THE GIRL UNDER THE SUN

LOGAN AND SCARLETT SERIAL KILLER THRILLER

BOOK 13

DAN PADAVONA

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1

Delaney’s eyes snapped open to a blinding sky, the sun’s glare searing her retinas. Every inch of her skin felt scorched, her lips cracked from thirst. She sucked in a breath, and the arid desert air clawed her raw throat. She tried to sit up, but pain jolted through her shoulder and chest as though knives had been driven into her flesh.

Blinking against the light, she took stock of her body. A film of red dust clung to her arms. Her clothes were torn and stained with blood. Cuts and bruises throbbed across her arms and legs. She tried to remember how she’d gotten there, but her mind was hollow. A headache pounded behind her eyes. Why couldn’t she remember?

She struggled to her feet, swaying dizzily. Ripples of heat rose off the sand and baked the soles of her feet through her sneakers. Fissures in the dirt formed pale veins of salt and stone. She turned in a circle, searching for civilization. The desert stretched in a vast, merciless expanse.

Then she saw a winding ribbon of asphalt shimmering on the horizon. A road. She forced her stiff legs to move and staggered across the cracked earth, plumes of dust rising with each dragging step.

“Help!”

Immediately, she regretted straining her voice.

As she approached the road, the scene materialized. The outline of a vehicle appeared; the white reflection made her shield her eyes. She recognized Dad’s SUV. But where was he?

Again, she tried to remember. She and Dad had left the Phoenix suburbs and driven out to see the desert. Then what?

She pressed onward, ignoring the pain. A new pang of dread tugged at her senses. Was Dad lost in the desert? The wind kicked grit into her eyes. She lowered her head, one hand raised to shield her face.

Finally, she drew close enough to confirm it was indeed her parents’ vehicle. The driver’s door hung open, keys dangling in the ignition. Fear pulsed in her veins. Then her eyes settled on a figure sprawled on the ground near the front tire. Unmoving.

Her knees buckled. She could see a shoe, the angle of an outstretched arm.

“Dad?”

Delaney recognized the shirt, the dark hair, and her lungs squeezed tight with a silent scream. She lowered herself onto her hands and knees.

No. It can’t be.

She swallowed, willing herself not to lose consciousness.

He lay with his face down, forehead pressed against the parched ground, one arm crumpled beneath his chest as if in a gesture of defense. But from whom?

Her breath hitched, and a wave of nausea rose in her throat. She knew how the desert could claim lives—heatstroke, dehydration—but this looked different. There was a bruise blooming at his temple, dark and swollen against his sunburned skin.

“Dad, say something.”

She forced herself to inch closer. Her fingers found his neck and searched for a pulse.

Nothing.

Was she even touching the right spot? She didn’t know what she was doing. Straining, she turned him over so she could see his face.

A gale ruffled his hair. She studied his chest and belly, willing them to rise and fall. They didn’t.

A sob caught in her throat. She jerked her hand back, leaving a smear of her own blood on his shirt. She peered down the open road and into the horizon, as though an explanation would materialize.

The vehicle hadn’t crashed. There were no dents on it, and she didn’t see skid marks along the blacktop.

Someone had attacked them. That was the only explanation. Who would do this?

An image of a faceless killer looming over her father’s body blossomed in her mind.

She squeezed her eyes shut, calming herself.

Think.

Vague impressions danced at the edges of her mind—the SUV crawling to a stop on the shoulder, a horrible feeling that something was wrong, that they weren’t alone in the desert.

Gritting her teeth, she brushed the sand from her father’s hair. A single droplet of blood stained the ground beneath him. His knuckles appeared raw, as if he’d fought for his life.

Her vision blurred. She forced herself to look at him—really look. The T-shirt she recognized from that morning now bore a dark smear around the collar. No bullet holes. The bruise on his temple seemed the only wound, but it was enough. The swelling told her someone had struck him hard. She looked around and saw a jagged rock beside the car. A red smear marred the surface.

Delaney pressed a hand to her mouth, trying to swallow the panicked wail building in her throat. She glanced over her shoulder with an instinctual fear that whoever had done this might come for her next. The desert stretched in all directions, a scorched and empty stage for whatever violence had unfolded.

She returned to the SUV, the door left wide open. The keys dangled in the ignition. A thousand questions jostled for attention, but all that mattered was surviving. Her pulse beat in her ears.

As the heat built, she climbed into the driver’s seat. She had only a learner’s permit, but the SUV was her lifeline.

Praying, she turned the key. The engine coughed with a grinding rattle.

“Come on. Please.”

She cranked the key again.

The SUV refused to cooperate. Her phone was gone, her pockets empty except for a crumpled receipt and a few coins. She searched the center console, the glove box, and couldn’t locate her father’s phone either. Which meant she couldn’t call for help, even if a signal existed in this wasteland. Fear clouded her thoughts, questions piling atop each other like dry kindling waiting for a spark.

A sob rose in her throat and she pounded the steering wheel with her fists. She looked at her father’s motionless body in the rearview mirror, and fresh horror gripped her. She couldn’t leave him there. But what choice did she have? If she stayed, the desert would claim her as its next victim.

Climbing out of the SUV, Delaney stood over her father. She felt guilty for even considering walking away.

“Dad, I’m sorry.”

The sole of her shoe caught on a crack. She shielded her eyes and wiped the perspiration from her brow. Turning back one last time, she saw her father’s fingers curled in a silent plea.

Tears stung her cheek. This was a betrayal. But there was no way around it.

“I’ll find help,” she told him, though she knew he couldn’t hear. His eyes would never open again.

She began walking. The world wavered before her like a fever dream.

With nothing but sorrow to guide her, Delaney put one foot in front of the other, abandoning a truth she couldn’t remember.

2

Scarlett Bell stirred as though surfacing from a muddy pond. Her eyelids, heavy with fatigue, fluttered open to the harsh glare of sunlight streaming through the Escalade’s tinted windows. She couldn’t remember when she’d allowed herself to slip into unconsciousness. Sleep had become a fleeting luxury these past days. Yet here she was, jostling in the backseat, an ache radiating across her shoulders and down her spine.

Harold sat to her left, his brow knit in quiet focus as he studied a dog-eared map spread across his knees. Up front, Gardy hunched over the steering wheel. Sweat beaded on his temple. Wolf observed from the passenger seat, his attention fixed on the road. The desert wind poured through a half-cracked window.

“It’s hotter than hell in the Escalade,” Gardy said. “Shouldn’t you raise the window and let the air conditioner do its job?”

“I prefer to listen to my surroundings, Agent Gardy,” Wolf said. “And the fresh air will do you well.”

“It’s a hundred degrees.”

“A hundred and five, if the temperature sensor is functioning properly.”

Bell pushed herself up, grimacing at the stiff protest of her muscles. The Arizona desert stretched in a dusty panorama. A cluster of faded buildings crawled out of the horizon. From here, they were dark silhouettes beneath the brutal sun.

Gardy removed his foot from the gas pedal when he spotted the town. “You fool, Wolf. You led us into a trap. I’ll turn around before the police spot us.”

“Continue forward.”

“It’s a town, and we’re fugitives. You might be comfortable in a disguise, but what about the three of us? Everyone will recognize us.”

Wolf lowered the window another inch. “No one will see us unless you’re worried about ghosts.”

Gardy slowed the vehicle as the structures took shape: sagging roofs, boarded windows, a single church spire defying the blue sky. “Look at that place. We should turn around. We’re sitting ducks.”

Bell sat forward and touched Wolf’s shoulder. “We need to avoid the police. Until Gardy, Harold, and I can prove our innocence, we are fugitives.”

“If there was a soul in this town, I would agree,” Wolf said.

“Wolf, are you taking us to a ghost town?”

“Precisely.”

“What makes you think squatting in some half-dead ghost town is a good idea?”

Wolf fixed his eyes on the town, scanning for hazards. “No one visits Redthorn Wells anymore. The rumors say it’s cursed. If someone comes looking, we’ll see them long before they find us.”

Bell couldn’t counter Wolf’s logic. But a ghost town in the Arizona desert? How would they survive?

Harold adjusted his seatbelt strap. “Call me superstitious, but I want nothing to do with ghosts.”

“Ghosts aren’t real, Harold,” Gardy said with a humorless laugh. “The only things that haunt places like this are snakes and tumbleweeds.”

“Not according to the archives I follow.” Harold folded the map. “Ever read the declassified documents on Skinwalker Ranch? All the weird stuff about Roswell? I’m telling you, the government has been hiding paranormal findings for decades.”

Wolf glanced over his shoulder. “Dear Harold, if anything haunts these streets, it’s the memory of human tragedy. You will not find glowing eyes in the darkness, except for the wildlife.”

“The desert is a big place. Plenty of room to bury secrets, especially where the government is involved.”

Bell pressed a hand to her temple. After the senseless deaths and Deputy Director Carter’s betrayal, she wanted to crawl into a hole and disappear. Yet a ghost town wasn’t what she had had in mind. “Enough.” Her voice sounded sharper than intended. “If this is our only choice, I suppose this place is safer than a populated area.”

“I hope you know what you’re doing,” Gardy said to Wolf. “What is this place?”

The serial killer checked the hunting knife sheathed at his side. “Welcome to Redthorn Wells, my friends.”

The stolen Escalade rumbled through the center of town, over aging asphalt hidden under a veil of swirling dust. In the stillness, Bell could almost believe old spirits roamed these empty alleys, bearing witness to the arrival of four souls in search of shelter, their secrets best left interred.

She inhaled, tasting desert air. They had no choice but to trust Wolf’s instincts. One more gamble. She blinked at the pale reflection of her face in the window.

“Are you certain no one is here?” Gardy asked.

“Quite. Redthorn Wells was founded in 1887, if the legends are to be believed. People viewed this place as a desert oasis, for it thrived on a scarlet-tinted water source—rich in iron, some say. Others claim it was painted with blood, that the land demanded sacrifice.”

“Sounds like a ridiculous story.”

“Of course, the townsfolk didn’t call it ‘cursed’ back then. Not until disputes over water rights turned neighbor against neighbor. People died under suspicious circumstances. The local sheriff disappeared, leaving nothing but his badge floating in a half-empty well. Rumors spread of sabotage and murder. Dark rituals, even.”

“See! I told you,” Harold said.

Bell suppressed a shiver.

Wolf continued, tilting his head toward a collapsing storefront. “When the spring ran dry, it was as if the entire town lost its pulse. A mass exodus, houses abandoned overnight. The few who stayed behind vanished within a few years.”

“This town isn’t safe,” Gardy said. “I don’t want a roof caving in on my head.”

“Fear not, Agent Gardy. These walls are sturdy enough for our purposes.”

“How is that possible?”

“The desert has a strange way of preserving things.” Wolf gestured from one crumbling façade to the next. “No rain to rot the timbers, no moisture to soften the walls. The sun bakes the earth until it hardens like stone, and the dryness mummifies the wood and clay. Only the winds will wear it away, and even that will take another few decades.” He swept a hand toward a warped porch outside a house, its boards gray and desiccated. “You can see it in the cracks, widened by scorching heat but not weakened enough to collapse. The adobe is thick, the timbers solid. These buildings were crafted to withstand nature’s hostility.”

“You’re saying these buildings are stable?”

“Stable enough. We won’t have to worry about a sudden cave-in if we choose our shelter wisely. A few doors and windows may be missing, but the walls still stand, proud and stubborn. And in these surroundings, we can become ghosts ourselves, unseen and undisturbed.”

“I’m not ready to become a ghost,” Harold said.

