He knew that no one would notice him; he was too far away, there were too many people walking by, too many cars passing, too much bright October sunlight. And he knew as well that he had been lucky to develop a chameleon-like ability to blend into his surroundings. He thought that he should really have become a movie star, because of his capacity to always seem to be someone else.

In a run-down dive of a bar, catering to alcoholics and fringe criminals, he could be a tough guy. Then, just as easily, in Boston’s massive student population, he could appear to be just another college kid. The backpack, filled to bursting with computer texts, helped form that impression. Michael O’Connell thought he maneuvered expertly from world to world, relying at all times on the inability of people to take more than a second to size him up.

Had they, he thought, they would have been scared.

He watched, easily picking out Ashley’s reddish blond hair from the group. A half dozen young people were sitting in a loose circle, eating lunch, laughing, telling stories. Had he been the seventh member of that group, he would have turned quiet. He was good at lying and making up believable fictions about who he was, where he’d come from, and what he’d done, but in a group, he always worried that he would go too far, say something loose and unlikely, and lose the credibility that was important to him. One-on-one, with someone like Ashley, he had no trouble being seductive, creating a need for sympathy.

Michael O’Connell watched, letting rage grow within him.

It was a familiar sensation, one that he both welcomed and hated. It was different from the anger he felt when he was readying for a fight, or when he got into an argument with a boss at any number of the occasional jobs he held, or with his landlord, or the old lady who lived next door to his tiny apartment and who bothered him with her cats and leery-eyed stares. He could have words with any number of people, even come to blows, and it was to him next to nothing. But his feelings about Ashley were far different.