From the acclaimed author of The Evening Spider and The Broken
Teaglass comes this psychological thriller about the murder of a
psychologist in a quiet New England town and his former patient whose
unreliable thread will keep readers guessing until the shocking end.
I hear myself whispering. Not again. Not again.
Why did I ever come back here? Surely because of you. Because I thought
of something I'd always meant to tell you. Because you were the only one
I ever really wanted to tell it to...
Therapist Dr. Mark Fabian is dead--bludgeoned in his office.
But that doesn't stop former patient Nadine Raines from talking to
him--in her head. Why did she come back to her hometown after so many
years away? Everyone here thinks she's crazy. And she has to admit--they
might have good reason to think so. She committed a shockingly violent
act when she was sixteen, and has never really been able to explain that
dark impulse--even to Fabian. Now that Fabian's dead, why is she still
trying?
Meanwhile, as Detective Henry Peacher investigates Fabian's death, he
discovers that shortly before he died, Fabian pulled the files of two
former patients. One was of Nadine Raines, one of Henry's former high
school classmates. Henry still remembers the disturbing attack on a
teacher that marked Nadine as a deeply troubled teen.
More shockingly, the other file was of Johnny Streeter, who is now
serving a life sentence for a mass shooting five years ago. The shooting
devastated the town and everyone--including Henry, who is uncomfortable
with the "hero" status the tragedy afforded him--is ready to move on.
But the appearance of his file brings up new questions. Maybe there is a
decades-old connection between Nadine and Streeter. And maybe that
somehow explains what Nadine is doing in Fabian's office nearly twenty
years after being his patient. Or how Fabian ended up dead two days
after her return. Or why Nadine has fled town once again.
But as Nadine and Henry head toward a confrontation, both will discover
that the secrets of people's hearts are rarely simple, and--even in the
hidden depths of a psychologist's files--rarely as they appear.
