Death Night. Todd Ritter

you are, Chief.”

      “Good,” Kat said, nodding her approval. “While I’m over at the museum, I want you to search our records and see if any of the town’s firefighters have a rap sheet. Arson. Property destruction. Things like that.”

      Carl paused at the door, holding it halfway open. “Every firefighter?”

      He was referring to Boyd Jansen, one of the most decent and dependable men Kat had the pleasure of knowing. There was little to no chance Dutch would ever torch a building. But Larry Sheldon was an expert on arson. If he said firefighters were the prime suspects, then there had to be a good reason for it.

      “Yes,” Kat said. “Even Dutch.”

      It took Henry an hour and a half to reach his destination. He could have made it there in thirty minutes, but he meandered—half out of trepidation, half out of curiosity. He hadn’t roamed these streets in a year, and he wondered how much had changed. So as the sun rose higher over Perry Hollow, Henry traversed Main Street. He passed his old apartment over the used-book shop he had frequented almost daily. He paused in front of the vacant headquarters of the Perry Hollow Gazette, his workplace for five years. Other than the for rent sign plastered on the front door, the place looked exactly the same.

      When he veered off Main Street, his path took him directly past the burned-out history museum. Seeing its charred façade made him think of Valhalla from the Ring cycle and its spectacular destruction by flames. Although Wagner’s epic was too bombastic for his taste, Henry at least respected the opera tetralogy’s boldness. And as he moved farther up the street, he found himself humming the cycle’s “Magic Fire” leitmotif.

      The humming continued as he passed the Sleepy Hollow Inn. At that point, he could have stopped walking, stepped inside, and gone up to his room. Henry knew it’s what he should have done. He had people to interview, an article to research, a job to do.

      Yet he kept walking, moving through the town’s still-empty streets. The few people he did come into contact with were strangers who stole glances at his scars before suddenly looking away. That was no surprise. Henry hadn’t been very sociable during his time in Perry Hollow. He really only knew Kat.

      And Deana Swan, of course. The first woman he had been with since the death of his wife. The only other woman he had grown to love.

      The woman whose home he now stood in front of.

      If someone had asked Henry what he expected to get out of visiting Deana’s house, he wouldn’t have been able to answer. Closure, he supposed. Not that such a thing was possible. Henry believed that most people wore their pain for the rest of their lives. Like scars, only invisible.

      He certainly didn’t want to see Deana again, let alone talk to her. That would be too much to bear. Henry knew he wouldn’t be able to exchange quick greetings and a few minutes of chitchat. What had happened to their relationship was too dramatic—even operatic—for something as mundane as small talk.

      In truth, Henry just wanted to linger outside a place he had once known very well. He wanted to gaze up at the window of Deana’s bedroom and get a glimpse of the lilac walls beyond it. He wanted to find out if any of the good memories created there still existed or if they had all been eclipsed by the bad ones.

      So far, it was the latter. Standing ramrod straight on the sidewalk, Henry tried to summon up a bit of the love he had once felt or the happiness he had experienced. Instead, he felt nothing but anxiety. What if a neighbor spotted him and got suspicious? What if Deana did? That would be interesting, trying to explain why he was there.

      His worry was short-lived.

      And completely justified.

      For while Henry was still looking up at the house’s second floor, the door of the attached garage rose in silence. He didn’t even notice it until a vehicle emerged—a green SUV backing down the driveway.

      Seeing the vehicle, Henry made a run for it. He dashed across the driveway, trying to escape undetected. But the driver saw him, as evidenced by the twin flares of brake lights at the back of the SUV. Henry halted in the middle of the driveway, directly behind the vehicle. He raised both arms like a suspect in a cop show. Caught red-handed. The SUV’s driver-side door opened and a familiar face turned to peer out at him.

      It was Deana, looking exactly the way he remembered her. Pretty face, kind eyes, surprisingly sensual lips. Those features that Henry had found so disarming more than a year ago stopped him short once again.

      They stared at each other, neither one speaking. Henry didn’t know what to say. Deana, he assumed, felt the same way. Her eyes flashed a hundred different emotions. Surprise. Joy. Pain. Regret.

      When she finally did speak, it was in a hoarse whisper Henry could barely hear over the steady purr of the idling SUV.

      “Henry.”

      Not a question. Not an exclamation. Just a quiet and stunned declaration that, despite being gone from her life for the past year, he still existed.

      That was more than Henry could muster. His mouth opened as words formed in the back of his throat. He felt them there, brushing his tonsils as they struggled to take shape. Instead of letting them gestate, Henry cut them off and bolted down the sidewalk.

      Deana called after him, her voice catching up to him a half-block away. “Henry! Wait!”

      But Henry had no choice. He certainly couldn’t go back and face her—not after all that he had been through. Running away was his only option. And instead of slowing down once Deana’s voice faded, Henry quickened his pace. He sprinted without slowing until he reached the Sleepy Hollow Inn, his heart pounding the entire way.

       8 A.M.