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relieved.
    She had to call the police. Her lungs shrank. If she called, she would have to explain finding him.
    At least he was still alive. Explaining a corpse in her house would be even more difficult. She stared at the slow rise and fall of his chest, backed up a few steps to grab her tartan wool throw from the couch, and draped it over him. “Here.”
    His lips were grayish blue where they weren’t too dirty to see the color. She had no idea how long he’d been out there, but long enough for hypothermia, apparently.
    She backed away again, still holding the broom, all the way to the kitchen phone. But once she got there, she hesitated.
    The cops didn’t like her. They hadn’t forgiven her for Dylan; nobody in Broslin had. But if she didn’t call, the man would die, and she couldn’t handle another lost life on her tally sheet. Dylan’s death had about broken her.
    Don’t think about Dylan now .
    She leaned the broom against the wall but kept it within reach, and grabbed the phone to dial 911.
    “ My name is Ashley Price. I need an ambulance and the police.” She gave her address. “I found an injured man on my property. I’m an artist. I was out looking for a place to paint.” She’d told the captain that. She needed to keep her story consistent.
    “ How bad is he hurt?” the dispatcher asked.
    “ He lost blood. Unconscious. I think hypothermia too.”
    “ Are you keeping him warm?”
    She could hear the keyboard clicking on the other end. “Yes.”
    “ Do you know his name?”
    “ No.”
    “ He doesn’t have any identification on him?”
    “ He was— He’s naked.”
    A small pause from the dispatcher, then, “All right, ma’am. Help is on the way. Please stay on the line.”
    But as Ashley glanced around, she caught sight of the easel up in the loft and her painting still on it. “I can’t. I need to put more blankets on him.” She hung up and ran for her last dreaded creation.
    She wrapped up the damn thing, then dragged it out to the garage, and hid it behind the others. Was that good enough? Would the police look there?
    She stood staring at the pile for a moment, unsure what to do, unable to think of a better hiding place. Panic rose in her throat. She swallowed it. They had no reason to search her home, no reason to think she was involved in any of this. She hadn’t done anything.
    But she would have to destroy that painting. She had to get rid of all of them. Just not at this moment. She didn’t have the time. She couldn’t allow the cops to catch her in the process.
    So she locked up the garage, then rushed back into the house and piled more blankets on the man, and could hear the sirens by the time she finished. She lived only a few miles outside Broslin.
    She skirted the man to open the door, happened to glance at her feet as she stepped carefully around him. Streaks of mud covered her legs, and blood where the frozen brush had scratched her skin. How was she going to explain why she’d been out there barefooted?
    She dashed into the laundry room, grabbed the first pair of knee-high socks she could find in the basket, and was yanking them on as cars pulled up her driveway outside.
    Act normal. She hurried back to the door to open it. Just act normal.
    “ Miss Price.” Captain Bing hiked up the steps first.
    Tall, trim, and somber, he was married to his job, from what she’d heard. Local gossip had it he’d lost his wife to murder a few years back, a murder he hadn’t been able to solve. That had to grate on a man like him.
    And he grated on others in return, which didn’t bode well for her.
    “ Captain.” She stepped back to let him in, her heart slamming against her rib cage so hard it hurt.
    Two younger officers came up the stairs behind him, a couple of EMTs in the back. He didn’t pay them any attention, his gaze snapping to the body.
    He squatted next to the unconscious man and swore, reaching for his radio. “Officer down. I repeat, officer down. It’s Jack.”