The grip on my arm changed to a stroke. “It would be good for her…she should know how to protect herself. Especially with what’s going on. You may think we’re protected because of who we are, but you can never be sure. Without training, who knows? Harmony might be too much the girl you want her to be-defenseless.” Her hand dropped to her side and her voice hardened. “That last girl, the one they found today, she was just a couple of years older than Harmony.”

A shiver passed over my skin and I closed my eyes. The dead girls delivered to me, the message-it couldn’t involve Harmony. Could it?

Mother waited, a questioning expression flitting across her face.

Forcing myself to answer, I replied, “I’ll think about it-there’s no rush.”

The buzzer sounded-signaling that my office manager and artist-in-training, Mandy, had arrived and it was time to get downstairs to the shop. We wouldn’t open for a few hours, but I’d agreed to work with Mandy this morning on some basic skills like sterilization and making stencils. Glad for the escape, I deserted my computer and stood to leave.

“You never know how much time you have, Mel. Remember that.”

Swallowing the lump that had formed in my throat, I turned on my heel and left the room.

Mother’s words haunted me all day. I was stubborn and at times lied to myself, but I would never do anything to endanger Harmony. But had I endangered someone else’s child? By keeping the discovery of the first girl from the Amazons, had I made it easier for the killer to take the second?

If so, I was going to rectify that tonight-at least somewhat.

It was after one in the morning. I’d driven two hours as fast as I dared-south from Madison, across the Wisconsin-Illinois border to a spot in the northern Illinois woods. It had taken me another fifteen minutes or so to find the rough path that led to the safe camp-an old farmstead surrounded by trees.

There were six such safe camps in the U.S.