talked pretty well for a kid his age. I wondered what Tara's voice would have sounded like, and behind my sunglasses, my eyes closed. Sensing something, Cheryl reached out to pull him away. I shook her off. "What is it, pal?"

"What about poop?"

"What about it?"

He looked up and closed one eye in concentration. "Is poop my friend?"

Hell of a question. "I don't know, pal. What do you think?"

Conner considered his own query so hard it appeared as if he might explode. Finally he replied, "It's more my friend than diarrhea."

I nodded sagely. Our team scored another goal. Lenny shot his fists into the air and shouted, "Yes!" He nearly cartwheeled out to congratulate Craig (or should I say Craigy), the goal scorer. The players followed no second chance 71

him. ihere was much high-fiving. I didn't join in. My job, I figured, was to be the quiet partner to Lenny's histrionics, the Tonto to his Lone Ranger, the Abbott to his Costello, the Rowan to his Martin, the Captain to his Tennille. Balance.

I watched the parents on the sidelines. The mothers became clusters. They talked about their kids, about their child's achievements and extracurricular activities, and no one listened much because other people's children are boring. The fathers offered more variety. Some videotaped. Some yelled encouragement. Some rode their kids in a way that borders on the unhealthy. Some gabbed on cell phones and constantly fiddled with handheld electronics of one kind or another, experiencing a bit of the bends after spending all week immersed in their work.

Why did I go to the police?

I have been told countless times since that terrible day that I am not to blame for what happened. On one level, I realize that my actions may have changed nothing. In all likelihood, they had never intended to let Tara come home. She might even have been dead before the first ransom call. Her death may have been accidental. Maybe they just panicked or were strung out. Who knows? I certainly don't.

And, ah, there's the rub.

I cannot, of course, be certain that I am not responsible. Basic science: For every action, there is a reaction.

I do not dream about Tara--or if I do, the gods are generous enough to not let me remember. That is probably giving them too much credit. Let me rephrase. I may not dream about Tara specifically, but I do dream about the white van with the mix-and-match license plate and the stolen magnetic sign. In the dreams I hear a noise, muffled, but I'm pretty sure it is the sound of a baby crying. Tara, I know now, was in the van, but in my dream, I don't go toward the sound. My legs are buried deep in that nightmare muck. I can't move. When I finally wake up, I cannot help but ponder the obvious. Was Tara that close to me? And more important: Had I been a little braver, could I have saved her then and there?

The referee, a lanky high-school boy with a good-natured grin, blew the whistle and waved his hands over his head. Game over. Lenny shouted, "Woo, yeah!" The eight-year-olds stared at one another, confused. One asked a teammate, "Who won?" and the teammate shrugged. They lined up, Stanley Cup hockey style, for the postgame handshakes. R Harlan Coben

Cheryl stood up and put a hand on my back. "Great win, Coach."

"Yeah, I carry this team," I said.

She smiled. The boys started rambling back toward us. I congratulated them with my stoic nod. Craig's mother had brought a fifty-pack of Dunkin' Donuts Munchkins in a box with a Halloween design. Dave's mom had boxes of something called Yoo-hoo, a perverse excuse for chocolate milk that tastes like chalk. I popped a Munchkin in my mouth and skipped the washdown. Cheryl asked, "What flavor was that?"

I shrugged. "They come in different flavors?" I watched the parents interact with their children and felt tremendously out of place. Lenny came toward me.

"Great win, wasn't it?"

"Yeah," I said. "We're the balls."

He gestured for us to step away. I complied. When we were out of earshot, Lenny said, "Monica's estate is almost wrapped up. It shouldn't be too much longer now."

I said, "Uh-huh," because I didn't really care.

"I also have your will drawn up. You need to sign it."

Neither Monica nor I had made up a will. For years, Lenny had warned me about that. You need to put in writing who gets your money, he'd remind me, who is going to raise your daughter, who is going to care for your parents, yadda, yadda, yadda. But we didn't listen. We were going to live forever. Last wills and testaments were for, well, the dead.

Lenny changed subjects on the fly. "You want to come back to the house for a game of foosball?"

Foosball, for those of you who lack a basic education, is that tabletop bar game with the soccer-type men skewered on sticks. "I'm already champion of the world," I reminded him.

"That was yesterday."

"Can't a man revel in his title for little while? I'm not yet ready to let go of the feeling."

"Understood." Lenny headed back to his family. I watched his daughter, Marianne, corner him. She was gesturing like mad. Lenny slumped his shoulders, took out his wallet, peeled out a bill. Marianne took it, kissed him on the cheek, ran off. Lenny watched her disappear, shaking his head. There was a smile on his face. I turned away. no second chance 73

The worst part--or should I say the best part--was that I have hope.

Here was what we found that night at Grandpa's cabin: my sister's corpse, hairs belonging to Tara in the Pack "N Play (DNA confirmed), and a pink one-piece with black penguins that matched Tara's.

Here was what we did not find and, in fact, still have not found: the ransom money, the identity, if any, of Stacy's accomplices--and Tara.

That's right. We never found my daughter.

The forest is big and sprawling, I know. The grave would be small and easily hidden. There could be rocks over it. An animal might have found it and dragged the contents deeper into the thicket. The contents could be miles from my grandfather's cabin. They could be somewhere else entirely.

Or--though I keep this thought to myself--maybe there is no grave at all.

So you see, the hope is there. Like grief, hope hides and pounces and taunts and never leaves. I am not sure which of the two is the crueler mistress.

The police and FBI theorize that my sister acted in conjunction with some very bad people. While no one is quite sure if their original intention was kidnapping or robbery, most everyone agrees that someone panicked. Maybe they thought that Monica and I would not be home. Maybe they thought that they would just have to contend with a babysitter. Whatever, they saw us, and acting in some drugged or crazed state, someone fired a shot. Then someone else fired a shot, ergo the ballistic tests showing Monica and I were shot by different .38's. They then kidnapped the baby. Eventually they double-crossed Stacy and killed her with an overdose of heroin.

I keep saying "they" because the authorities also believe that Stacy had at least two accomplices. One would be the professional, the cool head who knew how to work the drop and weld the license plates and disappear without a trace. The other accomplice would be the "pan icker," if you will, the one who shot us and probably caused the death of Tara.

Some, of course, don't buy that theory. Some believe that there was only one accomplice--the cool professional--and that the one who panicked was Stacy. She, this theory goes, was the one who fired the first bullet, probably at me since I don't remember any shots, and then the professional killed Monica to cover the mistake. This theory is 74 Harlan Coben

backed up by one of the few leads we had following that night in the cabin: a drug dealer who, in some bizarre plea bargain on another charge, told authorities that Stacy had purchased a gun from him, a .38, a week before the murder-kidnapping. This theory is further backed up by the fact that the only unexplained hairs and fingerprints found at the murder scene were Stacy's. While the cool pro would know to wear gloves and be careful, a drugged-out accomplice would probably not.

Still others do not embrace that theory either, which is why certain members of the police department and FBI cling to and support a more obvious third scenario:

I was the mastermind.

The theory goes something like this: first caveat, the husband is always suspect number one. Second, my Smith &; Wesson .38 is still missing. They press me on this question all the time. I wish I had an answer. Third, I never wanted a child. Tara's birth forced me into a loveless marriage. They believe that they have evidence that I was considering divorce (something that yes, I did indeed contemplate) and so I planned the whole thing, top to bottom. I invited my sister over to my house and perhaps enlisted her help so that she would take the fall. I have the ransom money hidden away. I killed and buried my own daughter.

Awful, yes, but I am past anger. I am past exhaustion. I am not sure where I am anymore.

The main problem with their hypothesis is, of course, that it is hard to finesse my being left for dead. Did I kill Stacy? Did she shoot me? Or--drum roll here--is there a third possibility out there, a blending of the two different theories into one? Some believe that yes, I was behind it, but I had another accomplice besides Stacy. That accomplice killed Stacy, perhaps against my wishes, perhaps as part of my grand scheme to deflect my guilt and avenge my own shooting. Or something like that.

And round and round we go.

In sum, when you cut through it all, they--and I--have nothing. No ransom money. No idea who did it. No idea why. And most important: no small corpse.

That is where we are today--a year and a half after the abduction. The file is still technically open, but Regan and Tickner have moved on to new cases. I haven't heard a word from either in nearly six months. no second chance /"Âť

The media gnawed on us for a tew weeks, but with nothing new to feed on, they too, slithered toward juicier troughs.

The Dunkin' Donuts Munchkins were gone. Everyone started heading to a parking lot overloaded with minivans. After the game we coaches take our budding athletes to Schrafft's Ice Cream Parlor, a tradition in our town. Every coach in every other league in every other age group follows the same tradition. The place was packed. Nothing like an ice cream cone in the autumn frost to burrow the chill into the bone.

I stood with my Cookies-n-Cream cone and surveyed the scene. Children and fathers. It was getting to be too much for me. I checked my watch. Time for me to leave anyway. I met Lenny's eye and motioned that I was going. He mouthed the words Your will at me. In case I didn't get the drift, he even made a signing motion with his hand. I waved that I understood. I got back into my car and flipped on the radio.

For a long while, I sat there and watched the flow of families. I kept my eyes on the fathers mostly. I gauged their reactions to this most domestic of activities, hoping to see a flicker of doubt, something in the eyes that might comfort me. But I didn't.

I'm not sure how long I stayed like that. Not more than ten minutes, I suppose. An old favorite by James Taylor came on the radio. It brought me back. I smiled, started up the car, and made my way toward the hospital.

An hour later, I was scrubbing up to perform surgery on an eight year-old boy with--to use terminology familiar to both layman and professional--a facial smash. Zia Leroux, my medical partner, was there.

I'm not sure why I first chose to be a plastic surgeon. It was neither the siren song of easy dollars nor the ideal of helping my fellowman. I had wanted to be a surgeon pretty much from the get-go, but I saw myself more in the vascular or cardiac fields. Life's turns come in funny ways though. During my second year of residency, the cardiac surgeon who ran our rotation was--what's the phrase?--a total prick. On the other hand, the doctor in charge of the cosmetic surgery, Liam Reese, was incredible. Dr. Reese had that enviable have-it-all feel to him, that combination of good looks, calm confidence, and internal warmth that 76 Harlan Coben

naturally drew people. You wanted to please him. You wanted to be like him.

Dr. Reese became my mentor. He showed how reconstructive surgery was creative, a Humpty-Dumpty process that forced you to find new ways to put back together what had been destroyed. The bones in the face and skull are the most complex stretch of skeletal landscape in the human body. We who repair them are artists. We are jazz musicians. If you talk to orthopedic or thoracic surgeons, they can be pretty specific about their procedures. Our work--reconstruction--is never exactly the same. We improvise. Dr. Reese taught me that. He appealed to my inner techno-weenie with talk of microsurgery and bone grafts and synthetic skin. I remember visiting him in Scarsdale. His wife was long legged and beautiful. His daughter was school valedictorian. His son was captain of the basketball team and the nicest kid I've ever met. At the age of forty-nine Dr. Reese was killed in a car crash on Route 684 heading to Connecticut. Somebody might find something poignant in that, but that person wouldn't be me.

When I was finishing up residency, I landed a one-year fellowship to train in oral surgery overseas. I didn't apply to be a do-gooder; I applied because it sounded pretty cool. This trip would be, I hoped, my version of backpacking through Europe. It was not. Things went wrong right away. We got caught up in a civil war in Sierra Leone. I handled wounds so horrible, so unfathomable, that it was hard to believe the human mind could conjure up the necessary cruelty to inflict them. But even in the midst of this destruction, I felt a strange exhilaration. I don't try to figure out why. Like I said before, this stuff gets me jazzed. Maybe part of it was the satisfaction of helping people truly in need. Or maybe I was drawn to this work the same way some are drawn to extreme sports, who need the risk of death to feel whole.

When I came back, Zia and I set up One World, and we were on our way. I love what I do. Perhaps our work is like an extreme sport, but it also has a very--pardon the pun--human face. I like that. I love my patients and yet I love the calculating distance, the necessary coldness, of what I do. I care about my patients so much, but then they are gone-- intense love mixed with fleeting commitment.

Today's patient presented us with a rather complicated challenge. My patron saint--the patron saint of many in reconstructive surgery-- is the French researcher Rene LeFort. LeFort tossed cadavers off a tavern no second chance 77

root onto their skulls to see the natural pattern of fracture lines in the face. I bet this impressed the ladies. Today we name certain fractures for him--more specifically, LeFort type I, LeFort type II, LeFort type I'll. Zia and I checked the films again. The Water view gave us the best look, but the Caldwell and lateral backed it up.

Simply put, the fracture line on this eight-year-old was a LeFort type 111, causing a complete separation of the facial bones and the cranium. I could pretty much rip off the boy's face like a mask if I wanted to.

"Car accident?" I asked.

Zia nodded. "Father was drunk."

"Don't tell me. He's fine, right?"

"He even remembered to put on his own seat belt."

"But not his son's."

"Too much trouble. What with him being tired from raising a glass so many times."

Zia and I started our life's journey in two very different places. Like the Story's classic seventies song "Brother Louie," Zia is black as the night while I am whiter than white (my skin tone, as described by Zia: "underwater fish belly"). I was born at Beth Israel Hospital in Newark and grew up on the suburban streets of Kasselton, New Jersey. Zia was born in a mud hut in a village outside of Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Sometime during the reign of Papa Doc, her parents became political prisoners. No one knows too many details. Her father was executed. Her mother, when released, was damaged goods. She grabbed her daughter and escaped on what might liberally be dubbed a raft. Three passengers died on the journey. Zia and her mother survived. They made their way to the Bronx where they took up residence in the basement of a beauty parlor. The two spent their days quietly sweeping hair. The hair, it seemed to Zia, was inescapable. It was on her clothes, clinging to her skin, in her throat, in her lungs. She lived forever with that feeling that a stray strand was in her mouth and she couldn't quite pull it out. To this day, when Zia gets nervous, her fingers play with her tongue, as though trying to pluck out a memento of her past.

When the surgery was over, Zia and I collapsed onto a bench. Zia untied her surgical mask and let it fall to her chest.

"Piece of cake," she said.

"Amen," I agreed. "How did your date go last night?"

"It sucked," she said. "And I don't mean that literally." 78 Harlan Coben

"Sorry."

"Men are such scum."

"Don't I know it."

"I'm getting so desperate," she said, "I'm thinking of sleeping with you again."

"Gasp," I said. "Woman, have you no standards?"

Her smile was blinding, the bright white against the dark skin. She was a shade under six feet tall with smooth muscles and cheekbones so high and sharp you feared they might pierce her skin. "When are you going to start dating?" she asked.

"I date."

"I mean, long enough to have a sexual encounter."

"Not all women are easy as you, Zia."

"Sad," she said, giving my arm a playful punch.

Zia and I slept together once--and we both knew that it would never happen again. It was how we met. We hooked up during my first year of medical school. Yep, a one-night stand. I have had my fair share of one-night stands, but only two have been memorable. The first led to disaster. The second--this one--led to a relationship I will cherish forever.

It was eight o'clock at night by the time we got out of our scrubs. We took Zia's car, a tiny thing called a BMW Mini, to the Stop & Shop on Northwood Avenue and picked up some groceries. Zia chatted without letup as we wheeled carts down the aisles. I liked when Zia talked. It gave me energy. At the deli counter Zia pulled a call number. She looked at the specials board and frowned.

"What?" I said.

"Boar's Head ham on sale."

"What about it?"

"Boar's Head," she repeated. "What marketing genius came up with that name? 'Say, I have an idea. Let's name our premium cold cuts after the most disgusting animal imaginable. No, check that. Let's name it after its head.' "

"You always order it," I said.

She thought about it. "Yeah, I guess."

We moved to the checkout line. Zia put her stuff up front. I placed the divider down and unloaded my cart. A portly cashier began to ring up her items. no second chance 79

"You hungry?" she asked me.

I shrugged. "Guess I could go for a couple of slices at Garho's."

"Let's do it." Zia's eyes drifted over my shoulder and then jerked to a stop. She squinted and something crossed her face. "Marc?"

"Yeah."

She waved it off. "Nah, can't be."

"What?"

Still staring over my shoulder, Zia gestured with her chin. I turned slowly and when I saw her, I felt it in my chest.

"I've only seen her in pictures," Zia said, "but isn't that. . . ?"

I managed a nod.

It was Rachel.

The world closed in around me. It shouldn't feel this way. I knew that. We had broken up years ago. Now, after all this time, I should be smiling. I should feel something wistful, a passing nostalgia, a poignant remembrance of a time when I was young and naive. But no, that was not what was going on here. Rachel stood ten yards away and it all flooded back. What I felt was a still-too-powerful yearning, a longing that tore through me, that made both the love and heartbreak feel fresh and alive.

"You okay?" Zia said.

Another nod.

Are you one of those who believe that we all have one true soul mate--one and only one preordained love? There, across three Stop &C Shop checkout lanes and under a sign reading EXPRESS LANE--15 ITEMS OR LESS, stood mine.

Zia said, "I thought she got married."

"She did, "I said.

"No ring." Then Zia punched my arm. "Oooh, this is exciting, isn't it?"

"Yeah," I said. "Exhilaration city."

Zia snapped her fingers. "Hey, you know what this is like? That crappy old album you used to play. The song about meeting the old lover in the grocery store. What's the name of it?"

The first time I'd seen Rachel, when I was a lad of nineteen years, the effect was relatively gentle. There was no big boom. I'm not even sure that I found her overly attractive. But as I'd soon learn, I like a woman whose looks grow on you. You start off thinking, Okay, she's pretty 80 Harlan Coben

decent looking, and then, a few days later, maybe it's something she says or the way she tilts her head when she says it, but then, wham, it's like getting hit by a bus.

It felt like that again now. Rachel had changed but not by much. The years had made that sneaky beauty harden maybe, more brittle and angled. She was thinner. Her dark blue-black hair was pulled back and tied into a ponytail. Most men like the hair down. I've always liked it tied back, the openness and exposure of it, I guess, especially with Rachel's cheekbones and neck. She wore jeans and a gray blouse. Her hazel eyes were down, her head bent in that pose of concentration I knew so well. She had not seen me yet.

" 'Same Old Lang Syne,' " Zia said.

"What?"

"The song about the lovers in the grocery store. By Clan Somebody. That's the title. 'Same Old Lang Syne.' " Then she added: "I think that's the title."

Rachel reached into her wallet and plucked out a twenty. She began to hand it to the cashier. Her gaze lifted--and that was when she saw me.

I can't say exactly what crossed her face. She did not look surprised. Our eyes met, but I did not see joy there. Fear, perhaps. Maybe resignation. I don't know. I also don't know how long we both stood there like that.

"Maybe I should move away from you," Zia whispered.

"Huh?"

"If she thinks you're with a chick this hot, she'll conclude that she has no chance."

I think I smiled.

"Marc?"

"Yeah."

"The way you're standing like that. Gaping like a total whack job. It's a little scary."

"Thanks."

I felt her hand push on my back. "Go over and say hello."

