Daddy told her that, too.

He wants to go someplace where you can have your own rooma real room. And maybe even a pet.

Really? Ashley looks up. That might be kind of cool.

Then she remembers something, and shakes her head.

Whats wrong? Meg asks.

I dont want a pet.

Why not?

Because I would be really upset if it ran away or something.

It wont, says Meg, who has two dogs and a cat.

It might.

Ashley cant help but think about poor Mrs. Josephson, who lives upstairs from Daddy. Her cat ran away a few weeks ago, and shes still looking for her. She sounds so sad whenever Ashley hears her standing at the door, calling for her lost cat.

Here, kitty kitty Come here, Agatha What are you doing? Brynn asks in dread as Pats handthe one that isnt holding a lit matchonce again closes around her arm. Hard.

But this time, she doesnt mistake the iron grip as protective. This time, she sees it for what it is: a vise from which now there is no escape.

Pat.

Pat is the one.

Not Rachel.

But why? she chokes out.

Ignoring the question, he drags her across the floor to the table. There, he holds the lit match to each of the three candles as it burns perilously close to his fingers.

One for every decade, he says calmly, impervious to the fire singing his skin. Sickened, she can smell it burning.

Why are you doing this? Brynn whispers.

I think you know by now. He waves the match to extinguish it.

She shakes her head mutely, struggling in his grasp, knowing its futile to attempt escape.

Her only hope is to keep him talking. But Idont know, Pat, she says desperately. Truthfully. I dont know why.

For the first time, she spots the gift-wrapped box on the table. The pink paper matches the one on the box she glimpsed that day in Fionas dining room, gripped in a pair of waxen, lifeless hands.

Please I just want to have my baby. Please dont do this.

Pat goes absolutely still for a moment, as if something just unexpectedly permeated his consciousness.

Has he suddenly come to his senses?

She dares to look at him, and sees that his dark eyes are unmistakably glittering with madness and hate.

Hearing Kylahs key turn in the lock, Isaac hurriedly lifts Smoochy off his lap and sets the purring cat gently on the floor.

Nowyou decide to like me, he mutters, shaking his head as the cat rubs against his ankles. Brushing cat hair from his jeans, he turns toward the door as Kylah steps inside.

Hey, she says, looking surprised to see him. Pleasantly surprised. Youre here.

I promised I would be when you got back.

I know. I just She didnt think hed keep his promise.

Wearily, she sets her purse on the floor, closes the door, and looks around. Your stuff is gone.

It didnt take her long to figure that out.

Surprising, since there wasnt much around here that belonged to him. He never fully moved in, so it didnt take him long to fully move out. Just his papers, and some books and CDs, computer equipment, and clothes.

Now its all back in his apartment fifteen blocks away.

Youre leaving, she says heavily, not moving, just looking at him. I thought youd be gone before I got here, actually. I didnt expect you to stick around and say good-bye.

Expect?

Does that mean she thought this would happenhim leaving? That shes considered how it was likely to happen?

An unexpected swell of contrition laps at his soul.

I wouldnt just run out on you, Kylah. Is that what you thought?

She looks him in the eye and nods.

My stuff is gone. Im not. Not really.

What are you doing? You were going. You were outta here.

Just because I dont want to live together right now doesnt mean its over, he hears himself say. I just need some s.p.a.ce.

Her blue eyes roll toward the ceiling and she sighs.

I know its a cliche. But I dont want this to be over; I justI should never have moved in so soon. But I still do want us to be together, I want to work on I dont, Kylah reaches back abruptly and jerks the door open again.

You want me to leave? For good?

Her resolute nod slams him hard.

Thats what you had in mind, remember? You didnt want to work on your relationship with her, you wanted it to be over, so you could focus on Rachel.

It always comes down to that.

No other relationship in his life can replace the one he had with her Because it never ended.

It only ebbed, like the tide, and hes been waiting for it to sweep in again.

Id tell you to come back when and if you ever find Rachel, Kylah says, arms folded, but you know what? Im not so sure shes even what youre looking for.

A search of Pats small apartment doesnt yield the silver sorority bracelet, or much of anything else Until she gets to the locked file cabinet.

