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seat as he kicked him out the other side. The boy rolled on the ground, but Grant didn’t wait to see what happened next. He dropped into the driver’s seat and gunned the engine.
    He’d nearly made a clean getaway when the big cop in the blue trench coat burst through the front door and stopped in front of the car, his gun leveled at Grant’s head.
    ‘‘Let ’er go!’’ he shouted in a pinched voice, his free hand clutching his opposite shoulder, which was bleeding.
    But Konrad chose that moment to start firing again, and the cop turned his attention to the faraway window and fired his pistol in that direction instead.
    Grant swerved around the cop and immediately heard a shout of ‘‘Hold it!’’ from behind.
    He didn’t.
    Julie moaned again. She was waking up.
    Daniel Cossick had seen some strange things in his life—stranger than most could claim—but there were no words for what he was seeing at this moment.
    Midnight had come and gone, and he’d just tracked down the source of the second shimmer at last.
    Stepping across fresh yellow police tape, he tentatively touched the knife that was wedged into the subway station column. It had dug all the way into the cement, stopped only by its hilt from going in any further.
    The subway was far from empty at this time of night, but no one seemed to care that he was taking a closer look.
    He was surprised the police hadn’t tried to remove the thing from the wall.
    Or maybe they had , and couldn’t.
    ‘‘What is it? What do you see?’’ Lisa squawked eagerly in his ear, making him jump.
    When he’d settled, he replied quietly, still examining the knife.
    ‘‘Exactly what we’re looking for. Something impossible.’’
    Daniel took a step forward and leaned in close to the weapon, getting as close an impression of it as he could. It looked rather heavy. Probably at least nine inches in length, handle to razor-sharp tip. The hilt was solid and had a comfortable, form-fitted grip.
    This was no pocket toy casually left behind. To whoever owned it, this was something of great value. It would not have been left here by choice.
    Daniel knew there was little chance of removing it, but he couldn’t resist trying. He gripped it with gloved hands, and after glancing around the station to make sure no one was looking, gave it his best King Arthur tug. It was a pointless exercise.
    ‘‘What does that mean?’’ Lisa asked.
    Daniel turned to see the other roped-off area on the opposite side of the tracks. Spots of dried blood were visible on the ground. He twisted to face the pillar in front of him once more.
    ‘‘It means the Threshold has been breached,’’ he answered somberly, stepping away from the column but never looking away from the knife. ‘‘And all bets are off.’’

6
    Grant drove. For hours, much of the time not realizing where he was going.
    He had no destination in mind; he just wanted to get Julie away from danger. Eventually he took the 405 to Rosa Parks and then headed east back to the glow of downtown. Traffic buzzed even this late but never bogged down. He almost took the exit back to his penthouse but dismissed it. It was too dangerous.
    The stolen Jeep finally came to a stop almost of its own volition at a small park called Hollenbeck Lake. Sunrise was still an hour or two away and Grant tucked the Jeep as far from streetlamps as possible. His mind should’ve been whirling, trying to decide what to say to Julie when she fully came to, but exhaustion overtook him and he fell into a fitful sleep.
    He roused, chilled, when a glint of dawn peeked off to the east.
    Julie made groggy noises from the backseat, and Grant carefully scooped her up into his arms, struggling under the weight on his bad leg. Her pocketbook still drooped over one shoulder. He glanced around frantically and spotted a park bench at the edge of the lake.
    Even at daybreak he was unsurprised to find a small handful of runners already there, circling the water.