They fell back into silence. The New Jersey Turnpike had a center-lane

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closure, slowing them down to a crawl. Should have taken the western spur.

Myron was about to change lanes when Christian said something that almost made him slam on the brakes.

'My mother once posed in the nude.'

Myron thought he'd heard wrong. 'What?'

'When I was a little kid. I don't know if they were ever printed in a magazine or anything. I doubt it. She wasn't very attractive by then. She was twenty-five but looked sixty. She worked as a prostitute in New York. On the streets. I don't know who my father was. She figured he was one of the guys at a bachelor party, but she had no idea which one.'

Myron sneaked a glance at him. Christian stared straight ahead. The game face was still on.

'I thought your mother and father raised you in Kansas,' Myron said carefully.

Christian shook his head. 'Those were my grandparents. My mom died when I was seven. They legally adopted me. We had the same last name, so I just pretended they were my real parents.'

Myron said, I didn't know. I'm sorry.'

'Don't be. They were wonderful parents. I guess they made a lot of mistakes with my mom, the way she ended up and all. But they were kind and loving to me. I miss them a lot.'

The silence was heavier now. They drove past the Meadowlands. Myron paid the toll at the end of the turnpike and followed the signs to the George Washington Bridge. Christian had bought a place two miles before the bridge, six miles from Titans Stadium. A set of three hundred prefab condos loftily labeled Cross Creek Pointe, one of those New Jersey housing developments that looked like something out of Poltergeist.

As they cruised to a stop, the car phone rang. Myron picked it up.

'Hello?'

'Where are you?'

It was Jessica.

In Englewood.'

'Take Route four west to seventeen north,' she said quickly. I'll meet you in the Pathmark parking lot in Ramsey.'

'What's going on?'

'Just meet me there. Now.'

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36

The moment Myron saw Jessica standing in the dusky glow of the Pathmark fluorescent parking lights, looking achingly beautiful in a pair of hip hugging blue jeans and a red blouse open at the throat, he knew there was trouble. Big trouble.

'Very bad?' he asked her.

She opened the car door and slid in next to him. 'Worse.'

He couldn't help it. He couldn't stop thinking of how beautiful she was.

She looked a little pale, her eyes a bit too sunken. She did not have crow's feet quite yet, but new lines had etched their way into her face. Had they been there yesterday or the day she visited his office? He wasn't sure. But he thought she had never looked so devastating. The imperfections, if you wanted to call them that, just made her more real and hence more desirable.

Myron had thought Dean-nessa Madelaine was attractive, but she was nary a penlight next to Jessica's blinding beacon.

'Want to tell me about it?'

She shook her head. 'I'd rather just show you.' She started giving directions. When they reached a road appropriately called Red Dirt Path, she said, 'My father rented a cabin out here.'

'In these woods?'

'Yes.'

'When?'

'Two weeks ago. He had it for the month. According to the realtor, he wanted some peace and quiet. A place to get away from it all.'

Doesn't sound much like your father,' Myron said.

'Not like him at all,' she agreed.

A few minutes later, they arrived at the cabin. Myron had a hard time believing that Adam Culver, a man he had gotten to know fairly well during his time with Jessica, would want to vacation out here. The man lik ed to gamble. He liked the ponies, the roulette wheel, the blackjack table.

He liked action. His idea of a quiet time was a Tony Bennett concert at the Sands.

Jessica got out of the car. Myron followed. Her posture was arrow-straight - So was the walk, something Myron had always loved to watch in the

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past. But there was an unmistakable teeter in her step, as though her legs were not sure they could sustain the lovely torso over the long haul.

Their footsteps creaked on the steps of the wooden porch. Myron spotted plenty of dry rot. Jessica unlocked the front door and pushed it open.

'Take a look,' she said.

He did. He said nothing. He could feel her eyes on him.

'I checked his charge card,' she said. 'He spent over three thousand dollars at a place in the city called Eye-Spy.'

Myron knew the store. This was definitely their handiwork. Three videocameras were sprawled across the couch. Panasonic. All with mounting material, so they could be hung up somewhere. There were also three small television monitors. Also Panasonic. The kind you might see at a high-rise's security station. Two VCRs. Toshiba. Lots of cables and wires and stuff like that.

But that stuff wasn't the most bothersome thing he saw. Alone, those electronic goods could have meant one of several things. But two other items - items that drew Myron's eye and held it like a baby near a shiny coin - changed everything. They were the added catalyst. They completed a mixture that was far too noxious to be ignored.

Propped against the wall was a rifle. And on the floor next to it, a set of handcuffs.

Jessica said, 'What the hell was he doing?'

He knew what she was thinking. The dead girls found near here, television images of their battered, decayed bodies hovered above them - the most haunting of ghosts.

'When did he buy this stuff?' Myron asked.

'Two weeks ago.' Her eyes were clear, controlled. 'Listen, I've had time to think about this. Even if our worst fears are true, it doesn't explain anything. What about the picture in the magazine? Or Kathy's handwriting on that envelope? Or the phone calls? Or for that matter his murder?'

Myron looked at her. He knew she was seeking an explanation other than the one that stared them straight in the face. 'Areyou okay?' he asked.

She crossed her arms under her breasts, a hand on each elbow, as if she were hugging herself. 'I feel,' she said, 'unanchored.'

'Can you take more?'

Her hands dropped to her sides. 'Why? What is it?'

He hesitated.

She exploded. 'Goddamn it, don't coddle me!'

'Jess-'

'You know I hate that protect-the-little-lady bullshit of yours! Tell what the hell is going on!'

'Kathy was gang-raped by some of Christian's teammates on the night she disappeared.'