Harrison's gaze narrowed. "So, how does it work, exactly?"

"I raise up a wall inside my mind, and he's blocked out. I mentally visualize the wall, build it strong and tall, and it cuts him off."

"But didn't you say his voice is stronger now?"

"Since he escaped. Yes." She nodded, felt the hair on her nape rise when she thought of Justice's hideous sibilant messages. "Oh, God, this is horrible."

Harrison stared at her a moment, then said softly, "I think I've got enough. No more questions for now."

"Good." The truth was, she was drained; dredging up all the old memories and concentrating on Justice's malevolence was exhausting.

Harrison leaned back, caught the bartender's attention, and signaled for the check. Within seconds, the bartender brought over the tab. Harrison left several bills on the table as she shrugged into her jacket. Together they wended their way through tables and past the bar, where, despite the early hour, the barkeep was drawing beers and making Bloody Marys.

Laura felt Harrison's hand in the small of her back once, guiding her around two newcomers who were talking and taking up more than their share of personal space in the aisle.

At the door, Harrison leaned closer and said, "I want to get this guy. I mean I really want to get him."

"Me, too," Laura responded with feeling. She wouldn't rest easy until he was behind bars. Or dead.

"If you can help me, I'm all for that, no matter how you do it," he said, shouldering open the door to the gray day beyond. "If he calls to you, let me know."

"I will." And she would, though what good it would do, she didn't know. Standing on the front steps and looking toward the ocean, she noticed a fog bank crawling closer to the shore. Eventually, it would obscure the beach completely, making it difficult for the beach cleaners, volunteers who had come to the coast, to pick up the garbage, to do their job.

He thought for a moment as they started down the wide stairs, disturbing a seagull that was scavenging near the walkway. "Wait a minute. Does it work both ways? Can you call to him?"

Laura had never tried. Didn't want to. "I don't know. Maybe." Anything was possible.

"Maybe the question should be, would you consider calling to him? You know, to draw him out?"

She paused on the bottom step and glared at him. "Let me get this straight. You want me to place myself in danger. He's a psychopath, you know. If . . . if I let him in, he'll know where I am."

Harrison frowned, squinting against the fractured sunlight slipping through the thickening fog. "And he'll come for you. That's what you think?"

"Yes!"

"You're certain?"

"Pretty much-yeah."

His scowl deepened. "Okay. That's not good."

"Not good at all." She felt the cold dampness of the morning caressing her skin, chilling her bones again.

"Does he know where you work?"

"He doesn't know anything about me but my name. At least I hope he doesn't," she said with a catch in her heart as they crossed the pockmarked parking lot, their shoes crunching on loose gravel.

"Does he know what you look like?" he asked.

Laura touched her dyed hair before she could stop herself, and she saw his eyes follow the gesture. "If he got anywhere near me, he'd know me, I think."

"That why you didn't want to be on camera last night?"

"I didn't want to be on camera for a lot of reasons, but yes," she admitted, "that was the biggie."

"So when was it that you last heard from him?" he asked.

"This morning, when I was in the shower." She remembered his hiss over the shower's pulsing spray, and she felt Justice's malevolence all over again . . . so close . . . so damned close. "He told me he was coming for me."

"In those words?"

"No . . . I don't know." Laura felt embarrassed now. Her secrets bared. The way Harrison was looking at her and struggling to understand was excruciating.

"Let me get this straight. Since he escaped, you think you've been getting stronger messages," he reiterated.

"I know I have. It's possible his messages might have been blocked while he was at Halo Valley. I hadn't heard from him at all while he was incarcerated." Harrison nodded slowly, and she said, "I know what this sounds like. The lady is loony, one step away from a room at Halo Valley herself."

"Nah." He shook his head, and she noticed his hair was darkening with the damp air. "I've heard a lot of weird stuff over the years. Maybe you've got some ability. Maybe you don't. Maybe this is just insight. Maybe it's something more. I don't really care." He seemed sincere. She didn't dare look too closely into his eyes, though, because she was afraid she might get lost in them and start believing everything he said, and that, she knew, would be foolish. He was saying, "But I'm willing to go with it and see where it leads. You obviously believe it, and if it helps find the bastard, fine. But it sounds like you think you haven't heard from him for a while because he was locked away."

"Yeah . . . it might be the distance, but . . . I have the feeling that it could be because he was on some kind of meds, drugs that inhibited his ability somehow. But that's just a guess. I don't really know."

"Doesn't matter. The thing is he wasn't able to reach you until he escaped. But now he's coming in loud and clear."

"Right," she said, knowing it was, at least partially, a lie.

The pregnancy. That's why he's so close. He found me because I'm pregnant. It wasn't just because he'd been incarcerated.

"What?" Harrison asked, his gaze searching her face, as if reading her thoughts.

I need to save my baby.

She nearly stumbled at a pothole, and Harrison caught her arm. "Hey, you okay?"

No, I'm not. I'll never be as long as Justice is free, maybe not until he's dead. Trying to get a grip on her runaway emotions, she closed her eyes and faced the ocean, feeling the heavy air, pent up with rain, calm her racing mind, while his strong hand held the crook of her elbow steady.

"Look, I'm going after him," he said with conviction. "He's a killer. Maybe the police will find him. Maybe I'll find him first."

"For your story?" She heard the bite in her words as they reached her Subaru.

"For the good of humanity." He offered her a smile and dropped her arm. "And yeah, it'll be a helluva story."

A question hung between them-unspoken and blurry, like fog-yet she guessed what was on his mind. "You want me to help you find him, don't you?" Of course he did. That was what this interview was really about.