My feet started moving, though I don't remember the brain issuing any commands. Rachel let the cashier bag her groceries. She stepped toward me and tried to smile. Her smile had always been spectacular, the kind that makes you think of poetry and spring showers, a dazzler no second chance 81

that can change your day. This smile, however, was not like that. It was tighter. It was pained. And I wondered if she was holding back or if she could no longer smile like she used to, if something had dimmed the vvattage permanently.

We stopped a yard away from each other, neither sure if the proper protocol called for a hug, a kiss, a handshake. So we did none of the above. 1 stood there and felt the hurt everywhere.

"Hi," I said.

"Good to see you still have all the smooth lines, " Rachel replied.

I feigned a rakish grin. "Hey, baby, what's your sign?"

"Better," she said.

"Come here often?"

"Good. Now say, 'Haven't we met before?' "

"Nah." I arched an eyebrow. "No way I'd forget meeting a foxy lady like you."

We both laughed. We were both trying too hard. We both knew it.

"You look good," I said.

"So do you."

Brief silence.

"Okay," I said, "I'm out of uncomfortable cliches and forced banter."

"Whew," Rachel said.

"Why are you here?"

"I'm buying food."

"No, I mean--"

"I know what you meant," she interrupted. "My mother moved into a condo development in West Orange."

A few of the strands had escaped her ponytail and fell across her face. It took all my willpower to stop from pushing them away.

Rachel glanced away and then back at me. "I heard about your wife and daughter," she said. "I'm sorry."

"Thank you."

"I wanted to call or write but..."

"I heard you got married," I said.

She wiggled the fingers on her left hand. "Not anymore."

"And that you were an agent with the FBI."

Rachel put her hand back down. "Also not anymore."

More silence. Again I don't know how long we stood there. The 8<? Harlan Coben

cashier had moved on to the next shopper. Zia came up behind us. She cleared her throat and jammed her hand toward Rachel. "Hi, I'm Zia Leroux," she said.

"Rachel Mills."

"Good to meet you, Rachel. I'm Marc's practice partner." Then, thinking about it, she added: "We're just friends."

"Zia," I said.

"Oh, right, sorry. Look, Rachel, I'd love to stay and chat, but I have to run." She jerked her thumb toward the exit to emphasize the point. "You two talk. Marc, I'll meet you back here later. Great meeting you, Rachel."

"Same here."

Zia rushed off. I shrugged. "She's a great doctor."

"I bet she is." Rachel took hold of her cart. "I have someone waiting in the car, Marc. It was good seeing you."

"You too." But surely, with all I'd lost, I must have learned something, right? I couldn't just let her go. I cleared my throat and said, "Maybe we should get together."

"I'm still living in Washington. I head back tomorrow."

Silence. My insides turned to jelly. My breathing was shallow.

"Good-bye, Marc," Rachel said. But those hazel eyes were wet.

"Don't go yet."

I tried to keep the pleading out of my voice, but I don't think I was successful. Rachel looked at me, and she saw everything. "What do you want me to say here, Marc?"

"That you want to get together too."

"That's all?"

I shook my head. "You know that's not all."

"I'm not twenty-one anymore."

"Neither am I."

"The girl you loved is dead and gone."

"No," I said. "She's right in front of me."

"You don't know me anymore."

"So let's get reacquainted. I'm not in a rush."

"Just like that?"

I tried to smile. "Yeah."

"I live in Washington. You live in New Jersey."

"So I'll move," I said. no second chance 83

But even before the impetuous words came out, even before Rachel made that face, I could recognize my own false bravado. I couldn't just leave my parents or dump my business with Zia or--or abandon my ghosts. Somewhere between my lips and her ears the sentiment crashed and burned.

Rachel turned to leave then. She did not say good-bye again. I watched her push the cart toward the door. I saw it automatically swing open with an electric grunt. I saw Rachel, the love of my life, disappear again without so much as a backward glance. I stayed still. I did not follow her. I felt my heart tumble and shatter, but I did nothing to stop her.

Maybe I hadn't learned anything, after all. chapter 10

i drank. i

I am not a big drinker--pot had been my elixir of choice during my 1 younger days--but I found an old bottle of gin in a cabinet over the 1 sink. There was tonic in the fridge. I have an automatic icemaker in the | freezer. You do the math. i

I still lived in the old Levinsky house. It is much too big for me, but I don't have the heart to let it go. It feels like a portal now, a lifeline (al' beit a fragile one) to my daughter. Yes, I know how that sounds, but ; selling it now would be like closing a door on her. I can't do that.

Zia wanted to stay with me, but I begged off. She did not push it. I thought about the corny Clan Fogelberg (not Clan Somebody) song ? where the old lovers talk until their tongues get tired. I thought about ! Bogie questioning the gods who would allow Ingrid Bergman into his, i of all possible, gin joints. Bogie drank after she left. It seemed to help i him. Maybe it would help me too. ',

The fact that Rachel could still pack this kind of wallop annoyed the | hell out of me. It was stupid and childish really. Rachel and I had first met during summer break between my sophomore and junior years of 1 college. She was from Middlebury, Vermont, and supposedly a distant 1 cousin of Lenny's wife, Cheryl, though no one could ascertain the exact 1 relationship. That summer--the summer of all summers--Rachel stayed | with Cheryl's family because Rachel's folks were going through a nasty 1 divorce. "We were introduced, and like I said before, it took some time ' for the bus to smack into me. Maybe that's what made it all the more \

potent when it did.

We began to date. We doubled a lot with Lenny and Cheryl. The ; no second cfiaRBB u^

four of us spent every weekend at Lenny's summer house on the Jersey shore. It was indeed a glorious summer, the kind of summer everyone should experience at least once in a lifetime.

If this were a movie, we'd be cueing up the montage music. I went to Tufts University while Rachel was starting out at Boston College. First scene of the montage, well, they'd probably have us on a boat on the Charles, me paddling, Rachel holding a parasol, her smile tentative then mocking. She'd splash me and then I'd splash her and then the boat would tip. It never happened, but you get the point. Next maybe there would be a picnic scene on campus, a shot of us studying in the library, our bodies entwined on a couch, me staring mesmerized as Rachel reads from her textbook, her glasses on, absentmindedly tucking a hair behind her ear. The montage would probably close on two bodies tussling under a white satin sheet, even though no college student uses satin sheets. Still, I'm thinking cinematic here.

I was in love.

During one Christmas break, we visited Rachel's grandmother, a card-carrying yenta from the old school, in a nursing home. The old woman took both our hands in hers and declared us beshert which is a Yiddish word that means predestined cr fated.

So what happened?

Our ending was not an uncommon one. We were young, I guess. During my senior year, Rachel decided that she wanted to spend a semester in Florence. I was twenty-two. I got pissed off and while she was away, I slept with another woman--a one-night stand with a featureless coed from Babson. It meant absolutely nothing. I understand that makes it no better, but maybe it should. I don't know.

Anyway, someone at the party told someone else and eventually it got back to Rachel. She called me from Italy and broke it off, just like that, which I saw as something of an overreaction. Like I said, we were young. At first, I was too proud (read: too stupid) to beg and then, when I started soaking in the repercussions, I called and wrote letters and sent flowers. Rachel never responded. It was over. We were done.

I stood and stumbled to my desk. I fished out the key I had taped under the credenza and unlocked the bottom drawer. I lifted off the files and found my secret stash underneath. No, not drugs. The past. Rachel things. I found the familiar photo and pulled it into view. Lenny and Cheryl still have this picture in their den, which had, understandably 86 Harlan Coben

enough, angered Monica to no end. It was a photograph of the four of us--Lenny, Cheryl, Rachel, and I--at a formal during my senior year. Rachel is wearing a spaghetti-strap black dress and the thought of the way it clung to her shoulders still takes my breath away.

A long time ago.

I've moved on, of course. Per my life plan, 1 went to medical school. I always knew that I wanted to be a doctor. Most doctors I know will tell you the same. It is rarely a decision you come to late.

And I dated too. I even had other one-night stands (remember Zia?), but--and this is going to sound pitiful--even after all these years, I never go through a day without thinking, at least fleetingly, about Rachel. Yes, I know that I've romanticized the romance, if you will, completely out of proportion. Had I not made that stupid blunder, I would probably not be living in some blissful alternative universe, still entwined on the couch with my beloved. As Lenny once pointed out in a moment of naked honesty, if my relationship with Rachel had been that great, it surely could have survived this most hackneyed of speed bumps.

Am I saying that I never loved my wife? No. At least, I think the answer is no. Monica was beautiful--right-away beautiful, nothing slow about the way her looks hit you--and passionate and surprising. She was also wealthy and glamorous. I tried not to compare--that is a terrible way to live your life--but I could not help but love Monica in my smaller, less bright, post-Rachel world. Given time, the same might have happened had I stayed with Rachel, but that's using logic and in matters of the heart, logic need not apply.

Over the years, Cheryl grudgingly kept me informed on what Rachel was up to. Rachel, I'd learned, had gone into law enforcement and become a federal agent in Washington. I can't say I was totally surprised. Three years ago, Cheryl told me that Rachel had gotten married to an older guy, a senior fed. Even after all this time--Rachel and I had been . broken up eleven years by then--I felt my insides cave in. I realized with a heavy thud just how badly I'd messed up. I'd always assumed some: how that Rachel and I were biding our time, living in some sort of suspended animation, until we inevitably came to our senses and got back together. Now she had married someone else.

Cheryl saw my face and has never again spoken to me about Rachel.; no second chance 87

1 stared at the picture and heard the familiar SUV pull up. No surprise there. I did not bother walking to the door. Lenny had a key. He never knocked anyway. He'd know where I was. I put away the photograph as Lenny entered the room carrying two enormous, brightly clad paper cups.

Lenny held up the Slurpees from 7-Eleven. "Cherry or cola?"

"Cherry."

He handed it to me. I waited.

"Zia called Cheryl," he said in way of explanation.

I had figured that. "I don't want to talk about it," I said.

Lenny hopped onto the couch. "Me neither." He reached into his pocket and took out a thick sheaf of papers. "The will and the final stuff on Monica's estate. Read it whenever." He picked up the remote control and began to flip. "Don't you have any porno?"

"No, sorry."

Lenny shrugged and settled on a college basketball game on ESPN. We watched a few minutes in silence. I broke it.

"Why didn't you tell me Rachel was divorced?"

Lenny grimaced in pain and raised his palm as if stopping traffic.

"What?" I said.

"Brain freeze." He rode it out. "I always drink these things too fast."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"I thought we weren't going to talk about it."

I looked at him.

"It's not that simple, Marc."

"What's not?"

"Rachel has been through some tough times."

"So have I," I said.

Lenny watched the game a little too closely.

"What happened to her, Lenny?"

"It's not my place." He shook his head. "You haven't even seen her in, what, fifteen years?"

Fourteen actually. "Something like that."

His eyes scanned the room and rested on a photograph of Monica and Tara. He looked away and sipped his Slurpee. "Have to stop living in the past, my friend." 88 Harlan Coben

We both settled back and pretended to watch the game. Stop living in the past, he'd said. I looked at the photograph of Tara and wondered if Lenny was talking about more than Rachel.

Edgar Portman picked up the leather dog leash. He jingled the end. Bruno, his champion bull mastiff, clattered toward the sound at full speed. Bruno had won a Best in Breed at the Westminster Dog Show six years ago. Many believed that he had what it took to earn Best in Show. Edgar chose instead to retire Bruno. A show dog is never home. Edgar wanted Bruno with him.

People disappointed Edgar. Dogs never.

Bruno stuck out his tongue and wagged his tail. Edgar clipped the leash onto the collar. They would go for an hour. Edgar looked down at his desk. There, on the shiny veneer, sat a cardboard package, identical to the one he had received eighteen months earlier. Bruno whimpered. Edgar wondered if it was a whimper of impatience or if he could sense his master's dread. Maybe both.

Either way, Edgar needed air.

The package from eighteen months ago had undergone every possible forensic test. The police had learned nothing. Edgar was relatively certain, based on that past experience, that the incompetents in law enforcement would find nothing again. Eighteen months ago, Marc had not listened to him. That mistake, Edgar hoped, would not be repeated.

He started for the door. Bruno led the way. The air felt good. He stepped outside and sucked in a deep breath. It did not change his outlook, but it helped. Edgar and Bruno started down the familiar route, but something made Edgar veer to the right. The family plot. He saw it every day, so often that he no longer saw it, so to speak. He never visited the stones. But today, suddenly, he felt drawn. Bruno, surprised by the deviation in his routine, grudgingly followed.

Edgar stepped over the small fence. His leg throbbed. Old age. These walks were getting more difficult. He had begun using a walking stick a lot of the time--he had purchased one purportedly used by Dashiell Hammet during a TH stint--but for some reason, Edgar never took it with him when he was with Bruno. It felt wrong somehow.

Bruno hesitated and then leapt the fence. They both stood in front of the two most recent headstones. Edgar tried not to ponder about life and death, about wealth and its relativity to happiness. That sort of lint no second chance 89

picking was best left to others. He realized now that he had probably not been a very good father. He had learned, however, from his father, who learned from his. And in the end, perhaps his aloofness had saved him. Had he loved his children fully, had he been deeply involved in their lives, he doubted that he could have survived their deaths.

The dog began to whimper again. Edgar looked down at his companion, deep into his eyes. "Time to go, boy," he said softly. The front door of the house opened. Edgar turned and spotted his brother Carson, rushing toward him. Edgar saw the look on his brother's face.

"My God," Carson called out.

"I assume you saw the package."

"Yes, of course. Did you call Marc?"

"No."

"Good," Carson said. "It's a hoax. It has to be."

Edgar did not reply.

"You don't agree?" Carson said.

"I don't know."

"You can't possibly think that she's still alive."

Edgar gave the leash a gentle tug. "Best to wait for the tests to come back," he said. "Then we'll know for certain."

I like to work night hours. I always have. I am lucky in my career choice. I love my job. It is never a chore or drudgery or something I do simply to put food on the table. I disappear into my work. Like a troubled athlete, I forget everything when I'm playing my game. I enter the zone. I am at my best.

This night, however--three nights after seeing Rachel--I was off duty. I sat alone in my den and flipped stations. I, like most males of our species, hit the remote too frequently. I can watch several hours of nothing. Last year, Lenny and Cheryl got me a DVD player, explaining to me that my VCR was heading the way of the eight-track. I checked the clock on it now. A few minutes after nine. I could pop in a DVD and still get to bed by eleven.

I had just removed the rental DVD from its box and was about to stick it into the machine--they do not have a remote that does that yet--when I heard a dog bark. I rose. A new family had moved in two houses down. They had four or five young kids, something like that. Hard to say when a family has that many. They seem to blur into one % Harlan Coben

another. I had not introduced myself yet, but I had seen in their yard an Aj Irish wolfhound, who was approximately the size of a Ford Explorer. The bark, I believed, was his.

I pushed the curtain aside. I looked out the window, and for some reason--a reason I cannot properly articulate--I was not surprised by what I saw.

The woman stood in the exact same spot where I had seen her eighteen months earlier. The long coat, the long hair, the hands in the pockets--all the same.

I was afraid to let her out of my sight, but then again, I did not want her to see me. I dropped to my knees and slid to the side of the window, 1 super-sleuth-style. With my back and cheek pressed against the wall, I | considered my options.

First off, I was now not watching her. That meant she could leave '| and I wouldn't notice. Hmm, not good. I had to risk a look. That was the first thing.

I turned my head and sneaked a peek. Still there. The woman was still out front, but she had moved a few steps closer to my front door. I had no idea what that meant exactly. So now what? How about going to the door and confronting her? That seemed a pretty good move. If | she ran, well, I guess that I would pursue.

I risked another glimpse, just a quick head turn, and when I did, I realized that the woman was staring directly at my window. I fell back. Damn. She'd seen me. No way around it. My hands grabbed the bottom of the window, readying to open it, but she had already started hurrying up the block.

Oh no, not this time.

I was wearing surgical scrubs--every doctor I know has a few pairs for lounge-wear use--and I was barefoot. I sprinted to the door and threw it open. The woman was almost to the top of the block. When she saw me at the door, she stopped the hurry-walk and broke into an | all-out run.

I gave chase. To hell with my feet. Part of me felt ridiculous. I am not the fastest fellow on two legs. I am probably not even the fastest on one | leg--and here I was running down a strange woman because she was standing in front of my house. I don't know what I hoped to find here. The woman was probably taking a walk, and I had spooked her. She would probably call the police. I could see their reaction. Bad enough I no second chance 91

killed my own family and got away with it. Now I was chasing strange women around my neighborhood.

I did not stop.

The woman turned right onto Phelps Road. She had a big lead. I pumped my arms and willed my legs to pick up the pace. The pebbles on the sidewalk dug into the soles of my feet. I tried to stay on grass. She was out of view now, and 1 was out of shape. I had gone maybe a hundred yards and I could already hear the wheeze in my breath. My nose started running.

I reached the end of my street and made the right.

But there was no one.

The road was long and straight and well enough lit. In other words, she should still be visible. For some dumb reason I looked the other way too, behind me. But the woman was not there either. I ran the route she'd taken. I looked down Morningside Drive, but there was no sign of her.

The woman was gone.

But how?

She could not have been that fast. Carl Lewis was not that fast. I stopped, put my hands on my knees, sucked in some very necessary oxygen. Think. Okay, could she live in one of these houses? Perhaps. And if she did, so what? That meant that she was taking a walk in her own neighborhood. She had seen something that had struck her as curious. She stopped to take a look.

Like she did eighteen months ago?

Okay, first off, we don't know if it was the same woman.

So two women stopped in front of your house in the exact same spot and stood like statues?

It was possible. Or maybe it was the same woman. Maybe she liked looking at houses. Maybe she was into architecture or something.

Oh yes, the ever-desirable architecture of the seventies suburban split-level. And if her visit was totally innocent, why did she run away?

I don't know, Marc, but maybe--and this is just a stab in the dark-- maybe because some lunatic chased her?

I shook the voice away and started running again, looking for I don't-know-what. But when I passed the Zuckers' house, I came to a halt.

Was that possible? 92 Harlan Coben

The woman had simply disappeared. I had checked both exit roads. She was not on either one of them. So that meant, A, she lived in one of the houses, B, she was hiding.

Or C, she had taken the Zucker path in the woods.

When I was a kid, we sometimes used to cut through the Zuckers' backyard. There was a path to the middle-school fields. It was not easy to find, and Old Lady Zucker really didn't like us going through her lawn. She would never say anything, but she would stand by the window, her beehive hair glazed like a Krispy Kreme, and glare us down. After a while, we stopped using the path and took the long way.

I looked left and right. No sign of her.

Could the woman know about the path?

I sprinted into the blackness of the Zuckers' backyard. I half expected Old Lady Zucker to be at her kitchen window, glaring at me, but she had moved out to Scottsdale years ago. I don't know who lived here anymore. I didn't even know if the path was still there.

It was black-hole dark in the yard. No lights were on in the house. I tried to remember where exactly the path was. Actually, that took no time. You remember stuff like that. It's automatic. I ran toward it and something whacked me in the head. I felt the thud and fell on my back.

My head swam. I looked up. In the faint moonlight, I could see a swing set. One of those fancy wooden ones. It hadn't been there in my childhood, and in the dark, I hadn't seen it. I felt woozy, but time was key here. I leapt to my feet with too much bravado, reeling back.