“If you wish to hide from the FBI, you will become one.”

3

Bell followed the others down what might have once been Main Street, the arid wind pushing her hair across her face. Splintered boards and broken windowpanes marked the path, telling stories of lost decades and desert storms. Wolf led the way with certainty, as if he had roamed these roads a hundred times before. Had he?

Ahead loomed a squat, single-story building fashioned from thick adobe bricks. Its faded whitewash had long since peeled away, exposing the sunbaked clay beneath. The roof, made of sturdy wooden beams and corrugated steel, held steady, though the rest of Redthorn Wells seemed on the verge of collapse. A warped sign hung crookedly above what had once been a front door. Most of the letters had worn off, leaving only outlines.

“This was a boarding house,” Wolf said. “Travelers lodged here for the night before heading deeper into the desert or back to the city. The woman who ran it believed in hospitality. A hearty meal and a place to sleep, if the stories hold true.”

Glancing over his shoulder, Harold muttered, “What kind of ‘stories’? I really don’t like this place.”

Gardy scowled at the battered facade. He shook his head, mouth set in a hard line. “Even if we survive the night, how are we supposed to make it long-term? We’re too close to the desert. Sooner or later, we’ll starve or dehydrate. The authorities won’t even have to arrest us. They can dig up our corpses.”

Wolf shrugged, stepping around a gaping hole in the old porch. “In case you’ve forgotten,” he said, “there is no alternative. We have supplies in the Escalade and enough water to last a little while.”

As Gardy appeared ready to argue, Bell turned to him.

“We just need time to figure out our next move,” she said. “Now isn’t the time to run. Wait until the heat dies down.”

“This heat will never die down,” Gardy said, looking up at the open sky.

Harold kicked at a fallen plank, sending up a cloud of dust that made him cough. “This place is beyond creepy.”

“It’s better than sleeping under the stars,” said Bell.

Wolf pushed open the door. Beyond the threshold lay a large, dimly lit room. Faded floral wallpaper clung to the adobe in patches. A wooden counter spanned one side, where guests would have signed in for the night.

“It may not be much,” Wolf allowed, “but the roof is intact, and the walls are thick.”

“The adobe should keep the building cool, but it’s an oven in here.”

“I have a plan to keep us cool.”

“Do tell.”

“One thing at a time, my friend.”

Inside the abandoned building, Bell felt the echoes of a hundred travelers who had rested here.

Wolf led them into the boardinghouse, past the remnants of a once grand lobby and along a narrow hallway. The second floor was accessed by a wooden staircase that, at first glance, appeared rickety. Yet when Wolf put his weight on it, the steps barely creaked.

“Sturdier than it appears,” Wolf said.

Bell trailed behind, brushing her hand over the banister. A fine layer of dust coated the polished wood.

Gardy, too, seemed taken aback. “I thought this place would be rotted through.”

“It’s almost clean,” Harold said.

At the top of the stairs, the hallway opened into a corridor with doorways lining each side. The wallpaper from below continued here, less tattered, the patterns visible. Wolf paused in front of room number five. A brass plate gleamed in the dull light.

He reached into his pocket and produced a key. Bell narrowed her brow. A key? She exchanged a glance with Gardy and Harold; both men seemed equally baffled. Wolf inserted the key into the lock, then gave a turn. The bolt slid free, smooth as if someone oiled it now and then.

The door swung inward and revealed a dustless space. Shelves lined the walls, and in the center stood a simple wooden table. On it lay an arrangement of canned goods, bottles of water, and two medical kits, everything one might need to hide out indefinitely. A single cot, folded against the far wall, suggested more comfort than she would have expected in an abandoned town.

“This is convenient,” Bell said.

Gardy took a step inside and glared at Wolf. “You’ve been here before.”

Wolf entered next. “We all have secrets, Agent Gardy. This is one of mine.” He rested a hand on a shelf crowded with MREs and a couple of Coleman lanterns. “I never expected to bring guests.”

How long had Wolf planned to use this place?

“This is another safe house,” Bell said.

“A temporary refuge.”

“Like the house in North Carolina.”

“This place has no owner except for me.”

Harold picked up a can of beans and gave Wolf a skeptical look. “The pull date on this can is several months into the future. How often do you visit this place?”

“Often enough.”

Gardy set his hands on his hips. “That spring you mentioned—does it still exist?”

“Indeed,” Wolf said. “When we run out of bottled water, the spring will prevent us from dying.”

“Is the water safe to drink?”

“Yes, but we will use water purification tablets. There is no need to risk illness.”

Crossing the room, Wolf stood before a closet with padlocked wooden slats. Another key undid the lock. He reached inside, where a plastic container held folded blankets. Then he withdrew an LCD television.

Gardy gave a derisive snort. “Right. So we’ll just plug that into the wall and catch a movie?”

Wolf set the TV down on a table. “As a matter of fact, we can.”

He located an outlet in the wall, unwound the power cord, and plugged it in. For a moment, nothing happened. Then the screen flickered to life.

Harold’s eyes widened. “Wait, what? This place doesn’t have electricity.”

“I installed three solar panels on the roof. They’re camouflaged to avoid detection. It’s basic, but enough to power a few devices.”

Bell couldn’t believe what she was seeing. A single news channel filled the screen, the sound muted, but the headline crawl was unmistakable—something about a manhunt in multiple states. She felt her pulse jump and quickly averted her gaze.

Gardy paced behind them, arms folded tight across his chest. “God, Wolf. You planned for every contingency. How long have you kept this place hidden?”

Wolf reached for the remote. “Long enough. He muted the television and turned to face them. “We’ll each have our own room. You’ll find cots and pillows. Enough basic comforts to keep us alive. Everyone should take a blanket from the box.”

“I don’t want to sleep alone. Not in this creepy place.” Harold moved away from the door.

“You’re welcome to share a room with me, if you prefer.”

Harold’s cheeks drained of color. “Ah—no, thanks. I’ll…I’ll be fine on my own.”

“Lead the way,” Gardy said. “I want to see these so-called accommodations.”

Wolf guided them down the hallway. Here, the adobe thick was enough to prevent the ravages of time. He opened the first door. Inside was a compact space with a single cot under a tarp, a pillow wrapped in plastic to keep out the dust, and a small table pushed against the wall. On the table stood a lamp, its cord curling toward another electrical outlet.

“Each room is similar,” Wolf explained, moving to the second door and unlocking it. Again, a neat cot, an outlet, and a lamp. The musty smell of disuse lingered, but it was far from unbearable. “I tried to keep everything sealed as best I could.”

Bell ran her fingertips over the tarp on a third cot, finding no residue. “This will do.”

“We have enough food to last us for two weeks. After that, the nearest town is a twenty-mile drive. Provided I wear a disguise, I can come and go without fear of detection.”

In the fourth room, Harold turned on the lamp and whistled. The Spartan arrangement was identical to the others.

“Did you wire this place or something?” Harold asked.

“A friend did.”

“Someone we know?”

“No, and don’t ask questions.”

The IT specialist swallowed. He turned the lamp on and off two times, reassured. “If we plan to stay here for any length of time, we’ll need a setup that keeps us connected but untraceable. I can rig a secure network with the gear we already have, as long as nobody tries something foolish like logging into their old email or social media.”

Everyone looked at Gardy, who shrugged.

“Yeah, I won’t do that,” Gardy said.

“The goal is to conceal our activity,” Harold added. “I can piggyback on a satellite connection or a nearby cell tower, but I’ll need to be careful. The more data we move, the more footprints we leave.”

Wolf leaned against the doorframe. “The solar panels on the roof are hooked to a robust battery bank. You’ll find plenty of juice to power laptops, lights, and whatever you carry around with you, Harold.”

“I have a router.”

Gardy stared at Harold. “You actually walk around with a router?”

“I know too many of the government’s secrets. It was only a matter of time before they came after me.” Harold checked his phone. “It’s about time I recharged my battery. Fox, are you saying we could theoretically stay powered forever? At least as long as the sun keeps shining?”

“Harold, we’re in a ghost town. Perhaps it is time you called me by my real name.”

“As you wish, Mr. Fox.”

Bell rolled her eyes. Harold believed the government bugged every home, every building, even an abandoned town like Redthorn Mills.

“That’s right,” Wolf said. “The power system is built for longevity. It won’t handle something like air conditioning, especially in this heat, but it will keep the computers, television, and phones running. Just try not to turn on too many devices at once.”

“Understood,” Harold said. “I can make this work. But I’m going to need some time. And if you have any spare hardware or extenders, that would help.”

“Check the storeroom downstairs,” Wolf said, handing Harold a third key. “I keep most electronics sealed in crates. You’ll find cables, another router, and a few tools.”

“Time to get this place wired up.”

4

Delaney lost all sense of time. The road continued in an unyielding line. Each step felt heavier than the last. She couldn’t recall how many miles she’d traveled. Her feet ached, and despair filled her mind.

Sunset painted the sky in a smear of red and gold, the blazing heat of the day melting into a burning glow that rested on the horizon. The Arizona desert air, scorching a few minutes ago, began its slow, inevitable decline in temperature. She recalled reading once that in early fall these deserts could still drop into the fifties after sundown.

She rubbed her hands over her bare arms, shivering at the sudden breeze. Her sunburned skin felt raw, and each breath scraped her throat. Dryness had settled into her mouth, and her thirst was growing by the moment. She needed water.

As she searched for refuge, she remembered her father as she’d left him. Guilt sliced through her heart. She’d had no choice. If she stayed with his body, she would have been as good as dead. The road was her only chance.

The encroaching dusk pressed in, changing the desert from a sun-scorched hell into a realm of spreading shadows. Delaney had never realized how dark it could get away from the city. The colors in the sky sharpened with deep purples and oranges, then started fading. She had no flashlight, no phone. It would be just her and the dark when night arrived.

A distant howl broke the stillness, echoed by a second cry farther off. A chill crawled along her spine. Coyotes, maybe. She stood still. The wildlife wouldn’t think twice about stalking anyone lost in the desert, especially someone weak from dehydration and exhaustion. She had to protect herself.

Delaney looked around. A meager scattering of mesquite bushes, spindly cacti, and jagged rocks stood several paces from the road. Nothing that offered true shelter. Off the road, she might find a gully, but walking blindly into the night would get her killed. The road, for all its emptiness, was still her best bet for rescue.

Yet not a single car had passed. Did no one else travel this route?

She cupped her elbows, feeling the temperature plummet as the light dipped below the horizon. The chill that seeped into her flesh was as biting as the day’s heat had been relentless. She knew the nighttime desert was an insatiable beast, one that showed no mercy for unprepared travelers.

Another cry came from the darkness. This one was deeper, closer. The hair rose along the back of her neck. Fear and fatigue threatened to pull her under, but adrenaline spurred her to keep moving. The desert had awakened, and she could feel its eyes following her.

Delaney peered left and right as another howl rippled through the air, always closer. The road was her safest bet in daylight, but in the dark? On foot? The animals would find her. Whether wolves or coyotes, those howls carried a desperate hunger.

She was out of options. The sixteen-year-old girl left the asphalt behind and ventured into the desert’s embrace. The ground underfoot turned uneven, strewn with stones and clumps of bristly plants. She imagined eyes lurking behind every shadow, silent watchers waiting for her to stumble.

A scuffing sound came out of the night, and she pictured her father’s killer following her. Over her shoulder, she saw nothing but the spreading black.

The deepening gloom made it almost impossible to see farther than a few yards. A sudden crack of branches startled her, and she swung around, heart hammering in her throat. The howls continued, multiplying as more joined the hunt.

