Sleepwalker (Nightwatcher #2)(107)

As usual, he makes up the lyrics he doesn’t know, but he remembers the part about her being a special lady . . . and how nice it is to be insane, because no one asks you to explain . . .

As he sings, his thoughts are on James MacKenna and Jerry Thompson and Sam Shields.

Rocky and Murph had spent all day Monday in Albany, tracking Shields’s last movements. The shift supervisor at his factory job confirmed that he hadn’t reported to work since September 12, and that he hadn’t bothered to call in or quit or return phone calls.

No one appeared to be home at the shabby duplex where he’s been living for a few years now; neither Shields nor Roger Krock, the elderly upstairs tenant, answered the bell. Rocky tracked down the curmudgeonly landlord, who refused to talk or provide access to the place, saying only that the rent has been paid on time, as always. None of the neighbors—most of them either elderly or down on their luck—had seen anyone coming and going in weeks.

Mai had confirmed that Shields wasn’t listed as Jerry Thompson’s next of kin in the prison records; in fact, he wasn’t listed at all, and thus hadn’t been personally notified of his son’s death. Chances are, he learned of it courtesy of the news media, along with the rest of the world. And right after he heard . . .

He disappeared.

A few days later, Cora Nowak was dead, and her sadistic killer delivered her mutilated remains to her husband on a sandwich roll.

Shields, with his sick, twisted reasoning, might have been prone to do that.

But James MacKenna?

Rocky shakes his head. It doesn’t make sense.

Before Cleary called this morning with the news about the DNA match, Rocky was so sure he was on the right track with Shields.

Even now . . .

Something isn’t adding up.

If MacKenna is behind this, then where is he now, and where are his wife and kids? Randi Weber thought the whole family had gone into hiding together, but she had no idea where they might be. She said Allison had seemed to brush off her final warning that MacKenna might harm her and the children.

“She said she wasn’t afraid of him,” Randi told Rocky. “She was afraid for him.”

Ever since Cleary told him about the DNA match, Rocky has mentally gone over and over everything he knows about MacKenna; everything MacKenna said to him years ago about Kristina Haines, on that awful day when he had just lost his wife . . .

Why can’t I accept that the guy is guilty? Why do I feel like I’m missing something?

Rocky was on his way back up to Glenhaven Park, where the task force was waiting on a search warrant of the MacKenna home, when Ange’s neurologist called to say there were encouraging signs that she might be starting to regain consciousness.

“How soon?” Rocky asked.

“There’s no way of knowing when—or if—it’ll happen,” was the cautious reply. Before Rocky could voice his frustration, the doctor added, “But if I were you, I’d come on over to the hospital.”

So here he is, watching his wife’s eyelids twitch, willing her to wake up.

He finishes singing “Angie Baby,” and he begs God, again, to bring Ange back to him.

This time, he tacks on a prayer for Allison MacKenna and her children to be delivered safely from whatever trials they’re facing.

A cart rattles into the room before he finishes praying, and he opens his eyes to see his favorite nurse.

“How are you today, Mr. Manzillo?”

“Judy! What are you doing on duty during the day? I thought you work the night shift.”

“I do, but I switched today. My daughter is going in first thing tomorrow morning for a C-section and I want to be there with her.”

“That’s great. First grandchild?”

She nods vigorously. “Poor kids have been through so much trying to conceive. I don’t think any of us believed it was ever going to happen.”

“Our son and daughter-in-law went down that road, too,” Rocky tells her. “They went to a clinic until they finally ran out of money—or maybe they just ran out of hope.”

“You should never run out of that,” Judy says, pulling on a pair of latex gloves. “There’s always hope.”

She’s talking about getting pregnant, but Rocky is talking about much more when he agrees, “Yes, there is. Just when you least expect it—”

“That’s exactly what happened with my daughter,” Judy says. “She got pregnant the old-fashioned way.”

Rocky stares into space, no longer listening as Judy goes on talking about her daughter’s pregnancy.

What if . . . ?

He jumps to his feet.

“Mr. Manzillo? Are you okay?”

“I’m sorry, Judy,” he says over his shoulder, already on his way out of the room. “I just remembered something. I have to make a phone call.”

About to pour her fourth cup of coffee after a sleepless night, worrying about Allison and the kids, Randi feels her cell phone suddenly vibrate in her pocket. She sets the pot back on the burner and pulls out the phone, hoping it’s not another automated reminder to get out and vote today.

Her heart beats faster when she sees that it is, indeed, an auto-text message—but one that reads: Signal Active.

Late last night, her fear and curiosity got the best of her and she revisited the phone locator site Allison showed her on that long-ago afternoon in her kitchen.