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Mia Ripley felt like a prize fool, because she’d been taken for a ride by the very breed of creature she despised.

Ripley should have trusted her gut and suckerpunched the stupid bitch when she had the chance, but she’d stupidly overrode instinct – for what?

Personal growth? Seeing an outside perspective?

All overrated. The sting was made even more painful by the presence of Josiah Nicholls’ downtrodden face opposite her, as if this asshole had anything to be upset about.

She had to get out of here and bring the real killer in.

Who, mercifully, was in this very building.

Her cell vibrated in her pocket. Ripley checked it and found Ella’s name gracing her screen. She jumped to her feet and gave Josiah Nicholls the final words she’d hopefully ever say to this gremlin. ‘Go home. Pray I don’t ever see you again.’

Nicholls had no time to respond because Ripley was out of the door. She missed the call from Ella, but a text came through a second later.

DO NOT LET SARAH WEBB LEAVE THE PRECINCT.

Dark had figured it out too. Sarah Webb wasn’t the wholesome author everyone thought she was, but the irony was that she was about to get a lot more fans once her name appeared in the headlines tomorrow. Ripley found Sheriff Bauer waiting in the corridor.

‘Ripley, what the hell is going on? None of this makes sense.’

‘It makes total sense. Clear Nicholls, he’s innocent, and-’

‘No he’s not. Assaulting a federal agent? Obstructing justice?’

‘Irrelevant. Where’s Sarah Webb?’

‘Webb?’ Bauer scrubbed his eyes with both palms. ‘She just went outside for a cigarette.’

‘A cigarette?’

‘That’s what she said. She watched you speaking with Nicholls, then rushed outside.’

Ripley had spent hours with Sarah Webb, and never once had she mentioned smoking, nor did she possess the intoxicating scent of burned tobacco on her clothes. Ripley knew what a smoker smelled like, and Sarah wasn’t one.

‘Did she catch the part where he confessed to being innocent?’

‘Yeah.’

Ripley took off down the corridor and burst out into the main precinct area.

Twenty pairs of eyeballs shot in her direction as she pounded the carpet but she didn’t return the stares.

Her focus was on finding this woman, this apparent author, this deceitful monster who’d been under their nose the whole time.

She burst out into the stairwell, rushed down with her heart in her throat, found herself in the lobby. There was a lone receptionist, but no sign of anyone outside the glass doors. Ripley exploded out into the night and frantically circled in search of her escapee.

There were about thirty cars in the lot. A candy wrapper blew past her feet.

Sarah Webb wasn’t here.

‘Shit!’

The word was quiet, but it was a visceral scream in Ripley’s head. Her legs burned and her heart screamed bloody murder, a result of both the sprint and the failure. The bitch had gone, and who knows if they’d ever find her again? She could move states or get surgery to look completely different.

Which means she’d never see justice for the blood on her hands.

Then – a sudden roar.

An engine, previously dormant, coughed, then tore to life.

It was a silver Nissan, and as the interior dome light flickered on, it illuminated the face Ripley was hunting.

Sarah Webb was the driver.

The dome light died, and before Ripley could even process a coherent thought, let alone move, the car shot forward.

It fishtailed slightly, then straightened.

And Sarah Webb sped off into the night.

Trace the plate? No, Webb would ditch that car at the first opportunity. Put out an APB? Summon as many cops as she could? No. Resources were already stretched thin. Webb would be halfway to Georgia before they even got a patrol car rolling.

Then Ripley felt a pair of car keys in her pocket.

The keys to the cruiser she’d driven back from Thomas Webb’s house. The Ford Explorer Interceptor with the high-output V8 engine that could hit 130 miles per hour with barely a tap on the gas.

Webb wanted a chase?

Game on.