Tuesday, July 27. 12:23 p.m. Seatoun, Wellington, New Zealand.

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Sergeant Miller needed a solid eight-hour sleep or even a twenty-minute nap. That was Ana’s estimation soon after she finally reached the end of the line and approached the man hunched behind a makeshift desk. The police had set up a temporary headquarters at the local community center, transformed in the last few days into another emergency shelter. The man yawned again and tugged absently on his droopy mustache. His eyes, when they met hers after she’d blurted out her story, were rimmed red with fatigue.

“Ms. Grace, in light of the extenuating circumstances and the vast number of displaced families in the immediate area, I think your worries that this teacher—Harrison Burbank, was it?”

Ana nodded tersely.

“That this teacher has harmed your son is perhaps a little…”

Her eyes narrowed as she mentally supplied the next word for him. Crazy? Hysterical?

“Premature, at this time.”

Diplomatic as his words were, Ana knew when she was being humored. The constable they’d first spoken to had all but rolled his eyes at her story, and it was only by recognizing her name as a former criminal lawyer that she had been handed over to the weary Sergeant Miller.

“What do you suggest I do, Sergeant?” Her voice could cut diamonds, but he affected not to notice.

“You may want to wander over to your father’s house to see if he has actually ended up there.” He stared pointedly over her shoulder at the long line of people behind her waiting for their chance to talk to him. “Your son would’ve still been a bit shaken after his ordeal when he composed the text. It’s probably an innocent mistake.”

A defensive flush heated her cheeks. When she’d informed him she hadn’t actually checked her father’s home yet, his tone had subtly changed to suggest that he thought her just another mother too frantic to think straight.

She knew better. She knew her son.

Ana braced her spine so straight she could feel every muscle and ligament tugging upward. “Thank you for your time, Sergeant Miller.”

She stalked back through the rows of mattresses lining most of the available floor space. Daniel waited for her at the entrance doors, worry lines creasing his forehead. His eyes darkened when they connected with hers. She didn’t need to tell him things hadn’t gone well—he could read her expressions now.

Pride cast aside, she stepped into his arms and clung to him.

“We’ll find him,” he said simply.

She believed him. Daniel Calder was a straightforward man who didn’t play power games and whom honesty appeared to be as much a part of him as his blue eyes. She’d no basis to question his integrity, so why couldn’t she trust the feelings of absolute rightness that surged through her as she pressed her face into his chest, absorbing his heartbeat?

Tuesday, July 27. 12:46 p.m. Seatoun, Wellington, New Zealand.

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“I’m pretty sure this street is less than a ten-minute walk from Dad’s place.” As they walked Ana glanced again at the scrap of paper the teacher had handed them. “Coincidence?”

Ice pinged into his gut, sharp little shards that refused to melt. Though he didn’t want Ana’s imagination to kick into overdrive, he agreed with her. “Possibly.”

Something didn’t feel right.

“We’re playing connect the dots when we don’t know what half the dots are. If this teacher is the son of the woman who accused your dad of rape—and saying it sounds like something out of a bad made-for-TV movie—it doesn’t necessarily mean anything sinister.”

But if Harrison was the kid she’d described from her past, Daniel wanted Ana well away from him. If it was the same kid he might know nothing about Ana’s father and what happened twenty-something years ago. On the flip side, if Patricia Burbank hadn’t kept the same code of silence as Ana’s family, how would Harrison feel about the man accused of raping his mother?

Not too damn friendly, he suspected.

It definitely wasn’t a situation he wanted Ana involved in.

She huffed and quickening her stride to keep pace with his. “Why, if it’s all an innocent coincidence like Sergeant Miller suggested, don’t we check Dad’s house? I’m worried about him. Look, if this Harrison guy thinks my dad raped his mother…”

She took a deep breath and he twitched. Could the woman read his mind now?

A kaleidoscope of emotions swept across her face and he heard the dry click as she swallowed. “He could’ve gone with Theo to Dad’s house. Hell, if he’s been watching Dad, he already knew where to find him.”

He skimmed his knuckles lightly down her cheek. “Since Harrison’s place is on the way to your dad’s, humor me, and let’s go there first. What’s the saying? Know thy enemy?”

A short time later at the back door of the address noted on the scrap of paper, Daniel said, “This is called breaking and entering, isn’t it?”

“Only if we get caught. I know a lot of lawyers.”

He caught a glimmer of her smile from the shadows of the alcove they huddled in.

Spiderwebs, strong enough to resist the earth’s violent shaking, spanned the corners between the veranda supports. The yard was unkempt, with weeds choking a few stunted fruit trees. Compared to the neatly mowed front yard, the neglect of the rear of the property was unsettling.

Daniel’s internal radar gave a warning blip. He wants to keep the appearance of normality at the front; doesn’t care about the back where nosy neighbors can’t see.

He’d been the one to approach the house first, in case Harrison had been at home, but no one answered the brittle shrill of the doorbell or his knocks on the front door. They’d cupped their hands against the window closest to the door, finding an empty living room. Nothing stirred inside and dust motes twisted and spun in the rays of sunlight drifting over an old velour La-Z-Boy, a big-screen television, and a coffee table with a few neatly stacked magazines.

“I’ll go in first and check it out.” He kept his voice pitched low. “If you hear any sort of confrontation before I call you to come in—run—and this time don’t come back.” He cradled her jaw and studied her eyes. “I mean it.”

“Okay,” she whispered.

He tried the door handle and it squeaked under his fingers. Locked. He grabbed a seat cushion from an ancient deck chair, held it up to the frosted glass set into the back door, and punched it. A sharp crack sounded then glass shards tinkled onto the floor.

“This is the breaking part of the exercise.” He reached through the gap and twisted the handle from the inside. The lock popped and the door swung open.

The stench of rotting fruit smacked him like a physical barrier. He stepped inside and glanced around with a curled upper lip.

“Guess he hasn’t been home in a while,” Ana murmured behind him.

He stood in a small kitchen. The pitted linoleum below his feet squeaked as he walked to a closed door on the other side of the kitchen.

Daniel turned before he opened it, and cocked a gun-shaped finger at Ana. “Stay there,” he mouthed.

The door led into a hallway with three closed rooms leading off it. The air had that claustrophobic closed-in smell, and sweat popped out on his forehead as he approached the first door. Odd creaks and ticks empty houses always made followed him down the hallway.

His gut indicated he was alone in the house, but his heart rate still amped up a notch. Trespassing in a stranger’s home with no weapons other than his bare hands made him fidgety, but the thought that Harrison might somehow get past him to hurt Ana caused his adrenaline levels to spike even higher.

Daniel turned the door handle to the first room and it swung open smoothly. Nothing adorned the wall except a large framed mirror. Exercise equipment and an array of dumbbells were evenly spaced around the room. He eased shut the door and moved onto the next, which turned out to be a bathroom, scrubbed clean and smelling faintly of pine disinfectant.

The final door creaked open. The stench reached out and grabbed him around the throat. He recognized it instantly, wrenched back to his teenage years and the room he’d shared with his younger brother, Tony, who suffered from occasional night terrors. Daniel would jerk awake to the sounds of Tony thrashing and moaning, and the feral-smelling substance that poured off his brother during the attacks was more like squeezed-out fear than sweat.

He backed away from the open door and strode back to the kitchen, the skin on his nape inching toward his scalp, hairs at rigid attention.

Whoever slept in that room fought their demons during the night.