The path was still there.

I headed along it as fast as I could. Branches whipped my face. I did not care. I stumbled on a root. I did not care. The Zucker path was not long, maybe forty, fifty feet. It opened into a big clearing of soccer fields and baseball diamonds. I was still making good enough time. If she had taken this route, I would be able to spot her in the recreational expanse.

I could see the smoky haze from the fluorescent lights drifting down from the field's parking lots. I burst out into the opening and quickly scanned my surroundings. I saw several sets of soccer posts and one chain-link backstop.

But no woman.

Damn.

I had lost her. Again. My heart fell. I don't know. I mean, when you no second chance 93

thought about it, what was the point? This whole thing was stupid, really. I looked down at my feet. They hurt like hell. I felt a trickle of what was probably blood on my right sole. I felt like an idiot. A defeated idiot, at that. I started to turn away. . . .

Hold the phone.

In the distance, under the lights of the parking lot, there was a car. One solitary car, all by its lonesome. I nodded to myself and followed my thoughts. Let's say that the car belonged to the woman. Why not? If it doesn't, well, nothing lost, nothing gained. But if it did, if she had parked here, it made sense. She parks, she goes through the woods, she stands in front of my house. Why she would do any of this, I had no idea. But for right now, I decided to go with it.

Okay, if that was the case--if that was her car--then I could conclude that she had not yet departed. No flies on me. So what had happened here? She's spotted, she runs, she starts heading down the path. . . .

1. and she realizes that I might follow.

I almost snapped my fingers. The mystery woman would know that I had grown up in this neighborhood and thus might remember the path. And if I did, if I somehow put together (as I had) that she would use the path, then I would spot her in the opening. So what would she do?

I thought about it and the answer came pretty quickly.

She would hide in the woods along the path.

The mystery woman was probably watching me at this very moment.

Yes, I know that this argument barely reached the level of flimsy conjecture. But it felt right. Very right. So what to do? I gave a heavy sigh and said out loud, "Damn." I slumped my shoulders as though deflated, trying hard not to oversell this, and started trudging back through the path to the Zucker place. I lowered my head, my eyes swerving left and right. I walked delicately, my ears alert, straining to hear a rustle of some sort.

The night remained silent.

I reached the end of the path and kept walking as if I were heading home. When I was deep in the thicket of darkness, I dropped to the ground. I commando-crawled back under the swing set toward the path's opening. I stopped and waited.

I don't know how long I stayed there. Probably not more than two 94 Harlan Coben

or three minutes. 1 was about to give up when I heard the noise. I was still on my stomach, my head raised. The silhouette rose and started down the path.

I scrambled to my feet, trying to stay quiet, but that was a major no go. The woman spun toward the sound, spotting me.

"Wait," I shouted. "I just want to talk to you."

But she had already darted back into the woods. Off the path, the woods were thick and yep, it was plenty dark. I could lose her easily. I was not about to risk that. Not again. Maybe I couldn't see her, but I could still hear her.

I jumped into the thicket and almost immediately hit a tree. I saw stars. Man, that had been a dumb move. I stopped now and listened.

Silence.

She had stopped. She was hiding again. So now what?

She had to be nearby. I considered my options and then thought, Ah, the hell with it. Remembering where I had last heard a noise, I leapt at the spot, spread-eagle, my hands and legs stretched to the max so that my body would cover as much territory as possible. I landed on a shrub.

But my left hand touched something else.

She tried to crawl away, but my ringers closed tight around her ankle. She kicked at me with her free leg. I held on like a dog digging his teeth in.

"Let go of me!" she shouted.

I did not recognize the voice. I did not let go of her ankle.

"What the--let go of me!"

No. I got some leverage and pulled her toward me. It was still too dark, but my eyes were beginning to adjust. I gave another tug. She rolled onto her back. We were close enough now. I was finally able to see her face.

It took a few moments to register. The memory was an old one, for one thing. The face, or what I could see of it, had changed. She looked different. What gave it away, what helped me recognize her, was the way her hair had fallen in front of her face during our tussle. That was almost more familiar than the features--the vulnerability of the pose, the way she now avoided eye contact. And of course, living in that house, that house I had always so closely associated with her, had kept her image in the forefront of my memory banks. no second chance ^

The woman pushed her hair to the side and looked up at me. I fell back to school days, the brick building barely two hundred yards from where we now lay. Now maybe it made some sort of sense. The mystery woman had been standing in front of the house where she used to live.

The mystery woman was Dina Levinsky. chapter 11

WP Sdt Jt the kitchen table. I made tea, a Tazo blend of Chinese green I'd bought at Starbucks. It was supposed to soothe. We'd see. I handed Dina a cup.

"Thank you, Marc."

I nodded and sat across from her. I had known Dina my whole life. I knew her in the way only a kid can know another kid, the way only elementary-school classmates know each other, even--bear with me here--even though I don't think we ever really spoke to one another.

We all have a Dina Levinsky in our past. She was the class victim, the girl so much an outcast, so often teased'and abused, you wonder how she stayed sane. I never picked on her, but I stood on the sidelines plenty of times. Even if I didn't reside in her childhood home, Dina Levinsky would still live in me. She lives in you too. Quick: Who was the most picked-on kid in your elementary school? Right, exactly, you remember. You remember their first and last name and what they looked like. You remember watching them walk home alone or sitting in the cafeteria in silence. Whatever, you remember. Dina Levinsky stays with you.

"I hear you're a doctor now," Dina said to me.

"Yes. And you?"

"A graphic designer and artist. I have a show in the Village next month."

"Paintings?"

She hesitated. "Yes."

"You were always a good artist," I said.

She cocked her head, surprised. "You noticed?" no second chance 97

There was a brief pause. Then I found myself saying, "I should have done something."

Dina smiled. "No, I should have."

She looked good. No, she had not grown into a beauty like those ugly-duckling-swans you see in the movies. First off, Dina had never been ugly. She had been plain. Maybe she still was. Her features were still too narrow, but they worked better on an adult face. Her hair, so drippy in her youth, had body now.

"Do you remember Cindy McGovern?" she asked me.

"Sure."

"She tortured me more than anyone."

"I remember."

"Well, this is funny. I had an exhibit a few years back at a gallery in midtown--and Cindy shows up. She comes up to me and gives me a big hug and kiss. She wants to talk about old times, you know, like 'Remember how dorky Mr. Lewis was?' She's all smiles and I swear, Marc, she didn't remember what she'd been like. She wasn't pretending either. She just totally blocked out how she'd treated me. I find that sometimes."

"Find what?"

Dina raised the cup with two hands. "No one remembers being the bully." She hunched over, her eyes darted about the room. I wondered about my own remembrance. Had I just been on the sidelines--or was that, too, some sort of revisionist history?

"This is so messed up," Dina said.

"Being back in this house?"

"Yeah." She put down the cup. "I guess you want an explanation."

I waited.

Her eyes started darting again. "You want to hear something bizarre?"

"Sure."

"This is where I used to sit. I mean, when I was a kid. We had a rectangular table too. I always sat in the same spot. When I came in here now, I don't know, I just naturally gravitated to this chair. I guess--I guess that's part of the reason why I was here tonight."

"I'm not sure I understand."

"This house," she said. "It still has a pull on me. A hold." She leaned forward. Her eyes met mine for the first time. "You've heard the rumors, haven't you? About my father and what happened here." 98 Harlan Coben

"Yes."

"They're true," she said.

I forced myself not to wince. I had no idea what to say. I thought about the hell of school. I tried to add on to that the hell of this house. It was unfathomable.

"He's dead now. My father, I mean. He died six years ago."

I blinked and looked away.

"I'm okay, Marc. Really. I was in therapy--well, I mean, I still am. Do you know Dr. Radio?"

"No."

"That's his real name. Stanley Radio. He's pretty famous for the Radio Technique. I've been with him for years. I'm much better. I'm over the self-destructive tendencies. I'm past feeling worthless. It's funny though. I got over it. No, I mean it. Most victims of abuse have commitment and sex issues. I never did. I'm able to be intimate, no problem. I'm married now. My husband is a great guy. It's not happily-ever-after, but it's pretty damn good."

"I'm glad," I said, because I had no idea what else to say.

She smiled again. "Are you superstitious, Marc?"

"No."

"Me neither. Except, I don't know, when I read about your wife and daughter, I started to wonder. About this house. Bad karma and all that. Your wife was so lovely."

"You knew Monica?"

"We'd met."

"When?"

Dina did not reply right away. "Are you familiar with the term trigger?"

I remembered it from my medical school rotations. "You mean, in terms of psychiatry?"

"Yes. You see, when I read about what happened here, it was a trigger. Like with an alcoholic or anorexic. You're never fully cured. Something happens--a trigger--and you fall back into bad patterns. I started biting my nails. I started doing physical harm to myself. It was like--it was like I had to face down this house. I had to confront the past in order to defeat it."

"And that's what you were doing tonight?"

"Yes." no second chance 99

"And when I spotted you eighteen months ago?"

"Same thing."

I sat back. "How often do you stop by?"

"Once every couple of months, I guess. I park at the school lot and come through the Zucker path. But there's more to it than that."

"More to what?"

"My visits. See, this house still holds my secrets. I mean that literally."

"I'm not following."

"I keep trying to work up the courage to knock on the door again, but I can't do it. And now I'm inside, in this kitchen, and I'm okay." She tried to smile, as if to prove the point. "But I still don't know if I can doit."

"Do what?" I asked.

"I'm babbling." Dina started scratching the back of her hand, hard and fast, digging her nails in and nearly breaking skin. I wanted to reach out to her, but it felt too forced. "I wrote it all down. In a journal. What happened to me. It's still here."

"In the house?"

She nodded. "I hid it."

"The police went through here after the murder. They searched this place pretty good."

"They didn't find it," she said. "I'm sure of it. And even if they did, it's just an old journal. There'd be no reason for them to disturb it. Part of me wants it to stay put. It's over and done with it, you know what I mean? Let sleeping dogs lie. But another part wants to let it out into the light. Like it's a vampire and the sunshine will kill it."

"Where is it?" I asked.

"In the basement. You have to stand on the dryer to get to it. It's behind one of the ducts in the crawl space." She glanced at the clock. She looked at me and hugged herself. "It's getting late."

"Are you okay?"

The eyes were darting again. Her breathing was suddenly uneven. "I don't know how much longer I can stay here."

"Do you want to look for your journal?"

"I don't know."

"Do you want me to get it for you?"

She shook her head hard. "No." She stood, gulping air now. "I better go now." 100 Harlan Coben

"You can always come back, Dina. Anytime you want."

But she wasn't listening. She was in full panic mode and heading for the door.

"Dina?"

She suddenly spun toward me. "Did you love her?"

"What?"

"Monica. Did you love her? Or was there someone else?"

"What are you talking about?"

Her face drained of color. She stared at me now, backing away, petrified. "You know who shot you, don't you, Marc?"

I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. By the time I found my voice, Dina had turned away.

"I'm sorry, I have to go."

"Wait."

She flung the door open and ran out. I stood by the window and watched her scurry back up toward Phelps Road. This time, I chose not to follow.

Instead, I turned and with her words--"You know who shot you, don't you, Marc?"--still reverberating in my ears, I sprinted to the basement door.

All right, let me explain something here, f was not going down into the dingy, unfinished subdwelling to invade Dina's privacy. I did not pretend to know what was best for her, what might salve her horrendous pain. Many of my psychiatry colleagues would disagree, but sometimes I wonder if the past is better left buried. I don't have the answer, of course, and as my psychiatry colleagues would remind me, I don't ask them for their take on the best way to handle a cleft palate. So in the end, all I know for certain is that it is not my place to decide for Dina.

And I was not going in the basement out of curiosity about her past either. I had no interest in reading the details of Dina's torment. In fact, I actively did not want to know them. To speak selfishly, I was creeped out plenty just knowing such horrors had occurred in the place I call | home. It was already enough in my face, thank you very much. I needed to hear or read no more.

So what exactly was I after?

I hit the light switch. A bare bulb came on. I was putting the pieces no second chance 101

together even as I started to descend. Dina had said several curious things. Putting aside the most dramatic for a moment, I was starting to pick up on the more subtle ones. It was a night of spontaneous behavior on my part. I decided to let the trend continue.

First off, I remembered how Dina, when she was still the mystery woman on the sidewalk, had taken a step toward the door. 1 know now, as Dina herself had told me, that she'd been "trying to work up the courage to knock on the door again."

Again.

Knock on the door again.

The obvious implication was that Dina had, on at least one other occasion, worked up the courage to knock on my door.

Second, Dina had told me that she had "met" Monica. I could not imagine how. Yes, Monica, too, had grown up in this town, but from all I knew of her, she might as well have grown up in a different, more opulent era. The Portman estate was on the opposite end of our rather sprawling suburb. Monica had started boarding school at a young age. No one in town knew her. I remember seeing her once at the Colony movie theater over the summer of my sophomore year in high school. I had stared. She had studiously ignored me. Monica had that whole remote-beauty thing down pat by then. When I met her years later--she actually coming on to me--the flattery turned my head. Monica had seemed so fabulous at a distance.

So how, I wondered now, had my wealthy, remote, beautiful wife met poor, drab Dina Levinsky? The most likely answer, when you consider the "again" comment, was that Dina had knocked on the door and Monica had answered. They met then. They probably talked. Dina probably told Monica about the hidden journal.

"You know who shot you, don't you, Marc?"

No, Dina. But I plan on finding out.

I had reached the cement floor. Boxes that I would never throw away and never open were piled everywhere. I noticed, perhaps for the first time, that there were paint splatters on the floor. A large variety of hues. They'd probably been here since Dina's time, a reminder of her sole escape.

The washer and dryer were in the corner on the left. I moved slowly toward them in the shadowy light. I tiptoed, actually, as though I were afraid of waking Dina's sleeping dogs. Stupid really. As I said before, I 102 Harlan Coben

am not superstitious and even if I were, even if I believed in evil spirits and the like, there was no reason to fear angering them. My wife was dead and my daughter was missing--what else could they do to me? In fact, I should disturb them, make them act, hope they let me know what really happened to my family, to Tara.

There it was again. Tara. Everything circled back to her eventually. I don't know how she fitted into all this. I don't know how her kidnapping was connected to Dina Levinsky. It probably wasn't. But I was not turning back.

You see, Monica never mentioned meeting Dina Levinsky.

I found that odd. True, I am building this ridiculous theory on pure foam. But if Dina had indeed knocked on the door, if Monica had indeed opened it, you would think that my wife would have mentioned it to me at some point. She knew that Dina Levinsky had gone to school with me. Why keep her visit--or the fact that they had met--a secret?

I hopped up on the dryer. I had to both crouch and look above me. Dust city. Spider webs were everywhere. I saw the duct and reached up. I felt around. It was difficult. There was a web of pipes, and my arm was having trouble fitting between them. It would have been much easier for a young girl with thin arms.

Eventually I worked my hand through the copper. I slid my fingertips to the right and pushed up. Nothing. My hand crawled a few more inches over and pushed again. Something gave way.

I pulled up my sleeve and twisted my arm in another inch or two. Two pipes pressed against my skin, but they gave enough. I was able to reach into the crawl space. I felt around, found something, pulled it into view.

The journal.

It was a classic school notebook with the familiar black marble cover. I opened and paged through it. The handwriting was minuscule. It reminded me of that guy in the mall who writes names on a grain of rice. Dina's immaculate penmanship--belying, no doubt, the content-- started at the very top of the sheet and ran all the way to the bottom. There were no left or right margins. Dina had used both sides of every sheet.

I did not read it. Again that was not what I had come down for. I reached back up and put the journal back in its place. I don't know how no second chance 103

this would set me with the gods--if just touching it would unleash a King Tut-like curse--but again I didn't care very much either.

I felt around again. I knew. I don't know how, but I just knew. Eventually my hand hit something else. My heart thumped. It felt smooth. Leather. I pulled it into view. Some dust followed. I blinked the particles out of my eyes.

It was Monica's DayRunner.

I remembered when she bought it at some chic boutique in New York. Something to organize her life, she'd told me. It'd had the customary calendar and datebook. When had we bought it? I wasn't sure. Maybe eight, nine months before she died. I tried to remember the last time I'd seen it. Nothing came to me.

I jammed the leather planner between my knees and put the ceiling panel back in place. I grabbed the datebook and climbed down from the dryer. I considered waiting until I got upstairs into better light, but, uh-uh, no way. The datebook had a zipper. Despite the dust it opened smoothly.

A CD fell out and landed on the floor.

It glittered in the low light like a jewel. I picked it up by the edges. There was no label on it. Memorex had manufactured it. "CD-R," it said, "80 Minutes."

What the hell is this?

One way to find out. I hurried upstairs and booted up my computer. chapter 12

WnPO i put the disk into the CD drive, the following screen appeared:

Password:

MVD Newark, NJ

Six-digit password. I typed in her birthday. No go. I tried Tara's birthday. No go. I put in our anniversary and then my birthday. I tried the code for our ATM. Nothing worked.

I sat back. So now what?

I debated calling Detective Regan. By now it was closing in on midnight, and even if I could reach him, what exactly would I say? "Hi, I found a CD hidden in my basement, rush over"? No. Hysterics would not work here. Better to show calm, to feign rationality. Patience was key. Think it through. I could call Regan in the morning. Nothing he could or would do tonight anyway. Sleep on it.

Fine, but I was not about to give up quite yet. I logged on to the Internet and brought up a search engine. I typed in MVD in Newark. A listing popped up.

"MVD--Most Valuable Detection."

Detection?

There was a link to a Web site. I clicked it, and the MVD Web site came up. My eyes did a quick scan. MVD was a "group of professional private investigators" who "provided confidential services." They offered online background checks for less than a hundred dollars. Their ads exclaimed, "Find out if that new boyfriend has a criminal record!" no second chance JO1*

and "Where is your old sweetheart? Maybe she's still pining for you!" Stuff like that. They also did more "intense, discreet investigations" for those who required such things. They were, per the top banner, a "full service investigative entity."

So, I asked myself, what had Monica needed investigated?

I picked up the phone and dialed MVD's 800 number. A machine picked up--no surprise considering the hour--and told me how much they appreciated my call and that their office opened at nine in the morning. Okay. I'd call back then.

I hung up the phone and pressed the e: drive's eject button. The CD slid into view. I lifted up by the edges and checked for, I don't know, clues, I guess. Nothing new. Time to think here. It seemed pretty clear that Monica had hired MVD to investigate something and that this CD contained whatever it was she wanted investigated. Not exactly a brilliant deduction on my part, but it was a start.

Let's go back then. Fact is, I had no idea what Monica wanted investigated or why or any of that. But if I was right, if this CD did indeed belong to Monica, if she had hired a private investigator for whatever reason, it would naturally follow that she would have had to pay MVD for said services.

I nodded. Okay, a better start.

But--and here is where confusion immediately set in--the police had thoroughly combed through our bank accounts and financial records. They had scrutinized every transaction, every Visa purchase, every written check, every ATM withdrawal. Had they seen one to MVD? If so, they decided not to tell me. Of course, I had not been a potted plant here. My daughter was gone. I, too, had examined those financial statements. There was nothing to any detective agency nor were there any cash withdrawals out of the ordinary.

