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“Good enough.”

Dr. Boyd said, “Same man who killed Father Michael Joseph?”

Delion nodded. “Yeah, if that’s when she died, then it was probably him. She was a loose end.”

“Now for my good news, gentlemen. Ms. Striker didn’t go easily. She may have got some of him under her fingernails, probably skin from his neck.”

“DNA,” Delion said, and did a little dance.

“Get me a match and we’ll fry the guy, Inspector Delion.”

They watched Dr. Stephen Boyd walk away, pause to speak to one of his investigators, then continue toward his office.

“Hot damn,” Delion said. “You know, no one ever even makes a joke about that man? No Sawbones, no Doctor Death, nothing like that. He’s a straight arrow, smart, does what he says he’ll do. When the pressure builds, the brass are really heating things up, Dr. Boyd never panics, just lowers his head and keeps marching.”

“Good for him,” Dane said. “On the other hand, if he did panic, the person on the slab wouldn’t be able to tell anyone about it.”

“True enough. Now, if that sample’s got DNA in it, it’s our first real break.”

TEN

CHICAGO

Nick had never been so happy in her life. Well, maybe when she’d had her Ph.D. diploma placed reverently into her hand, but that was more a huge sense of relief than pure, unadulterated happiness. It was because of her fiancé, John Kennedy Rothman, senior senator from Illinois. “No relation,” he’d told her, a lowly new volunteer in his reelection campaign three years before. That was before his wife, Cleo Rothman, disappeared, just up and ran away with one of his senior aides, Tod Gambol. Because everyone knew he loved his wife dearly, her abandoning her husband had given him an incredible sympathy vote and he’d been swept back into office by a 58/42 margin over his opponent, who’d been portrayed as too liberal for the fiscal health of both Illinois and the country, though he really hadn’t been at all. Truth was, John’s overpowering charm, his ability to look straight at a person and have that person believe that he would be the best at whatever he tried, was the overriding reason he was voted in.

And now she was going to marry him. It was heady. There were nearly twenty years separating them, but she didn’t care. She had no parents to gainsay her decision, only two brothers, both Air Force pilots, both in Europe, both younger than she.

She knew all about campaigning now, what it would be like to live in a fishbowl. But the media really hadn’t come after her yet, and she prayed they wouldn’t, at least not until after they were married and she’d be able to simply step behind John as she smiled and waved.

It was a dark night, the wind whipping her hair back from her face, because it was, after all, Chicago. When you were walking the deep canyons, buildings soaring up on either side, and the wind swept off Lake Michigan, funneling through those buildings, whipping the temperature down, it could make your teeth chatter and your bones rattle. She ducked her head and walked faster. One more block and she’d be home. Why hadn’t she taken a taxi? No, ridiculous. When she got home, she’d sit in front of her small fireplace, pull over her legs the heavy red afghan that her mom had knitted eight years before, and read some essays from her senior medieval research class.

She looked both ways, didn’t see a single soul, and stepped into the street. It happened so fast, she wasn’t certain what had actually happened after she was safely back in her apartment. A black car, a big job, with four doors, swept up the street, lights off, and veered straight at her. She saw that it was accelerating, not slowing, not swerving out of the way. No, it was coming straight on, and it was going to hit her.

She hurled herself sideways. She hit a fire hydrant and went crashing down on her hip. She felt the hot air, smelled the sour rubber of the tires as the sedan sped by. She lay there, pain pulsing through her hip, wondering why no one was around. Not a single person was stupid enough to be out in this weather. Oh God.