The previous year, she’d taken a survival course. Shelters existed in the desert. If only she could remember everything she’d learned.

Another screeching howl. They were close now. She could hear paws scrabbling over rocks.

Coming for her. Gaining ground.

The land sloped upward under her feet. She tripped on a rock buried in the loose sand. Dragging her foot free, she realized she was standing at the edge of a shallow ravine, its basin shadowed in moonlight. She squinted, hardly daring to believe her eyes. A notch in the earthen wall, hidden by a tumble of rocks, gave her just enough room to crawl through.

More howls erupted. They were minutes away. Without hesitating, she dropped to her knees and squeezed into the opening. The shallow cavity smelled of sand and old decay, but it was deep enough for her to wedge inside. Dirt clung to her raw arms, and she bit down on her lip to fight against the agony.

Once inside, she groped around, her fingers landing on several half-rotten branches. She could hear them below the slope. Another minute and the predators would have torn her into shreds.

Could they get inside?

She dragged the branches into the opening, piling the tangled limbs to block it. The barricade had to hold. If something out there wanted her badly enough, the animal would tear through.

Delaney pressed her body against the wall, knees tucked to her chest. The desert night fell silent, then another distant chorus of yips and barks made her inch backward.

Please, just let them pass by.

If she could make it until dawn, she could find her way back to the road. Perhaps a traveler would appear with water and food.

For now, all she could do was huddle in the cramped darkness, praying the barrier would hide her scent from whatever prowled under the desert moon.

5

Night settled over Redthorn Wells like a bruise, deep purples and blacks swallowing the remnants of light. Inside the boarding house, Bell and Gardy draped extra blankets over the windows. Outside, a tumbleweed rolled past.

Bell fixed a strip of duct tape to the edge of a blanket, smoothing it tight against the wall. She’d found the tape, along with a toolbox, inside the downstairs storage room. “This should prevent anyone from seeing our lights.”

“Two more rooms to go,” Gardy said.

They moved to Bell’s room next. The lamp on the table gave them enough light to work. At the far end of the hall, Harold’s snores rumbled behind a closed door. How could the IT specialist sleep?

Below the second-floor window, Wolf kept watch outside the boardinghouse.

Gardy pressed the blanket against the window. “Why this place?” he asked.

“Because it’s one of Wolf’s safe houses.”

“Bell, he could have taken us anywhere. Yet he drove across the country to reach this hellhole. I want to know why.”

“Isn’t fleeing from the FBI reason enough?”

“You know Wolf. He thinks three steps ahead. There’s more to this excursion than he told us.”

“Neil, can we focus on covering the windows? I’d rather not have a spotlight on us if a stray traveler drives through this town.”

He opened his mouth to press her further, then seemed to reconsider. They stretched the fabric across the glass and taped it in place, working together to complete the task.

Yes, Wolf kept secrets. Was Wolf manipulating them again?

Outside, the wind picked up, rattling the old building. A board creaked, and Gardy snatched the gun out of his holster. But the sound was Harold shifting on his cot.

Gardy tore a piece of tape and secured the fourth corner of the blanket. “That should do it. We should get some rest soon.”

“I’ll take the next watch,” Bell said.

“No, I’ll relieve Wolf. Nobody deserves sleep more than you.”

Would she rest tonight? It seemed impossible. She’d been through too much.

Bell followed Gardy into the command room, which was a spare bedroom down the hall. A battered wooden table served as their workstation. The small laptop Harold had rigged to Wolf’s hidden network turned on when Bell moved the mouse. With the windows covered, the laptop provided the only source of light.

“Harold gave me these secure log-in credentials,” Gardy said, tapping on the keyboard. The device emitted a whir. “I’m curious to see what we’ll find.”

Bell set her elbows on the table. A headache coiled at the base of her skull. The FBI was looking for them, combing through every digital breadcrumb. She ignored her trepidation as Gardy navigated through multiple proxy screens. Finally, he accessed a hidden portal that connected them to the internal law enforcement bulletins.

“Here,” he said, pointing at a text feed that scrolled along the bottom of the screen. It was a system typically reserved for interagency alerts and included info about high-profile fugitives, terror threats, or major cross-state operations.

The text loaded on the screen.

FBI-INTERAGENCY BULLETIN

Classification: Restricted

Subject(s): Agents Scarlett Bell & Neil Gardy (FBI), and Logan Wolf (Former FBI, FUGITIVE)

Priority: High

Update:

Following the discovery of evidence tying Agents Bell and Gardy to multiple unsanctioned activities, they remain persons of interest in the homicides of Dr. Margot Klein, Agent Sophia LeClaire, and Deputy Director Magnus Carter. Fugitive Logan Wolf is believed to be aiding and abetting, though roles and motives remain unclear.

Recent intel suggests movement toward the Southwest corridor; however, no confirmed sightings have been reported. State and local enforcement agencies within Texas, New Mexico, Nevada, and Southern Utah are advised to increase checkpoint vigilance. Customs and Border Protection remains on high alert for cross-border flight.

Investigative leads from toll booth data and digital camera hits in the Midwest corridor show partial matches to Wolf’s known aliases. The Bureau strongly encourages all field agents to treat these suspects as armed and extremely dangerous. Any contact or visual confirmation requires immediate coordination with Task Force Carter.

End of Bulletin.

Gardy scrolled back up, reading it twice. “They don’t know we’re in Redthorn Mills,” he said, relief and wariness warring in his voice. “They suspect we might be in the Southwest, but Arizona isn’t on the list.”

“So they have a rough idea, but nothing concrete. For now.” She pushed the hair away from her face. “This is all because of Carter.”

“I wonder how long it took to find Carter and LeClaire.”

“Someone must have reported the gunfire.”

A moment of contemplation stretched between them. Images of the confrontation with Carter played on a loop behind Bell’s eyelids.

Gardy closed the screen. “We can’t stay in the system for too long. Someone will detect unusual traffic. Harold said the firewall is good but not infallible.”

Bell stood, one hand braced against the table. Exhaustion dulled her every nerve.

From hunting the Laughing Man to fleeing from the government.

She looked at the covered windows. The blankets fluttered at the corners as the wind slipped through the warped panes.

“Go to bed, Bell. I’ll tell Wolf he can take a break.”

She wanted to protest but felt the sag in her muscles, the weight of her eyelids. The clash of stubborn pride and fatigue fought to a stalemate. “I’m not sure I can sleep,” she said. “I can’t shut my mind off.”

“Try. Even for a few hours. Let me worry about the perimeter.”

Bell thanked him and turned toward the hallway, the gloomy light catching her reflection in a dusty mirror. She looked like a stranger with haunted circles beneath her eyes and grit in her hair. It felt impossible that she might close her eyes and escape her nightmares.

Before going to bed, she made a circuit around the second floor, listening at the windows and peering through the gaps where the blankets didn’t quite meet the frame. Inside, the hush was thick—silent and oddly comforting.

No movement on the street below, no sign of headlights scything through the darkness.

She lingered at the window overlooking Main Street and adjusted the tape to seal the corner more securely. So much for the ghost town. They had become the actual specters in the night.

Finally, she followed the corridor to her room. When she closed the door, she felt gratitude for this patch of privacy. The lamp threw light across the cot Wolf had prepared for her. The tarps and plastic sheeting lay folded at the foot. She slipped out of her boots and sat on the edge of the bed. A delicate quiet blanketed the space with the promise of sanctuary.

We can stay here indefinitely.

The thought sparked an odd sense of excitement. Though the government wanted to catch her, she had never felt so free.

Even if Wolf’s stashes of food dwindled, they could venture into town in disguises. Who would have guessed Wolf rigged the boarding house with solar power? Electricity offered the fugitives a way to monitor those who hunted them.

As she peeled off her shirt, Gardy’s warning echoed in her head. Why had Wolf chosen Redthorn Mills? The serial killer had a network of bolt-holes. Each was carefully concealed, guarded by a secret network of authority figures who agreed with his cause.

Bell sank back, the cot creaking under her. The building had trapped the day’s warmth. Before she turned off the light, she spotted a box fan in the open closet. Perfect. She plugged in the fan, and the blades spun, cooling the room.

She pictured Wolf outside, searching for threats. He had secrets, and he was good at guarding them. Was there something hidden in Redthorn Mills that he needed? How many times had he visited this place? No wonder the FBI had failed to capture him.

Bell trusted Wolf. She owed him her life; he’d saved her more times than she could count. But trust was not blind faith.

If she could sleep through this one night, maybe tomorrow she would have the energy to keep running. She let her eyes drift shut, lulled by the security of four adobe walls and the fan’s white noise. In that moment, she almost believed in the fragile promise that they could hide here forever—phantoms of a new kind, safe in a dusty, forgotten corner of the world.

6

Delaney startled awake with a gasp. She snatched a pointed stick she’d found last night. Her body shook with fear and adrenaline. Sunlight glowed through the tangle of branches and brush stacked against the entrance. The rays spotlit the cramped hollow. The sudden brightness made her squint as her eyes adjusted.

Her thoughts returned to the horrific memories from the night. She saw slivers of yellow eyes catching the moonlight, pawing and scratching at the flimsy barrier. Savage yips and whines battered her ears, and the predators’ breath stank of carrion. One of them—a gaunt shape, lean and wild—had jammed its muzzle through a gap in the brush, teeth snapping only inches from her foot. The memory of its jagged fangs made her want to scream.

She inhaled, forcing herself to stay still despite the spike of terror coursing through her veins.

Are they still out there?

The makeshift barricade was holding despite the broken twigs. Fur clung to the spikes of mesquite. She stared, wishing she could blot out the images from those desperate nighttime hours—the animals’ frantic scraping that had nearly dislodged her meager protection.

Crawling to her feet, she braced the stick against the dirt, using it as a cane as she inched toward the entrance. Her muscles ached, protesting every motion after a night spent curled in a ball. A wave of vertigo washed over her, but she gritted her teeth, focusing on the steady beam of sunlight. If the animals were still waiting, she needed to be ready, though she hardly felt equipped to fight off a hungry pack.

She pressed her ear against the brush, straining to hear anything beyond the thunderous rush of blood in her ears. The desert didn’t make a sound.

Delaney knew she couldn’t stay here. Continuing to hide in this burrow would only bring another round of predators by sundown. She’d gotten lucky last night.

Her fingers clutched the sharp stick so tightly she felt splinters bite her skin. Better than claws or teeth, she thought, pushing aside the broken branches. The morning air rushed inside, cool but already heralding the scorching heat to come. Dust motes danced in the sunlight.

Her throat was impossibly dry, and her skin felt too tight. She needed to find water. But where?

She looked back at the battered shelter, her tiny womb of safety, and ducked through the opening into the nascent day. The sun seared her sunburned shoulders. That was okay. Pain reminded her she was alive.

Tracks in the sand and dirt led away from her hideout, multiple paw prints converging then diverging. They were gone, but they would come back. Stick in hand, she forced her shaking legs to straighten. She was alone, but she could do this. The distant road beckoned. Today someone would drive past and save her.

Delaney set off once more, staggering toward uncertain outcomes.

I need water.

The warning echoed in her skull like a drumbeat. Without water, the midday heat would finish her, long before any coyotes came around again.

She squinted at the empty strip of highway. The vast landscape stretched into infinity.

As Delaney crossed the desert, she recalled fragments of her high school survival course. The half-remembered lessons suddenly became vital.

Stay calm, the teacher had stressed. Panic kills faster than thirst.

The other students had chuckled at the lessons. What were the chances any of them would get lost in the desert?

