That was back when his niece, Jenna, still looked up to him, following his career path into law enforcement. He remembers all those nights when Jenna was still a young girl, after her father and brother died, when she would sit with Lang, how her eyes would widen as she listened to his tales of cops and robbers, good guys and bad, fighting for truth and justice. He remembers the swell of pride he felt on Jenna’s first day at the academy, when he looked at her, eager to one day don a uniform and make the world a safer place.
The chief clicks off the TV and rubs his eyes. She’s a good kid, Jenna. He wishes they hadn’t clashed over Noah Walker. After all, she did what any good cop should do—pick up a scent and follow it—and he shot her down when she started to question Walker’s guilt.
He hated doing it, dousing her flame that way. But as good a cop as she is—she has more instinct in her pinkie finger than most cops will ever have in their whole bodies—she doesn’t always see the bigger picture. Noah Walker is guilty. He’s sure of it. Rules and procedure and evidence aside, at the end of the day, that’s all that matters.
Is the dead hooker’s murder in the woods linked to the murders at 7 Ocean Drive? He doubts it. Hell, Jenna didn’t even know for sure—it was just a hunch, an itch she was scratching. But he makes himself this promise: He will follow that lead—soon. Just not now. Not when Noah’s defense attorney could play with it. After Noah is convicted, he’ll personally check it out.
“Oh, Jenna,” he mumbles to himself. Maybe she never should have come back here. The nightmares, the drinking—yes, he’s noticed how much she drinks—it all kicked in since she came back here. Is that just a coincidence?
No, it can’t be a coincidence.
Seven hours. He remembers it well. If there were seven hours in all the world he could remove, erase completely, it would be those seven hours from Jenna’s life.
Seven hours of hell.
And her mother never let Jenna set foot in the Hamptons again.
Until she came back as an adult, to be a cop.
And he let her do it. He thought he was helping her, after she got run out of Manhattan. He thought he was doing a good thing.
He pushes away his notes on tomorrow’s testimony. He’s testified a hundred times in court. He knows the drill, the flow of the questioning, the way to frame his answers, the phrases to avoid, the importance of maintaining the appropriate demeanor. He stamps out the remainder of the joint, feeling a little stoned but not wanting to take it too far tonight, with the big day tomorrow. Seems like these days, he’s always seeking some kind of lubricant to get through the evenings.
He kicks his feet off the bed and heads for the kitchen, for a glass of Beefeater. Just one glass tonight, no more, especially after smoking so much—
Something … something is wrong.
A shudder runs through him. He reaches the threshold of the kitchen before he realizes that the something—a change in the pressure, a creak in the floor, a foreign heat source—is behind him, not in front.
He turns back just as the figure steps into the hallway from the bathroom. A man wearing a full mask, though Halloween is still weeks away.
“Wait,” the chief says as he sees the weapon rising, training on him. “Wait, just hold on, let’s—”
He feels the sharp pinch, the pure heat in his left upper thigh, an instant before he hears the thwip from the gun’s suppressor. He doubles over but keeps his balance, yells, “Wait!” before another bullet tears through his left biceps. The momentum spins him around, and this time he loses his balance, falling to his hands and knees, crawling like a wounded dog away from his predator, who takes slow, deliberate steps behind him, tracking him.
The chief makes it into the kitchen, pushing off with his good arm and good leg. Another bullet blows through the bottom of his foot, ricocheting off the tile, and this time the cry he lets out is gargled, and he collapses to the floor. He tells himself to keep breathing, to avoid shock, and when he finally manages a push-up, his right elbow explodes from another bullet and he’s down for good.
The floor is spinning, everything is upside down. The intruder now casts a shadow over the chief, seeming to be in no particular hurry for this ordeal to come to an end. The chief can do nothing but hope—hope that this man just wants to hurt him and not kill him.
The next bullet drills through his right calf. Langdon can no longer bring himself to scream.
Silence follows, a pause. For just that moment, the chief feels a surge of hope. He’s been shot in the limbs, not the head or torso, no vital organs. Maybe the man will let him live. Maybe—
The chief feels a foot in his ribs, a gentle nudging. And then he hears the man’s voice, slow and deliberate, icy-calm.
“I … need a few minutes,” the man with the mask says. “Your fireplace … is really old.”
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