And then there was Evelyn’s tabby cat, Roadblock. Roadblock spent the evening in a kind of frenzy, tearing around the bedroom in tight circles until Evelyn lost patience and put her out. Had the cat sensed some tenuous radiation coming across the dark water of the lake?

Perhaps. Perhaps.

He woke a little after midnight.

He hovered a moment on the fragile edge of awareness, dimly conscious of Evelyn beside him, of the way she breathed in her sleep, long delicate sighs. What had woken him? A sound, a motion…

Then it came again, an irregular metallic tapping—a tapping at the window.

He turned and saw the moonlit silhouette of the cat. Roadblock, out for the night, had climbed onto the garage roof and up the shingled slope to the bedroom window. Now she wanted back in. Claws on the plate glass. Tack-scratch. “Go ’way,” Dex mumbled. Wishful thinking. Tack tack.

He stood up and pulled on his underwear. The warmth of the day had evaporated; the bedroom was chilly. The cat stood on her hind legs, arched against the windowpane in an eerie stretch. Moonlight fell on Dex, and he turned and saw his reflection in the vanity mirror. He saw the thatch of dark hair across his chest, his large hands loose at his sides. His gaunt face lay half in shadow, eyes wide and bewildered by sleep. He would be forty-one years old in August. Old man.

He unlatched the window. Roadblock leaped inside and raced across the carpet, more frantic than ever. The cat jumped on the bed and Evelyn stirred in her sleep. “Dex?” she murmured. “What—?” And rolled over, sighing.

He leaned out into the cool night air.

The town was silent. Two Rivers closed down after midnight, even on a warm Friday. The sound of traffic had faded. He heard the warble of a loon out on the deeps of Lake Merced. Trees flush with new leaves moved in tides of night air. Somewhere down Beacon Road, a dog barked.