Yet here she was, trying to recall details from the lessons: how to glean moisture from dew, how to find water in desert plants. But it was early fall. Dew was scarce, and the ground looked bone-dry. She eyed the cacti dotting the sandy terrain and remembered a warning. Not all cacti are safe. But some, like the prickly pear, could offer a trickle of hydration if handled carefully.

Scanning the horizon, Delaney spotted a cluster of prickly pear cactus pads fifty yards away. Fat with the promise of moisture, they rose from the sand like road signs promising survival. She winced at the thought of walking deeper into the desert, where the coyotes prowled. But her thirst became a scorching ache that worsened with every breath of hot air.

She rolled the sharpened stick across her palm in contemplation. Then she ventured away from the road, away from potential travelers. With every step, she worried about rattlesnakes and scorpions hiding in the underbrush.

When she reached the prickly pear, the cacti grew waist-high. The plants held thick pads studded with spines. Now, how did the teacher say to do this?

Kneeling, she rummaged for a flat stone, something she could use to scrape off the deadliest needles. The prickly pear’s outer spines were barbed, and the hairlike glochids could embed in the skin, causing excruciating pain. She persisted, using a smaller stone to knock away the larger spines. Bits of them clattered to the sandy ground, leaving shiny green flesh beneath.

Her hands shook with hunger and fear, yet she forced herself to be patient. Once the pad was free of spikes, she used the same stone to slice it loose, revealing a pale interior that oozed droplets.

Careful.

Prickly pear juice could upset the stomach if taken in large amounts, but a little might stave off dehydration. She tapped the pad gently, the watery sap clinging to her fingers. Then she braced herself for the taste—bitter and green, but not entirely unpleasant.

Delaney lifted the pad to her mouth and sucked on its cool interior. The moisture felt heavenly. Her parched throat begged for more, but she resisted gulping too much in one go. She’d read that could lead to cramps, and every part of her body already ached enough.

After scraping out a second piece from the pad’s center, she let the juices trickle down her throat. The tang made her cough. She tossed aside the used chunk of cactus, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. It wasn’t as satiating as spring water, but it would do.

The mesquite bushes rustled. Was that the wind?

Delaney tensed, the stick gripped tightly. The desert lay bathed in the relentless morning sun. She gathered a second pad, repeating the careful process of removing spines, taking only enough to wet her mouth. Then she stood, swaying a little with dizziness.

It was time to get moving.

7

Bell stirred and opened her eyes. She lay still, startled by the realization that she had slept deeply and dreamlessly through the night. The cot made her back throb with spasms, but it was better than sleeping on the floor.

She dressed, tugging on her boots and smoothing down her hair with the flat of her hand. Voices from the control center drew her.

When she entered the room, the three men paused in their conversation. Harold worked at his computer, while Gardy removed the burner phone Wolf had given him from the charger. Wolf peeled back the blanket and studied the street below.

“You slept all night,” Wolf said without turning to her.

“Apparently,” Bell said. “I meant to ask about showering or bathing. We spent so much time on the road. I must reek.”

“There’s a shower, if you’d like one.”

“How is that possible? Is there a well?”

“Yes, and it is quite clean.”

“But this has been abandoned for decades. The pump can’t possibly work.”

“No,” said Wolf. “Which is why I replaced it last year.”

“You really think of every contingency, don’t you?”

“I also changed the filter system. I still don’t trust the water without the purification tablets. But it’s fine for showering. Cold, and the pressure won’t remind you of home, but it does the job.”

“The last thing we need to think about is a shower,” Gardy said. “Harold, what’s the latest?”

Harold clicked the mouse. “If you’re worried about the FBI, they haven’t posted any updates about us since last night. Looks like they don’t know we’re near the desert.”

“That will change.”

“How?” Wolf asked. “Nobody knows about this place, Agent Gardy.”

“You’ll excuse me if I don’t take every fact you spit at face value. If it wasn’t for you⁠—”

“We’d all be dead. The Laughing Man wouldn’t have let us leave the forest alive.”

“He’s right,” Bell said.

Gardy mumbled something under his breath.

Fending off another argument, Harold closed the laptop. “What’s for breakfast?”

Bell glanced at the stash of rations they’d spread out on the tabletop. Canned goods lined one side, while a few sealed MRE packs and water bottles cluttered the other. It wasn’t a feast, but compared to the hollow pit in her stomach, the food looked almost decadent.

Wolf lifted a can of beans and a box of crackers. “Bon appétit,” he said dryly. “We’ll need to ration carefully, but we have enough to keep us going awhile.”

Though his eyes gleamed with genuine amusement, Harold snorted. “Beans and crackers. Can’t say I pictured myself living on this stuff in a secret hideout.” He tore open the cardboard and fished out a few stale wafers. “But hey, no one is complaining. At least we’re not eating freeze-dried cat kibble.”

Gardy handed Bell a water bottle. She twisted off the cap and took a sip, wishing she could guzzle the entire thing. Wolf moved back to the window, quietly surveying the street.

Harold looked at Bell. “I have to admit, I could get used to this.”

“Get used to what?” asked Bell.

“This might be the only place in the world where the federal government can’t monitor my activities.” He tapped the side of his head. “I can practically hear the servers straining to find me, but out here? They’ve got nothing.”

Never knowing if Harold was serious or kidding, Bell laughed. The indefinite isolation made her wish she could stay forever and forget about hunting serial killers. That made her think of her mentor, Dr. Klein. What would Klein say if she could see them?

A short while later, Bell excused herself and entered the bathroom. She turned on a light. The shower stall appeared intact despite the scuffed porcelain base, tarnished fixtures, and a curtain Wolf must have replaced at some point.

She tested the water, bracing for the rush of cold. It sputtered briefly then became a steady stream. She didn’t see a washcloth or a towel. Wolf hadn’t considered every eventuality.

Could she do this? She knew agents who swore by cold plunges, yet the thought had never appealed to her. But if she wanted to clean herself…

Closing her eyes, she stepped under the spray. At first, the frigid water made her head swim. Goosebumps rose along her arms, but the sensation was refreshing against her sun-chapped skin. As she let the spray pour over her, the grit of desert dust slid away.

Her mind drifted back to Dr. Margot Klein. If only she were still alive. The memory was a dull knife twisting in Bell’s gut. Klein had believed justice meant more than personal ambition. She had taught Bell that morality wasn’t a set of rules, but a guiding principle—something to cling to when the lines blurred. And now that very principle had led Bell to this abandoned desert boarding house, cut off from the government she’d once served.

Bell fought back a tear as the water cascaded down her neck and back. She would make this right and clear Gardy’s name, as well as Harold’s and her own.

Her flesh felt numb. She turned off the faucet with a squeak of old metal. Without a towel, she stood in the basin and waited for her skin to dry. Near the desert, it didn’t take long.

8

Bell tugged on her shirt and shoved her arms through the sleeves, rushing to buckle her belt when a spike in volume reverberated down the hallway. Not another argument, she thought. She exited the bathroom, damp hair clinging to her neck, and followed the voices to Wolf’s room.

Inside, Gardy stood beside the LCD television, arms rigid at his sides, while Wolf leaned against the far wall with that unsettling calm that made Bell’s stomach tighten. The screen displayed a local news broadcast with grainy footage of desert scrubland and police tape flapping in the wind.

“…the remains of yet another unidentified victim discovered just hours ago, bringing the total to seven bodies found over the past twelve months,” the anchor said. “Authorities say the victims appear to have suffered violent assaults before being dumped in remote desert locations across Arizona and New Mexico. While local law enforcement has formed a task force, no official suspects have been named. The FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit has been consulted, but at this time investigators are withholding details of the killer’s profile.”

Gardy turned down the volume, but the footage continued: crime scene markers in the dirt, tire tracks scorched by the midday sun.

“So that’s it,” Gardy told Wolf. “That’s why you brought us here. You’re not just hiding—you’re hunting this murderer, aren’t you?”

Bell entered the room. “Is that true?”

Wolf cast a sidelong glance at the TV. “I’ve followed this pattern for a few months, long enough to know we’re dealing with another serial killer.”

“You never told us,” Gardy accused.

“Because we had bigger problems, like Carter and the Laughing Man.” Wolf’s gaze shifted to Bell. “If I’d said I wanted to go after some unknown killer in the desert, would you have come?”

Gardy didn’t answer.

The news report switched to a shot of the anchor standing in front of a row of patrol vehicles. A scrolling banner at the bottom read: Victims found in remote areas—FBI consults, no official leads.

“Seven murders in twelve months is a pattern, all right,” Bell said. “The FBI will come, and when they do, they might find this place.”

“Don’t you ever take a day off?” Gardy asked.

“Isn’t this what you crave, Agent Gardy?” Wolf asked. “Justice?”

Bell hesitated, remembering the irony in the fact that they were the ones supposed to hunt monsters. But now they were playing hide-and-seek as fugitives.

Gardy rounded on Wolf. “Don’t you see how insane this is? We’re wanted for murder, and you dragged us into a killing ground.”

The temperature in the room seemed to drop a few degrees. “If you wish to sit this one out, be my guest,” Wolf said, stepping closer to Gardy. “I’ve seen the coroners’ reports. This killer knows the desert better than any law enforcement. If we don’t stop him, the bodies will keep piling up. Trust me, the FBI isn’t close to catching this one.”

“I never said I wouldn’t help. It’s just…wouldn’t it make sense to include us when you’re devising these plans?”

“My apologies, Agent Gardy. From now on, I will run all future butcherings through you.”

“That’s a pleasant thought.”

Wolf turned back to the television and raised the volume.

The anchor’s voice returned.

“In each case, authorities report the victims were found posed carefully, their personal effects removed. No signs of robbery or sexual assault. Experts suggest the killer may be following a ritualistic pattern, as all seven victims were discovered in similar desert environments, often near abandoned roads or remote landmarks.”

The scene switched to a row of police cruisers parked along a highway running through the desert.

“Most chilling, however, is the discovery of personal items at the crime scenes—small tokens. A child’s toy. A woman’s scarf. A family photograph scorched at the edges. Investigators believe these items may be significant to the killer’s identity or motives, suggesting a family-related trauma or obsession. Behavioral experts are calling this one of the most perplexing serial cases in recent years, with the killer showing both restraint and extraordinary familiarity with the desert terrain.”

Bell stepped closer to the screen. A family photograph? A child’s toy? She rummaged through the catalog in her mind and compared this killer to those she’d pursued in the past.

Wolf’s eyes never left the screen. His voice dropped to a low, almost conversational tone. “He’s building a story. Every victim adds to the narrative.”

“Do you realize how large the desert is? You can’t hope to find this guy,” Gardy said.

“He’s recreating something. Over and over.” Wolf spoke as if Gardy wasn’t in the room. “A family dynamic, I’d bet.”

The anchor continued.

“Law enforcement urges anyone traveling along rural desert highways to avoid stopping for strangers and to report any suspicious activity. While officials remain tight-lipped about connections between the victims, sources say at least two were last seen accepting rides from an unidentified male driver.”

Again Wolf muted the TV. The sudden quiet seemed to expand, pressing against the walls of the room.

“He’s a local,” Wolf said flatly.

“What makes you so sure?” Bell asked.

“Because men like this don’t choose strangers at random. They choose replacements.”

No one spoke for a long moment. The implications sank in, heavy and undeniable.

Bell remembered the map Harold had examined in the Escalade, showing stretches of empty highways snaking through the desert.

Gardy rubbed a hand over his face. “How in the world do you expect to catch this guy while avoiding the FBI?”

“I don’t know. But I will stop this man.”