"Yes." He was honest. "But that decision's yours. Meanwhile, I'll do some investigating. Maybe his mother knows something. Or maybe one of your sisters or your aunt? Any chance I could talk to them?"

"No," she stated quickly. "You're a reporter. And a man."

"Hmmm . . . okay. Well, Justice lived around here. Your family's here. He's going to come back this way to get to you all. The police aren't idiots. They know that, too, and it's merely a matter of time before he's caught."

"But you want to find him first," she guessed, fishing in her purse for her keys.

"That's the plan."

"A crazy plan."

He shrugged.

"And the cult' will make a big story."

"Not bigger than the recapture of a psychotic killer. Maybe a nice side story," he admitted, unabashed. "But I'm off the record until you give me the green light."

She had to believe him. Trust him. She'd just bared her damned soul . . . well, almost. She hadn't mentioned the baby or the fact that being pregnant made her more vulnerable, more easily found by Justice. "So, what are you going to do now?" she asked as she unlocked her car.

"Right now? For starters, stick close to you. If he's sending you messages, I want to be around when you receive the next one." Harrison slid her a look. "And if you change your mind and decide to call him first, I want to be on that party line."

"Why do I feel I'm being used?"

"Not at all."

So much for the "good of humanity" line.

"I don't think you should count on me dialing up the psycho," Laura said, opening the Outback's driver side door. "It's the old self-preservation thing, you know."

"I wouldn't put you in danger."

She sent him a look that said more sarcastically than words, "Sure."

"Seriously, I'll be with you every step of the way."

"Oh, yeah, right. Save that for some idiotic romantic, B-rated movie."

He touched her arm again. Long fingers curling over her jacket's sleeve. "I'm not kidding. But this is your call."

"You've got that right."

"If you change your mind, if you want to catch him soon, let me know."

"Don't hold your breath!" She pulled her arm back, grateful to break any touch with him. What had she been thinking? That he cared? For the love of God, she barely knew him! "There's the sheriff's department. They'll handle it."

"They're doing their best, I'm sure," he agreed.

But the unspoken end of that sentence was, "They just don't have your unique resource to pinpoint his location."

"Will you call me? The next time you hear' from him?" He handed her a card and scratched a number on it. "My cell," he said, and she, telling herself this was crazy, the damned reporter was on a fool's mission, slipped the card into a pocket of her purse. Foolish, foolish woman!

"I'll think about it. Thanks for breakfast. You were right. The huevos were worth it."

"You're welcome, Lorelei." He gave her a quick grin, and he headed for his Impala, jogging across the asphalt and gravel, his back straight, his legs striding in an easy, athletic lope.

She dragged her gaze away and climbed into her car.

Pulling out of the lot, she checked her rearview mirror and saw him slide into the interior of his beat-up Chevy. A sexy man. A very sexy man with a mission. Just exactly what she didn't need in her life right now.

Still, she watched him nose the Impala out of the lot and wondered what the hell she'd gotten herself into.

CHAPTER 14.

Dr. Maurice Zellman sat in a room on the second floor of the hospital. As Lang strode across the threshold, he noted the white gauzy bandage around the man's neck and the sharp lines of pain that bracketed his mouth. Zellman's eyes, however, were bright with anger, and as soon as he saw Lang's TCSD uniform, he lifted a hand and motioned him forward.

"Dr. Zellman, I'm Langdon Stone with the Tillamook County Sheriff's Department," he introduced as he took a few steps toward the bed.

Zellman motioned more furiously, and Lang moved next to the bed, to where he was gazing down at the man with the trim beard and grimly set mouth. Zellman touched his bandaged throat, then pointed to his quivering lips and shook his head slightly.

"You can't talk." Lang nodded. "You've had surgery. How about I ask a couple of yes or no questions and you let me know what the answer is by nodding or shaking your head?"

A curt nod.

"I just want to clarify some facts. Your patient, Justice Turnbull, stabbed you in the throat with your own pen."

Zellman pressed his lips together and nodded again as the sound of a rattling medication cart slid through the door Lang had left ajar.

"He wasn't wearing handcuffs. Was that your decision?"

The doctor gazed at him with burning eyes and didn't respond.

"He attacked the security guard, Conrad Weiser, and took off in the hospital van. Thinking back, do you remember anything, anything at all, that now seems significant? Something that could lead us to him now? Something small, maybe, but that on reflection, could have been a clue that he had plans to escape?"

Zellman just stared at him. Lang could feel the man's fury rolling off him in waves. Anger and embarrassment, perhaps. The doctor's lax standards had directly led to Justice's ability to escape. And he knew it.

Lang said, "If something comes to you, maybe you could write it down. Or, if you remember something that may have come from your therapy sessions, something that could help . . ." Lang knew he was treading down that super sacrosanct road of patient/doctor confidentiality, but hey, the psycho had stabbed Zellman in the throat and that had to count for something in Lang's book.

Zellman, pursing his lips, motioned imperiously for a pen and paper, and Lang stepped into the hall and grabbed the attention of a junior nurse, who scurried to get him what he needed, returning quick enough for Lang to flash her a smile of gratitude that made her blush.

He handed the small pad and pen to Zellman, who looked long and hard at the pen itself for long seconds before writing: The lighthouse. His mother's motel. Seagull Pointe?

"Seagull Pointe is where his mother resides," Lang said for confirmation.

Zellman nodded once more, and his shoulders seemed to sag a bit, some of the starch leaving him.

"We're checking those places, but so far, he hasn't shown up at any of them. Anywhere else?"

Zellman considered, his eyes narrowing. After a few moments, he wrote: He wants to watch the sea. He spoke of it with reverence. He would face west. Even being locked up.