“Absolutely,” he said. “Don’t think I don’t appreciate your assistance.”

Fuck you.

We got out of the car and started up the road, the gravel crunching beneath our shoes. A uniformed officer coming from the direction of the crime scene approached.

“You Detective Duckworth?” he said.

Duckworth nodded and extended a hand. “Thanks for the quick heads-up on this,” he said. The cop looked at me. Before I had a chance to introduce myself, Duckworth said, “This is Mr. Harwood. He’s the one whose wife is missing.” The two of them exchanged a quick glance. I could only imagine what this cop had been told already.

“Mr. Harwood,” he said. “My name is Daltrey. I’m very sorry. This must be a very difficult time for you.”

“Is it my wife?” I asked.

“We don’t know that at this stage.”

“But it’s a woman?” I asked. “A woman’s body?”

Daltrey glanced at Duckworth, as though looking for permission. When Duckworth didn’t say anything, Daltrey replied, “Yes, it’s a woman.”

“I need to see her.”

Duckworth reached over and lightly touched my arm. “I really don’t know that that’s a good idea.”

“Where’s the grave?” I asked.

Daltrey pointed. “Just beyond those cars, on the left side. We haven’t moved her yet.”

Duckworth tightened his grip on me. “Let me go up there first. You wait here with Daltrey.”

“No,” I said, breathing in short gasps. “I have to-”

“You wait. If there’s a reason for you to come up, I’ll come back and get you.”

I looked him in the eye. I couldn’t get a read on him. I didn’t know whether he was trying to be compassionate here, or whether somehow I was being played.

“Okay,” I said.

As Duckworth went ahead, Daltrey positioned himself in front of me, in case I decided to run after him. He said, “Looks like it might rain.”

I walked to Duckworth’s car, ambled around it a couple of times, always glancing back for him.

He was back in about five minutes, caught my eye, beckoned with his index finger. I ran over to him.

“If you’re up to it,” he said, “I think it would help if you make an identification.”

“Oh God,” I said. I felt weak in the knees.

He gripped my arm. “I don’t know for certain that this is your wife, Mr. Harwood. But I think you need to be prepared for that fact.”

“It can’t be her,” I said. “There’s no reason for her to be up here…”

“Take a minute,” he said.

I took a couple of breaths, swallowed, and said, “Show me.”

He led me between two police cars that had acted as a privacy shield. Once we got past them, I looked to the left and saw that where the opposite side of the ditch sloped up, there was a five-foot ridge of earth. It was in full view of the road. Draped over the ridge was a pale, dirt-splotched white hand and part of an arm. Whoever that arm belonged to was on the other side of the dirt pile.

I stopped, and stared.

“Mr. Harwood?” Duckworth said.

I took another couple of breaths. “Okay,” I said.

“I can’t have you disturbing anything,” he said. “You can’t… touch her. Sometimes, people, when they’re overcome with grief…”

“I understand,” I said.

He led me up to the grave. When we were close enough that we could see beyond the ridge, Duckworth stopped me.

“Here we are,” Duckworth said. I could feel him watching me.

I looked at the dirt-smeared face of the dead woman lying in that grave and fell to my knees, then pitched forward, catching myself with my hands.

“Oh God,” I said. “Oh God.”

Duckworth knelt down next to me, held on to my shoulders. “Talk to me, Mr. Harwood.”

“It’s not her,” I whispered. “It’s not Jan.”

“You’re sure?” he said.

“It’s Leanne,” I said. “It’s Leanne Kowalski.”

THIRTY-ONE

In the short time she’d been going by the name Kate, she’d never gotten used to it. Maybe she needed a few more days for it to feel like her own. Taking Leanne’s middle name, shortening it, it was the first idea that came to her. Just seemed natural.

The funny thing was, she couldn’t even think of herself by her own name these days. If someone called out “Hey, Connie!” she wasn’t even sure she’d turn around. It had been years since anyone had known her as Connie.

Her worry now was if someone shouted out “Jan!,” she’d turn around reflexively, wouldn’t even think about it.

But that was still how she thought of herself. You spend six years with a name, you start to get comfortable with it. That was the name she’d been answering to for a very long time.

That, and “Mom.”

When she’d told Dwayne Jan was dead, she’d been telling herself more than him. She wanted to put that person, that life, behind her. She wanted to lay Jan to rest. Give her the last rites. Say a few words in her memory.

But she wasn’t really gone. A large part of her still was Jan. But now she was moving into something new. She was evolving. She’d always been evolving, moving through one stage to get to another. It was just that some of those stages took longer to get through than others.

She reached up, made another adjustment to the wig as they continued their journey to Boston.

It was the same wig Jan had worn when she walked in-and out-of Five Mountains. She’d worn it long enough to get through the gates, then went in a ladies room stall to remove it before rejoining Dave and Ethan. The wig and a change of clothes had been stuffed into the backpack. The moment Dave had run off in search of Ethan, instead of heading straight to the gate as he’d instructed her, she’d turned in to the closest ladies’ room, taken a stall, and stripped down.

She’d switched from shorts to jeans, traded the sleeveless top for a long-sleeved blouse. Even took off the running shoes and went with sandals. But the blonde wig was the accessory that really pulled it all together. She jammed her discarded outfit back into the backpack-couldn’t leave her clothes around for someone to find-and strolled back out of that ladies’ room like she hadn’t just had her son snatched out from under her. Walked, real cool-like, through those gates, through the parking lot, met up with Dwayne and got into his car. He’d wanted to take off the fake beard right then, said it itched like crazy, but she persuaded him to keep it on until they were beyond the park grounds.

She’d never had to worry about Ethan. She knew that if Dave didn’t find him, someone else would. He’d be okay. The abduction thing, that was all a distraction, a way to make David’s story even more unbelievable. Ethan would be fine.

She hoped the Dramamine-spiked juice box she’d given him put him out for most of it. Sure, there’d be plenty of teary moments later, in the days and weeks to come, but at least he didn’t have to go through the terror of an actual kidnapping.

It was the least a mother could do.

Having a kid, becoming a mother, that had never been part of the plan. But then, neither had getting married.

She’d picked Promise Falls more or less at random. She saw it on a map, checked it out online. Nice upstate New York town. Quaint. Anonymous. A college town. It didn’t look like the kind of place where someone would hide out. New York, that was a place where someone would disappear. Buffalo, Los Angeles, Miami. Those were places where someone went to blend in, to vanish.

Who’d go looking for someone in a place called Promise Falls?

She had no ties there, no roots. There was no more reason for the courier to think she’d be in Promise Falls than in Tacoma, Washington.

She could go there, find a job, a place to live, and bide her time until Dwayne had done his time. When he was out, they’d go back to Boston, exchange keys, open the safe-deposit boxes, and make their deal.

It would be a long time to wait, but some things were worth it. Like enough money to go sit on a beach forever with nothing more to worry about than a bit of sand in your shorts. Living the dream like Matty Walker in Body Heat.