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running an equine therapy program for disabled and disadvantaged kids.”
    “Big farm?”
    “About ninety acres, I think. It looks like an English countryside out there.”
    Mitch grunted. “Money will buy that.”
    Reid knew Mitch had his own share of money troubles related to his latest divorce. “How are things going with the house? Are you going to be able to keep it?”
    “Probably, if I can refinance.” Mitch scowled in thought. “Eileen would like to see me lose it. It’s about the only thing she didn’t get handed to her in the settlement.”
    After another twenty minutes, Reid left Mitch to pursue the redhead, who had accepted a second drink and gotten a little friendlier. Shouldering his way toward the front of the bar through the packed crowd, he tried to disregard the faint throb that had started in his temples a few minutes earlier. It’s only a headache. Anyone could get one in a packed bar buzzing with loud music and too much conversation.
    It was nothing to worry about.
    Reaching the exit, he welcomed the rush of cool night air onto his face and headed left toward the side street where he had parked his SUV. But as he clicked the key fob to open the door, the pain inside his skull suddenly became sharper and more insistent. Reid closed his eyes and raised the fingers of his right hand to his forehead, leaning against the vehicle to steady himself.
    A minute later, the dizzying pain subsided. He felt a momentary anxiety that the tumor was back—that it had somehow regrown or the surgery had failed to remove all of it.
    He shrugged off the irrational thoughts. His last MRI was one hundred percent clean.
    Reid opened the door to the SUV and slid onto its leather seat. He felt fine now. The headache had comeand gone like a summer storm. Still, he sat inside the vehicle for several more moments, staring out through the windshield and contemplating his lengthy recuperation. Although the tumor hadn’t been malignant, its location had been in a vital region, making its removal necessary. The surgery had been complex and invasive, and it had taken months to get his life back. He’d been weak, fragile, two things he had no intention of ever being again.
    The crime scene photo—the one he’d shown to Caitlyn—lay on the passenger seat. Seeking a new direction for his thoughts, Reid allowed his gaze to settle on it. The victim in the row-house basement eerily mirrored the dead women Cahill had left behind. Frowning, he picked up the photo and studied it more closely. For him, the chess pawn removed any possibility of coincidence.
    He wondered how long it would be before a second body turned up.

5
    T he snapshots were stored in a cardboard box, in back of the closet shelf almost out of reach. He had placed them there after the funeral, unable to bear seeing her beautiful face in the photos that marked the ridiculously short time they’d had together. Someday, he would give the photos to his daughters, who had been too young to remember much about her. But he needed no reminders.
    Her image was burned into his mind.
    Sometimes, he imagined seeing her—in the throngs of shoppers at the Georgetown mall during the holidays, or among the businesspeople headed to work on a busy Tuesday morning. His heart would lift until reality grabbed him by the collar.
    She’s gone. Let her go .
    Once, he had followed a woman for five city blocks, mesmerized by the sway of her blond hair in the morning sunlight. She had worn a navy peacoat that looked achingly familiar. Winded, he had caught up with her, his throat tight and his heart beating in hopeful anticipation. He’d reached for her, whirling her around to face him. But the eyes, nose, the tilt of the chin were all wrong. Not even close to her beauty.
    Startled, the woman had backed away as he offered a broken apology, his face red and eyes tearing with another foolish disappointment.
    He knew better—knew that sick son of a bitch had killed her—and yet he