He knew what was waiting for him and still it seemed like a surprise. Worth grabbed his bag from the passenger seat, thumbed the button clipped to the visor, and got out of the truck. The garage door lowered behind him, grinding and banging in its track, slowly cutting off the outside light.

In the dimness, dust-flecked slivers of daylight slipped in around the edges of the black landscaping fabric he’d put over the windows a few hours earlier. Worth grabbed the claw hammer from its spot on the pegboard and went around pounding in more tacks.

Strategy.

He couldn’t risk getting caught in any kind of weather with the idiotic street-drag tires on the GTO. Worth didn’t want to take the car out before dark. But if he waited, and the snow came like they said, he and his new buddy Russell could wind up with trouble.

He wanted to sleep so badly it hurt. The headache was worse, and he couldn’t seem to concentrate. Stress. Mental exhaustion. Worth knew the signs. People made mistakes if they weren’t careful.

Tools caught his eye.

When he finished squaring up the windows, Worth traded the hammer for a ten-pound sledge. He grabbed a corner of the tarp and peeled it away from the back end of the goat, just to see.

There was a decal on the trunk lid, same as the ones behind both front wheels, all of which he’d noted in his report. Two words in wavy cartoon letters: The Judge.

Standing there, feet spaced, balancing the weight of the sledgehammer in his hands, Worth saw a liquid reflection of himself in the car’s gleaming black finish. He heard Dr. Grail’s voice in his head: Tell me what you see.

A dozen stiff jabs and one passing swing with the sledge knocked the spoiler off the back end in a loud clatter. Worth stopped and picked the splintered fin up off the cold concrete. He tossed it in the backseat, next to the spare tire he’d had to remove from the trunk to make room for Russell.

His stomach rumbled. He looked at his watch. He looked at the car, pondering decals. Trunk lid, front quarter panels, matching accent stripes over all four wheels: instant identification.

Worth leaned against the handle of the sledgehammer, thinking it through. He tried to remember where he’d put the heat gun he’d bought that time the gutters froze.

He tried to focus, jumping inside his own skin at the sudden sharp rap at the side door.

7

“Matthew?”

He stood still, brain seizing.

“Hey.” The knock came louder. “Open up, it’s me.”

When the doorknob twisted, Worth lurched from his spot. The sledgehammer’s handle slapped the concrete behind him, sharp and startling. He made the door just as Sondra poked her head inside.

“Are you—”

“Oh,” he said, backing her up, stepping on her feet. “Hey.”

“Jesus, let me get out of the way.”

Worth turned his back as he pushed across the threshold, boxing her out. He pulled the door shut behind him, feeling a snag at the pocket of his jacket.

“Ow!”

You didn’t lock it. Twenty minutes he’d spent covering all the windows, imagining remote possibilities, and he hadn’t locked the goddamned door.

Mistakes.

Sondra wore a pained wince. She hiked a brown leather sling purse up on her shoulder, sucking the tip of her left thumb.

“What’s wrong?” He could hear his voice. Too urgent.

She gave him an exasperated look. “You bent my nail back.”

“Are you okay?”

“I think it’s still attached.” Sondra glanced at her thumbnail. Coffee-colored polish, freshly chipped. “Damn.”

“Let me see.”

She shook her hand, already over it. “It’s not even bleeding. What’s with you?”

Worth took a breath. “Sorry. Long shift.”

“You’re just coming off now?” She checked her watch. “I thought you’d be asleep already.”

Then what the hell are you doing here? Worth thought, but he let it go. Even in the midst of ball-squeezing panic, seeing her brought a small sad tingle.

Sondra looked terrific. Snug jeans, a fitted sheepskin jacket that stopped at her waist. Her hair was longer than he’d seen her wear it, loose cinnamon curls nearly touching the wool collar of the coat. Lips the same shade as her fingernails. Her pale skin always flushed in the cold.

“I didn’t know you were coming over,” he said.

“Hello to you, too. I rang at the house, then I heard all the racket out here.” She looked beyond his shoulder. “What are you doing in there, building something?”

“Car trouble,” he said.

She tried a smile. “Maybe if you pounded on it some more.”

Worth became conscious of his hands, suddenly jittery, adrenaline tremors creeping along his fingers. He shoved them in his jacket pockets. “What’s up?”

Her smile became an expression he didn’t know how to interpret.

“It’s freezing out here,” she said. “Can we go inside?”

She’d met with the Realtor an hour ago.

For some reason it was imperative that she stop by, unannounced, knowing his schedule, to accomplish what on any other day they’d handle by answering machine.

Worth could feel himself cratering. He’d been on autopilot for hours, and now he was running on fumes. Impatient, mind still in the garage, he fried two eggs and a slab of ham at the stove while she ran the deal points down for him.

“We can close next week,” she said.

“Okay.”

“You’re fine with the offer? We can counter.”

“Yeah.”

“I think I’ll take my pants off.”

When he realized that a long silence had passed, Worth looked toward the kitchen table. “What?”

“Jesus,” she said. “You’re on Pluto. Are you okay or what?”

“I told you, I’m fine.” He glanced through a gap in the curtains above the sink, toward the sky. “Just tired.”

“That’s the fourth time you’ve looked out the window. Who are you waiting for, anyway? Hot date?”

“Just the snow.”

“Well, I’m not staying long,” she said. “You could at least pretend to listen.”

Worth sighed. He snapped off the burner, slid his breakfast onto a plate, and sat down at the table across from her. “Okay? I’m listening.”

“Never mind.” Sondra reached for her purse. “I’ll just call you later.”

“Jesus, sweetie. Give me a break.”

The endearment hung in the air between them, awkward. Sweetie. Still automatic.

“I just thought…” She dropped the purse strap, slumped against the back of the chair. “It’s such a gorgeous house. I don’t know.”

Worth didn’t know, either. He started eating. What did she want him to add?

They’d wanted a place with some character, in one of the neighborhoods, near a decent school. Her parents had helped them with the down payment on a drafty foursquare in Dundee—a beautiful fixer-upper with more space than they’d needed, a price they couldn’t pass up, and a mortgage they could just afford.

Sondra had stayed there alone through the separation, even after the divorce. For a while, Worth had deluded himself into taking that as some sort of hopeful sign.

“I mean, whatever,” she said. “It’s still our home.”

“It’s our house,” he said.

“Matthew, don’t say that.”

“What do you want me to say?”

Last month, she’d moved into some cookie-cutter minimansion with Vargas, out in Pepperwood. I thought you never wanted to live west of Seventy-second street, Worth had said. She’d just sighed into the phone like she was tired. We thought all kinds of things.

He’d been living here, in the house on Martha. Renters had trashed the place, and it had sat vacant most of the winter. Those first weeks, Worth occupied himself hauling out carpet soaked with cat piss, scrubbing mold and nicotine from the walls, fixing what was broken or throwing it out. Midsummer, he’d spent his one-week duty suspension replacing the old fuse box with a new breaker panel, pulling all the old wiring, fishing grounded Romex to every room.