10:32 p.m.

Andrew leaned against the wall of the shower and let the warm water massage his wounded head. The throbbing wouldn't stop. Nor would the image of that Gas N' Shop clerk, her small body scurrying back and forth from one task to the other. Full of life, and now she was dead because he had tried something stupid. Thanks to Jared, Andrew felt like an accessory to the farmer's murder. But he felt completely responsible for that poor clerk.

There had to be something he could do to get out of this. It was clear Jared wasn't going to ever let him go. Eventually, he'd have to kill him. At first, that realization paralyzed as much as it panicked Andrew. But at the moment, he was too exhausted to be either. Especially after examining the bathroom's contents and being disappointed to find only the miniature shampoo, conditioner, mouthwash and soap. The shower had a Plexiglas door instead of a rod and curtain, not that he had had much success with the rod he had found at the cabin. He had even checked out the in-sides of the toilet tank, only to find that almost all of the mechanical guts were made of plastic. He wasn't sure what he'd expected. He knew hotel rooms didn't provide razors or nail files. He had spent enough time in the best of them over the course of the last two years, traveling to promote one of his books or do research for the next.

Research. All the research, all the interviews about murder and killers that he had done and yet, what good was it to him now? He had gathered all that knowledge, but without the experience of dealing with the real thing, he wasn't sure what he could do. Although, he wondered if anything could have prepared him for this.

He wished he could rip off the harness from his shoulder and arm. He wished he had full use of it. Then he would, at least, be on an equal footing with Jared. But, as it was, he couldn't even wash up under his damn armpit without experiencing a shooting pain. In the beginning, when he hadn't even dared to lift his arm enough to fit a sponge under it because of the pain, he worried about body odor. A Nebraska summer, with its heat and humidity was not a good time to break a collarbone. Now he scrubbed all over, ignoring the pain and practically rubbing his skin raw, feeling a bit like Lady Macbeth.

His father would tell him it served him right. Of this, Andrew was certain. He heard his voice in the back corners of his throbbing head: "All your fucking book learn-in' can't get you out of this one, can it?" It reminded him of the reprimands he had endured as a kid when his father found him reading instead of doing some chore like shoveling the crap from the chicken coop, a task that hadn't even been on Andrew's to-do list until he was discovered with a book. It was almost as if his father had hoped to drain him, so that he wouldn't have the energy to read. At the end of the day, Andrew's young body would be physically exhausted and aching, but there was nothing his father could do to turn off his curiosity, his desire to read and learn and dream beyond the borders of his family's farm. And that made his father even more angry. He seemed to be forever disappointing the man. John Kane wanted a son to take over the farm when he was gone and instead he got one who couldn't wait to leave.

That's when he remembered Charlie with the comic books, quiet and innocent. And then he thought about Charlie's explosive reaction when he saw that waitress's face on TV. Andrew had believed that Melanie was the weakest link, but now he realized he might be wrong. His mind started reeling, accessing what he knew about the psychological effects of murder. If Andrew was feeling this responsible and guilty about the gas station clerk when he hadn't even pulled the trigger, what must Charlie be feeling? And suddenly Andrew wondered what it might take to get Charlie on his side.