Jessica had been close. The Rosary Killer had defaced the door at St. Katherine three years ago and had fully intended to end his madness there tonight. He intended to take Lauren Semanski to the church and fulfill the final of the five Sorrowful Mysteries on the altar there. The crucifixion.

That Lauren had fought back and escaped only delayed him. When Byrne had touched the broken ballpoint pen in Lauren’s hand, he knew where the killer was ultimately headed, and who would be his final victim. He had immediately called the Eighth District, which had dispatched a half a dozen officers to the church and a pair of patrol cars to Jessica’s house.

Byrne’s only hope was that they were not too late.

The streetlights were out, as were the traffic lights. Accordingly, as always when things like this happened, everyone in Philly forgot how to drive. Byrne took out his cell phone and called Jessica again. He got a busy signal. He tried her cell phone. It rang five times, then switched over to her voice mail.

Come on, Jess.

He pulled over to the side of the road, closed his eyes. To anyone who had never experienced the exacting pain of a rampant migraine, there could be no explanation rich enough. The lights of the oncoming cars seared his eyes. Between the flashes, he saw the bodies. Not the chalk outlines of the crime scene after the sanitization of investigation, but rather the human beings.

Tessa Wells having her arms and legs positioned around the pillar.

Nicole Taylor being laid to rest in the field of bright flowers.

Bethany Price and her crown of razors.

Kristi Hamilton soaked with blood.

Their eyes were open, questioning, pleading.

Pleading with him.

The fifth body was not clear to him at all, but he knew enough to shake him to the bottom of his soul.

The fifth body was just a little girl.

FRIDAY, 9:35 PM

Jessica slammed shut the bedroom door. Locked it. She had to begin with the immediate area. She searched beneath the bed, behind the curtains, in the closet, her weapon out front.

Empty.

Somehow Patrick had gotten upstairs and made the sign of the cross on Sophie’s forehead. She had tried to ask Sophie a gentle question about it, but her little girl seemed traumatized.

The idea made Jessica as sick as it did enraged. But at the moment, rage was her enemy. Her life was under siege.

She sat back down on the bed.

“You have to listen to Mommy, okay?”

Sophie stared, as if she was in shock.

“Sweetie? Listen to Mommy.”

Silence from her daughter.

“Mommy is going to make up a bed in the closet, okay? Like camping. Okay?”

Sophie had no reaction.

Jessica scrambled over to the closet. She pushed everything to the back, yanked the bedclothes off the bed, and created a makeshift bed. It broke her heart to have to do this, but she had no choice. She pulled everything else out of the closet and tossed it on the floor, everything that might cause Sophie harm. She lifted her daughter out of the bed, fighting her own tears of fury and terror.

She kissed Sophie, then closed the closet door. She turned the church key, pocketed it. She grabbed her weapon, and exited the room.

All the candles she had lighted in the house were blown out. The wind howled outside, but in the house it was deathly quiet. It was an intoxicating dark, a dark that seemed to consume everything it touched. Jessica saw everything she knew to be there in her mind, not with her eyes. As she moved down the stairs, she considered the layout of the living room. The table, the chairs, the hutch, the armoire that held the TV and the audio and video equipment, the love seats. It was all so familiar and all so foreign at the same moment. Each shadow held a monster; each outline, a threat.

She had qualified at the range every year she had been a cop, had taken the tactical, live-fire training course. But it was never supposed to be her house, her refuge from the insane world outside. This was the place where her little girl played. Now it had become a battleground.

When she touched the last step, she realized what she was doing. She was leaving Sophie alone upstairs. Had she really cleared the entire floor? Had she looked everywhere? Had she eliminated every possibility of threat?

“Patrick?” she said. Her voice sounded weak, plaintive. No answer.

Cold sweat latticed her back and shoulders, trickling to her waist. Then, loud, but not loud enough to frighten Sophie: “Listen. Patrick.

I’ve got my weapon in my hand. I’m not fucking around. I need to see you out here right now. We go downtown, we work this out. Don’t do this to me.”

Cold silence.

Just the wind.

Patrick had taken her Maglite. It was the only working flashlight in the house. The wind rattled the windowpanes in their mullions, resulting in a low, keening wail that sounded like a hurt animal.

Jessica stepped into the kitchen, trying her best to focus in the gloom. She moved slowly, keeping her left shoulder to the wall, the side opposite her shooting hand. If she had to, she could put her back to the wall and swing the weapon 180, protecting her rear flank.

The kitchen was clear.

Before she rolled the jamb, into the living room, she stopped, listened, cocking her ear to the night sounds. Was someone moaning? Crying? She knew it wasn’t Sophie.

She listened, searching the house for the sound. It was gone.

From the opening in the back door, Jessica smelled the scent of rain on early-spring soil, earthen and damp. She stepped forward in the darkness, her foot crunching the broken glass on the kitchen floor. The wind kicked, flapping the edges of the black plastic bag pinned over the opening.

When she edged back into the living room, she remembered that her laptop computer was on the small desk. If she wasn’t mistaken, and if any luck could be found this night, the battery was fully charged. She edged over to the desk, opened the laptop. The screen kicked to life, flickered twice, then threw a milky blue light across the living room. Jessica shut her eyes tightly for a few seconds, then opened them. It was enough light to see. The room opened before her.

She checked behind the love seats, in the blind spot next to the armoire. She edged open the coat closet near the front door. All empty.

She crossed the room to the armoire that held the television. If she wasn’t mistaken, Sophie had left her electronic walking puppy in one of the drawers. She eased it open. The bright plastic snout stared back.

Yes.

Jessica took the D-cell batteries out of the back, walked into the dining room. She slipped them into the flashlight. It blazed to life.