So what did that mean?

Maybe this CD was old.

That was a possibility. I don't think any of us checked transactions going back more than six months before the attack. Maybe her relationship with Most Valuable Detection predated that. I could probably check through the old statements.

But I wasn't buying it.

This CD was not old. I was fairly certain of that. And it didn't matter much anyway. Time frame, when I thought about it, was irrelevant. 106 Harlan Coben

Recent or otherwise, the key questions remained: Why would Monica hire a private investigator? What was password protected on that damn CD? Why had she hidden it in that creepy space in the basement? What, if anything, did Dina Levinsky have to do with any of this? And most important, did it have anything to do with the attack--or was this all a big exercise in wishful thinking on my part?

I looked out the window. The street was clear and silent. Suburbia sleeps. No more answers would come tonight. In the morning, I would take my father for our weekly walk and then I would call MVD and maybe even Regan.

I climbed into bed and waited for sleep.

The phone next to Edgar Portman's bed rang at four-thirty in the morning. Edgar jerked awake, pulled out in middream, and fumbled with the phone.

"What?" he barked.

"You said to call as soon as I knew."

Edgar rubbed his face. "You have the results."

"I do."

"And?"

"It's a match."

Edgar closed his eyes. "How certain are you?"

"It's preliminary. If I were taking it to court, I'd need a few more weeks to line up all the arrows. But that would just be following proper protocol."

Edgar could not stop shaking. He thanked the man, put the phone back in its cradle, and began to prepare. chapter 13

At SIX tnP next morning, I left my house and walked down the block. Using a key I've had since college, I unlocked the door and slipped into my childhood home.

The years had not been a friend to this dwelling, but then again, it hadn't been featured in House and Garden (except maybe as one of their "before" photos) to begin with. We'd replaced the shag carpet four years ago--the blue-white speck had been so faded and threadbare, it practically replaced itself--and went with close-cropped office gray so that my father's wheelchair could move with ease. Other than that, nothing had been changed. The overvarnished side tables still held Lladro porcelain knickknacks from a long-ago trip to Spain. Holiday Inn-like oils of violins and fruit--none of us are the least bit musical or, uh, fruity--still adorned the white-painted wood paneling.

There were photos on the fireplace mantel. I always stopped and looked at the ones of my sister, Stacy. I don't know what I was looking for. Or maybe I do. I was searching for clues, for foreshadowing. I was searching for any hint that this young, fragile, damaged woman would one day buy a gun off the street, shoot me, harm my daughter.

"Marc?" It was Mom. She knew what I was doing. "Come help me, okay?"

I nodded and headed toward the back bedroom. Dad slept on the ground floor now--easier than trying to get up the stairs with a wheelchair. We dressed him, which was a bit like dressing wet sand. My father lolls from side to side. His weight has a tendency toward sudden shifts. My mother and I were used to that, but it doesn't make the task less arduous. 108 Harlan Coben

When my mother kissed me good-bye, the faint and familiar whiff of breath mint and cigarette smoke came off her. I had urged her to quit. She kept promising, but I knew that it would never happen. I noticed how loose the skin on her neck was getting, her gold chains almost embedded in their folds. She leaned down and kissed my father on the cheek, holding her lips to him a few seconds too long.

"Be careful," she told us. Then again, that was what she always told us.

We began our journey. I pushed Dad past the train station. We live in a commuter town. Mostly men but yes, women, too, were lined up in long coats, briefcase in one hand, coffee cup in the other. This might sound odd, but even before 9/11, these people were heroes to me. They board that damn train five times a week. They take it to Hoboken and switch to the PATH. That train takes them into New York City. Some will head up to Thirty-third Street and change to hit midtown. Others will take it to the financial center, now that it's opened up again. They make the everyday sacrifice, stifling their own wants and dreams in order to provide for those they love.

I could be doing cosmetic plastic surgery and making a mint. My parents would be able to afford better care for my dad. They could move someplace nice, get that full-time nurse, find a place that could cater more to their needs. But I don't do that. I don't help them by taking the more traveled route because, frankly, working such a job would bore me. So I choose to do something more exciting, something I love to do. For that, people think I'm the heroic one, that I am the one making the sacrifice. Here's the truth. The person who works with the poor? They are usually more selfish. We are not willing to sacrifice our needs. Working a job that provides for our families is not enough for us. Supporting those we love is secondary. We need personal satisfaction, even if our own family is made to do without. Those suits I now watch numbingly board the NJ Transit train? They often hate where they are going and what they are doing, but they do it anyway. They do it to take care of their families, to provide a better life for their spouses, their children, and maybe, just maybe, their aging and ill parents.

So, really, which one of us is to be admired?

Dad and I followed the same route every Thursday. We took the path around the park behind the library. The park was chockful--and you'll notice a suburban theme here--of soccer fields. How much no second chance 109

quality real estate was tied up in this supposedly second-tier foreign sport? My father seemed comforted by the playground, by the sights and sounds of children at play. We stopped and took deep breaths. I glanced to my left. Several healthy women jogged by clad in your finest, sheer-clingy Lycra. Dad seemed very still. I smiled. Maybe Dad's liking this spot had nothing to do with soccer.

I no longer remember what my father used to be like. When I try to think back that far, my memories are snapshots, flashes--a man's deep laugh, a little boy clinging to his bicep, dangling off the ground. That was pretty much it. I remember that I loved him deeply, and I guess that has always been enough.

After his second stroke sixteen years ago, Dad's speech became extremely labored. He'd get stuck midsentence. He'd drop words. He'd go silent for hours and sometimes days. You'd forget that he was there. No one really knew for sure if he understood, if he had classic "expressive aphasia"--you understand but you can't really communicate--or something even more sinister.

But on a hot June day during my senior year of high school, my father suddenly reached out and grabbed hold of my sleeve with an eagle-talon grip. I'd been heading out to a party at the time. Lenny was waiting for me by the door. My father's surprisingly strong grasp stopped me cold. I looked down. His face was pure white, the tendons of his neck taut, and more than anything, what I saw was naked fear. That look on his face haunted my sleep for years afterward. I slid into the chair next to him, his hand still clutching my arm.

"Dad?"

"I understand," he pleaded. His grip on my sleeve tightened. "Please." Every word was a struggle. "I still understand."

That was all he said. But it was enough. What I took it to mean was this: "Even though I can't speak or respond, I comprehend. Please don't shut me out." For a while, the doctors agreed. He had expressive aphasia. Then he had another stroke, and the doctors became less sure of what he did and did not understand. I don't know if I apply my own version of Pascal's Wager here--if he understands me, then I should talk to him, if he doesn't, what's the harm?--but I figure that I owe him that. So I talk to him. I tell him everything. And right now, I was telling him about Dina Levinsky's visit--"Do you remember her, Dad?"--and the hidden CD. HO Harlan Coben

Dad's face was locked, immobile, the left side of his mouth turned down in an angry slash-hook. I often wished that he and I never had that "I understand" conversation. I don't know which is worse: to be beyond comprehension, or to understand how trapped you really are. Or maybe I do know.

1 was making the second turn, the one by the new skateboard run, when I spotted my former father-in-law. Edgar Portman sat on a bench, splendid in his casual best, his legs crossed, his pants crease sharp enough to slice tomatoes. After the shootings, Edgar and I tried to keep up a relationship that had never existed when his daughter was alive. We had hired a detective agency together--Edgar, of course, knew the best--but they came up with nothing. After a while, Edgar and I both grew weary of the pretense. The only bond between us was one that conjured up the worst moment of my life.

Edgar's being here could, of course, have been a coincidence. We live in the same town. It would only be natural to bump into one another from time to time. But that wasn't the case. I knew that. Edgar was not one for casual park visits. He was here for me.

Our eyes met, and I wasn't sure I liked what I saw. I wheeled the chair toward the bench. Edgar kept his eyes on me, never glancing down at my father. I might as well have been pushing a shopping cart.

"Your mother told me I'd find you here, "'Edgar said.

I stopped a few feet away from him. "What's up?"

"Sit with me."

I set my father's chair on my left. I lowered the brake. My father stared straight out. His head lolled toward his right shoulder, the way it does when he gets tired. I turned and faced Edgar. He uncrossed his legs.

"I've been wondering how to tell you this," he began.

I gave him a little space. He looked off. "Edgar?"

"Hmm."

"Just tell me."

He nodded, appreciating my directness. Edgar was that kind of man. Without preamble, he said, "I got another ransom demand."

I reeled back. I don't know what I had expected to hear--maybe that Tara had been found dead--but what he was saying ... I couldn't quite comprehend it. I was about to ask a follow-up question when I saw that no second chance 111

he now had a satchel in his lap. He opened it and pulled something into view. It was in a plastic bag--just like the last time we went through this. I squinted. He handed it to me. Something ballooned in my chest. I blinked and looked at the bag.

Hairs. There were hairs inside it.

"This is their proof," Edgar said.

I could not speak. I just looked at the hairs. I laid the bag gently on my lap.

"They understood that we would be skeptical," Edgar said.

"Who understood?"

"The kidnappers. They said they'd give us a few days. I immediately brought the hairs to a DNA laboratory."

I looked up at him and then back at the hairs.

"The preliminary results came in two hours ago," Edgar said. "Nothing they could use in court, but it's still pretty conclusive. The hairs match the ones sent to us a year and a half ago." He stopped and swallowed. "The hairs belong to Tara."

I heard the words. I didn't understand them. For some reason, I shook my head no. "Maybe they just saved them from before. ..."

"No. They have aging tests too. Those hairs came from a child around two years old."

I guess that I knew that already. I could look and see that these were not my daughter's wispy baby hairs. She wouldn't have them anymore. Her hair would have darkened and thickened. . . .

Edgar handed me a note. Still in a fog, I took it from him. The font was the same as from the note we'd gotten eighteen months before. The top line over the fold said:

WANT ONE LAST CHANCE?

I felt the thud deep in my chest. Edgar's voice seemed suddenly far away. "I probably should have told you immediately, but it seemed an obvious hoax. Carson and I didn't want to get your hopes up unnecessarily. I have friends. They were able to rush through the DNA results. We still had hairs from the last mailing." He put a hand on my shoulder. I did not move.

"She's alive, Marc. I don't know how or where, but Tara is alive." 112 Harlan Coben

My eyes stayed on the hairs. Tara. They belonged to Tara. The sheen, that golden-wheat hue. I petted them through the plastic. I wanted to reach inside the bag, to touch my daughter, but I thought my heart would burst.

"They want another two million dollars. The note warns us again about calling the police--they claim to have an inside source. They sent another cell phone for you. I have the money in the car. We have another twenty-four hours maybe. That was the window they gave us for the DNA testing. You'll have to be ready."

I finally read the note. Then I looked over at my father in his wheelchair. He still stared straight ahead.

Edgar said, "I know you think I'm rich. I am, I guess. But not like you'd think. I'm leveraged and ..."

I turned toward him. His eyes were wide. His hands shook.

"What I mean to say is that I don't really have that many liquid assets left. I'm not made of money. This is it."

"I'm surprised you're doing this at all," I said.

The words, I could see immediately, wounded him. I wanted to take them back, but for some reason I didn't. I let my eyes drift back toward my father. Dad's face remained frozen, but--I looked closer--there was a tear on his cheek. That didn't mean anything. Dad has teared up before, usually with no apparent provocation. I did not take this as any j kind of sign.

And then, I don't know why, I followed his gaze. I looked across the soccer field, past the goalposts, past two women with Baby Joggers, all the way to the street nearly a hundred yards away. My stomach | dropped. There, standing on the sidewalk, looking back at me with his hands in his pockets, was a man wearing a flannel shirt and black jeans and a Yankee cap.

I couldn't say for sure that it was the same man from the ransom drop. 1 Red-and-black flannel is hardly an uncommon pattern. And maybe it was | my imagination--I was pretty far away--but I think he was smiling at me. I felt my whole body jerk.

Edgar said, "Marc?"

I barely heard him. I rose and kept my eyes up. At first, the man in the flannel stayed perfectly still. I ran toward him.

"Marc?"

But I knew that it was no mistake. You don't forget. You close your 1 no second chance 113

eyes and you still see him. He never leaves you. You wish for moments like this. I knew that. And I knew what wishes could bring. But I ran straight toward him. Because there was no mistake. I knew who it was.

When I was still a good distance away, the man lifted his hand and waved to me. I kept moving, but I could already see that it was futile. I was only halfway across the park when a white van drove up. The man in flannel snapped a salute in my direction before disappearing into the back.

The van was out of sight before I reached the street. chapter 14

TifllP StcJftpd plctyifl^ games with me. Going in and out. Speeding up and slowing down. In focus and suddenly blurred. But that did not last long. I let the surgeon side of me take over. He, Marc the Doctor, knew how to compartmentalize. I have always found this easier to do at work than in my personal life. The skill--to partition, to separate, to detach--has never translated. At work, I am able to take my emotional excess and channel it, allow it to converge into a constructive focus. I have never been successful at doing this at home.

But this crisis had forced a change. Compartmentalizing wasn't a question of desire as much as survival. To get emotional, to allow myself to wallow in doubt or consider the implications of a child missing for eighteen months ... it would paralyze me. That was probably what the kidnappers wanted. They wanted me to come apart. But I work well under pressure. I am at my best. I know that. I had to do that now. The walls came up. I could look at the situation rationally.

First thing: No, I would not contact the police this time.

But that did not mean I had to wait around helplessly.

By the time Edgar handed me the duffel bag stuffed with money, I had an idea.

I called Cheryl and Lenny's house. There was no answer. I checked my watch. Eight-fifteen in the morning. I didn't have Cheryl's cell phone, but it would be better to do this in person anyway.

I drove over to Willard Elementary School and arrived at eight twenty-five. I parked behind a line of SUVs and minivans and got out. This elementary school, like so many others, has the bricks, the cement no second chance 11^

back steps, the one level, the architectural design made shapeless by the many additions. Some additions try to blend in, but then there are the others, usually built between 1968 and 1975, that were faux sleek with blue glass and odd tiling. They looked like post-apocalyptic greenhouses.

Kids scrambled around the playground as they always do. The difference was, the parents now stayed and watched. They chatted with one another and when the bell rang, they made sure that their charges were safely ensconced inside the brick or sleek blue glass before departing. I hated to see the fear in the eyes of the parents. But I understood it. The day you become a parent, fear becomes your constant companion. It never lets you go. My life was Exhibit A in the why.

Cheryl's blue Chevy Suburban pulled into the drop-off line. I started toward her. She was unharnessing Justin from his car seat when she spotted me. Justin gave her a dutiful kiss, an act he takes for granted which, I guess, is how it should be, and then he ran off. Cheryl watched him as though afraid he could vanish on the short concrete trek. Kids can never understand that fear, but that's okay. Hard enough to be a kid without having that weight on you.

"Hey," Cheryl said to me.

I said hi back. Then: "I need something."

"What?"

"Rachel's phone number."

Cheryl was already back at the driver-side door. "Get in."

"My car is parked over there."

"I'll bring you back. Swim practice ran late. I've got to get Marianne to school."

She had already started the car. I hopped up into the front passenger seat. I turned and smiled at Marianne. She wore headphones and quick fingered her Game Boy Advance. She gave me an absentminded wave, barely glancing up. Her hair was still wet. Conner was in the child seat next to her. The car reeked of chlorine, but I found the smell oddly comforting. Lenny, I know, cleans out the car religiously, but you can't possibly keep up. There were French fries in the crevice between the seats. Crumbs of unknown origin clung to the upholstery. On the floor by my feet lay a potpourri of school notices and children's artwork that had been subjected to onslaughts of rain boots. I sat on a small action figure, the kind that McDonald's gives away with their Happy Meals. A 116 Harlan Coben

CD case reading now that's what I call music 14 sat between us, providing listeners with the latest from Britney and Christina and Generic Boy Band. The windows in the back were smeared with greasy fingerprints.

The kids were only allowed to play with the Game Boy in the car, never in the house. They were never, under any circumstance, allowed to watch a PG-13 movie. I asked Lenny about how he and Cheryl went about deciding such matters and he responded, "It's not the rules themselves, but the fact that there are rules." I think I know what he meant.

Cheryl kept her eyes on the road. "It's not my nature to pry."

"But you want to know my intentions."

"I guess."

"And if I don't want to tell you?"

"Maybe," she said, "it's better if you don't."

"Trust me here, Cheryl. I need the number."

She flipped on her signal light. "Rachel is still my closest friend."

"Okay."

"It took her a long time to get over you." She hesitated.

"And vice versa."

"Exactly. Look, I'm not saying this right. It's just. . . there are some things you need to know."

"Like?"

She kept her eyes on the road, two hands on the wheel. "You asked J Lenny why we never told you she got divorced."

"Yes."

Cheryl glanced in the rearview mirror, not at the road, but at her daughter. Marianne seemed wrapped up in her game. "She didn't get divorced. Her husband is dead."

Cheryl glided to a stop in front of the middle school. Marianne took off the headphones and slid out. She did not bother with the dutiful kiss, but she did say good-bye. Cheryl put the car back in drive.

"I'm sorry to hear that," I said, because that was what people said under these circumstances. I almost added, because the mind works in very strange and even macabre ways: Hey, Rachel and I have something else in common.

And then, as if Cheryl could read these thoughts, she said, "He was | shot."

This eerie parallel sat between us for several seconds. I stayed quiet. no second chance 117

"I don't know the details," she quickly added. "He was with the FBI too. Rachel was one of the highest-ranking women in the bureau at the time. She resigned after he died. She stopped taking my calls. It hasn't been good for her since." Cheryl pulled up to my car and stopped. "I'm telling you this because I want you to understand. A lot of years have passed since college. Rachel isn't the same person you loved all those years ago."

I kept my tone steady. "I just need her phone number."

Without another word, Cheryl grabbed a pen from the visor, uncapped it with her teeth, and jotted the number on a Dunkin' Donuts napkin.

"Thanks," I said.

She barely nodded as I got out.

I did not hesitate. I had my cell phone. I slipped into my car and dialed the number. Rachel answered with a tentative hello. My words were simple enough.

"I need your help." chapter 15

Five hours Idter, Rachel's train pulled into Newark Station.

I couldn't help but think of all those old movies where trains separate lovers, steam billowing from beneath, the conductor calling a last warning, the whistle sounding, the chug-chug as the wheels begin to move, one lover hanging out and waving, the other running along the platform. I don't know why I thought of this. The Newark train station is about as romantic as a pile of hippo dung with head lice. The train approached with nary a whisper and nothing you'd want to see or smell wafted in the air.

But when Rachel stepped off, I still felt tlie hum in my chest. She was dressed in faded blue jeans and a red turtleneck. Her overnight bag dangled from one shoulder, and she hoisted it up as she stepped down. For a moment, I just stared. I'd just turned thirty-six years old. Rachel was thirty-five. We had not been together since our very early twenties. We had lived our entire adult lives apart. Odd when you think of it that way. I told you before about our breakup. I try to unearth the whys, but maybe it is that simple. We were kids. Kids do dumb things. Kids don't understand repercussions, don't think long term. Kids don't understand that the hum may never really leave your chest.

Yet today, when I realized that I needed help, I thought first of Rachel. And she had come.

