She tried to imagine his plan. He was, after all, the kind of murderer who liked to be creative. What was it that reporter, Cynthia Ross, had once said of him? He had a genius for the gruesome, a talent for the macabre. What sick scheme had he dreamt up now? And what did the sequence of film captured by the security cameras have to do with it all? Was he using himself as some kind of bait? And if so, whose attention was he trying to gain?

She glanced in her mirror. The police car was still behind her. She was safe. There was no way Gleason could get anywhere near her.

As she drove into the carport of the beach house she watched the cop car slow down and park outside. She checked her watch. Josh was late.

She walked down the path that led to the terrace overlooking the sea. She stopped for a moment, enjoying the feel of the sun on her face and the faint traces of spray that came off the ocean below. Each time she looked at the water now she felt guilty. She had had to postpone her exhibition yet again. Would she ever get her life back?

She was tempted to try and end it once and for all. To draw Ryan towards her somehow. Or to break away from the cops who tailed her every moment and go looking for him. But what had happened last time? She had nearly gotten herself killed. She wasn’t prepared to do that again. She couldn’t risk losing the baby. And, although she prided herself on her logical mind and sceptical nature, there was something about Cassie’s dream that disturbed her, that chimed with her own worst imaginings.

The only answer was to wait. Surely it was only a matter of time before Josh hunted him down. That, or Ryan accidentally gave himself away, just like his father before him.

She took a deep breath of salty air and turned away from the sea. She unlocked the door and walked into the kitchen. She opened the icebox and poured herself a glass of ice tea. She cut a few slices of lemon and added them to the drink, which she took with her through to the dark room. She glanced at the clock on the wall. It was already 12:40. Josh was 25 minutes late. She took out her cell and dialled his number. It went straight to his answer service. She listened to his voice, but, at the last moment, decided not to leave a message. She didn’t want to hassle him.

He had told her that he had something important to say to her. What could it be? Did he have a lead? Had he discovered where Ryan was hiding? Had he already made an arrest? Was Ryan behind bars? Or had there been some kind of shoot out? Was that why he was late?

The idea turned her stomach. It was something she couldn’t contemplate. No, that wasn’t going to happen. Josh was just stuck in traffic. On one of the freeways he claimed to love so much. The 101, the 405, the 110, the 10.

She finished her ice tea and placed the glass down on the stainless steel trough. She turned on the tap and rinsed her hands with cold water. In the corner of her eye she caught a glimpse of something she had been trying to avoid. The clay model of Ryan which she had covered with dry cloth. She couldn’t bear to see his features, that straight jaw, that high forehead, those eyes that stared blankly from the face with such awful indifference. Almost like he didn’t care whether he lived or died.

She felt compelled to move towards it. She took a step – slowly – and then another. Despite the ice tea her mouth was dry. She stretched out her hand, which she noticed was shaking. She hated herself for the fear she felt. For fuck’s sake, she cursed. ‘I’m not supposed to be like this,’ she said to herself. ‘I don’t do superstition. It’s bullshit.’

She steadied her hand and, with a swift motion, whipped the cloth from the bust. There. That wasn’t too bad, was it? It was just a lump of clay that she had worked with. Nothing more. If she chose she could take a hammer or a chisel to it and reduce it back to an amorphous clump, a shape without features, form or fear. She looked around the floor for her box of tools. Where had she put them? Yes, that was right, they were in the cupboard under the trough. She bent down and opened the door. She pushed her hand into the dark space and felt for the ridge of the crate that held her tools. She pulled the box towards her. There was a claw hammer, a chisel, a round of cheese wire, a gavel. Although she was tempted to destroy the model she knew that she couldn’t. Not while the investigation was still ongoing. From the clay maquette the tech-heads in Josh’s team had created a high definition computer image of Ryan Gleason which should have been sent to every force in America. He was going to be hunted down and brought to justice. He would be tried and found guilty and most likely receive the death sentence.

She tried to picture it – Ryan’s arrest, his trial, his imprisonment, his execution – but the images didn’t come. The future was nothing but a black hole, vague and shapeless. And what of herself? What would her future be like? She would have her child and then what? They would live together at the beach house or with her mother? She closed her eyes and tried to imagine the scene. She was in a nursery, its ceiling alive with colourful mobiles, and she was holding a child swaddled in a pure white shawl. Its comfortable form filled her arms. She could smell its milky breath, the honeyed aroma of baby soap. She cooed to it, talked to the baby about how precious she was, how she was mummy’s darling. She went to peel back the top of the shawl to give the child a kiss. But as she did so she realised there was nothing there. She was just holding a mass of blankets, which, as she opened them out to search for her baby, fell apart into fragments of cloth in her arms.

As she opened her eyes, suddenly terrified, she heard a knock at the door. She steadied herself by the sink, pushing the nightmarish images from her consciousness. There was another knock. She couldn’t move. She felt paralysed by the unknown, by the nasty trace of fear left by what Cassie had told her and now by this awful daydream. She touched her stomach and couldn’t feel it move. She stopped breathing. There was nothing. Was it -?

The ring of her cell made her jump and at the same moment, as if mimicking her movements, she felt something kick inside her. Her baby. It was alive.

She took the cell out of her jeans pocket. It was Josh.

‘I’m standing outside,’ he said. ‘Where are you?’

‘Just in the dark room.’

‘What were doing? Working?’

‘No – but – I’ll be right there.’

‘Bye.’

She cut the line and walked to the door. Josh looked beat. His eyes were circled with black and his skin was pale.

‘Are you okay?’ she asked.

‘Yeah – well. Not much sleep.’

‘I can imagine. What’s the latest? You said you had something you needed to tell me.’

She led him into the kitchen and opened the ice box.

‘Do you want a drink? Ice tea?’

‘I’ll have a beer.’