9

He shuffled with an unsteady gait, his bruised ribs and lacerated head making him nauseous. The desert sun hung low, washing the endless road in molten gold, but he barely noticed the heat. His focus remained on the trail.

She was out there.

He knew the girl would follow the road. They always did. The promise of help, of salvation, lay somewhere at the end of the pavement, or so they believed. Like Dorothy following a yellow brick road. But travelers rarely passed this way. The road stretched on in false hope, a cruel trick the desert played on the desperate.

He paused along the shoulder, squinting against the glare. The desert wind stirred, carrying dust across the asphalt.

There. Footprints.

She was tired, stumbling. Each print sank deeper into the sand as the path veered off the road toward the wilderness.

A grin tugged at the corner of his mouth, though it never reached his eyes. She was a fighter. It would be all the more fulfilling when he plunged his knife into her belly.

The thrill of the pursuit dulled the aches in his body. He lowered himself to the ground, fingers brushing the prints. Still fresh. The sand hadn’t yet reclaimed them. She couldn’t be that far ahead. He rose and followed.

The terrain grew rougher. Bushes tore at his clothes. The trail of footprints weaved between low hills and thorny scrub. He moved carefully, never rushing. Haste ruined the hunt.

A shallow basin came into view, its edge crumbling from erosion. His steps slowed. He scanned the ground and felt his breath hitch.

Coyote tracks.

They crisscrossed the basin, claw marks digging deep into the dirt. He studied these new tracks and worried the coyotes had gotten her first. The thought stirred something cold and violent in his chest.

No. She was his prey.

He took another step and found a small hollow at the base of the basin wall, partially concealed by brush and broken sticks. The branches formed a crude barrier.

Clever.

He crouched beside the entrance, sifting through the sticks. The coyotes had tried to break through. Their claw marks scored the dirt. But they hadn’t succeeded. The girl had survived the night. He could almost picture her—huddled, shaking, clutching some weapon, listening to the hungry snarls in the dark.

He held a grudging respect for this one. She was stronger than the others.

But strength only prolonged the inevitable.

More footprints led away from the hollow, back toward the road. He rose to his full height, brushing dirt from his knees.

Good. She was still alive.

The sun rose higher now, a ruthless eye in the sky beating down without mercy. Sweat streaked the dirt on his face, but he paid it no mind. The footprints continued in a winding trail marked by uncertainty and desperation. He noted the scuffs where she had stumbled, the deeper impressions where she had paused. The distance between them was shrinking.

She’s slowing down.

The girl was smarter than most. But exhaustion was a ruthless adversary. The desert stripped away the illusion of choice. It left only instinct.

And instinct, he knew, would lead her into his hands.

Ahead, he spied a cluster of prickly pear cacti rising from the sand. He paused and wondered. The trail led directly to them.

Carefully, he approached. The ground around the cacti was disturbed. Sand had been kicked aside. One of the thick pads lay on the ground, its spines removed with hasty scrapes.

The killer crouched beside the remains and lifted the exposed flesh of the cactus. Moisture still glistened where the girl had cut it.

A slow smile crept across his face.

She’s a survivor.

The girl knew what she was doing. The prickly pear’s spines could tear through skin, and the juice could sicken the careless. But she had figured it out. She had fought back the desert’s hunger, found water where others would have perished.

He respected that. Truly, he did.

The footprints resumed beyond the cacti, less sure. She was weakening. The brief burst of strength from the cactus moisture wouldn’t last. The heat would drag her down, and when she finally collapsed, there would be no one to save her.

His eyes tracked the horizon. He knew these roads. The girl had chosen the only path available to her. But she didn’t know that the path led nowhere.

And now he was close.

Very close.

10

The scents of soap and well water clung to the air. Freshly showered and slightly restored, Bell, Gardy, and Harold gathered around the table in the command room.

Harold’s laptop played a continuous loop of recorded news footage showing desert roads, patrol cars, and the crime scene markers from the recent murders.

Wolf waited for them to sit before he spoke.

“Seven victims in twelve months,” the serial killer said. “Similar causes of death. Bodies dumped miles apart, but always near isolated highways. No signs of theft, no sexual assault. Each scene staged.”

He switched to a separate laptop window and displayed photos pulled from news reports and the case files Harold had hacked into.

“A family photo at one scene, and a child’s toy at another. A scarf and a wedding band. All arranged with care.”

Wolf turned, his sharp eyes settling on Bell. “You’ve seen killers like this before, dear Scarlett. What’s your opinion?”

Bell studied the pictures, unsure of what to say. An hour ago, she hadn’t even realized they were following a murderer. “This reminds me of the Alton Ridge case,” she said. “Remember that one?”

Gardy chewed the inside of his cheek. “Yeah. That guy targeted runaways—women who reminded him of his family. He posed them as if they were part of a portrait.”

“This one is similar, and judging by the timeline of the murders, he’s escalating. The tokens show he’s reconstructing something. A life he lost. Or a life he thinks he deserves.”

“He’s overdue,” Wolf said.

Harold looked up from the laptop, confusion on his face. “Overdue?”

“Yes. The time between kills is shrinking. Three months. Two months. Six weeks. The last victim was found a month ago. By his pattern, he should have killed again.”

Bell snapped her fingers. “So something is holding him back. Or he’s hunting someone specific.”

“I believe you’re correct.”

“How do we know he hasn’t already struck?” Gardy asked. The others turned to him. “Think about it. The police don’t know someone is missing until the reports reach their desks.”

“Then we need to monitor police chatter,” Wolf said. “Harold?”

Harold nodded. “I’ll pull in the local law enforcement feeds and highway patrol reports. Might as well check the missing persons bulletins from Arizona, New Mexico, and Nevada, concentrating on desert routes.”

“Focus on recent disappearances,” Gardy said. “Within the last several days.”

Bell stared at the carefully posed bodies.

He’s close. And he’s not finished.

She looked over Harold’s shoulder as he sifted through reports of people who’d gone missing in the last several days—names, ages, last-known locations. She barely registered Gardy’s hand on her shoulder.

“Hey.”

His voice pulled her out of her mind. He studied her face in a way that made her want to avoid his eyes.

“You’re getting that look again,” he said.

“What look?”

“The one you had during the Laughing Man investigation. Back when you stopped sleeping. You’d stare through people like you weren’t there at all.”

“I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not.” Gardy stepped in front of her, blocking her view of the screen. “Talk to me.”

Bell let out a shaky breath, brushing a strand of damp hair from her face. Her gaze drifted back to the photographs—the child’s toy, the family photo, the wedding band—each left behind with a story only the killer understood.

“It always bothers me more when they target families.”

Her throat tightened. She didn’t want to say more. The memories of other cases, other tragedies, returned to her.

“I need some air,” she said.

Gardy didn’t hesitate. “I’ll come with you.”

Bell opened her mouth to protest, but Gardy raised a hand.

“No argument. You’re not wandering into a ghost town alone, not with some killer using the desert as his personal hunting ground.”

“Fair enough.”

They slipped out of the command room, leaving Harold to his work. Bell could feel Wolf’s eyes following her as she exited.

The dry air hit Bell as they stepped onto the porch. The wind stirred the dust in lazy spirals, the remains of Redthorn Wells stretching out in crumbling silence. Here, boarded storefronts and empty streets seemed to lean in, listening to what they had to say.

She crossed her arms, staring at the distant line where the sand met the sky.

“Sometimes I think these places remember,” she said.

“Remember what?”

“The ones who go to sleep and never awaken.”

Gardy leaned against the railing. “Don’t carry these murders. If you want, I’ll provide Wolf with profiles.”

“And what would I do?”

“Stay here. Rest. Try to forget.”

“You know that’s impossible,” she said.

“Why? Because you promised yourself so many years ago that you’d never let a serial killer take an innocent, like God’s Hand did? You’ve avenged Jillian. The work is done.”

“It will never be done.”

“Only because you say it won’t.”

Bell didn’t respond. The wind kicked up again, rattling loose boards on a nearby building.

“Families,” she said. “When a killer goes after a family, it’s personal. They’re not hunting strangers. They’re rewriting something. Trying to fix something broken.”

Gardy was quiet for a long moment. “Is that what you think this guy’s doing? Rewriting his history?”

Bell glanced sideways at him, her expression hardening.

“I think he’s hunting for someone who fits his story,” she said. “And I think when he finds them, he won’t stop until he writes the last sentence.”

He pressed his lips together and looked away. “You need to clear your head. Let’s walk.”

“Where to?”

“How many opportunities do you get to explore an old mining town?”

The dry air stole the moisture from Bell’s mouth and chapped her lips. Her boots crunched on the sunbaked dirt. Redthorn Wells was a town in decay. The remnants of old wooden buildings struggled against time itself. A gale rattled warped planks and sent loose shingles clattering to the ground.

“I feel like we’re walking through a movie set,” Gardy said, stepping over a splintered board that had fallen from what looked like an old saloon. The faded lettering above the entrance read Larkspur Tavern—Fine Spirits & Lodging.

“Except this was real. People lived here. Ate here. Drank here. Probably died here, too.”

They passed what must have been a general store, the large front window shattered long ago, its wooden door hanging by a single hinge. Faded advertisements for tobacco and canned goods were still plastered to the walls, their colors erased by the desert sun. Bell peeked her head inside. A rusted cash register lay on the floor, half-buried under years of dust and sand.

“I wonder what made the last people leave,” Bell said.

Gardy kicked a loose rock and watched it tumble down the street. “Wolf said the well dried up. The town probably collapsed after that. No water, no town.”

“But it’s working now.”

“My guess is it took decades for the well to refill. By then, it was too late for the town.”

Bell nodded absently, but her thoughts circled to her parents. There was nothing to shield them from the horrors scrolling across their news feeds. Their daughter was a fugitive and a killer.

“Talk to me, Bell,” he said. “I know something else is wrong.”

“I keep thinking about my parents. They must be losing their minds.”

“Your parents can’t possibly believe what the government is saying.”

“No, but I can’t even imagine what they’re going through. I can picture them glued to the TV, pacing the house, calling anyone they think might have answers.”

Gardy was silent for a beat before saying, “You can’t reach out.”

“I know.”

“It’s too risky. The FBI is monitoring their calls.”

“I can’t put them in the crosshairs,” Bell said.

He shoved his hands into his pockets. “It’s just temporary, Bell. We’ll clear this up.”

“When?”

“When the time is right.”

They stopped in front of an old brick building, one of the few not entirely made of wood. Its once white paint had peeled away in great patches, revealing the weathered stone beneath. Above the doorway, barely legible in the cracked facade, were the words Redthorn Miners’ Union Hall.

Bell assessed the structure’s soundness. “What do you say? This place might still have records and give us more history on the town.”

“Or it might collapse on our heads.”

“Only one way to find out.”

With a careful push, Bell tested the door. It groaned but held firm. She put her shoulder into it, and with a shuddering snap of rusted hinges, the door gave way, swinging inward and stirring a cloud of dirt and sand.

The air inside was stale, tinged with the scent of dry rot and something faintly metallic. Sunlight streamed in through jagged holes in the roof, illuminating old wooden chairs facing a raised platform. A speaker’s podium stood at the front, its edges bearing the initials of miners long gone.

Bell ran a hand along the surface of a nearby desk, her fingers coming away coated in dust. “It’s creepy, as if the people just got up and left mid-conversation.”

Gardy wandered toward a chalkboard mounted on the far wall. Markings remained—schedules, perhaps, or a tally of wages. “This place had structure once. People fought for their rights here.”

“Now it’s just bones.”

