Sleepwalker (Nightwatcher #2)(83)

Is that why Phyllis Lewis became a victim? Because she had the misfortune to entrust Allison with the keys to her home, just as Kristina Haines did?

What if . . . ?

Struck by a sudden, troubling thought, Allison sits up straight.

She’s the one who found Phyllis Lewis’s murdered body, and she was the one who found Kristina Haines, too, ten years ago.

What if the police decide she’s a potential suspect?

It was her eyewitness testimony that sent Jerry Thompson to prison. What if they conclude that she made it all up—seeing him there that night—in order to throw them off her own trail?

Jerry confessed, though. You had nothing to do with that.

Yes, Jerry confessed . . . but there was another murder after he died, and it was staged to look just like Kristina’s. The lingerie, the flickering candles, the missing finger on her right hand . . .

The only thing missing was the music, and—

“Allison?”

She whirls around, startled. Mack is once again behind her.

“This is bizarre. The alarm company said they didn’t call me.”

“What do you mean?”

“I just got ahold of them, and they didn’t know anything about making a phone call to me earlier about the alarm system.” He turns to Ben, who’s come up behind him. “Can you call Nate Jennings?”

Ben nods and pulls his cell phone from his pocket. Mack and Allison watch in silence as he scrolls through the numbers, selects one, and presses a button to dial the call.

It seems to ring a couple of times before Ben says, “Nate?”

Even from across the room, Allison hears the explosion of sound from the phone in Ben’s hand. Nathan Jennings is screaming about something, and the blood drains from Ben’s face.

Allison’s heart begins to pound and she stands, crossing the room to stand beside Mack.

“My God . . . my God . . .” Ben listens for a few more seconds, then says hoarsely into the phone, “Nate, I’m so sorry. I’ll be right there.”

Hanging up, he turns to Allison and Mack. “Zoe . . .” His voice breaks and he tries again. “Zoe’s been . . . she’s been . . . she’s dead. Someone killed her in her bed.”

Intellectually, Rocky knows the unsub had nothing to do with Ange’s condition. Even if he hadn’t seen her stricken with his own eyes in the darkened bedroom that August night; even if there were some way a predator could administer some kind of drug that would mimic an aneurysm . . .

The truth is, it happened long before Jerry Thompson died in prison.

It has to be a coincidence, and nothing more.

In fact, if someone seeking revenge against Rocky had figured out that his wife is the most precious thing in his world, then chances are, the damned aneurysm very well saved her life.

But that doesn’t mean that someone isn’t watching at this very moment, bent on making sure that Ange never comes out of her coma, now that she’s showing signs of recovery . . .

The NYPD has already sent a couple of uniforms over there, and hospital security is on alert.

Still . . .

“I wonder if I should try to have her moved,” Rocky muses aloud to Murph, at the wheel.

It’s been over an hour since they left the prison, headed to Ange’s bedside so that Rocky can see with his own eyes that she’s still hanging in there.

“I don’t know, Rock. In her condition, that’s probably not a good idea.”

“Neither is leaving her there if someone wants to hurt her even more than she’s already been . . .”

Throat clogged with emotion, Rocky can’t even finish the sentence.

Murph glances over and says simply, “I know. Hang in there, Rock.”

They ride on in silence for another couple of minutes, Rocky weighing the odds that perhaps karma is somehow responsible for what happened to Ange. If he is partly responsible for sending an innocent man to prison, then in the grand scheme of things . . .

What right do I have to be happy? What right do I have to pray for a miracle? What right do I have to hold out hope when—

His cell phone rings abruptly. Pulse racing, he snatches it up.

Braced for bad news, given the path his thoughts have taken, he gets it—but not at all what he was expecting.

Thank God, thank God, it isn’t Ange.

He closes his eyes in brief, silent prayer as that sinks in—then opens them abruptly and grabs his reading glasses, a pencil, and notepad from the console.

“Okay, go ahead,” he tells Tommy, the station house desk sergeant, and quickly jots down the victim’s name and address Tommy provides.

Zoe Jennings . . . Abernathy Place . . .

Startled, he asks, “Did you say Glenhaven Park?”

Murph shoots a sharp, questioning glance in his direction.

“Yeah,” Tommy says. “That’s up in—”

“I know where it is,” Rocky cuts in. “We’re on our way.”

He hangs up and looks at his partner.

“Another one,” Murph guesses. “Same MO and signature?”

“Sounds like it.”

“And it’s in Glenhaven Park? So there’s a connection to Allison MacKenna again?”

“Looks that way,” Rocky says grimly, wondering if they were on the wrong track altogether with Jamie and the revenge killings.