“She told me not to watch the show ahead, so I switched over to something else. I haven’t been sleeping very well with everything that’s been going on, so I was tired and ended up nodding off on the couch. I woke up to someone hitting me with something. I don’t know what it was, but it was hard. The rest is kind of a blur. I know I managed to get off the couch, and I tried to fight back, but I had taken my contacts out, and my glasses were knocked off when he first hit me. I could barely see, and I was disoriented from the first blow. He got some good hits in, but I know I came in contact with him a couple of times too. I managed to grab a knife from the kitchen and got him in the leg. He hit me again and knocked the knife out of my hand.

“I can’t believe I’m saying this because it sounds so ridiculous, but I hit him with a skillet and managed to get away from him. I had my phone in my pocket and called 911 while I was trying to get up the stairs. He caught up with me and hit me a couple more times. I don’t remember anything after being about halfway up the steps. The next thing I knew, I was waking up here. They told me I managed to somehow make it to the bedroom and lock myself in there. Then I passed out.”

“I don’t understand why you didn’t just run out of the house,” Carla says.

“You know how when you’re watching a horror movie and you’re yelling at the characters because they’re doing stupid things, thinking you would never do something like that?” he asks. “You do them. That’s the only thing I can say. I don’t know what I was thinking at that moment. Something just told me to go upstairs.”

“You never know how you are going to react to a situation until you are actually in it,” I say. “You might think you know exactly what you would do, but people always surprise themselves. All that matters is you survived. What can you tell me about your assailant?”

“Not much. It was definitely a man. He was wearing a black ski mask and gloves. Long sleeves. He was totally covered. The lights were off in the house, so the only light was coming from the TV, and I remember thinking he looked like a shadow,” Marshall says.

“Did he say anything to you?” I ask.

“Not to me. When I was on the phone, I heard him yell for Carla. I was so glad she wasn’t home,” he says.

“Did you recognize the voice? Was there anything about it that stood out to you?” I ask.

“I didn’t recognize it. It sounded deep and gravelly, almost like the guy was trying to force it to sound intimidating.”

“Like it wasn’t his real voice?” I ask.

“Or just that he was trying to make it sound bigger and more aggressive than it actually is,” he says.

“I’m so sorry I wasn’t there,” Carla says, taking his hand. “I wish I had been there.”

“I’m so glad you weren’t,” he repeats. “If he was coming after you, I’d much rather it have been me. I’m just sorry there isn’t more I can remember.”

“You did great,” I say. “Thank you for talking to me.”

I leave the hospital and go to the police station. Detective Fuller is in the conference room and looks up at me in surprise when I walk in.

“Hey,” he says. “I was just about to call you.”

“You were?” I ask.

“Marshall Powell’s phone records came in.” He picks up a stack of papers from the desk and hands it over to me. “It doesn’t look like he talked to anyone the night he was attacked. Other than the 911 call, he didn’t make or receive any calls or send or receive any texts for at least six hours. And before that, there was a message from Carla asking if he wanted her to make pasta for dinner.”

It reminds me of what Ander said about losing Sabrina and the little things that wouldn’t happen anymore, like talking about what they were going to have for dinner. The thought makes the back of my neck tingle. I’m convinced Carla wasn’t involved with Ander, but there’s still something that isn’t fitting together.

Crime scene pictures of the threatening messages on the walls of Gideon and Sabrina’s homes are sitting on the table, and I stare down at them. I started this investigation so focused on the threats and what kind of entity might have wanted to not only send them but act on them. But now my feelings have shifted. This feels personal. Without any group or fanatical person claiming responsibility for the crimes, the threats feel random and almost arbitrary. There’s no real reasoning for who got them and what they say.

I start to sift through the phone records, noticing that Marshall seems like one of those people who doesn’t use his phone very often. Carla’s number appears over and over with a few others scattered in the list. I’ve gone back a few pages when a number pops out at me. It’s there only once, and it says the call lasted less than five seconds, but I can’t take my eyes off it. I recognize that number. I’ve dialed it, and it has shown up on my phone screen.

Jesse Kristoff.

I look at the date of the call and realize it is a few weeks before the first reports of the threats came in. I think back on the conversation I had with Marshall and Carla right after Gideon died when they told me that they were preparing for a big move—plans that had been just getting started right before this all started. I can’t prove it just from this, but I know in my gut, I was right—I just had the wrong person.

Grabbing that sheet from the records and shoving it into my bag with the rest of my notes, I start out of the conference room.

“You’re leaving already?” Detective Fuller asks. “You just got here.”

“I know,” I say. “But there’s something I have to do.”

For the second time today, I make the drive to the hospital and park in the main entrance lot. I jog to the door and hop on the elevator to get to Marshall’s floor. The door to his room is closed when I get there, so I knock, and he calls out for me to come in. There’s a doctor standing alongside Carla by the side of the bed, and she looks annoyed at the interruption.

“Can I help you?” she asks.

“This is Agent Griffin. She’s the FBI agent investigating my case,” Marshall explains.