For a long moment, neither of them spoke. The gloom was different inside the building—thicker. The kind that made you feel like someone might be standing just behind you if you turned too fast.

Finally, Gardy backed away from the podium. “Come on. We should head back before the others wonder if we fell through a hole in the floor.”

Bell waited a little longer, glancing up at the broken rafters, at the posters fraying off the walls. Then she followed him out.

11

Sweat soaked Bell’s shirt when she and Gardy returned to the boarding house. This morning, the structure had felt unbearably hot. Compared to the outside, the building seemed almost comfortable. Two rotating fans, one at the base of the stairs and another at the top, circulated the air.

Bell paused before entering the command center. Wolf’s gaze landed on her immediately, curious and probing. His eyes narrowed, as though he were reading her thoughts. Bell lifted her chin without flinching. She wasn’t about to share the conversation they’d had about her parents, though Wolf surely knew she was worried.

“While you were out for your walk, we found two intriguing reports,” Wolf said, making a sweeping gesture for them to enter.

Harold hunched over the laptop. He didn’t look up when Bell and Gardy took their seats beside him.

“What have you got?” Gardy asked.

Harold clicked a few times and turned the laptop so everyone could see the screen.

“Two cases,” Harold said. “Both recent.” He tapped the first report. “Case one: The Mercer family. Luke Mercer, 39. Schoolteacher. Grace Mercer, 37. Nurse. And their son, Ben, age 10. They disappeared eight days ago from a small town called Arroyo Creek, about forty miles east of here.”

Bell read through the sparse details. A photograph accompanied the report—Luke and Grace standing beside a boy with a wide grin and a missing front tooth. The family looked ordinary. Happy.

“No signs of a struggle at their home,” Harold said. “No reports of a break-in. Their SUV was last seen at a gas station outside town. Surveillance cameras caught them fueling up and buying supplies. Then they vanished.”

“Forty miles,” Gardy repeated. “Close enough to other murders.”

Bell stared at the boy’s smile. Another family.

Wolf spoke. “A family of three, vanishing without a trace near the desert, fits the pattern.”

“But we got another,” Harold said. He clicked the second report. “This came in three days ago from a different jurisdiction. I picked it up from a shared missing persons database.”

The screen changed to show two faces: a man in his forties, tall, with dark hair and a weathered face, standing beside a teenage girl with long brown hair and wary eyes.

“Randall Silas,” Harold said. “Single father. Age 45. Construction foreman. And his daughter, Delaney Silas, age 16. They left Phoenix two days ago for what Randall told neighbors was a father-daughter camping trip. Neither of them returned. The last phone signal pinged along a highway thirty miles west of the city.”

Bell felt ice form on her spine. The girl’s expression in the photo—guarded, distant—stood out more than anything.

“No idea where they planned to camp?” Gardy asked.

“None. The father’s SUV hasn’t turned up either.”

Wolf pushed off the wall. His shadow fell across the table as he stared at the photos. “Two cases. Two disappearances in the desert. One family. One father and daughter.”

“This has to be the same killer,” Bell said. “Two in one week? There’s no question he’s escalating.”

Without immediately replying, Wolf looked at Harold’s map, which was pinned to the wall. Redthorn Wells sat several miles from the center. Red pins marked where the murdered families had disappeared from. They’d all been found in the desert. He pointed at a network of roads that connected Arroyo Creek, Phoenix, and the desert highways.

“Look at the pattern,” Wolf murmured. “All the victims turned up in the sand, close enough to the road that anyone venturing off the highway would find them.”

“Do we know how long he keeps them alive before killing them?” Gardy asked.

“Not yet, though the medical examiner who examined the first bodies believed he murdered them as soon as he reached the desert.”

“So these people are probably dead?”

“Maybe.”

Harold stopped typing. “What do we do? Wait for another body to turn up?”

Wolf looked at Bell, questioning her with his eyes.

She stood. “No. We know he’s completing his story. The Mercer and Silas families are critical chapters. When we determine why he took the latest family, we’ll have the key that unlocks his mind.”

“Then we’ll find him,” Gardy said.

She glanced at the photo of Delaney Silas again. “Something about this picture bothers me.”

“What is it, dear Scarlett?”

“It’s the look on the girl’s face. She’s troubled. I want to find her. Harold, what can you tell me about the Silas family? What became of the mother?”

“Uh,” Harold muttered, typing. “According to the records, the mother walked out on the family after giving birth.”

“Where is she now?”

“That’s a question the police would like to answer. The report says the mother left the hospital without the nurses noticing and never returned.”

“So she abandoned Delaney,” Bell said.

“It seems that way.”

“These abductions always end in blood,” Wolf said. “If there is any hope of saving Randall and Delaney Silas, we need to begin.”

“One issue,” Harold said. “The FBI is coming to the desert.”

The government’s arrival was inevitable. Now Bell and the other fugitives would have to dodge the FBI while hunting for a depraved killer.

12

The sun was a white-hot disc that scoured the landscape with the devil’s fire. Heat rose in ripples off the asphalt and created a blurry mirage.

Delaney staggered forward. Her vision blurred at the edges, the horizon wavering. Her lips were cracked, her skin burned and raw beneath the sleeves of her shirt. She pressed a hand to her forehead and drew it back in pain. Had she spiked a fever?

She was going to die out here.

The horizon looked the same in all directions. She had lost track of how long she had been walking. Hours? A day? Her confusion made it impossible to tell.

Why had she left her father?

The image of his still form lying beside the SUV struck her. A sob caught in her throat. She should have stayed. Should have waited. Someone might have come. But the terror over someone killing her father and attacking her had been too strong, causing her to panic. Now she was a day’s walk from the SUV, lost, sun-scorched, and out of water.

Delaney fell. She caught herself with her hands after scraping them against the gravel and sand. Grit peppered her flesh.

Get up.

The voice in her head spoke with insistence.

Get up or die.

Clenching her teeth, Delaney forced herself upright. There was no going back. She couldn’t look at her father’s body again.

Yet Dad’s vehicle was her only hope for salvation. She’d believed a traveler would have saved her by now. No one was coming. She was alone. The wisest plan was to turn around and return to the SUV. Maybe this time it would start. A part of her whispered that she’d done something wrong the last time she turned the key.

Even if she wandered back, she couldn’t do it now. All that mattered was living until sundown. And then the predators would come out again.

A thin line of hills rose in the distance, jagged and sun-bleached. Perhaps there was shade there. Shelter. She veered off the road, questioning herself. Leaving the road had nearly killed her yesterday. But the heat would take her life if she didn’t find cover.

The ground grew rougher, dotted with scrub brush and brittle tufts of grass. Perspiration made her eyes sting.

Just as her legs threatened to give out again, she saw it.

A narrow ravine split the earth, unnoticeable until she was on top of it. The drop wasn’t steep—only a few feet—but the darkness that pooled at the base promised something she hadn’t seen for hours.

Shade.

Desperation pushed her forward. She slid down the crumbling edge of the ravine, sand and rock cascading beneath her feet. She hit the bottom hard and bit her tongue, but she didn’t care. The air was cooler here, the narrow walls blocking out the worst of the sun’s glare.

Delaney collapsed against the shaded side of the ravine, pressing her burning cheek against the cool dirt. Her chest heaved as she gasped for breath, but already the stabbing pain in her head had dulled.

This place would buy her time. Time to decide. Time to survive.

Her eyes rose to a sky that was a merciless blue, but from here it felt a little less oppressive.

Curling into herself, Delaney closed her eyes. The desert wind whispered above the ravine, carrying with it a stench that made her sick to her stomach. It only reached her when the breeze came from her right. What was out there? A dead animal?

When the wind shifted, the air smelled safe to breathe again. She closed her eyes, knowing doing so was unwise. But there was no fighting her fatigue.

Delaney fell asleep.

Delaney jolted awake and pressed a hand to her mouth.

For a terrifying moment, she didn’t remember where she was. The rough earth scraped her palms as she pushed herself upright. The deep shadows of the ravine closed in and her breath came in ragged gasps.

Her eyes snapped upward.

The sky had morphed. No longer the blazing blue of midday, it had softened into a dull, bruised orange. The sun hovered low on the horizon, dipping behind the hills. Long shadows stretched across the desert floor, swallowing everything in creeping darkness.

No, no, no.

She had slept through the day.

Delaney scrambled to her feet, swaying as dizziness enveloped her body. The ravine that had saved her from the heat now felt like a trap. The walls were closing in and cutting off her view of the world beyond.

Darkness was coming.

The desert came alive at night. Coyotes. Snakes. Worse. She remembered sharp teeth gleaming in the dark and animals clawing at the barrier of sticks. She’d survived once. Could she again?

She couldn’t stay here. The animals would crawl inside.

Her limbs ached, but adrenaline gave her strength. She pulled herself out of the ravine, fingers clawing into loose sand as she reached the open desert.

It was cooler now. Sunset carried the scent of creosote. The chill should have been a relief, but it only deepened her fear.

She searched the horizon. The road, her only tether to safety, lay in the distance. How far had she wandered?

The asphalt looked miles away. The scrub and hills had concealed how far she’d strayed. She could have gotten turned around and lost herself in the endless sprawl of sand and stone.

There was no more hesitation. She had to go back. If she traveled now, the cooler air would help her conserve energy.

As long as the coyotes didn’t find her again. The thought of those yellow eyes glinting in the dark made her skin prickle.

If they come back, I’ll find another place to hide.

But, deep down, she knew the truth. There might not be another place. The hole had been a lucky break. Out here, the desert was wide open.

Delaney set her sights on the highway and forced herself to walk. Somewhere in the coming night, a scratching sound made her ears prick.

She spun around, but the land lay empty behind her. Had the sound been her imagination? She knew better. The predators would wait for the dark.

And when they did, she would have nowhere to hide.

13

Special Agent Vera Sinclair climbed down from the black bureau-issued vehicle and onto the warped pavement of Arroyo Creek’s sheriff’s station parking lot. The Arizona heat hit her like a slow-moving wall, rising off the asphalt beneath her polished Oxfords. With the sun westering, the temperature had fallen. But it was still hotter than hell. She wasn’t in Virginia anymore.

The temperature didn’t bother her. She had spent years chasing killers through worse places—swamps thick with mosquitos, freezing Midwestern farmlands, the suffocating back alleys of cities where death smelled like garbage and rain.

Here, the air was dry, sharp with grime and sunbaked desperation. A town on the edge of nowhere. The kind of place where people vanished, and no one noticed until the buzzards started circling.

Sinclair adjusted her tailored blazer. She marched toward the squat, bleached building where Arroyo Creek’s sheriff and deputies were waiting. She didn’t rush, nor did she dawdle. The woman moved like someone who knew where she was going and expected everyone else to keep up.

At forty years old, she had a face that rarely betrayed her thoughts—high cheekbones, brown eyes that cut like a scalpel, and short, dark hair framing her angular features with severe precision. She wasn’t tall, but she carried herself like she was. Agents under her command had once joked that standing next to her felt like standing in a pressure chamber, as if the air were a little thinner, making it difficult to catch one’s breath.

Sinclair didn’t intimidate with volume. She didn’t bark orders or slam desks. Instead, she had a way of looking at people as though they were puzzles with missing pieces. She could see the gaps in their reasoning before they opened their mouths.

And right now, she was looking for a killer.

“Ma’am?”

She turned slightly. Agent Price, one of her team members, had stepped out of the second SUV, adjusting his tie with the nervous energy she had come to tolerate. Price was young, mid-thirties, a former homicide detective from Dallas. Sharp, but not as intelligent as he thought he was.

“The locals are inside,” Price continued. “Sheriff’s waiting on you.”

