“If she is, she’s running out of time,” Dante said.

He felt a cold knot in his stomach, a sudden, dark suspicion.

He remembered Rachel’s terrified eyes before she lost consciousness.

She had looked at Dante not just with fear of Kane, but with a deep, crushing guilt.

Dante wondered what Rachel had been forced to do to keep Eli safe.

He wondered if I had been forced to make the same terrible choices to protect our family.

He shut down the monitor, plunging the basement into near-total darkness.

Only the pale moonlight from the high, dirty window illuminated the dust motes dancing in the cold air.

Dante walked up the concrete stairs, his boots crunching on the dry salt scattered on the steps.

Outside, the Chicago wind howled between the brick tenements, driving the snow in sharp, horizontal sheets.

Dante slipped into the passenger seat of the idling SUV where Luca sat waiting.

“The wind is picking up,” Luca said, shifting the vehicle into drive. “The roads are clearing out. No one wants to be out in this.”