PROLOGUE
‘Pick up, Hawkins!Answer the phone!’
Ella Dark floored the gas and was now hurtling down the I-81 at a hundred miles an hour.She flew past a convoy of trucks that were nothing but a red blur, then the call on her Bluetooth went to voicemail.
‘Goddammit!Redial,’ she shouted.
It rang again.One ring stretched to seven rings.
‘You’ve reached the voicemail of Luca Hawkins, please-,’
‘Agh!’Ella screamed and jabbed theEND CALLbutton on the dashboard.She’d pieced fragments together in her head, and she still wasn’t sure how or why this could have happened, but she knew in her gut she was right.And even if she wasn’t right, alive-but-embarrassed was preferable to the alternative.
Alarm woman is here.Thanks for sorting it out.See you soon.
That was the message Luca had sent her five minutes ago.The alarm woman was at their apartment to fix their broken alarm, and that would have been perfectly logical if Ella had actually sent for an alarm woman.
She hadn’t.Luca couldn’t call for an alarm woman because he wasn’t the administrator.So that meant there was an uninvited stranger about to be alone with Luca in their apartment, and Ella had a good idea who that stranger might be.
It was the same stranger who’d damaged her alarm in the first place, and the same stranger who’d killed three of Ella’s friends.
Lindsey Doyle.
Ella had made Luca stare at pictures of Lindsey Doyle until he knew her face better than his own, but Lindsey Doyle wouldn't be wearing her own face.She was a master of disguise, so she was probably wearing a wig, contact lenses, or prosthetics.And once she had Luca alone, once his back was turned, she could put a bullet in his head before he had a chance to blink.
Another redial.Another voicemail.
‘Luca, call me back.Right now.Do not let that woman into the apartment.Do you hear me?Donotlet her in.Call me.’
Her message felt pathetically inadequate, but she was four hours from home and short of teleportation, she had no way of getting there in time.
What about her neighbors?
No.She didn’t know any of them, nor did she have their numbers.
Only one other option.
‘Dial 911,’ she shouted at her console.It dialed.The operator picked up on the first ring.
‘911, what’s your emergency?’
‘This is Special Agent Ella Dark, FBI.Badge number four-seven-seven-one-six.I need a unit at my apartment immediately.’
‘Of course, ma’am.Connecting you now.’
God, she hoped she’d done this in time.
***
‘I don’t know much about alarms.I don’t have admin access either.Is that going to be a problem?’
The slight brunette woman was tinkering with the alarm panel in what Luca called the shoe cupboard.She’d brought a toolbox and what looked like a giant calculator, and Luca had never seen such a contrasting sight.He’d never seen a woman handyman in his life, and he’d called out a lot of them back during his farm days.Maybe it was a product of city living.
‘Not at all.Do you live here alone, Mr… Hawkins, is it?’
‘It is Hawkins, but I don’t live here alone.My girlfriend lives here too.’
‘Expecting her back any time soon?’