“Then we shouldn’t waste time.” Sinclair strode forward, pushing through the glass doors.

Inside, the Arroyo Creek Sheriff’s Department was exactly what she expected. Small and outdated, the place held room for three deputies, a bad coffeemaker, and whatever items from funding the county hadn’t funneled elsewhere. A few officers looked up as she entered, their expressions shifting between curiosity and wariness.

Sheriff Donnelly, a broad-shouldered man with a graying mustache and a sweat-stained uniform, worked beside a conference table littered with case files. He straightened when he saw her.

“Agent Sinclair,” Donnelly greeted, offering his hand. His grip was firm, though she could tell he was sizing her up. Small-town cops never liked the feds swooping in.

Before getting to business, Sinclair shook his hand once. “Thank you for having us, Sheriff. Let’s talk about the Mercer family.”

“Damn shame,” he said, motioning for her team to sit. “Good people. Just up and vanished.”

Sinclair pulled out a chair but didn’t sit yet. Instead, she scanned the photos spread across the table.

Luke Mercer. Grace Mercer. Their ten-year-old son, Ben. Eight days missing.

She lifted one image—a family portrait. Smiling faces. This was a photo a family stuck to their refrigerator with a cheap magnet. Something about this case felt familiar.

“Tell me everything,” she said.

“Last seen at a gas station outside town, eight days ago. No known enemies or financial issues. No reason to run. Their SUV was found in the desert about fifteen minutes from our location. No signs of struggle. I’ll give you the exact coordinates.”

“Patterns?”

Donnelly hesitated.

Sinclair lifted her gaze, pinning him with a look that made most people regret hesitation. “You’re resisting. You think this matches something else?”

“There have been others. People disappearing on these back roads. Mostly travelers and loners. But the Mercers are from Arroyo Creek. A whole family? That’s new, so maybe the cases aren’t related.”

“Doubtful,” Sinclair said, filing the information away.

A serial killer had taken the Mercers, and unless her instincts were way off—and they never were—the same psychopath had snatched Randall Silas and his daughter from Phoenix. This killer was taking victims at an alarming rate, initially every several months, and now weekly. He had drawn the FBI. And if Sinclair was correct, this killer had drawn the attention of three others.

She glanced at Agent Price, who was already flipping through the case notes on a different hunt.

The fugitives.

Scarlett Bell. Neil Gardy. Logan Wolf.

Sinclair hadn’t forgotten them. She had been hunting them since the day Bell and Gardy went rogue. The agent was aware of Wolf’s reputation—the vigilante, the ghost, a former profiler who hunted killers. He’d also murdered his wife Renee. Why would Bell and Gardy trust a madman like Wolf? Together, the three killers had taken the lives of Deputy Director Magnus Carter and Agent Sophia LeClaire.

The Arizona murders would draw Wolf like blood in the water. And if Wolf was here, so were Gardy and Bell. Sinclair could take out all of them.

Ironically, she admired Logan Wolf’s ability more than anyone’s except her own. Had Wolf already figured out what the FBI was just now piecing together? That the Arizona killer was a local who came from a broken family and had suffered abuse?

Sinclair sat down and studied the photos and case files. There were two hunts happening in Arizona.

One for a killer. One for Wolf, Bell, and Gardy. But she couldn’t tell Sheriff Donnelly about the fugitives until she was sure. The distraction would send his deputies in too many directions. They would see the former FBI agents hiding in alleys and standing on every corner. Better to keep them focused on catching this new killer.

Sinclair kept her face impassive as she flipped through the case files. Her mind was working three steps ahead. The sheriff and his deputies were useful, but only if they stuck to one task. Right now, the Arizona killer took priority.

She looked at Donnelly. “Here’s what we’re going to do.”

The sheriff drew himself up like a man who wasn’t used to taking orders.

“You’ll treat the Mercer case as a standalone disappearance. Don’t tie it to any ongoing investigations publicly. No press conferences. No media involvement outside of what you’ve already released. You don’t want to tip off the killer.”

Donnelly frowned. “That might be tough. People talk. There is already a rumor that this guy is the same one who took those people in Phoenix.”

“Then make sure your people talk in generalities. If we say ‘serial killer’ on the national news, our unsub will change his pattern. Move on. We’ll lose him.”

“Unsub?”

“Unknown subject. It’s what we call a suspect when we don’t have a name.”

Donnelly grunted. “Fancy FBI term for a killer we haven’t caught yet, huh?”

“It’s more than that. An unsub isn’t merely a faceless criminal. It’s a profile formed by a pattern. A collection of behaviors we dissect until we understand who we’re dealing with.”

“And once you do?”

Sinclair’s voice was calm. “Then we catch them.”

Donnelly ran a hand over his graying mustache. “All right. So I can’t confirm anything about a serial killer. What do you want my deputies to do in the meantime?”

“Set up checkpoints along any rural highways within a fifty-mile radius. If this guy’s working the roads, he must have routes he prefers, places he feels comfortable. We know where he posed the bodies. He wanted us to see, and that was his first mistake.”

“We’ll make it happen,” Donnelly grunted.

“Excellent.” Sinclair turned to the stack of missing persons reports. “I also need your deputies reviewing every case of abandoned vehicles in the area from the last three years, no matter how insignificant it seemed at the time. This killer didn’t materialize out of thin air. He’s killed before.”

One of Donnelly’s younger deputies, who had been watching the exchange, shifted in his seat. “You think this guy has been here all along?”

Sinclair’s brown eyes met his. “I know he has. Maybe not in Arroyo Creek, but close. Think of a great white shark. The shark claims a territory, an area where the prey is plentiful, the conditions familiar. It doesn’t stray unless forced. It learns the currents, the migration patterns, the best places to strike. And it keeps returning to that same stretch of ocean until the food runs out.”

She tapped a finger on the map spread across the table. “Our unsub is the same. He’s chosen this hunting ground for a reason. The desert is his deep water. He’s from the area, so he understands the landscape. In society, he blends in. The people closest to him would never guess he’s a killer.”

“And when the food…when the victims dry up?”

“He moves and adapts. If we don’t stop him here, he’ll disappear and reestablish dominance somewhere else.” She gestured to the missing persons’ reports on the table. “Right now, he’s taking victims at an accelerated rate. That means one of two things: Either he’s becoming reckless, or he’s working toward something.”

“What do you mean, working toward something?”

“Some serial killers are compulsive. They kill when the urge strikes, reacting to impulse. Others are methodical and structured. They have an end goal, even if only they understand it.”

“What’s this killer’s end goal?” the sheriff asked.

“When I know, I’ll catch him. The items left at the scenes—family photos, children’s toys, wedding rings—those aren’t random. He’s reliving a story.”

Donnelly muttered something under his breath before composing himself. “A story about what?”

“About the life he thinks he should have had. The one he’s trying to create. In his childhood, he was a victim who lacked control. Now he holds dominance over people. This is his fantasy.”

“Fine. My team will handle the checkpoints and start pulling those reports. What about you?”

“I’ll be following another lead,” Sinclair said.

“Anything we need to know about?”

Sinclair stood, smoothing the front of her blazer. “When I’m ready to share our information, you will know.”

She didn’t offer more, and Donnelly didn’t push. She had learned years ago that local cops had a limit—they helped, but they didn’t want to be dragged too deep. They wanted to believe that killers weren’t that much smarter than them. That justice always won in the end.

Sinclair knew better.

Gathering her files, she motioned for Price to follow and headed for the exit.

In the parking lot, the smell of a cruiser’s gasoline lingered in the breeze. Sinclair pulled out her phone and scrolled through the latest FBI alerts as she walked toward their vehicles.

Price followed, waiting until they were far enough from the sheriff’s office before speaking. “They’re here, aren’t they?”

Sinclair didn’t answer immediately. She reached her SUV, rested one hand on the doorframe, and looked out over the empty horizon. The endless stretch of desert held highways cutting through nothingness.

“They’re here.”

Price rubbed the back of his neck. “Good God. Just what we need.”

“I want this information kept within our team only. No leaks to the locals. No tips to the sheriff’s department or state police.”

“Ma’am, with respect, Agents Bell, Gardy, and Wolf are fugitives. They’re top priority.”

“They are no longer agents. Drop the titles, or we will have a problem.”

“If they’re in Arizona, don’t we want⁠—”

“We want control,” Sinclair interrupted.

Price shut his mouth.

Sinclair lowered her voice. “Bell and Gardy realize they’re running from the FBI. But they don’t know I’m the one tracking them. Wolf thinks he can outmaneuver us because he’s spent his career hunting people like himself. If the wrong people get involved, they’ll disappear again. I can’t let that happen.”

“And when we find them?”

“We bring them in. And if they resist,” she added, her voice cold as iron, “we end it.”

“Even Bell?”

Agent Sophia LeClaire had trained with Bell and Sinclair. They had all been part of the same machine. But Sophia was dead. Bell had made her choice; Sinclair wouldn’t hesitate when the time came.

“Yes, even Bell.”

“As you command, Agent Sinclair.”

She opened the door and slid into the seat. “Keep monitoring roadblocks and police reports. If they’re here, they won’t stay quiet for long. My guess is we’ll cross paths. As much as I detest the thought, Wolf, Bell, and I think alike.”

Price climbed into the passenger seat. Sinclair started the engine.

Two hunts were underway in Arizona.

Agent Vera Sinclair intended to take four scalps back to Quantico.

14

Inside the boarding house, Bell and Gardy strapped on their gear. The worn tactical vests and boots carried memories of the life they had left behind in Virginia. Wolf kept additional vests and weapons downstairs, but they had enough for tonight.

Besides, if the killer had kept to his MO, they would find nothing but dead bodies.

Bell slid her sidearm into its holster. She glanced at Gardy, who adjusted his own weapon and checked the batteries on a compact tactical flashlight.

“Feels like we’re working for the BAU,” Gardy said, offering her a tight smile.

“If it weren’t for Carter, we would be.”

Wolf appeared in the doorway, a shadow among shadows. Dressed in dark clothing and carrying a worn backpack, he moved with the quiet assurance that had once made him a top-tier agent. He looked them over.

“Ready?” he asked, though it wasn’t really a question.

Bell fastened her jacket. “You said you’ve narrowed the search. How far?”

Leading them back to the command center, Wolf indicated the pen marks that highlighted old mining routes and roads through the desert.

“Fifteen miles southeast of Redthorn Wells,” he said, tapping a section of the map with his finger. “Based on the last known locations of the Mercer family and Randall Silas’s truck, I’ve isolated a corridor where our killer is likely operating.”

Gardy squinted at the lines. “That’s a lot of ground.”

“It is. But this killer follows a pattern—isolated desert roads, limited visibility, and terrain that offers natural concealment. He knows the desert, but so do we.”

Bell studied the map. “How do you know he placed the bodies there?”

Wolf glanced up, his expression unreadable. “Because if I were him, that’s where I would pose the families.”

The room fell silent. Bell didn’t doubt him. Her heart quickened as she remembered the bodies Wolf had left behind. Yet his ability to think like the monsters they hunted made him invaluable. It also made him terrifying.

“The killer is overdue,” Wolf continued. “The Mercer family is probably already gone, but I hold a slim hope that we’ll find Randall and Delaney Silas.”

“What about Harold?” Gardy asked. “Is he coming?”

“Harold isn’t a trained field agent. He will only get in the way.”

“Don’t tell me Harold agreed to stay here alone.”

“I gave him two choices—man the fort or hunt a serial killer while the FBI searches for us. He chose the former.”

“Where is he now?” asked Bell.