She moved toward me with no hesitation. "You okay?"

"Fine."

"Did they call?"

"Not yet." no second chance 119

She nodded and started walking down the platform. Her tone was no nonsense. She, too, had slipped into her role as a professional. "Tell me more about the DNA test."

"I don't know anything else."

"So it's not definitive?"

"Not court-evidence definitive, no, but they seem pretty sure."

Rachel shifted her bag from her right shoulder to her left. I tried to keep up with her pace. "We have to make some tough decisions, Marc. You ready for that?"

"Yes."

"First off, are you certain that you don't want to contact the cops or FBI?"

"The note said they had an inside source."

"That's probably bull," she said.

We walked a few more steps.

"I contacted the authorities last time," I said.

"Doesn't mean it was the wrong move."

"But it certainly wasn't the right one."

She made a yes-no gesture with her head. "You don't know what happened last time. Maybe they spotted the tail. Maybe they watched your house. But most likely, they never intended to give her back. You understand that?"

"Yes."

"But you still want them left out."

"It's why I called you."

She nodded and finally stopped, waiting for me to signal which way. I pointed to the right. She started up again. "Another thing," she said.

"What?"

"We can't let them dictate the tempo this time. We have to insist on assurances that Tara is alive."

"They'll say the hairs prove it."

"And we'll say the tests were inconclusive."

"You think they'll buy that?"

"I don't know. Probably not." She kept walking, the cut of her jaw held high. "But this is what I mean by tough decisions. That flannel shirt guy in the park? That's about head games. They want to intimidate and weaken you. They want you to follow blindly again. Tara is 1<?0 Marian Coben

your child. If you want to just hand over the money again, that's up to you. But I wouldn't advise it. They vanished before. There's no reason to think they won't again."

We entered the parking garage. I handed the attendant my ticket. "So what do you suggest?" I asked her.

"A few things. First, we have to demand an exchange. No 'Here's the money, call us later.' We get your daughter when they get the money."

"And if they don't agree?"

She looked at me with those eyes. "Tough decisions. You understand?"

I nodded.

"I also want a total electronic surveillance hookup, so I can stay with you. I want to strap on a fiber-optic camera and see what this guy looks like, if possible. We don't have manpower, but there are still things we can do."

"Suppose they catch on?"

"Suppose they run away again?" she countered. "We're taking chances here no matter what we do. I'm trying to learn from what happened the first time. There are no guarantees. I'm simply trying to improve our odds."

The car arrived. We slid in and started up McCarter Highway. Rachel suddenly grew very quiet. The years' again melted away. I knew this posture. I had seen it before.

"What else?" I said.

"Nothing."

"Rachel."

Something in my tone made her look away. "There are some things you should know."

I waited.

"I called Cheryl," she said. "I know she filled you in on most of it. You understand that I'm not a fed anymore."

"Yes."

"There's a limit to what I can do."

"I understand that." She sat back. The posture was still there. "What else?"

"You need a reality check here, Marc."

We pulled to a red light. I turned and looked at her--really looked at i no second chance J21

her--for the first time. The eyes still had that hazel with gold flakes. I know the years had been tough, but it didn't show in the eyes.

"The odds that Tara is still alive are minuscule," she said.

"But the DNA test," I countered.

"I'll handle that later."

"Handle it?"

"Later," she said again.

"What the hell does that mean? It's a match. Edgar said the final confirmation is a formality."

"Later," she repeated with steel in her voice. "Right now we might as well assume that she's alive. We should go through with the ransom drop-off as if there is a healthy child on the other end. But somewhere along the line, I need you to understand that this could be an elaborate con."

"How do you figure?"

"That's not relevant."

"Like hell it isn't. Are you saying, what, they faked a DNA test?"

"I doubt it." Then she added, "But it's a possibility."

"How? There was a match between the two sets of hairs."

"The hairs matched each other."

"Yes."

"But," she said, "how do you know the first set of hairs--the ones you got a year and a half ago--belonged to Tara?"

It took a few moments for the meaning to reach me.

"Did you ever run a test on the first set, see if the DNA matched yours?" she asked.

"Why would we?"

"So for all you know, the original kidnappers sent you the hairs of another kid."

I tried to shake my head clear. "But they had a snippet of her clothes," I said. "The pink with black penguins. How do you explain that?"

"You don't think the Gap sold more than one of those? Look, I don't know what the story is yet, so let's not get bogged down in hypotheticals. Let's just concentrate on what we can do here and now."

I sat back. We fell into silence. I wondered if I had made the right move by calling her. There was so much excess baggage here. But at the Ml Harlan Coben

end of the day, I trusted her. We needed to maintain the professional, to keep compartmentalizing.

"I just want my daughter back," I said.

Rachel nodded, opened her mouth as if to say something, and then grew silent again. And that was when the ransom call came in. chapter 16

Llfdid liked tO stare at old photographs.

She did not know why. They offered her little comfort. The nostalgia factor was, at best, limited. Heshy never looked back. For reasons that she could never properly articulate, Lydia did.

This particular photograph had been taken when Lydia was eight years old. It was a black-and-white still from the beloved classic TV sitcom Family Laughs. The show ran for seven years--in Lydia's case, from the age of six until just near her thirteenth birthday. Family Laughs starred ex-movie hunk Clive Wilkins as the widowed father of three adorable children: twin boys, Tod and Rod, who were eleven when the series began, and an adorable pixie of a little sister named, cutely enough, Trixie, played by the irrepressible Larissa Dane. Yes, the show was at least three steps beyond precious. Old repeats of Family Laughs still run on TV Land.

Every once in a while, the E! True Hollywood Story runs a piece on the old cast of Family Laughs. Clive Wilkins died from pancreatic cancer two years after the show ended. The narrator would note that Clive was "just like a father on the set," which, Lydia knew, was a load of crap. The guy drank and smelled liked tobacco. When she hugged him for the cameras, it took all her considerable young acting skills not to gag from the stench.

Jarad and Stan Frank, the real-life identical twins who played Tod and Rod, had been trying to get a music career going since the show's cancellation. On Family Laughs, they had a groovy garage band with a repertoire of songs written by others, instruments played by others, and voices so echoed and distorted by synthesizers that even Jarad and Stan, 1i>4 Harlan Coben

who could not hold a key if it was tattooed into their palms, started to believe that they were genuine musical artistes. The twins were both nearing forty now, both clearly clients of the Hair Club, both deluding themselves that, even though they claimed to be "tired of the fame," they were one break away from the return to stardom.

But the true draw here, the gripping enigma of the Family Laughs saga, involved the fate of the adorable "Pixie named Trixie," Larissa Dane. Here is what is known about her: During the show's final season, Larissa's parents got divorced and fought bitterly over her earnings. Her dad ended up blowing his brains out. Her mother remarried a con artist who disappeared with the money. Like most child actors, Larissa Dane became an immediate has-been. Rumors of promiscuity and drug abuse swirled, though--this being before the nostalgia craze--no one really cared enough to be interested. She overdosed and nearly died when she was just fifteen. She was sent to a sanitarium of some sort and seemingly dropped off the face of the earth. No one really knows what became of her. Many believe that she died from a second drug overdose.

But of course, she had not.

Heshy said, "You ready to make the call, Lydia?"

She did not answer right away. Lydia moved to the next photograph. Another shot from Family Laughs, this time Season Five, Episode 112. Little Trixie wore a cast on her arm. Tod wanted to draw a guitar on it. Father didn't really approve. Tod protested, "But, Dad, I promise only to draw it, not play it!" The laugh track howled. Young Larissa didn't understand the joke. Grown-up Lydia didn't either. What she did remember, however, was how she had broken her arm that day. Typical kid stuff really. She was horsing around and fell down the stairs. The pain was tremendous, but they needed to get this show in the can. With that in mind, the studio doctor shot her up with Lord-knows-what and two hack screenwriters incorporated the injury into the script. She was barely conscious when they filmed.

But please, do not start up the violins.

Lydia had read Danny Partridge's book. She had listened to the whining of Willis on Diff'rent Strokes. She had heard all about the plight of the child star, the abuse, the stolen money, the long hours. She had seen all the talk shows, heard all the complaints, seen all the crocodile tears from her colleagues--and their dishonesty sickened her.

Here was the truth about the child star dilemma. No, it's not the no second chance 12"ÂŤ

abuse, though when Lydia was young and foolish enough to believe a shrink could help, he kept telling her how she must be "blocking," that she had in all likelihood been molested by one of the show's producers. And no, don't blame parental neglect for what child stars become. Or, in reverse, parental pushing. It's not the lack of friends, the long hours, the poor socialization skills, the stream of studio tutors. No, it is none of that.

It is, quite simply, the loss of the spotlight.

Period. The rest are excuses because no one wants to admit that they are that shallow. Lydia began working on the show when she was six. She had few memories that dated back before then. All she remembers, thus, is being a star. A star is special. A star is royalty. A star is the closest thing on earth to a god. And for Lydia, there had never been anything else. We teach our children that they are special, but Lydia lived it. Everyone thought she was adorable. Everyone thought she was the perfect daughter, loving and kind and yet properly sassy. People stared at her with a bizarre longing. People wanted to be near her, to know about her life, spend time with her, touch the hem of her cloak.

And then, one day, poof--all gone.

Fame is more addictive than crack. Adults who lose fame--one-hit wonders, for example--usually tailspin into depression, though they try to act like they're above it. They don't want to admit the truth. Their whole life is a lie, a desperate scramble for another dose of that most potent of drugs. Fame.

Those adults had a mere sip of the nectar before it was snatched away. But for a child star, that nectar is mother's milk. It's all they've ever known. They can't comprehend that it's fleeting, that it won't last. You can't explain that to a child. You can't prepare them for the inevitable. Lydia had never known anything but adulation. And then, pretty much overnight, the spotlight went out. She was, for the first time in her life, alone in the dark.

That was what screws you up.

Lydia recognized that now. Heshy had helped her. He had gotten her off the junk once and for all. She had hurt herself, had been a slut, had snorted and shot up more narcotics than one could imagine. She did none of these things to escape. She did them to lash out, to hurt something or someone. Her mistake, she realized in rehab after a truly horrific and violent incident, was that she was hurting herself. Fame raises 1<?6 Marian Coben

you up. It makes others lesser. So why on earth was she hurting the one who should be on top? Instead, why not hurt the pitiful masses, those who had worshiped her, who had given her such heady power, who had turned on her? Why harm the superior species, the one who'd been worthy of all this praise?

"Lydia?"

"Hmm."

"I think we should call now."

She turned to Heshy. They had met in the loony bin, and right away, it was as if their mutual misery could reach out and embrace. Heshy had rescued her when two orderlies had pinned her down. At the time, he had merely pushed them off her. The orderlies threatened them, and they both promised not to say anything. But Heshy understood how to bide his time. He waited. Two weeks later, he ran over one of the goons with a stolen car. While the goon lay wounded, Heshy backed up over his head and then, positioning the tire near the base of the neck, hit the accelerator. A month later, the second goon--the lead orderly--was found in his home. Four of his fingers had been ripped off. Not cut or sliced, but twisted. The ME could tell by the rotation tears. The fingers had been rotated around and around until the tendons and bone finally snapped. Lydia still had one of the fingers somewhere in the basement.

Ten years ago, they ran off together and clianged their names. They altered their appearances just enough. They both started over, avenging angels, damaged but superior, above the riffraff. She didn't hurt anymore. Or at least, when she did, she found an outlet.

They had three residences. Heshy purportedly lived in the Bronx. She had a place in Queens. They both had working addresses and working phones. But that was all for show. Business offices, if you will. Neither of them wanted anyone to know that they were, in fact, a team, connected, lovers. Lydia, using an alias, had bought this bright yellow ; house four years ago. It had two bedrooms and one and a half baths. The kitchen, where Heshy now sat, was airy and happy. They were on a lake in the tippy north corner of Morris County, New Jersey. It was peaceful here. They loved the sunsets.

Lydia kept staring at the pictures of "Pixie Trixie." She tried to remember what she'd felt like back then. The memories were pretty much gone. Heshy stood behind her now and waited with his usual patience. There were those who would claim that she and Heshy were cold-blooded no second chance Ml

killers. That, Lydia quickly realized, was pretty much a misnomer, another Hollywood creation. Like the wonderfulness of Pixie Trixie. No one enters this violent business merely because it is profitable. There are easier ways to make a living. You may act like a professional. You may keep your emotions in check. You may even delude yourself into thinking it's just another day at the office, but when you look at it honestly, the reason you walk on this wrong side of the line is because you enjoy it. Lydia understood that. Hurting someone, killing someone, fading or turning out the light in a person's eyes . . . no, she did not need that. She did not crave it as she had the spotlight. But yes, no question, there was that pleasant jolt, that unmistakable thrill, a lessening of her own pain.

"Lydia?"

"I'm on it, Pooh Bear." She picked up the cell phone with the stolen number and the scramble. She turned and faced Heshy. He was hideous, but she didn't see that. He nodded at her. She flipped on the voice changer and dialed the number.

When Lydia heard Marc Seidman's voice, she said, "Shall we try this again?" chapter 17

Before I dnSWered the phone, Rachel put her hand over mine. I "This is a negotiation," she said. "Fear and intimidation are tools in | that. You have to stay strong. If they intend to let her go, they will be flexible."

I swallowed and flicked on the phone. I said hello.

"Shall we try this again?"

The voice had the same robotic hum. I felt a tick in my blood. I closed my eyes and said, "No."

"Pardon me?"

"I want assurances that Tara is alive."

"You received hair samples, did you not?"

"Yes."

"And?"

I looked over at Rachel. She nodded. "The match was inconclusive." "Fine," the voice said. "I might as well hang up now." *

"Wait," I said.

"Yes?"

"You drove off last time."

"So we did."

"How do I know you won't do that again?"

"Did you call the police this time?"

"No."

"Then you have nothing to worry about. Here is what I want you ;J to do."

"It's not going to work like that," I said. no second chance 129

"What?"

I could feel my body begin to quake. "We make a swap. You don't get the money until I get my daughter."

"You're not in any position to bargain."

"I get my daughter," I said, my words coming out slowly, dead weights. "You get your money."

"It's not going to work like that."

"Yes," I said, trying to force bravado into my voice. "This ends here and now. I don't want you running away again and then coming back for more. So we make an exchange and end this."

"Dr. Seidman?"

"I'm here."

"I want you to listen to me carefully."

The silence was too long, straining my nerves.

"If I hang up now, I won't call back for another eighteen months."

I closed my eyes and hung on.

"Think about the repercussions for a moment. Aren't you wondering where your daughter has been? Aren't you wondering what will become of her? If I hang up, you won't know anything for another eighteen months."

It felt like a steel belt was being tightened around my chest. I couldn't breathe. I looked at Rachel. She stared back steadily, urging me to stay strong.

"How old would she be then, Dr. Seidman? I mean, if we keep her alive."

"Please."

"Are you ready to listen?" I squeezed my eyes shut. "I'm just asking for assurances."

"We sent you the hair samples."

"I bring the money. You bring my daughter. You get the money when I see her."

"Are you trying to dictate terms, Dr. Seidman?"

The robotic voice had a funny lilt now.

"I don't care who you are," I said. "I don't care why you did any of this. I just want my daughter back."

"Then you'll make the drop exactly as I tell you."

"No," I said. "Not without assurances." 130 Harlan Coben

"Dr. Seidman?"

"Yes."

"Goodbye."

And then the phone went dead. chapter 18

Scffllfy IS d thin string. Mine snapped.

No, I did not scream. Just the opposite. I grew impossibly calm. I pulled the phone away from my ear and looked it as if it'd just materialized there and I had no idea what it was.

"Marc?"

I looked at Rachel. "They hung up."

"They'll call back," she said.

I shook my head. "They said not for another eighteen months."

Rachel studied my face. "Marc?"

"Yes?" "I need you to listen to me closely."

I waited.

"You did the right thing here."

"Thanks. Now I feel better."

"I've had experience with this. If Tara is still alive and if they have any intention of giving her back, they'll give on this issue. The only reason not to make this exchange is because they don't want to--or can't."

Can't. The tiny part of my brain that remained rational understood that. I reminded myself of my training. Compartmentalize. "So now what?"

"We get ready just as we planned before. I have enough equipment With me. We'll wire you up. If they call back, we'll be ready."

I nodded dumbly. "Okay."

"Meanwhile, is there anything else we can do here? Did you recognize the voice at all? Do you remember anything new about the man in "annel, about the van, anything?" 132 Harlan Coben

"No," I said.

"On the phone, you mentioned finding a CD in your basement."

"Yes." I quickly told her the story about the disk and the label reading MVD. She took out a pad and jotted down notes.

"Do you have the disk with you?"

"No."

"Doesn't matter," she said. "We're in Newark now. We might as well see what we can learn from this MVD." chapter 19

Lljdia lifted the Sig-Sauer P226 into the air.

"I don't like how that went," she said.

"You made the right move," Heshy said. "We cut out now. This is over."

She stared at the weapon. She wanted very much to pull the trigger.

"Lydia?"

"I heard you."

"We were doing this because it was simple."

"Simple?"

"Yes. We thought that it would be easy money."

"Lots of money."

"True," he said.

"We can't just walk away."

Heshy saw the wetness in her eyes. This was not about the money. He knew that. "He's tortured either way," he said.

"I know."

"Think about what you just did to him," Heshy said. "If he never hears from us again, he will spend the rest of his life wondering, blaming himself."

She smiled. "Are you trying to turn me on?"

Lydia moved onto Heshy's lap, curled into him like a kitten. He wrapped his giant arms around her and for a moment, Lydia calmed. She felt safe and quiet. She closed her eyes. She loved the feeling. And she knew--as did he--that it would never last. That it would never be enough.

"Heshy?" 134 Harlan Coben

"Yes."

"I want to get that money."

"I know you do."

"And then, I think, it would be best if he died."

Heshy pulled her close. "Then that's what will happen. chapter 20

I dOfl't" knOW what I expected from the offices of Most Valuable Detection. A pebbled-glass door a la Sam Spade or Philip Marlowe maybe. A soiled building of faded brick. A walk-up, for sure. A buxom secretary with a bad dye job.

But the office of Most Valuable Detection had none of that. The building was shiny and bright, part of the "urban renewal" program of Newark. I keep hearing about Newark's renaissance, but I don't see it. Yes, there are several beautiful office buildings--like this one--and a stunning Performing Arts Center conveniently located so that those who can afford to attend (read: those who don't live in Newark) can get to it without, well, driving through the city. But these sleek edifices are flowers among the weeds, scant stars in an otherwise black sky. They do not change the basic color. They do not blend or bleed. They remain removed. Their sterile beauty is not contagious.

We stepped off the elevator. I still held the bag with two million dollars in it. It felt weird in my hand. There were three headphone-clad receptionists behind a wall of glass. Their desk was high. We stated our names into an intercom. Rachel showed an ID that listed her as a retired FBI agent. We were buzzed in.

Rachel pushed open the door. I trailed behind her. I felt empty, but I was functioning. The horror of what had happened--the hang-up-- was so great that I had pushed beyond paralysis to a strange state of focus. Again I compare all this to the surgery room. I enter that room, 1 cross that gateway, and I shed the world. I had a patient once, a six year-old boy, who was getting a fairly routine cleft palate repair. While 136 Harlan Coben

on the table, his vitals dropped suddenly. His heart stopped. I didn't panic. I fell into a state of focus, not unlike this one. The boy pulled through.

Still flashing the ID, Rachel explained that we wanted to see someone in charge. The receptionist smiled and nodded in that way people do when they aren't listening. She never took off the headphones. Her fingers pressed some buttons. Another woman appeared. She led us down the corridor and into a private office.

For a moment, I couldn't tell if we were in the presence of a man or a woman. The bronze nameplate on the desk read Conrad Dorfman. Conclusion: a man. He rose theatrically. He was too slim in a blue suit with Guys and Dolls-wide pinstripes, tapered at the waist so that the bottom of the jacket flared out almost enough to be mistaken for a skirt. His fingers were thin like a pianist's, his hair slicked down like Julie Andrews's in Victor/Victoria, and his face had a blotchy smoothness I usually associate with a cosmetic foundation.

"Please," he said in a voice with too much affect. "My name is Conrad Dorfman. I'm the executive vice president of MVD." We shook his hand. He held our hands a second too long, putting the free hand over the shake and peering intently into our eyes. Conrad invited us to sit. We did. He asked us if we'd enjoy a cup of tea. Rachel, taking the lead, said that we would.

There were a few more minutes of chitchat. Conrad asked Rachel questions about her time with the FBI. Rachel was vague. She implied that she, too, worked in the private detection biz and was thus his colleague and worthy of professional courtesy. I said nothing, letting her work. There was a knock on the door. The woman who had escorted us down the corridor opened the door and wheeled in a silver teacart. Conrad began to pour. Rachel got to the point.

"We were hoping you could help us," Rachel said. "Dr. Seidman's wife was a client of yours."

Conrad Dorfman concentrated on the tea. He used one of those screen-door sifters that seemed all the rage nowadays. He shook out some leaves and slowly poured.

"You folks provided her with a CD that's password protected. We need to get into it."

Conrad handed a cup of tea to Rachel first, then me. He settled back no second chance 137

and took a deep sip. "I'm sorry," he said. "I can't help you. The password is set by the client on their own."

"The client is dead."

Conrad Dorfman did not blink. "That really doesn't change anything."

"Her husband here is next of kin. That makes the CD his."

"I wouldn't know," Conrad said. "I don't practice estate law. But we have no control over any of that. As I said before, the client sets the password. We may have given her the CD--I really can't confirm or deny that at this stage--but we would have no idea what numbers or letters she programmed in for the password."

Rachel waited a beat. She stared at Conrad Dorfman. He stared back but dropped his eyes first. He picked up his tea and took another sip. "Can we find out why she came to you in the first place?"

"Without a court order? No, I don't think so."

"Your CD," she said. "There's a back entry."

"Excuse me?"

"Every company has one," Rachel said. "The info isn't lost forever. Your company programs in its own password so that you folks can get on the CD."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"I used to be an FBI agent, Mr. Dorfman."

"So?"

"So I know these things. Please don't insult my intelligence."

"That was not my intent, Ms. Mills. But I simply can't help."

I looked at Rachel. She seemed to be weighing her options. "I still have friends, Mr. Dorfman. In the department. We can ask questions. We can poke around. The feds don't much like private eyes. You know that. I don't want trouble. I just want to know what's on the CD."

Dorfman put down his cup. He strummed his fingers. There was a knock, and the same woman opened the door. She beckoned Conrad Dorfman. He rose, again too theatrically, and practically leapt across the floor. "Excuse me a moment."

When he left the office, I looked at Rachel. She wouldn't turn toward me. "Rachel?"

"Let's just see how it plays out, Marc."

But there really wasn't much more to play. Conrad came back into 138 Harlan Coben

the office. He crossed the room and stood over Rachel, waiting for her to look up. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction.

"Our president, Malcolm Deward, is a former federal agent himself. Did you know that?"

Rachel said nothing.

"He made some calls while we chatted." Conrad waited. "Ms. Mills?" Rachel finally looked up. "Your threats are impotent. You have no friends at the agency. Mr. Deward, alas, does. Get out of my office. Now." chapter 21

I Said, "What the hell was that all about?"

"I told you before. I'm not an agent anymore."

"What happened, Rachel?"

She kept her eyes forward. "You haven't been a part of my life in a long time."

There was nothing to add. Rachel drove now. I held on to the cell phone, again willing it to ring. When we arrived back at my house, dusk had settled in. We went inside. I debated calling Tickner or Regan, but what good would that do now?

"We need to get that DNA checked," Rachel said. "My theory might sound implausible, but does the idea of your daughter being held all this time sound any more so?"

So I called Edgar. I told him that I wanted to run some additional tests on the hair. He said that would be fine. I hung up without telling him that I had already endangered the drop by enlisting the help of a former FBI agent. The less said on that, the better. Rachel called someone she knew to pick up the samples from Edgar, as well as a blood sample from me. He ran a private lab, she said. We would know something within twenty-four to forty-eight hours, which would probably be, in terms of a ransom demand, too late.

I settled into a chair in the den. Rachel sat on the floor. She opened her bag and pulled out wires and electronic contraptions of all sorts. Being a surgeon makes me pretty good with my hands, but when it comes to high-tech gizmos, I'm totally lost. She carefully spread the contents of the bag across the carpet, giving this action her full attention. Again I was 140 Harlan Coben

reminded of the way she'd do the same thing with textbooks when we were in college. She reached into the bag and pulled out a razor.

"The bag of money?" she said.

I handed it to her. "What are you going to do?"

She opened it. The money was in packs of hundred-dollar bills. She grabbed a wad and slowly slipped the money out, not breaking the band around it. She cut the bills like they were a deck of cards.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"I'm going to cut a hole."

"In the actual currency?"

"Yup."

She did it with the straight razor. She dug out a circle about the perimeter of a silver dollar, maybe a quarter inch thick. She scanned the floor, found a black device that was about the same size, fit it into the bills. Then she put the wrapping back on it. The device was totally hidden in the middle of the money wad.

"A Q-Logger," she said in way of explanation. "It's a GPS device."

"You say so."

"GPS stands for Global Positioning System. Put simply, it will track the money. I'll put one in the lining of the bag too, but most criminals know about that. They usually, dump the cash into a bag of their own. But with all this money, they won't have time right away to search through every pack."

"How small do those things come?"

"The Q-Loggers?"

"Yes."

"They can make them even thinner, but the problem is the power source. You need a battery. That's where we lose out. I need something that can travel at least eight miles. This will do it."

"And where does it go to?"

"You mean where do I keep track of the movements?"

"Yes."

"Most of the time it goes to a laptop, but this is state of the art." Rachel lifted a device into the air, one I see too often in the world of medicine. In fact, I think I'm the only doctor on the planet without one. "A Palm Pilot?" no second chance 141

"Designed with a special tracking screen. I'll have it on me if I have to move." She went back to work.

"What's all the other stuff?" I asked.

"Surveillance equipment. I don't know how much I'll be able to use, but I'd like to put a Q-Logger in your shoe. I want to get a camera on the car. I'd like to see if I can hook up some fiber-optics on you, but that could be riskier." She started to organize her equipment, lost in the activity. Her eyes were down when she spoke again. "Something else I want to explain to you."

I leaned forward.

"Do you remember when my parents got divorced?" she asked.

"Yeah, sure." It had been when we first met.

"Close as we were, we never talked about it."

"I always got the impression you didn't want to."

"I didn't," she said too quickly.

And, I thought, neither had I. I was selfish. We were supposedly in love for two years--and yet I never so much as nudged her to open up about her parents' divorce. It was more than an "impression" that made me hold my tongue. I knew something dark and unhappy lay there. I did not want to poke at it, disturb it, have it possibly turn its attention in my direction.

"It was my father's fault."

I almost said something really stupid like "It's never anyone's fault" or "There are two sides to every story," but a fly by of good sense kept my tongue in check. Rachel still hadn't looked up. "My father destroyed my mother. Crushed her soul. Do you know how?"

"No."

"He cheated on her."

She lifted her head and held my gaze. I did not look away. "It was a destructive cycle," she said. "He'd cheat, he'd get caught, he'd swear he'd never do it again. But he always did. It wormed into my mother, ate away at her." Rachel swallowed, turned back to her high-tech toys. "So when I was away in Italy and I heard you'd been with someone else ..."

I thought of a million different things to say, but they were all meaningless. Frankly so was what she was telling me. It explained a lot, I guess, but it was the ultimate too-little-too-late. I stayed where I was, not moving from the chair. 142 Harlan Coben

"I overreacted," she said.

"We were young."

"I just wanted ... I should have told you about this back then."

She was reaching out. I started to say something, but I pulled up short. Too much. Just all too much. It had been six hours since the ransom call. The seconds tick-ticked, a deep, painful pounding in the well of my chest.

I jumped when the phone rang, but it was my regular line, not the kidnapper's cell. I picked it up. It was Lenny.

"What's wrong?" he said without preamble.

I looked at Rachel. She shook her head. I nodded back that I understood. "Nothing," I said.

"Your mom told me you saw Edgar in the park."

"Don't worry."

"That old bastard will screw you, you know that."

There was no reasoning with Lenny when it came to Edgar Portman. He also might be right. "I know."

There was brief silence.

"You called Rachel," he said.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Nothing important."

There was another pause. Then Lenny said, "You're lying to me, right?"

"Like a Vegas toupee."

"Yeah, okay. Hey, we still on for racquetball tomorrow morning?"

"I better cancel."

"No problem. Marc?"

"Yeah."

"If you need me ..."

"Thanks, Lenny."

I hung up. Rachel was busy with her electronic gizmos. The words she had said were gone now, dissipated smoke. She looked up and saw something in my face.

"Marc?"

I didn't speak.

"If your daughter is alive, we'll bring her home. I promise."

And for the first time, I was not sure that I believed her. chapter 22

Speddl Agent TJCkner stared down at the report.

The Seidman murder-kidnapping had been beyond back-burner. The FBI had realigned its priorities in recent years. Terrorism was number one on the most wanted list. Numbers two through ten were, well, terrorism. The Seidman case had only involved him when it became a kidnapping issue. Despite what you see on television, the local police are usually anxious to have the FBI involved. The feds have the resources and the know-how. Calling them too late can cost a life. Regan had been smart enough not to wait.

But once the kidnapping issue was--and he hated to use this term for it--"resolved," Tickner's job (unofficially at least) was to back off and leave it to the locals. He still thought about it a lot--you don't forget the sight of a baby's clothing in a cabin like that--but in his mind, the case had been inactive.

Until five minutes ago.

He read the brief report for the third time. He wasn't trying to put it together. Not yet. This was too weird for that. What he was trying to do, what he hoped to accomplish, was to find some kind of angle, some sort of handle he could grip. Nothing came to him.

Rachel Mills. How the hell did she fit into this?

A young subordinate--Tickner couldn't remember if his name was Kelly or Fitzgerald, something Irish like that--stood in front of the desk, hands not sure what to do. Tickner leaned back in the chair and crossed his legs. He tapped the pen against his lower lip.

"There has to be a connection between them," he told Sean or Patrick.

"She claimed to be a private detective." 144 Harlan Coben

"Is she licensed?"

"No, sir."

Tickner shook his head. "There's more to it than that. Check phone records, find some friends, whatever. Trace it down for me."

"Yes, sir."

"Call that detective agency. The MVD. Tell them I'm on my way."

"Yes, sir."

The Irish kid left. Tickner stared off. He and Rachel had gone through training together at Quantico. They'd both had the same mentor. Tickner thought about what to do here. While he didn't always trust the locals, he liked Regan. The guy was just off enough to be an asset. He picked up the phone and dialed Regan's cell.

"Detective Regan."

"Long time, no speak."

"Ah, Federal Agent Tickner. You still wearing the sunglasses?"

"You still stroking that soul patch--uh, among other things?"

"Yes. And maybe."

Tickner could hear sitar music in the background. "You busy?"

"Not at all. I'was just meditating."

"Like Phil Jackson?"

"Exactly. Except I don't have all those pesky championship rings. You should join me sometime."

"Yeah, I'll put that on my list of must-dos."

"It would relax you, Agent Tickner. I hear tremendous strain in your voice." Then: "I assume that there was a reason for this call?"

"Remember our favorite case?"

There was a funny pause. "Yes."

"How long has it been since we had something new?"

"I don't think we ever had anything new."

"Well, we may now."

"I'm listening."

"We just got a strange call from an ex-FBI agent. Guy named Dew ard. He's a private dick in Newark now."

"So?"

"It seems our friend Dr. Seidman paid his office a visit today. And he had someone very special with him." no second chance 141*

Lydia dyed her hair black--the better to blend in with the night.

The plan, as it were, was simple.

"We confirm that he has the money," she told Heshy. "Then I kill him."

''You sure?"

"Positive. And the beauty of it is, the murder will automatically get tied to the original shooting." Lydia smiled at him. "Even if something goes wrong, nothing ties back to us."

"Lydia?"

"Something the matter?"

Heshy shrugged his giant shoulders. "Don't you think it would be better if I kill him?"

"I'm the better shot, Pooh Bear."

"But"--he hesitated, shrugged again--"I don't need a weapon."

"You're trying to protect me," she said.

He said nothing.

"That's sweet." And it was. But one of the reasons she wanted to do it herself was to protect Heshy. He was the vulnerable one here. Lydia never worried about getting caught. Part of it was classic overconfidence. Dumb people get caught, not those who were careful. But more than that, she knew if she did get nabbed, they'd never convict her. Forget her still girl-next-door looks, though that would undoubtedly be an asset. What no prosecutor would ever overcome would be the weepy Oprahization of her case. Lydia would remind them of her "tragic" past. She would claim abuses in many forms. She would cry on the talk shows. She would talk about the plight of the child star, of the calamity of being forced into the world of Pixie Trixie. She would look adorably victimized and innocent. And the public--not to mention the jury-- would lap it up.

"I think it's best this way," she told him. "If he sees you approach, well, he is apt to run. But if he catches sight of HP of' me ..." Lydia let her voice die out with a small shrug.

Heshy nodded. She was right. This should be cake. She stroked his face and handed him the car keys.

"Does Pavel understand his part?" Lydia asked.

"He does. He'll meet us there. And yes, he'll be wearing the flannel shirt." 146 Harlan Coben

"Then we might as well start on our way," she said. "I'll call Dr. Seidman."

Heshy used the remote to unlock the car doors.

"Oh," she said, "I have to check something before we go."

Lydia opened the back door. The child was fast asleep in the car seat. She checked the straps and made sure that they were secure. "I better sit in the back, Pooh Bear," she said. "Just in case a little someone wakes up."

Heshy angled his way into the driver's seat. Lydia took out the phone and voice changer and dialed the number. chapter 23

We Ordered d pizza, which I think was a mistake. Late-night pizzas are college. It was yet another not-so-subtle reminder of the past. I kept staring at the mobile phone, wishing it to ring. Rachel was quiet, but that was okay. We had always been good with silence. That, too, was weird. In many ways, we were falling back, picking up where we'd left off. But in many more ways, we were strangers with a tenuous, awkward connection.

What was odd was that my memories were suddenly hazy. I'd thought that once I saw her again, they'd head straight to the surface. But few specifics came to me. It was more a feeling, an emotion, like the way I remembered the ruddy cold of New England. I don't know why I couldn't remember. And I wasn't sure what it meant.

Rachel's brow creased as she toyed with the electronic equipment. She took a bite of pizza and said, "Not as good as Tony's."

"That place was awful."

"A little greasy," she agreed.

"A little? Didn't the large come with a coupon for a free angioplasty?"

"Well, there was that sludge-through-the-veins feel to it."

We looked at each other.

"Rachel?"

"Yeah."

"Suppose they don't call."

"Then they don't have her, Marc."

I let that settle in. I thought about Lenny's son, Conner, the things he could say and do, and I tried to apply it to the baby I'd last laid eyes on in her crib. It wouldn't compute, but that didn't mean anything. There 148 Harlan Coben

was hope. I held on to that. If my daughter was dead, if that phone never rang again, the hope would, I know, kill me. But I didn't care. Better to go down this way than try to go the distance.

So I had hope. And I, the cynic, let myself believe the best.

When the cell phone finally did ring, it was nearly ten. I did not even glance over to Rachel and wait for her nod. My finger was on the answer button before the first chirp could die off.

"Hello?"

"Okay," the robotic voice said, "you'll get to see her."

I couldn't breathe. Rachel moved over closer and put her ear near mine.

"Good," I said.

"You have the money?"

"Yes."

"All of it?"

"Yes."

"Then listen closely. Deviate from what I tell you and we disappear. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"We checked with our police sources. So far, so good. It appears that you haven't contacted the authorities. But we need to make sure. You will drive alone toward the George Washington Bridge. Once there, we will be in range. Use the two-way radio feature on the phone. I will tell you where to go and what to do. You will be searched. If we find any weapons or wires, we will disappear. Do you understand?"

I could feel Rachel's breath quicken.

"When do I see my daughter?"

"When we meet."

"How do I know you won't just take the money?"

"How do you know I'm not going to hang up on you now?"

"I'm on my way," I said. Then I quickly added, "But I won't hand over the money until I see Tara."

"Then we are in agreement. You have an hour. Signal me then." chapter 24

Conrdd DoffnidO did not appear happy to be dragged back into the MVD office this late. Tickner didn't care. If Seidman had come here alone, that would be an important lead, no doubt about it. But the fact that Rachel Mills had been here, too, that she was somehow involved, well, let's just say that Tickner's curiosity was more than piqued.

"Did Ms. Mills show you an ID?" he asked.

"Yes," Dorfman replied. "But it was stamped 'Retired.' "

"And she was with Dr. Seidman?"

"Yes."

"They arrived together."

"I think so. I mean, yes, when they came in here, they were together."

Tickner nodded. "What did they want?"

"A password. For a CDROM."

"I'm not sure I follow."

"They claimed that they had a CD-ROM we provided to a client. Our CDs are password protected. They wanted us to give them the password."

"Did you?"

Dorfman looked properly shocked. "Of course not. We had a call put in to your agency. They explained to us ... well, they never quite explained to us anything really. They just stressed that we should not cooperate with Agent Mills in any way."

"Ex-agent," Tickner said.

How? Tickner wondered. How the hell had Rachel Mills hooked up with Seidman? He had tried to give her the benefit of the doubt. Unlike 1^0 Harlan Coben

his fellow agents, he had known her, had seen her in action. She'd been a good agent, maybe even a great one. But now he wondered. He wondered about the timing. He wondered about her being here. He wondered about her flashing her badge and trying to apply pressure.

"Did they tell you how they came by this CDROM?"

"They claimed that it belonged to Dr. Seidman's wife."

"Does it?"

"I believe so, yes."

"Are you aware that his wife died more than a year and a half ago, Mr. Dorfman?"

"I know that now."

"But you didn't when they were here?"

"Right."

"Why did Seidman wait eighteen months to ask for the password?"

"He didn't say."

"Did you ask?"

Dorfman shifted in his seat. "No."

Tickner smiled, buddy-to-buddy. "No reason you should," he said, faux-genteel. "Did you give them any information at all?"

"None."

"You didn't tell them why Mrs. Seidman hired your agency in the first place?"

"That's correct."

"Okay, very good." Tickner leaned forward, his elbows on his knees now. He was about to ask another question when his cell phone rang. "Excuse me," he said, reaching into his pocket.

"Is this going to take much longer?" Dorfman asked. "I have plans."

He didn't even bother responding. Rising, he put the phone to his ear. "Tickner."

"It's Agent O'Malley," the young kid said.

"Did you find anything?"

"Oh yeah."

"I'm listening."

"We checked the phone records going back three years. Seidman never called her--at least, not from his house or office--until today."

"Am I about to hear a but?"

"You are. But Rachel Mills called him--once."

"When?" no second chance 1"<1

"June two years ago."

Tickner did the math. That would have been about three months before the murder and kidnapping. "Anything else?"

"Something big, I think. I had one of our agents check Rachel's apartment in Falls Church. He's still poking around, but guess what he found in her night-table drawer?"

"Does this look like a quiz show, O'Ryan?"

"O'Malley."

Tickner rubbed the bridge of his nose. "What did the agent find?"

"A prom photo."

"What?"

"I mean, I don't know if it's from the prom exactly. It's some kind of old formal. Photo gotta be fifteen, twenty years old. She's wearing her hair in some flip-style and she's got one of those flower bands on her arm. What do you call those?"

"A corsage?"

"Right."

"What the hell does this have to do with--"

"The guy in the picture."

"What about him?"

"Our agent is sure. The guy she's with--her date, I mean--is our own Dr. Seidman."

Tickner felt the thrum rush through him. "Keep digging," he said. "Call me when you get more."

"On it."

He hung up the phone. Rachel and Seidman went to a prom together? What the hell was going on? She was from Vermont, if he remembered correctly. Seidman lived in New Jersey. They didn't go to high school together. How about college? They'd have to look into it.

"Something wrong?"

Tickner turned. It was Dorfman. "Let me see if I have this straight, Mr. Dorfman. This CD-ROM belonged to Monica Seidman?"

"That's what we were told, yes."

"Yes or no, Mr. Dorfman."

He cleared his throat. "We believe the answer is yes."

"So she was a client here?"

"Yes, that we've been able to confirm."

"So to sum up, a murder victim was a client of yours." l1^ Harlan Coben

Silence.

"Her name was in every paper in the state," Tickner went on, giving him the hard stare. "How come you never came forward?"

"We didn't know."

Tickner kept with the hard stare.

"The guy who handled that case is no longer employed by us," he added quickly. "See, he was gone by the time Mrs. Seidman was killed. So no one here put the pieces together."

Defensive. Tickner liked that. He believed him, but he didn't show it. Make the guy anxious to please.

"What was on the CD?"

"Photographs, we think."

"Think?"

"That's usually the case. Not always. We use the CD to store photographs, but there could be some scanned documents too. I really couldn't tell you."

"Why the hell not?"

He put up both hands. "Don't worry. We have a backup. But any file more than a year old is stored in the basement. The office was closed, but when I heard you were interested, I got someone to come in. He's running off the material on the backup CD right now."

"Where?"

"He's on the lower level." Dorfman checked his watch. "He should be done or just about by now. Do you want to go down and see?"

Tickner stood. "Let's rumble." chapter 25

"TherP dfC Still things we can do," Rachel said. "This stuff is state of the art. Even if they pat you down, we can get away with it. I have a bulletproof vest that has a pinhole camera right in the center."

"And you don't think they'll find that with a pat-down?"

"Yeah, okay, look, I know you're worried about them finding out, but let's be realistic here. There's an excellent chance this is all a setup. Don't give up the money until you see Tara. Don't get yourself stuck somewhere alone. Don't worry about the Q-Logger--if they're being up front, we'll have Tara before they can search the stacks of money. I know this isn't an easy decision, Marc."

"No, you're right. I played it safe last time. I think we need to take some chances. But the vest is out."

"Okay, here's what we're going to do. I'm going to be in the trunk. They may check the backseat to see if someone is lying there. The trunk will be a safer bet. I'll disconnect the wires back there so when the trunk opens, no lights will come on. I'll try to keep up with you, but I have to stay at a safe distance. Make no mistake here. I'm not Wonder Woman. I might lose you, but remember: Don't look for me. Not even casually. These guys are probably pretty good. They'll spot that."

"I understand." She was dressed totally in black. I said, "You look like you're going to do a reading in the Village."

"Kumbaya, my Lord. You ready?"

We both heard the car pull up. I looked out the window and felt my panic needle jump. "Damn," I said.

"What?" 1M Harlan Coben

"That's Regan, the cop on the case. I haven't seen him in more than a month." I looked at her. Her face was stark white against the black outfit. "Coincidence?"

"No coincidence," she said.

"How the hell did he find out about the ransom?"

She moved back from the window. "He's probably not here for that."

"Then what?"

"My guess would be that they got word of my involvement from MVD."

I frowned. "So?"

"No time to explain. Look, I'm going to go out to the garage and hide. He's going to ask about me. Tell him I went back to D.C. If he presses, tell him I'm an old friend and leave it at that. He's going to want to interrogate you."

"Why?"

But she was already moving away from me. "Just be firm and get him out of there. I'll wait for you by the car."

I didn't like it, but now was not the time. "Okay."

Rachel headed to the garage via the door in the den. I waited until she was out of sight. When Regan hit my front walkway, I opened the door, trying to cut him off at the pass.

Regan smiled. "Were you expecting me?" he asked.

"I heard your car."

He nodded as if I'd said something that required serious analysis. "Do you have a few moments, Dr. Seidman?"

"Actually, it's a bad time."

"Oh." Regan did not break stride. He slid past me and into my front foyer, his eyes taking in everything. "Heading out, are we?"

"What do you want, Detective?"

"Some new information has come to our attention."

I waited for him to say more.

"Don't you want to know what it is?"

"Of course."

Regan had a strange, almost serene look on his face. He looked up at the ceiling, as if he were considering what color to paint it. "Where have you been today?" no second chance 1^

"'Get out, please."

His eyes were still on the ceiling. "Your hostility surprises me." But he did not look surprised.

"You said you had some new information. If you do, say it. If not, get out. I'm not in the mood to be questioned."

He made a well-well face. "We hear that you visited a private detective agency in Newark today."

"So?"

"So what were you doing there?"

"Tell you what, Detective. I'm going to ask you to leave because I know answering your questions will bring me no closer to finding my daughter."

He looked at me. "You sure about that?"

"Kindly get the hell out of my house. Now."

"Suit yourself." Regan started for the door. When we reached it, he asked, "Where's Rachel Mills?" "Don't know."

"She's not here?"

"Nope."

"No idea at all where she could be?"

"I think she's on her way back to Washington."

"Hmm. How do you two know each other?"

"Good night, Detective."

"Okay, sure. But one last question."

I stifled a sigh. "You've watched too many episodes of Columbo, Detective."

"Indeed I have." He smiled. "But let me ask it anyway."

I spread my hands for him to go ahead.

"Do you know how her husband died?"

"He was shot," I said too quickly, and immediately regretted it. He leaned a little more into my space and kept on me.

"And do you know who shot him?"

I stood without moving.

"Do you, Marc?"

"Good night, Detective."

"She killed him, Marc. A bullet to the head at close range."

"That," I said, "is a load of bull." 1% Harlan Coben

"Is it? 1 mean, are you sure?"

"If she killed him, why isn't she in jail?" "Good question," Regan said, backing down the walkway. When he reached the end of the walkway, he added, "Maybe you should ask her." chapter 26

ReJCPPl W3S 1(1 the garage. She looked up at me. She suddenly looked small, I thought. And I saw fear in her face. The car trunk was open. I moved toward the driver-side door.

"What did he want?" she asked.

"What you said."

"He knew about the CD?"

"He knew we'd been at MVD. He didn't say anything about the CD."

I slid into the car. She let it drop. Now was not the time to raise any new issues. We both knew that. But again I questioned my judgment here. My wife had been murdered. So had my sister. Someone had tried very hard to kill me. Stripping it bare, I was trusting a woman I really didn't know. I was trusting her not only with my life, but with my daughter's. How stupid when you think about it. Lenny had been right. It was not so simple. In truth, I had no idea who she was or what she'd become. I had deluded myself into making her something she might not be, and now I wondered what it might cost me.

Her voice cut through my haze. "Marc?"

"What?"

"I still think you should wear the bulletproof vest."

"No."

My tone was firmer than I'd wanted. Or maybe not. Rachel climbed into the trunk and closed it. I put the duffel bag with the money on the seat next to me. I hit the garage-door opener under the sun-visor and started the car.

We were on our way. 1^8 Harlan Coben

When Tickner was nine years old, his mother bought him a book of optical illusions. You'd look at a drawing of, say, an old lady with a big nose. You'd look a little longer and then, poof, it appeared now to be a young woman with her head turned. Tickner had loved the book. When he got a little older, he moved on to those Magic Eyes, staring for however long it took for the horsey or whatever to appear in the swirling colors. Sometimes it would take a long time. You'd even start to wonder if there was anything there at all. And then, suddenly, the image surfaced.

That was what was happening here.

There were moments in a case, Tickner knew, that altered everything-- just like those old optical illusions. You are viewing one reality and then, with a gentle tilt, reality changes. Nothing is as it appeared.

He had never really bought the conventional theories on the Seid man murder-kidnapping. They all felt too much like reading a book with missing pages.

Over the years, Tickner had not dealt with that many murders. They were, for the most part, left to the local cops. But he knew plenty of homicide investigators. The best ones were always off center, overly theatrical, ridiculously imaginative. Tickner had heard them talk about a point in the case where the victim "reaches out" from the grave. The victim "talks" to them somehow, pointing them toward the killer. Tickner would listen to his nonsense and nod politely. It always sounded like a load of hyperbole, just one of those meaningless things cops say because the general public laps it up.

The printer still whirred. Tickner had seen twelve photos already.

"How many more?" he asked.

Dorfman looked at the computer screen. "Six more."

"Same as these?"

"Pretty much, yeah. I mean, same person."

Tickner stared down at the photographs. Yes, the same person was featured in all of them. They were all in black and white, all taken without the subject knowing, probably from a distance with a zoom lens.

The reach-from-the-grave stuff--it no longer sounded so silly. Monica Seidman had been dead for eighteen months. Her murderer had gone free. And now, with all hope lost, she seemed to have risen from the dead to point a finger. Tickner looked again and tried to understand.

The subject of the pictures, the person Monica Seidman was pointing at, was Rachel Mills. no second chance 1^9

When you take the eastern spur of the New Jersey Turnpike north, the night skyline of Manhattan beckons. Like most people who see it nearly every day, I used to take it for granted. No more. For a while afterward, I thought I could still see the Towers. It was as though they were bright lights I'd stared at for a long time, so that even when I closed my eyes, their images were still there, imbedded. But like any sunspot, the images eventually began to fade. It is different now. When I drive this route, I still make myself look for them. Even tonight. But sometimes I forget precisely where those towers stood. And that angers me more than I can express.

Out of habit, I took the lower level of the George Washington Bridge. There was no traffic at this hour. I drove through the E-ZPass. I had managed to keep myself distracted. I flipped stations between two talk radio shows. One was a sports station where lots of guys named Vinny from Bayside called up and complained about inept coaches and how much better they'd be at the job. The other station featured two beyond-puerile Howard Stern rip-offs who thought it was funny for a college freshman to call his mother and tell her he had testicular cancer. Both were, if not entertaining, mildly distracting.

Rachel was in the trunk, which was totally weird if I thought about it. I reached for the cell phone and flipped on the two-way radio feature. My ringer pressed down on the call button and almost instantly I heard the robotic voice say, "Take the Henry Hudson north."

I put the phone to mouth, walkie-talkie style. "Okay."

"Tell me the moment you get on the Hudson."

"Right."

I got into the left lane. I knew the way. This area was familiar to me. I had done a fellowship at New York Presbyterian, which resided about ten blocks south. Zia and I had roomed with a cardiac resident named Lester in an Art Deco building at the tail end of Fort Washington Avenue in upper, upper Manhattan. When I lived here, this section of the city was known as the far northern point of Washington Heights. Now I had noticed several realtors redubbing it "Hudson Heights" so as to differentiate it, in both substance and cost, from its lower-class roots.

"Okay, I'm on the Hudson," I said.

"Take your next exit."

"Fort Try on Park?" 160 Harlan Coben

"Yes."

Again I knew it. Fort Tryon floats cloudlike high above the Hudson River. It is a quiet and restful jagged cliff, New Jersey on its west, Riverdale-Bronx on its east. The park is a mishmash of terrains-- walkways of harsh stone, fauna from a bygone era, terraces of stone, nooks and crannies of cement and brick, thick brush, rocky slopes, open grass. I had spent plenty of summer days on her green lawns, adorned in shorts and T-shirt, Zia and unread medical books my companions. My favorite time here: summer, right before dark. The orange glow bathing the park in something almost ethereal.

I put on my blinker and glided onto the exit ramp. There were no cars and few lights. The park was closed at night, but the roadway stayed open for through traffic. My car chugged up the steep road and entered what felt like a medieval fortress. The Cloisters, a former quasi French monastery that was now part of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, held middle ground. It houses a fabulous collection of medieval artifacts. Or so I'm told. I've been in this park a hundred times. I've never been inside the Cloisters.

It was, I thought, a smart place for a ransom drop--dark, quiet, filled with serpentine trails, stone cliffs, sudden drops, thick woods, paved and unpaved walks. You could get lost here. You could hide here for a very long time and never be found.

The robotic voice asked, "Are you there yet?"

"I'm in Fort Tryon, yes."

"Park near the cafe. Get out and walk up to the circle."

Riding in the trunk was noisy and jarring. Rachel had brought a padded blanket, but there was not much she could do about the noise. A flashlight stayed in her satchel. She had no interest in turning it on. Rachel had never minded the dark.

Sight could be distracting. The dark was a good place to think.

She tried to keep her body loose, riding bumps, and wondered about Marc's behavior right before they left. The cop at the house had, no doubt, said something that shook him. About her? Probably. She wondered what exactly he had said and how she should react.

Didn't matter now. They were on their way. She had to concentrate on the task at hand.

Rachel was falling back into a familiar role. There was a pang here. no second chance 16)

She missed being with the FBI. She had loved her job. Yes, perhaps it was all she had. It was more than her escape--it was the only thing she really enjoyed doing. Some people pushed through the nine-to-five so they could go home and live their lives. For Rachel, it was the opposite.

After all these years apart, here was something that she and Marc had in common: They'd both found careers they loved. She wondered about that. She wondered if there was a connection, if their careers had become some kind of true-love substitute. Or was that looking at it too deeply?

Marc still had his job. She did not. Did that make her more desperate?

No. His child was gone. Game, set, match.

In the darkness of the trunk, she smeared her face with black makeup, enough to take the shine away. The car started climbing upward. Her gear was packed and ready.

She thought about Hugh Reilly, the son of a bitch.

Her breakup with Marc--and everything after--was his fault. Hugh had been her dearest friend in college. That was what he wanted, he told her. Just to be her friend. No pressure. He understood that she had a boyfriend. Had Rachel been naive or purposefully naive? Men who want to "just be friends" do so because they hope to be next in line, as though friendship were an on-deck circle, a good place for practice swings before heading to the plate. Hugh had called her in Italy that night with nothing but the best of intentions. "I just think you should know," he said, "as your friend." Right. And then he told her what Marc had done at some stupid frat party.

Yes, enough blaming herself. Enough blaming Marc. Hugh Reilly. If that son of a bitch had just minded his own business, what would her life be like right now? She couldn't say. Ah, but what had her life become? That was easier to answer. She drank too much. She had a bad temper. Her stomach bothered her more than it should. She spent too much time reading TV Guide. And let's not forget the piece de resistance: She had gotten herself ensnared in a self-destructive relationship-- and gotten herself out of it in the worst way possible.

The car veered and climbed upward, forcing Rachel to roll back. A moment or two later, the car stopped. Rachel lifted her head. The cruel musings fled.

It was game time. 162 Harlan Coben

From the old fort's lookout tower, some two hundred fifty feet above the Hudson River, Heshy had one of the most stunning views of the Jersey Palisades, stretching from the Tappan Zee Bridge on the right to the George Washington Bridge on his left. He actually took the time to appreciate it before he got to the matter at hand.

As though on cue, Seidman took the exit off the Henry Hudson Parkway. No one followed. Heshy kept his eyes on the road. No car slowed. No car sped up. No one was trying to make it look as though they weren't following.

He spun around, lost sight of the car for a brief moment, then spotted it again as it came back into view. He could see Seidman in the driver's seat. No one else was visible. That didn't mean much--someone could be ducking down in the back--but it was a start.

Seidman parked the car. He turned off the engine and opened the door. Heshy lifted the microphone to his mouth.

"Pavel, you ready?"

"Yes."

"He's alone," he said, speaking now for Lydia's benefit. "Proceed."

"Park near the cafe. Get out and walk up to the circle."

The circle, I knew, was Margaret Corbin Circle. When I reached the clearing, the first thing I spotted, even in the 5ark, was the bright colors of the children's playground near Fort Washington Avenue at 190th Street. The colors still leapt out. I'd always liked this playground, but tonight the yellows and blues taunted me. I thought of myself as a city boy. When I lived near here, I'd imagined staying in this neighborhood-- too sophisticated was I for the vanilla suburbs--and of course, that meant that I would bring my children to this very park. I took that as an omen, but I didn't know of what.

The phone squawked. "There's a subway station on the left."

"Okay."

"Take the stairs down toward the elevator."

I might have suspected this. He would put me on the elevator and then on the A train. It would be difficult, if not impossible, for Rachel to follow me.

"Are you on the stairs?"

"Yes." no second chance 163

';At the bottom, you'll see a gate on the right."

I knew where it was. It led to a smaller park and was locked except for weekends. It had been set aside as something of a small picnic area. There were Ping-Pong tables, though you had to bring your own net and paddles to play. There were benches and eating areas. Kids used it for birthday parties.

The wrought-iron gate, I remember, was always locked.

"I'm there," I said.

"Make sure no one sees you. Push open the gate. Slip through and quickly close it."

I peered inside. The park was black. Distant streetlights reached out and gave the area no more than a dull glow. The duffel bag felt heavy. I adjusted it up my shoulder. I looked behind me now. No one. I looked to my left. The subway elevators were still. I put my hand on the gate door. The padlock had been cut. I gave the area one more quick glance because that was what the robotic voice had told me to do.

No sign of Rachel.

The gate creaked when I pushed it open. The echo ripped through the still night. I slipped through the opening and let the dark swallow me whole.

Rachel felt the car rock as Marc got out.

She made herself wait a full minute, which felt like two hours. When she thought that it was probably safe, Rachel lifted the trunk an inch and peeked out.

She saw no one.

Rachel had a gun with her, a fed-issue Clock .22 40-caliber semiautomatic, and she carried her night-vision goggles, Rigel 3501 military grade Gen. 2+. The Palm Pilot that could read the Q-Logger transmitter was in her pocket.

