“Couldn’t sleep.”

I stop a couple of feet from him, wishing I could see his face. That’s when I notice the bottle in his hand. The careless way he’s holding the neck. I smell cigarettes and whiskey on his breath and I know whatever it is that has changed, it’s bad. “What’s wrong?”

“Joey Ferguson walked today.”

The words strike me with the force of a physical blow. Joey Ferguson is the last living person involved with the murders of Tomasetti’s wife and children three years ago in Cleveland. According to the evidence and witness statements, he hadn’t participated in the assaults on Nancy Tomasetti or the two preteen girls, Donna and Kelly. But he’d driven the getaway car and he’d helped set the house on fire afterward. The fire that ultimately killed them. The trial had been over a year ago. Tomasetti had taken the stand and painted a horrific picture for the jury, telling them what he found the night he came home to a burning house. That when he’d left that morning, he’d been a husband and father of two. When he arrived home that night, his family was dead, murdered by a career criminal intent on intimidating a cop who’d dared cross him. The media had capitalized on every minute of it, running photo after photo of Tomasetti’s pretty wife and his curly-haired little girls, sensationalizing a brutal triple murder that had destroyed a family, shocked the country—and sent Tomasetti spiraling out of control.

But the evidence against Ferguson was sketchy. We’d been relieved and left with a sense of closure when he was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder and sentenced to thirty years in prison. But his high-profile, high-powered attorney immediately appealed. Tomasetti hadn’t talked about it. Not once. We didn’t discuss it or let it into this new life we’ve built for ourselves. But I know he followed the proceedings.

“What?” I blurt. “How?”

“He got off on a chain-of-command technicality.”

For an interminable moment, I can’t speak; I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how to reconcile this or help him deal with it, and I’m filled with a sense of injustice and impotence.

“I’m sorry.” I reach for him, but he moves back slightly. “What can I do?” I ask.

“Thanks, Kate, but I don’t think there’s anything anyone can do. It’s done.”

For the span of a full minute, the only sound comes from the tap of rain on the roof. The water running through the spouting. The slap of it against the ground as it overflows gutters that are clogged with leaves. And for the first time in the four months that I’ve been living here with him, I feel something lonely and cold surround me.

I reach for the lamp on the end table.

“Don’t,” he says.

I motion toward the bottle at his side. “That’s not going to help.”

“Yes, it is.” His laugh is a harsh sound. “I know that bucks conventional wisdom, but believe me, it’s helping.”

“I know you’re hurting—”

“That’s not quite the right word.”

I don’t agree with him. A man can’t endure the kind of hell he did without pain becoming a constant in his life. But I don’t argue. “Tell me what to do.”

When he doesn’t respond, I gesture in the direction of the door. “Let’s sit on the porch and talk.”

“I’m not in the mood to be psychoanalyzed.”

“Then we can just sit.”

“I’m not very good company right now. Why don’t you go on upstairs and get some sleep?”

“I’m not leaving you alone.”

He utters another laugh. “I don’t think that’s up to you.” As if realizing the words were harsher than he intended, he softens. “Look, I’m all right. I just need some time alone to think. That’s all. You’ve got an early morning. Go to bed. I’ll join you in a while.”

I stand there, debating, trying to figure out who needs whom, because at that moment my need for him is twisting my gut into a knot. “I’m worried about you.”

“I’m okay. I can handle this. I’ve handled worse.” He shrugs. “I don’t want to bring this to what we have here. Just give me some space, all right?”

It’s difficult, but in the end I opt to honor his request. “I’m going to take a shower.”

When he leans close and presses his mouth against mine, his lips are cold.

*   *   *

I wake before daybreak to find Tomasetti gone. At some point during the early morning hours—without coming into the bedroom to say good-bye—he got into his Tahoe and left. Usually, if for whatever reason we don’t connect during the day, he’ll leave a note next to the coffeemaker. That’s become our routine for touching base when we don’t actually see each other. This morning there’s no note. He didn’t even make coffee. The house is cold and damp, and when I walk into the kitchen, I’m accosted by an unbearable sense of aloneness.

I make a pot of coffee, lingering longer than I should in the hope he’ll return. When I dump yesterday’s grounds in the trash, I find the empty bottle of Crown Royal along with a half a dozen cigarette butts. Neither are a good sign.

I tell myself not to worry and remind myself that Tomasetti is a strong man with a good head on his shoulders. Chances are, he went to his office at the Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation in Richfield because he couldn’t sleep and wanted to get a jump on his day. But I am worried. I know Tomasetti. He’s come a long way in the three years since his family was killed. But I’m ever aware that he has a dark side. An unpredictable side that, in the past, has been triggered by pain and injustice and all those gnarly emotions in between.

I’m the only person in the world who knows what he did in the months following the deaths of his wife and children. I know he turned to pills and alcohol—and spent some time at a mental health facility. I also know he took the law into his own hands and the killers paid hard for what they’d done. The knowledge isn’t a burden; I’m glad he trusted me enough to share it, but this morning it’s at the forefront of my mind. Right or wrong—moral or not—I’ve learned to live with what he did. Maybe because I understand his motives. Because I know he’s a good man, and like him, I see the world in stark black-and-white.

The need to call him is powerful, but some inner voice advises me to wait. A call from me now would be seen by him as evidence of my lack of trust, an admission of my fear that he’s going to fall off some emotional cliff. But the truth of the matter is that I don’t fully trust him.

I arrive at the police station at 7 A.M. to find my third-shift dispatcher, Mona Kurtz, sitting cross-legged on the floor near her desk, several files spread out in front of her. She’s wearing her headset and tapping her foot against the floor to Florence and the Machine’s “Dog Days Are Over.” She looks up when I enter and grins sheepishly. “Hey, Chief.”

“Morning.” I pull a stack of message slips from my slot.

“You’re in early this morning.”

“Murder makes for a busy day.” I glance through my messages. “Anything else come back on Dale Michaels?”

“Guy didn’t even have a speeding ticket.” Rising, she reaches for a manila folder next to the switchboard and passes it to me. “I started a file, but there’s not much there.”

“What about the Hochstetler file?”

“Jodie couldn’t find it. She thinks it’s locked up in your office.”

Tucking the file under my arm, I stop at the coffee station to fill my cup and then head to my office. I’m doing my utmost not to think about Tomasetti, but even with an unsolved homicide on my hands, I’m not doing a very good job of it.

At my desk, I open the file and find Glock’s report along with a couple of dozen photos of the scene. I read the report twice and then take a few minutes to look at each photo. Of the body. The scene. And the mysterious Amish peg doll, including a shot of the name inscribed on the base. HOCHSTETLER. And I know this is one of those cases that won’t give up its secrets easily.