Wolf grinned. “Locked inside his room. He’s safe here, even if he doesn’t believe it.” The serial killer slipped the hunting knife into its sheath. “We move at night. Less chance of running into law enforcement. The bureau will focus on the highways during the day. Even if they search at night, darkness will act as our ally. If we’re careful, they’ll never see us.”

“What about the coyotes, snakes, and God knows what else?” Gardy asked.

“Stay close, and you’ll be fine.”

“Why is that?”

“Because predators sense one of their own.”

Bell glanced at Gardy, who shrugged.

The desert air was chilly against Bell’s skin as they stepped outside. The sky glittered with stars, so many that it seemed impossible.

Wolf led the way to the Escalade, which he’d concealed behind a squat building two doors down from the boarding house. Bell and Gardy followed, their footsteps muffled by the sand. The night was alive with chirping insects and the rustle of unseen movement.

Fifteen miles.

Fifteen miles between them and a killer who knew the desert better than anyone. Bell touched her sidearm and made sure it was still there.

When Wolf turned onto the highway, the cracked asphalt vanished in the pitch-black expanse beyond the reach of the headlights. This road was a pale scar across a landscape starved of life, twisting into the darkness.

In the back seat of the stolen Escalade, Bell watched the road unfurl through the windshield. Wolf drove in silence, his hands steady on the wheel, eyes fixed on the black stretching beyond the headlights’ glow.

The desert wasn’t quiet. No, it whispered. The wind carried faint murmurs across the sand, like voices just out of earshot. Dunes loomed like burial mounds, spilling shadows that pooled along the edges of the road.

Bell couldn’t shake the feeling that the landscape was watching them.

She leaned closer to the window. The reflection of her own face stared back—pale, gaunt, with eyes that looked more haunted than human. Twisted mesquite trees jutted from the earth like fingers clawing their way out of shallow graves.

“This road doesn’t see any traffic,” Wolf said.

“No wonder,” Bell said. “It leads straight to hell.”

“You aren’t wrong, dear Scarlett.”

She glimpsed rusted road signs leaning at unnatural angles. Their faded lettering was unreadable, worn smooth by time, as if the desert had erased all memories of what lay beyond.

The sand, now creeping across the road, glimmered under the moonlight like ash.

Bell’s breath fogged the window, and for a moment she thought she saw movement. A shape shifting between the dunes. Low to the ground. But when she blinked, there was only emptiness.

The road narrowed, coiling between rocky outcrops. The craggy formations cast grotesque silhouettes against the night sky—figures bent in agony, faces stretched in silent screams.

As they passed, Bell had the unsettling feeling that the rocks were shifting ever so slightly, inching closer, closing the road behind them.

No turning back now.

Breaking the spell, Gardy asked, “What’s that smell?”

Bell caught it too.

“A dead animal,” she said.

“I hope that’s an animal.”

She didn’t reply.

The headlights found something on the road ahead. It was an animal carcass, half-consumed and surrounded by deep paw prints. Coyotes. The body had been torn open, its exposed ribs like ivory fingers reaching for the sky.

Bell looked away. The desert was also a predator.

As the road dipped into a shallow valley, the darkness thickened. The wind had stopped whispering. Now it howled with a mournful wail that echoed through the rocky crags.

Wolf slowed the SUV. “We’re close. Keep your eyes open.”

“How do you know?” Gardy asked.

Bell gave Gardy a pointed look. There was no point in questioning Wolf.

15

Night poured down from the heavens. The desert, once a blast furnace, had shifted into something quieter and darker but no less dangerous.

Delaney’s sneakers scuffed against the gravel shoulder of the road. With the temperature somewhere in the sixties, she moved faster now.

Maybe she wasn’t that far from the SUV. She’d been such a fool for leaving her only means of transportation.

But a chill settled in her chest. When she returned to the vehicle, she would see Dad again. What if the animals had found his body and torn him to bits?

I won’t look.

If she could just make it back, maybe the SUV would start. Maybe she would remember who attacked them.

But the way forward looked the same as what lay behind. The macadam gleamed under the moonlight before disappearing into blackness. No headlights. No distant glow from a town. She was on her own.

Her lips tasted of salt and dust. She prayed for a traveler, for anyone to drive by and stop. Deep down, she knew no one would. This stretch of road wasn’t meant for travelers. It was forgotten. Like her.

She slowed her pace and listened. The last time she’d heard the howls, they had come from a long way off. But the desert played tricks. Sound carried differently here. What seemed far could be closer than she realized.

Her fingers tightened around the worn stick she had carried since that first night. It was a poor weapon, but she’d found nothing better.

Keep moving.

The soles of her feet throbbed. But stopping meant death. She knew it with certainty. The desert didn’t care. If she paused for too long, the cold would seep in, and the night’s predators would have their chance.

The road curved slightly ahead, and Delaney broke into a jog. She remembered this curve. The landscape all looked the same now: dark hills in the distance, twisted silhouettes of brush and cacti along the roadside. Yet she was sure this curve was a few miles from the SUV. By traveling at night, she was making up time.

The howls started again.

She froze.

Somewhere far behind her—faint, but there—a howl rose into the night.

They were closer than before.

She wasn’t fast enough to outrun them, but she had to try.

Delaney forced herself to sprint, wondering how she could defend herself. The stick would be useless if the coyotes came in a pack. She wouldn’t survive the encounter.

The first growl came from the dark. It sounded as if it was no more than a few hundred paces from her.

Delaney skidded to a stop. Her breath steamed in the night air as her eyes darted across the desert.

Then she saw them.

Glowing eyes. Three—no, five pairs—reflecting silver in the moonlight. They blinked in and out of view as the predators skittered between scrub brush and rocks. Lean, ragged shapes moved with deadly purpose.

When did they get so close?

A yip echoed from the left, followed by another growl from the right. They were circling and closing in.

Run.

Her legs moved before the thought finished forming. The weapon in her hand was useless now, a toy against the monsters gaining on her. She sprinted off the road. The sand dragged at her sneakers. Her lungs burned.

The coyotes followed. Their snarls and panting breaths became louder. They were too fast. Paws pounded against the dirt and sand as their jaws snapped.

Delaney had no choice but to flee. She no longer knew how far she’d drifted from the road. Dunes and twisted plants offered no protection.

Her eyes darted wildly.

The growls came again. She risked a glance over her shoulder.

Too close.

The lead coyote, its fur matted and dark, snapped at the air fifty yards behind her. Its yellow eyes locked onto hers.

I won’t make it.

In desperation, she veered, stumbling through a patch of brittle bushes. Thorns tore at her legs, but she kept going. The coyotes followed, crashing through the brush without hesitation.

A rock caught her ankle. She stumbled, nearly falling.

Then a shadow caught her eye.

A low ridge stood ahead. The earth had crumbled, forming a narrow crevice between two rocky outcrops.

Another shelter.

It wasn’t deep, but it was narrow, too narrow for the coyotes to squeeze through. But her skinny frame might make it. The shelter was her only chance.

With the last of her strength, she lunged for the gap, scraping her arms against the rough terrain as she squeezed inside. Jagged walls tore at her clothes, but she kept crawling, forcing herself deeper. Wetness along her forearms told her she’d cut her flesh on the rocks. She didn’t stop until her back scraped against the stone.

The moment she wedged herself inside, the pack arrived.

Snapping and screaming, the lead coyote lunged at the opening. Its breath stank of rot and hunger. Paws scrabbled against the rock as it tried to force its way inside, teeth flashing in the dim light.

Delaney screamed, pressing herself deeper into the narrow space. The second coyote joined the first, growling and pawing at the gap. Dust and pebbles rained down. They were squeezing in.

She drew back the stick and thrust it upward. The point rammed through the lead coyote’s eye. It squealed and fell back. Two more predators took its place.

The pack circled, snarling at the opening. But the space was too tight. The coyotes couldn’t get to her.

Yet they didn’t leave.

Delaney pressed her hand over her mouth, stifling another scream.

The next coyote sat back on its haunches, staring at her with eyes that gleamed like burning coals. The animals wouldn’t give up. Not until she was theirs.

The predators waited. Delaney drew her knees to her chest and cried.

She was trapped.

16

The government SUV met a barren stretch of highway and rumbled to a stop along the shoulder. Beyond the road, the landscape stretched into an abyss of sand and rock as the night wind stirred the dry air into whispering eddies.

“This is the place?” Agent Price asked.

“The coordinates say this is where the killer posed a pair of bodies two months ago.”

Sinclair stepped out first, her shoes sinking into the loose dirt. She assessed her surroundings. It was the perfect spot to conceal a body.

Agent Price and two other members of her team followed, fanning out behind her.

“This is straight out of a horror story,” Price said, peering into the emptiness. “Not a single landmark. If someone dumped a body out here, it’s a miracle anyone found it.”

Sinclair didn’t respond. She studied the terrain, the way the desert rose and fell in deceptive waves—a natural maze of shallow ravines, rock formations, and thorny scrub. The killer had chosen this place. Why?

She reached into her pocket and pulled out an LED flashlight, clicking it on as she stepped off the roadside.

“The dumping ground is about a hundred yards from here,” she said, leading the way. “Shielded from passing cars by those ridges up ahead. You wouldn’t see anything unless you left the road.”

“Why would anyone leave the road out here?”

“Because they wanted to look death in the face.”

The wind carried their footsteps across the sand as they moved, boots and shoes crunching over brittle brush and loose stones. The ground sloped downward, just enough to break the line of sight from the road. A perfect pocket for a killer to work unseen.

Sinclair’s light swept over the terrain. She’d read the reports and studied the photographs. But standing here, where the bodies had been posed, was something else entirely. The ground bore no signs of violence now, just scattered stones and wind-carved grooves that gave texture to the ocean of sand. But she could see it as it had been months ago. Two bodies, carefully arranged, staring sightlessly at the stars.

Price shivered. “Creepy as hell.”

Sinclair crouched and swept her light over the ground. “And compromised.”

“What?”

“The local investigation. They contaminated the scene.” She motioned at the ground. “No perimeter markers. No attempt to preserve wind-blown debris. Did you see any impression sites noted in the report?”

“You mean where the bodies were?”

“The investigators didn’t mark them properly. No forensic mapping. They let the wind erase our best shot at reconstructing the scene.” She scowled. “Sloppy work. They took photographs, bagged evidence, and called it a day.”

“If the killer left evidence behind, it’s long gone.”

“The police should have noticed the pattern and called us months ago.”

She turned, sweeping her flashlight across the ridges. The killer hadn’t rushed. He’d taken his time arranging his victims just right. That meant he felt comfortable here.

Price studied her. “Killers return to the scene. Do you think he’s been here again?”

“Likely.”

She clicked off her flashlight, letting the darkness settle around them. A long, mournful howl carried across the open desert.

Though Sinclair barely flinched, she saw her team react. Price stiffened, his hand twitching toward his weapon. Behind him, Agent Holcomb muttered a curse and turned in a slow circle, his flashlight sweeping the ridges. Even Agent Alvarez, the most level-headed of the group, shifted his feet.

Another howl followed the first, then another, spreading through the night in eerie harmony. A pack. Distant, but not distant enough.

"You’re hearing coyotes," Sinclair said, but she didn’t miss the way Holcomb’s hand drifted toward his holster. Spooked agents made poor decisions.

“Yeah, well, I don’t feel like getting eaten alive,” Price said. “We should head back to the SUV before we get into trouble.”

He wasn’t wrong. There was nothing left of the crime scene to examine. The local cops had seen to that. The killer wasn’t dumb enough to leave obvious clues. