Lee made another note. “Has he hurt your brother enough for the hospital before?”

“He didn’t let Zane go to the hospital before. He locked him in his room. Christmas, Emily, you remember? Not last Christmas. The one before.”

“Oh God.” Emily closed her eyes. “Zane didn’t have flu, and he didn’t have a skiing accident when you were at the resort.”

“We came home from school. The last day of school before Christmas. Dad was home early, and when we came in, we could hear Mom crying, and Dad yelling. Zane tried to stop me, but I ran back, and she was on the floor, and there was blood, and he was hitting her, and I yelled for it to stop. And Zane…”

She took a long sip of Sprite. “Before, he’d make me go upstairs, sit with me. Or if it happened when we were already in our rooms, I’d go to his, and he’d let me stay until it stopped. But this time, he tried to stop him from hurting her, and Dad…”

She let out a hiccupping sob. “I kept yelling to stop, and he—Dad turned and looked at me, and he was going to hit me. And Zane pushed me back and tried to stop him. He hurt him so bad, Mr. Keller. He kept hitting him, and he kicked him, and she just watched! And Dad picked Zane up, like over his shoulder, and took him upstairs, locked him in his room. I should’ve done something, but I was afraid.”

“It’s not your fault.” Even paler than she’d been, Emily brought Britt’s clenched fist to her lips, kissed it. “None of it’s your fault.”

“He broke Zane’s nose, and his eyes were all swollen and black, and his lip was cut and swollen. I snuck him a sandwich when I could, a PB&J, but he could hardly eat.

“The day after, on Christmas Eve, I heard Dad go in, and in a little while Zane was yelling—screaming—like he was hurt again. And he said—Dad said—Zane had the flu. He was contagious and no one was allowed to see him, and spread germs. Even though Grams and Pop were coming for Christmas. And when we got to the resort, we’d tell the people there he’d been messing around on his bike and had a bad fall. He had to stay in the room while we went skiing. And when we got back, we had to say he fell when he was skiing.”

She took the tissue Emily pressed into her hand. “You can call the resort if you don’t believe me. You can call them. We go every year. They’ll tell you he had the black eyes and everything when we got there. And you can talk to people where we live, to his teachers, and they’ll tell you how we said he fell skiing.”

“What resort do you go to?”

“High Country Resort and Spa. We go from December twenty-sixth to the thirtieth. We go every year.”

“I went to see Zane Christmas Eve,” Emily said. “My sister called, said he was sick, said we had to move Christmas dinner to my place because of germs. I went to take him some chicken soup, and a book I was going to smuggle in—on their do-not-read list. A Dark Tower novel, that’s all.”

When she felt her throat burn, she took a swig of Coke, breathed out the helpless rage. “They wouldn’t let me go up, and they left him there alone on Christmas while they came to dinner. They’ve cut me off from the kids recently. I don’t get to see them very often, there’s always an excuse.”

“They said you didn’t want to spend time with us, that you had other things you wanted to do. We didn’t believe them, honest we didn’t, but that’s what they said. Dad says you’re a lazy slut.”

Emily managed a smile. “Sometimes I wish.” She kissed Britt’s cheek. “We have more evidence. A friend—the father of my nephew’s best friend is on his way here now. He’s an EMT, and he heard Zane was hurt, he stayed with him at the hospital. Zane gave him his house key, asked him to go in and get some notebooks he’d hidden. He said he’d written it all down. They took him to prison, Detective Keller. They had to take him out in a wheelchair. If you became a cop to help people, help us.”

“What’s the name of the friend bringing the notebooks? I need to clear him with the officer on the night desk,” he said when they both hesitated.

“Dave Carter.”

“Give me a second.”

He should call his lieutenant, Lee thought. Child services. He should call Buncombe and get the full name of the brother. But for now, he’d play it out.

The kid wasn’t lying.

He came back to find the girl with her head on her aunt’s shoulder. She looked so damn small, so beat-up.

“How’d you get out of the hospital?”

“I snuck into another room for the phone, and called Emily. She was already there, but they wouldn’t tell her where I was because my father said not to. I went down the stairs, and she met me. Because she believes me, believes Zane, because she said we had to tell the police. My father will hurt her, too, if he can.”

“You don’t worry about that,” Emily told her.

“If I’m going to help you, I need your names.” It would take him about two minutes to find this Zane with a call to Buncombe, but he wanted the girl, the little girl with exhausted green eyes, to tell him. To trust him.

“Do you believe me? Will you believe me even when my father says I’m lying?”

“If I didn’t believe you, I’d have made calls already. I’m a detective.” He smiled when he said it. “I could find out your names, and your brother’s. But I didn’t, because I believe you, and I want you to believe I believe you.”

Britt looked at Emily, got a nod. “You have to trust.”

“I’m Britt Bigelow. My brother’s Zane. My parents are Dr. Graham Bigelow and Mrs. Eliza Bigelow. We live in Lakeview Terrace. And I think he’ll kill me if he can now that I’ve stopped lying.”

“He’s not going to touch you, or Zane, again. Didn’t I tell you I wouldn’t let him? The wrong Bigelow is in prison, Detective. And I’m Emily Walker.”

“Got someone here for you, Detective.” A uniformed officer led Dave in.

“Hey, Britt, let me have a look there.” With a messenger bag over his shoulder, Dave crouched down by her chair. “Are you hurting?”

“I have an awful bad headache, Mr. Carter, and my cheek hurts a lot. My eye, too.”

“Oh, Britt, why didn’t you say? Damn it, I didn’t even ask, not really. I must have some Advil or something.”

“Let’s not,” Dave said as Emily started pawing through her purse. “I don’t know what they gave her in the hospital. But I stopped on the way.” He opened the bag, took out a bag of frozen peas. “Quick relief. You just hold that on your cheek, okay? How many?” He held up two fingers.

“Two. I’m okay, Mr. Carter. I feel better since we came here.”

“Good to hear.” Dave rose, held out a hand to Lee. “Dave Carter.”

“Detective Keller.”

“Well, Detective Keller, since I had Zane’s key and his permission, I don’t think going in the house, into his room qualifies as unlawful entry, but I’ll take that lump if it comes.”

He pulled several notebooks out of his bag. “I read the first entry in the one marked Number One. If you can read that and do nothing about getting Zane out of that place, about putting Graham Bigelow behind bars, you aren’t human.”