Hooley whispered, “Kevin. He was career Army, a major. He died, in Iraq.” His breathing hitched for a moment, then, “I was proud of him. Is Mrs. Black okay?”

“I’m sorry about your brother. Mrs. Black is fine. She and Perry are on their way in. As for Savich—ah, here he is now.”

Savich looked down at the wide bandages wrapped around Hooley’s chest, saw the drains were clear of blood. He looked good, considering. Hooley would survive this. He said quietly, “I spoke to Dr. Proctor. He said he’d kick us out in five because he wants to check you over. He’s pleased with how you’re doing, so keep it up. I don’t want to wear you out, Hooley, but that doesn’t give us a lot of time. If it becomes too much, you close your eyes and we’ll leave you alone. Are you up to telling us anything about last night? Anything Natalie and Connie don’t know?”

Hooley felt a stab of pain and stayed silent, coming to grips with it. He nodded toward the cup, and Davis placed the straw on his tongue. He managed to suck a little. Davis closed his hand around the pain medicine dispenser lying at his side. “Press the button for a shot of morphine. You don’t want to chase the pain, Beef, you want to stay in front of it.”

Hooley pressed the button. After a few moments, the pain seemed to float away, or maybe he was the one doing the floating, he didn’t know, nor did he particularly care. He saw the two men standing beside him, looking down at him, and was baffled for a moment. Then he remembered the question. “It was so bloody dark,” he said. “I don’t know how he saw me well enough to throw that knife in my chest. Have you found him?”

Davis said, “Not yet. He’s either gone to ground, trying to deal with it himself, or he’s found himself a doctor. He hasn’t been to an ER.”

“He wouldn’t go to an ER. That would be stupid,” and Hooley closed his eyes as his head fell to the side. He wouldn’t be talking anymore for a while.

Savich’s home

Saturday morning

What would you think if we moved in with Natalie?”

“What?” Sherlock whirled around to face him, scrambled eggs falling off the spatula in her hand.

Savich fiddled with a slice of wheat toast. “Well, with Hooley down, she could use the protection of our sleeping down the hall. It’s been tough to concentrate on helping her with Blessed hanging over us like a black cloud of doom.”

“That’s true, but moving in? No, Dillon, I don’t think it’ll come to that. The assassination attempt on the ambassador to the United Kingdom is all over the news, on the Internet, and that means the State Department have already sent over agents to protect her. They’ll wrap her in a blanket and form a circle with H-and-Ks around her.

“Do you know, this whole deal with Natalie, it feels like Blessed in a way. Like obsession, like someone has set a course and now won’t, or can’t, back down until it’s over. Seems to me it goes real deep.”

“Like a wound that never healed, that will fester until he finds a way to make her pay?”

“Yes, that’s it exactly.”

Savich said, “Blessed isn’t going away, either, and he knows where we live. He’ll try for us here sooner or later, we both know that and need to face it head-on. It might have happened last night if we hadn’t had all those people over for dinner. Sean is with his grandmother for safekeeping, but what about you? About us?”

Sherlock didn’t notice the scrambled eggs on the kitchen floor. “We could ask a couple of agents to hang out with us here or, better yet, they could hunker down in a warm car outside. What’d I’d really like is for Blessed to come back to the house so we can end him. Then we can fetch Sean and Astro from your mom’s and get our lives back on track.”

Savich realized the eggs were burning, grabbed the skillet off the stove, turned off the flame. He took the spatula from her hand, but again Sherlock didn’t notice. She started pacing the kitchen. “When you left for the hospital this morning to see Hooley, I looked around the neighborhood—yes, I was very careful—to make sure Blessed wasn’t lurking around. I found a candy wrapper in the bushes. I think he was hiding here last night, waiting for a chance to get to us. We need to act, Dillon. I’m thinking Blessed will come back to the house tonight.”

He sat her down and kneaded her tense shoulders. “All I know for sure is that he’s committed to killing us and that’s not going to happen.”

Sherlock leaned her head up to look at him upside down. “Let’s stay up tonight and wait for him.”