She doubted that anyone would see her, but she still only opened the trunk wide enough so she could roll out. She huddled down low. Her hand reached back and grabbed the semiautomatic and night-vision goggles. Then she quietly closed the trunk.

Field operations had always been her favorite--or at least, the training for them. There had been very few missions that required this sort of cloak-and-dagger reconnaissance. For the most part, stakeouts 164 Harlan Coben

were high-tech. You had vans and spy planes and fiber-optics. You rarely found yourself crawling through the night in black clothes and greasepaint.

She made herself small against the back tire. In the distance, she saw Marc heading up the drive. She put the gun in its holster and strapped the night-vision goggles to her belt. Keeping low, Rachel moved up the grass to higher ground. There was still enough light. She didn't need the goggles yet.

A sliver of moon sliced through the sky. There were no stars tonight. Up ahead, she could see that Marc had the cell phone near his ear. The duffel bag was on his shoulder. Rachel looked around, saw no one. Would the drop take place here? It wasn't a bad place, if you had a planned escape route. She started to think about the possibilities.

Fort Tryon was hilly. The secret would be to try to get higher. She started climbing and was just about to settle in when Marc exited the park.

Damn. She'd have to move again.

Rachel commando-crawled down the hill. The grass was prickly and smelled like hay, the cause being, she assumed, the recent water shortage. She tried to keep her eyes on Marc, but she lost him when he left the park grounds. She took a risk and moved quicker. At the park gate, she ducked behind a stone pillar.

Marc was there. But not for very long.

With the phone back to his ear, Marc veered to the left and vanished down the steps leading to the A train.

Up ahead, Rachel saw a man and a woman walking a dog. They could be part of this--or they could be a man and a woman walking a dog. Marc was still out of sight. No time for debate now. She ducked low at a stone wall.

Leaning her back against it, Rachel made her way toward the stairs.

Tickner thought that Edgar Portman looked like something out of a Noel Coward production. He wore silk pajamas under a red robe that appeared to have been tied with great care. There were velvet slippers on his feet. His brother, Carson, on the other hand, looked properly ruffled. His pajamas were askew. His hair was all over the place. His eyes were bloodshot.

Neither Portman could take his eyes off the photographs from the CD. no second chance 16^

"Edgar," Carson said, "let's not jump to conclusions."

"Not jump ... ?" Edgar turned to Tickner. "I gave him money."

"Yes, sir," Tickner said. "A year and a half ago. We know about that."

"No." Edgar tried to make the word snap with impatience, but he didn't have the strength. "I mean, recently. Today, in fact."

Tickner sat up. "How much?"

"Two million dollars. There was another ransom demand."

"Why didn't you contact us?"

"Oh sure." Edgar made a sound that was half chortle, half sneer. "You all did such a wonderful job last time."

Tickner felt the tick in his blood. "Are you saying that you gave your son-in-law an additional two million dollars?"

"That is precisely what I'm saying."

Carson Portman was still staring at the photographs. Edgar glanced at his brother, then back at Tickner. "Did Marc Seidman kill my daughter?"

Carson stood up. "You know better."

"I'm not asking you, Carson."

Both men looked at Tickner now. Tickner was not having any of it. "You said you met with your son-in-law today?"

If Edgar was upset about his question being ignored, he did not show it. "Early this morning," he said. "At Memorial Park."

"That woman in the pictures." Tickner gestured toward them. "Was she with him?"

"No."

"Has either of you ever seen her before?"

Both Carson and Edgar answered in the negative. Edgar picked up one of the photographs. "My daughter hired a private investigator to take these?"

"Yes."

"I don't understand. Who is she?"

Tickner again ignored his question. "The ransom note came to you, like last time?"

"Yes."

"I'm not sure I follow. How did you know that it wasn't a hoax? How did you know that you were dealing with the real kidnappers?"

Carson took that one. "We did think it was a hoax," he said. "At first, I mean." 166 Harlan Coben

"So what changed your mind?"

"They sent hairs again." Carson quickly explained about the tests and about Dr. Seidman's request for additional tests.

"You gave him all the hairs, then?"

"We did, yes," Carson said.

Edgar seemed lost in the photographs again. "This woman," he spat. "Was Seidman involved with her?"

"I can't answer that."

"Why else would my daughter want these pictures taken?"

A mobile phone rang. Tickner excused himself and put the receiver to his ear.

"Bingo," O'Malley said.

"What?"

"We got a hit on Seidman's E-ZPass. He crossed the George Washington Bridge five minutes ago."

The robotic voice told me, "Walk down the path."

There was still enough light to see the first few steps. I started down them. The darkness gathered around, closed in. I started to use my foot to feel my way, like a blind man swinging a cane. I didn't like this. I didn't like this at all. I wondered again about Rachel. Was she near here? I tried to follow the path. It curved to the left. I stumbled on the cobblestone.

"Okay," the voice said. "Stop."

I did so. I could see nothing in front of me. Behind me, the street was a faded glow. On my right was a steep incline. The air had that city park smell to it, a swirling potpourri of fresh and stale. I listened for some sort of clue, but there was nothing other than the distant humming swish of traffic.

"Put down the money."

"No," I said. "I want to see my daughter."

"Put down the money."

"We had a deal. You show me my daughter, I show you the money."

There was no reply. I could hear the blood roaring in my ears. The fear was crippling. No, I did not like this. I was too exposed. I checked the path behind me. I could still break into a run and scream like a psycho. This neighborhood was tighter than most in Manhattan. Someone might call the police or try to help.

"Dr. Seidman?" no second chance 167

"Yes?"'

And then a flashlight hit my face. I blinked and raised a hand to block my eyes. I squinted, trying to see past it. Someone lowered the flashlight beam. My eyes quickly adjusted, but there was no need. The beam was cut off by a silhouette. There was no mistake. I could see immediately what was being highlighted.

There was a man. I may have even seen flannel, I'm not sure. As I said, it was in silhouette. I couldn't really make out features or colors or design. So that part could have been my imagination. But not the rest. I saw the shapes and outlines clear enough to know.

Standing next to the man, gripping his leg just above the knee, was a small child. chapter 27

Lydid WiSPPu that there was more light. She would very much like to see the look on Dr. Seidman's face right now. Her desire to see his expression had nothing to do with the cruelty that was about to come down. It was curiosity. It was deeper than the slow-toseethe-car accident aspect of human nature. Imagine. This man had had his child taken away. For a year and a half, he had been left to wonder about her fate, tossing through sleepless nights, conjuring up horrors best left in the dark abyss of our subconscious.

Now he had seen her.

It would be unnatural not to want to see the expression on his face.

Seconds ticked away. She wanted that. She wanted to stretch the tension, pull him beyond what a man could handle, soften him for the final blow.

Lydia took out her Sig-Sauer. She held it to her side. Peering out from behind the bush she judged the distance between her and Seidman at thirty, maybe forty feet. She put the voice changer and phone back to her mouth. She whispered into it. Whisper or scream, it made no difference. The voice changer made it all sound the same.

"Open the money bag."

From her perch, she watched him move like a man in a trance. He did what she asked--now without question. This time, she was the one using the flashlight. She shone it at his face and then dropped the beam to the bag.

Money. She could see the stacks. She nodded to herself. They were good to go. no second chance 169

"Okay," she said. "Leave the money on the ground. Walk slowly down the path. Tara will be waiting for you."

She watched Dr. Seidman drop the bag. He was squinting at the spot where he believed his daughter would be waiting. His movements were stiff, but then again his vision had probably been affected by the lights in his eyes. That again would make it easier.

Lydia wanted a close shot. Two quick bullets to the head, in case he was wearing a flap jacket. She was a good shot. She could probably hit him in the head from here. But she wanted the sure thing. No mistakes. No chance to run.

Seidman moved toward her. He was twenty feet away. Then fifteen. When he was only ten feet away, Lydia raised the pistol and took aim.

If Marc took the subway, Rachel knew that it'd be near impossible to follow him without being spotted.

Rachel hurried toward the stairwell. When she got there, she looked down into the dark. Marc was gone. Damn. She scanned the surroundings. There was a sign for elevators leading down to the A train. On the right was a closed wrought-iron gate. Nothing else.

He had to be in an elevator heading down to the subway.

Now what?

She heard footsteps behind her. With her right hand, Rachel quickly wiped the greasepaint, hoping to make herself look at least semi presentable. With her left hand, she slid the goggles behind her and out of sight.

Two men trotted down the stairs. One caught her eye and smiled. She wiped her face again and smiled back. The men jogged the rest of the way down the steps and turned toward the elevator bank.

Rachel quickly considered her options. Those two men could be her cover. She could follow them down, get into the same elevator, get off with them, maybe even engage them in conversation. Who'd suspect her then? Hopefully Marc's subway car hadn't left yet. If it had . . . well, no use in thinking negative.

Rachel started toward the men when something made her stop. The wrought-iron gate. The one she had seen on her right. It was closed. The sign on it read: OPEN ON WEEKENDS AND MAJOR HOLIDAYS ONLY.

But through the thicket, Rachel saw the beam of a flashlight. 1/0 Harlan Coben

She pulled up. She tried to peer through the fence, but all she could see was the light beam. The brush was too thick. On her left, she heard the ding of an elevator. The doors slid open. The men stepped inside. No time to pull out the Palm Pilot and check the GPS. Besides, the elevator and beam of flashlight were too close. It would be hard to pinpoint the difference.

The man who had smiled at her put his hand against the side, keeping the door open. She wondered what to do.

The flashlight beam went out.

"Are you coming?" the man asked.

She waited for the flashlight beam to come back on. It didn't. She shook her head. "No, thank you."

Rachel quickly broke back up the stairs, trying to find a dark spot. It had to be dark for the goggles to work. The Rigels came with a built-in overlight sensor system to protect from bright lights, but Rachel still found that the fewer artificial lights, the better. Street level looked down over the park. Okay, the positioning was pretty good, but there was still too much light from the street.

She moved to the side of the stone hut that housed the elevators. On the left, there was a spot that--if she pressed herself against the wall-- would give her total darkness. Perfect. The trees and bushes were still too heavy to get a clear view. But it would have to do.

Her goggles were supposedly lightweight but they still felt bulky. She should have bought a model you could just hold up to your face, binocular style. Most have that feature. This model didn't. You could not just hold it to up your eyes. You had to strap it on as a mask. The advantage, however, was obvious: If you attached it like a mask, you could keep your hands free.

As she pulled them over her head, the flashlight beam appeared again. Rachel tried to follow it, see where it was coming from. It seemed to her that it was a different spot this time. Over on the right now. Closer.

And then, before she could pinpoint it, the beam was gone.

Her eyes locked on the spot where she thought the beam had come from. Dark. Very dark now. Still keeping her eyes looking there, she finished getting the night-vision goggles in place. Night-vision goggles are not magic. They don't really see in the dark. Night-vision optics work by intensifying existing light, even very small amounts. But here, there no second chance 1/1

was pretty much nothing. That used to be a problem, but now most brands came with an infrared illuminator standard. The illuminator cast a beam of infrared light that was not visible to the human eye.

But it was visible to the night-vision goggles.

Rachel flipped on the illuminator. The night lit up in full green. She was looking not through a lens, but at a phosphor screen, not unlike the one on your TV set. The eyepiece magnified the picture--you were looking at a picture, not the actual site--and the picture was green because the human eye can differentiate more shades of green than any other phosphor color. Rachel stared.

Got something.

The view was hazy, but it looked to Rachel like a small woman. The woman seemed to be hiding behind a bush. She held something up to her mouth. A phone maybe. Peripheral vision is nearly nonexistent with these goggles, though these claimed to give you a thirty-seven-degree angle. She had to swivel her head to the right, and there, putting down the duffel bag with the two million dollars in it, was Marc.

Marc started walking toward the woman. His steps were short, probably because he was on cobblestones in the dark.

Rachel swiveled her head from the woman, to Marc, back to the woman. Marc was approaching, getting closer. The woman was still crouched in hiding. There was no way Marc could see her. Rachel frowned and wondered what the hell was going on.

Then the woman swung her arm up.

It was hard to see clearly--there were trees and branches in the way--but the woman seemed to be pointing her finger at Marc. They were not far apart anymore. Rachel squinted at the screen attached to her face. And it was then that she realized that the woman was not pointing a finger. The image was too big for a hand.

It was a gun. The woman was pointing a gun at Marc's head.

A shadow crossed over Rachel's vision. She started back, opening her mouth to call out a warning, when a hand like a baseball glove covered her mouth and smothered all sound away.

Tickner and Regan hooked up on the New Jersey Turnpike. Tickner drove. Regan sat next to him and stroked his face.

Tickner shook his head. "Can't believe you still have that soul patch." 1/2 Harlan Coben

"You don't like it?"

"You think you're Enrique Iglesias?"

"Who?"

"Exactly."

"What's wrong with the soul patch?"

"It's like wearing a T-shirt that says, "I Had a Middle-Age Crisis in 1998.' "

Regan thought about it. "Yeah, okay, fair point. By the way, those sunglasses you always wear. I was wondering if they were FBI issue."

Tickner grinned. "Helps me land the chicks."

"Yeah, those and your stun gun." Regan shifted in the chair. "Lloyd?"

"Uh-huh."

"I'm not sure I get it."

They weren't talking about eyewear or facial hair anymore.

"We don't have all the pieces," Tickner said.

"But we're getting close?"

"Oh yeah."

"Let's go through it then, cool?"

Tickner nodded. "First off, if the DNA lab Edgar Portman used is correct, the child is still alive."

"Which is weird."

"Very. But it explains a lot. Who would be most likely to keep a kidnapped child alive?"

"Her father," Regan said.

"And whose gun mysteriously vanished from the murder scene?"

"Her father's."

Tickner made a gun with his forefinger and thumb, aimed it at Regan, dropped the hammer. "Righto."

"So where has the kid been all this time?" Regan asked.

"Hidden."

"Well, gee, that helps."

"No, think about it. We've been looking at Seidman. We've looked closely. He knows that. So who would be the best person to hide his kid?"

Regan saw where he was going. "The girlfriend we didn't know about."

"More than that, a girlfriend who used to work for the feds. A girl no second chance 173

friend who would know how we work. How to do a ransom drop. How to hide a child. Someone who would know Seidman's sister, Stacy, and be able to enlist her help."

Regan thought about it. "Okay, let's assume I believe all that. They commit this crime. They get two million dollars and the kid. But then what? They bide their time for eighteen months? They decide they need more cash? What?"

"They need to wait to avoid suspicion. Maybe they wanted the wife's estate to clear. Maybe they need another two million dollars to run away, I don't know."

Regan frowned. "We're still trying to finesse away the same point."

"What's that?"

"If Seidman was behind this, how come he was nearly killed? This was no wound-me-so-it-looks-good injury. He was flatlined. The paramedics were sure they had a goner when they first got there. Hell, we quietly called it a double homicide for almost ten days."

Tickner nodded. "It's a problem."

"And more than that, where the hell is he going right now? I mean, crossing the George Washington Bridge. Do you think he decided now was the time to flee with the two million dollars?"

"Could be."

"If you were fleeing, would you use your E-ZPass to pay the toll?"

"No, but he might not know how easy it is to trace."

"Hey, everyone knows how easy it is to trace. You get the bill in the mail. It tells you what time you hit what tollbooth. And even if he was dumb enough to forget that, your federal agent Rachel Whatshername isn't."

"Rachel Mills." Tickner nodded slowly. "Good point, though."

"Thank you."

"So what conclusions can we draw?"

"That we still don't have a clue what the hell is going on," Regan said.

Tickner smiled. "Nice to be in familiar territory."

The cell phone rang. Tickner picked it up. It was O'Malley. "Where are you?" O'Malley asked.

"A mile from the George Washington Bridge," Tickner said.

"Hit the accelerator."

"Why? What's up?" 1/4 Harlan Coben

"NYPD just spotted Seidman's car," O'Malley said, "it's parked at Fort Tryon Park--a mile, maybe mile and a half, from the bridge." "Know it," Tickner said. "We'll be there in less than five."

Heshy had thought that it was all going a little too smoothly.

He'd watched Dr. Seidman leave his car. He waited. No one else had come out. He'd started down from the old fort's tower.

That was when he spotted the woman.

He paused, watching her head down toward the subway elevators. Two guys were with her. Nothing suspicious in that. But then, when the woman sprinted back up alone, well, that was when things had changed.

He kept a close eye from then on. When she moved into the darkness, Heshy started creeping toward her.

Heshy knew that his appearance was intimidating. He also knew that much of the circuitry inside of his brain was not wired normally. He didn't much care, which, he assumed, was part of the wiring problem. There were those who would tell you that Heshy was pure evil. He had killed sixteen people in his life, fourteen of them slowly. He had left six men alive who still wished that he hadn't.

Supposedly, people like Heshy did not understand what they were doing. Other people's pain did not reach them.'That was not true. His victims' pain was not something distant to him. He knew what pain was like. And he understood love. He loved Lydia. He loved her in ways most people could never fathom. He would kill for her. He would die for her. Many people say that about their loved ones, of course--but how many are willing to put it to the test?

The woman in the dark had binoculars strapped onto her head. Night vision goggles. Heshy had seen them on the news. Soldiers in battle wore them. Having them did not necessarily mean she was a cop. Most weaponry and military gizmos were available online to anyone with the proper dollars. Heshy watched her. Either way, cop or no cop, if the goggles worked, this woman would be a witness to Lydia committing murder.

So she had to be silenced.

He closed in slowly. He wanted to hear if she was talking to anyone, if she had some kind of radio control to other units. But the woman was silent. Good. Maybe she was indeed on her own.

He was about two yards away from her when her body stiffened. no second chance I/1*

The woman gave a little gasp. And Heshy knew that it was time to close her down.

He hurried over, moving with a grace that defied his bulk. He snaked one hand around her face and clasped it over her mouth. His hand was big enough to cover her nose too. Cut off the air supply. With his free hand, he cupped the back of her skull. He pushed his hands together.

And then, with both hands firmly placed on the woman's head, Heshy lifted her all the way off the ground. chapter 28

A SOUnd iTIdClP me stop. I turned to my right. I thought that maybe I heard something up there, near the street level. I tried to see, but my eyes were still suffering from the onslaught of the flashlight. The trees also helped cut off my view. I waited, seeing if I heard a followup. Nothing. The sound was gone now. It wasn't important anyway. Tara should be waiting for me at the end of this path. Whatever else might go on, that was all that counted.

Focus, I thought again. Tara, end of the path. All else was extraneous.

I started up again, not even glancing behind'me to check on the fate of the duffel bag with the two million dollars in it. It, too, was, like everything else but Tara, irrelevant. I tried to conjure up the shadowy image again, the silhouette made by the flashlight. I trudged on. My daughter. She could be right here, scant steps from where I now walked. I had been given a second chance to rescue her. Focus on that. Compartmentalize. Let nothing stop me.

I continued down the path.

While with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Rachel had been well trained in weapons and hand-to-hand combat. She had learned much during her four months at Quantico. She knew that true fighting was nothing like you saw on TV. You would never, for example, mess around with a high kick to the face. You would never try anything involving turning your back on an opponent, spinning, leaping--none of that.

Successful hand-to-hand combat could be broken down pretty simply.

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