Its a cheap metal one, the kind you can buy in an office-supply warehouse store. The kind whose flimsy lock can be easily picked with a bobby pin, a trick she learned back in her days at Saint Vincents. It was the only way to keep track of what the nuns were writing in your filesand, on occasion, to change certain details you dont necessarily want on your permanent record.

Shes reaching up to pluck a bobby pin from her hair before she remembers there isnt one.

Dee doesnt wear her hair in a chignon like her twin sister, Fiona. No, Dees hair is long and loose And its driving me absolutely crazy.

Not as crazy, though, as having given up smoking cold turkey. But maybe it wont be much longer.

In the kitchenette, she rummages around, looking for something to use. In the process, she comes across a prescription bottle of sleeping capsules tucked in the back of a drawer. An unfamiliar name, Esther Josephson, is on the label. Did he steal them? And why would he need sleeping pills? That lazy s...o...b.. never had any trouble sleeping.

She pockets the bottle and continues her search until shes a.s.sembled a corn cob holder, a paper clip, a metal skewer, and a.s.sorted other potential picks.

The corn cob holder doesnt work; the p.r.o.ngs are too short.

The paper clip does, though.

The drawer slides open.

She begins rifling through the files inside, not quite sure what shes looking for Until she finds it.

I wanted my baby, too, Brynn.

What are you talking about? she asks Pat, trying to keep her voice from giving way to shrill hysteria. You have your baby. Ashley is No! My other baby.

I dont know what you He cuts in impatiently, With Rachel.

Rachel?

Rachel was pregnant?

That was her secret, Brynn realizes. That was why she was so distraught. And no wonder.

You were there that night, she breathes, remembering the snapping twig in the forest, the sensation of being watched. Why?

To talk to Rachel.

Keep him distracted, Brynn tells herself, and asks, What did you have to talk to her about?

I needed to say I was sorry.

For what?

For what I said.

Miraculously, shes sustaining a conversation. And every second, shes trying wildly to figure out a way to save herself, and her baby.

What did you say?

I said Shes startled by the choked emotion in his voice, but she does her best not to react. She cant jar him out of the past, because then h.e.l.l remember what he means to do now, in the present.

I said something terrible But I loved Fee, and I knew if she ever found out about me and Rachel because it was just once. I gave her a ride from the Rat, and Brynn is shaking her head in disbelief. Rachel slept with Pat? Rachel was carrying Pats child?

Why did I say it? he asks plaintively. I told her to get rid of it. Our own child, he whispers, tortured.

And in that instant, Brynn can only imagine how Rachel must have felt.

How she herself would feel if someone told her to get rid of the tiny life thats taken hold in her own womb.

Rachel was such a live wire, she was livid. She threatened to tell Fiona, and she took off. I let her go, but the more I thought about it Well, I ended up going over to the sorority house to find Rachel and tell her I didnt mean it.

No,Brynn thinks, watching him.You did mean it, and of course it made Rachel angry. You were afraid she was going to tell Fee, so you came after her, to do G.o.d only knows what, to stop her from talking .

You saw us leaving the house, and followed us up to the Prom, didnt you, Pat? You saw her fall.

He nods. After you left, I went down there. She was dead.

Like Tildy said.

So I carried her away, Pat goes on in a monotone. I buried her way up in the woods. I didnt want her to be found. I was afraid Afraid that if her body ever turned up, her pregnancy would have been revealed. And connected to him. And Fiona would have found out.

Now the pieces are falling into place.

Oh, G.o.d.

It all would have been okay, Brynn, if Fee had just loved me the way I loved her. But she robbed me. She stole my baby.

No, Pat, Fee gave you Ashley.

She destroyed my babies, Pat roars.

You mean the one Rachel was carrying? But Rachel fell, Pat. You said yourself she was dead when you She was but maybe the baby wasnt yet. If the four of you had gotten help right away, the baby might have survived.

Yes, the baby he had told Rachel to destroy, Brynn thinks incredulously. Hes making no sense. Hes insane. And hes going to kill her, too, like he did the others.

Pat, you cant blame us for your babys death.

Babies deaths.