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They had endless positive-energy thoughts – which Lizzie called ‘happy thoughts’, and always shared them with one another, and with Brendan of course.

What else could she remember? What? Anything?

They had so many animals over the years that eventually they gave each one a number.

Chester, a black lab with a curly tail like a chow was number 16. The lab would bark constantly, all day and all night until Lizzie merely showed him a bottle of Tabasco sauce – his kryptonite. Then he would finally shut up.

Dukie, number 15, was a short-haired, orange calico who Lizzie believed had probably been an old Jewish lady in another life and who was always complaining, ‘Oh no, no, no, no.’

Maximus Kiltimus was number 11; Stubbles was number 31; Kitten Little was number 35.

Memories were all that Lizzie Connelly had – because there could be no present for her. None.

She couldn’t be here in this horror house.

Had to be somewhere else, anywhere else.

Had to be!

Had to be!

Had to be!

Because he was inside her now.

The Wolf was inside her, in the real world, grunting and thrusting like an animal, violating, raping, for minutes that seemed like hours.

But Lizzie had the last laugh, didn’t she?

She wasn’t there.

She was somewhere in her memories.

Chapter Ninety-Two

Then he was finally gone, the terrible, inhuman Wolf. Monster! Beast! He’d given her a bathroom break, and food, but now he was gone. God, his arrogance in keeping her here in his house! When is he going to kill me? I’m going mad. Going, going, gone!

She peered through teary eyes into the pitch-blackness. She’d been bound and gagged again. In a strange way, that was good news. It meant he still wanted her, right?

Good God, I’m alive because I’m desirable to a horrid beast! Please help me, dear God. Please, please, help me.

She thought about her good girls and then she turned her mind toward escape. A fantasy, she understood, and therefore escape in itself.

By now, she knew this closet by heart, even in total darkness. It was as if she could see everything, as if she had night sight. More than anything, she was aware of her own body – trapped in here – and her mind – trapped as well.

Lizzie let her hands wander as much as they could. There were clothes in the closet – a male’s – his. The closest to her was some kind of sport coat with round, smooth buttons. Possibly a blazer? Lightweight, which reinforced her belief that this was a warm-weather city.

Next was a vest. A smallish ball was in one pocket, hard, maybe a golf ball.

What could she do with a golf ball? Could it be a weapon?

A zipper on the pocket. What could she do with a zipper? She’d like to catch his tattooed dick in it!

Then a windbreaker. Flimsy. Strong, sickening smell of tobacco on it. And then, her favorite thing to touch, a soft overcoat, possibly cashmere.

There were more ‘treasures’ in the overcoat’s pockets.

A loose button. Scraps of paper. From a notepad?

A ballpoint pen, possibly a Bic – blue, black or red. Coins – four quarters, two dimes, a nickel. Unless the coins were foreign? She wondered endlessly.

There was also a book of matches, with a shiny cover and embossed letters.

What did the embossed letters say? Would it tell her the city where she was being kept?

Also, a lighter.

A half pack of mints which she knew to be cinnamon because she smelled it on her hands.

And at the bottom of the pocket – lint, so insignificant, yet important to her now.

Behind the overcoat were two bundles of his clothing still covered in plastic from the cleaners. A receipt of some kind on the first packet. Attached by a staple.

She imagined the name of the cleaners, an identification number in red, writing by some dry-cleaning store clerk.

All of it seemed strangely precious to Lizzie – because she had nothing else.

Except a powerful will to live.

And get her revenge on the Wolf.

Chapter Ninety-Three

I was a part of the large surveillance detail near the house in old Highland Park, and I thought we were going to take Lawrence Lipton down soon, maybe within hours. We’d been told that Washington was working with the Dallas police.

I stared absently at the house, a large two-story Tudor on about two and a half acres of very expensive real estate. It looked pristine. A redbrick sidewalk went from the street to an arched doorway, which led inside to a house which looked as if it had a dozen rooms. Interestingly, the big news that day in Dallas was about a fire in Kessler Park that had incinerated a 64,000-square-foot mega mansion. The Lipton spread was less than a third that size, but it was still impressive, or depressing, or both.

It was around nine in the evening. A supervisory agent from the Dallas office, Joseph Denyeau, came on my earphones. ‘We just got word from the Director’s office. We have to back off immediately. I don’t understand it either. The order couldn’t be any clearer, though. Pull back! Everybody head to the office. We need to reconnoiter and talk about this.’

I looked at my partner in the car that night, an agent named Bob Shaw. It was pretty obvious that he didn’t understand what the hell had just happened either.

‘What was that?’ I asked him.

Shaw shook his head and rolled his eyes. ‘What do I know? We go back to the field office, drink some bad coffee, maybe somebody higher-up explains it to us, but don’t count on it.’

It took us only fifteen minutes to get to the field office at that time of night. The Rangers were playing the Angels, and Agent Shaw turned on the game as we rode. We needed to hear something, anything, that seemed a little organized and sane, even a baseball play-by-play on the car radio.

We filed into a conference room at the field office, and I saw a lot of weary, confused and pissed-off agents. Nobody was saying much yet. We’d gotten close to a possible break on this case, and now we’d been ordered to pull back. Nobody seemed to understand why.

The ASAC finally came out of his office and joined the rest of us. Joseph Denyeau looked thoroughly disgusted as he threw his dusty cowboy boots up on a conference table. ‘I have no idea,’ he announced. ‘Not a clue, folks. Consider yourselves debriefed.’

So about forty agents waited for an explanation of the night’s action, but one didn’t come, or wasn’t ‘forthcoming’ as they say. The agent in charge, Roger Nielsen, finally called D.C. and was told they would get back to us. In the meantime, we were to stand down. We might even be sent home in the morning.

Around eleven o’clock Denyeau got another update from Nielsen, and passed it on to us. ‘They’re working on it,’ he said and smiled wryly.

‘Working on what?’ somebody called from the back.

‘Oh hell, I don’t know, Donnie. Working on their pedicures. Working on getting all of us to quit the Bureau. Then there’ll be no more agents, and, I guess, no more embarrassing screw-ups for the media to write about. I’m going to get some sleep. I’d advise all of you to do the same.’