A blade of fear knifed through Karen as the blood drained from her face. Disbelieving, she just shook her head. “No, that’s a bluff, Saul.” Ty couldn’t be dead. He’d just left her. He was headed to the station. He was going to come back and pick her up.

“I’m afraid so, Karen. We had an old friend of his awaiting his arrival at home. He might even have been carrying something of interest to us on his person. Am I right, dear?”

“No!” She stood up. Her blood stiffened in denial and rage. “No!” She went to lunge at Lennick, but the ponytailed man who had crept up behind grabbed her by the arms and held her back.

She tried to wrench them away. “Go to fucking hell, Saul!”

“Maybe later.” He shrugged. “But in the meantime, Karen, I’m afraid it’s simply back to my house for a late dinner. And you…” He smoothed out the wrinkles from his sweater and straightened his collar. He had a look on his face that was almost sad. “You know I don’t take any pleasure in doing this, Karen. I’ve always been fond of you. But you must realize there’s just no way we can afford to let you go.”

At that moment the French doors to the backyard opened and another man stepped in—shorter, dark-haired, with a graying mustache.

Karen knew him instantly from the descriptions. Dietz.

“All clear,” he said. Karen noticed that his shoes were caked with dirt and sand.

Lennick nodded. “Good.”

Fear swelled up in Karen. “What are you going to do with me, Saul?”

“A little late-night swim, maybe. Overcome with grief and dismay at finding your husband alive—then dead again. It’s a lot for anybody, Karen.”

Karen shook her head. “It’s not gonna hold up, Saul. Hauck’s already been to his boss. He told him everything. About the hit-and-runs, Dietz, and Hodges. They’re gonna know who did this. They’re gonna come after you, Saul.”

“After me?” Lennick headed toward the door as Karen struggled against the man who pinned her arms. “Don’t worry your little head about it, dear. Our friend Hodges is going to have a rather difficult go of it tonight himself. And Mr. Dietz here”—Lennick nodded conspiratorially—“well, I might as well let him explain his situation to you himself.”

She pulled against her assailant’s grip, tears of hate burning in her eyes. “How did you ever become such a reptile, Saul? How can you ever look at my children again after this?”

“Sam and Alex.” He brushed his thin hair back. “Oh, rest assured they’ll be very well taken care of, Karen. Those kids will have a lot of money coming to them. Your late husband was a very wealthy man. Didn’t you know?”

“Rot in hell, Saul! You bastard!” Karen twisted around as he closed the front door.

He left. Karen started to sob. Hauck. Charles. Never seeing Sam and Alex again. The idea of Saul “grieving” over her. The anger burning inside her that her kids would never know. She thought of Ty, and a sharp sadness came over her. She had gotten him into this. She thought of his own daughter, who would never know.

Then she turned to Dietz, petrified. Hot tears and mucus were running down her face.

“You don’t have to do this,” she begged.

“Oh, don’t get yourself into such a state,” the man with the mustache sneered. “They say it’s like falling asleep. Just give yourself over to it. It’s sort of like sex, right? Do you want it rough? Or do you want it easy?” He chuckled to his partner. “We’re not exactly savages here, are we, Cates?”

“Savages? No,” the man holding her said. He kneed her in the back of the legs, and Karen cried out, her weight crumbling. “C’mon….”

Dietz picked up a roll of packing tape that was sitting on the table. He tore a piece off and placed it firmly over Karen’s mouth. It cut off her breath. Then he ripped a longer strip and wrapped it tightly around her wrists. “C’mon, doll….” He took her by the arms. “Shame about your boyfriend, though. I mean, after busting into my house like that—I’d have liked to have done that one myself.”

They dragged her through the open French doors out onto the patio in back. Karen could hear Tobey barking wildly from where he was locked up, fighting them, forced into the dark against her will, his helpless yelps filled her not only with worry but with a rising sadness, too.

Why the hell do they get to win?

They pulled her off the deck into the backyard. There was a path behind her property through a wooden gate that led to the town road to Teddy’s Beach, restricted to local residents, just a block away.

Teddy’s Beach. Suddenly a new fear swept through Karen’s body. That beach was tiny and deserted. It had a protective rock-wall jetty, and other than a few teenagers who might’ve gone down there at night to make a bonfire or smoke some pot, Karen realized that it would be totally deserted. And blocked from the other homes.

That’s what Dietz had meant when he’d said “All clear.”

Goddamn it, no. She kicked Dietz in the shins with the point of her shoe, and he spun, angry, and smacked her in the face with the back of his rough hand. Blood spurted out Karen’s nose. She choked on it.

Dietz glared at her. “I said behave!”

He hoisted her over his shoulder like a sack of flour and ripped off her shoes. He thrust the barrel of a gun up into her nose. “Listen, bitch, I told you what the choice was. You want it easy—or rough? You can fucking decide. Me, I can do it either way. My advice is to lie back and enjoy the ride. It’s gonna be over before you even know it. Trust me, you got a much better ticket than your boyfriend.”

He carried her through the tightly wooded path, thorns and brambles scratching her legs. Her only hope was that someone would see them. She screamed and fought against the tape, but she could barely make a sound. Please, let someone be down here, she begged, please….

But what would that even get her? Probably only a bullet in the head.

They came out of the woods onto the end of the town road. Totally dark and deserted. No one. The salty breeze crept into her nostrils. A few lights shone from houses in the distance, across the cove.

Dietz dropped her and pulled her by the arms. “Let’s go.”

No… Karen was crying. Fiercely, she wrenched her bound wrists away from him, but there was nothing she could do. Tears rolled down her cheeks. She thought of Ty, and the tears grew heavier and uncontrollable, choking her, making her unable to breathe. Oh, baby, you can’t be dead. Please, Ty, please, hear me…. Her heart almost split in two at the thought that she had caused him harm.

They dragged her down through the sand, and she shook her head back and forth, screaming inside, No!

Cates, the ponytailed bastard, yanked her into the water.

Karen kneed him in the groin. He howled and then spun in rage. “Goddamn it!” and kicked her in the stomach. He dropped her at last, face-first, in the shallow water. Exhausted, out of resistance. Forcing Karen’s face under the warm foam.

“Heard the jet stream’s nice this time of year.” Cates chuckled. “Shouldn’t be too bad.”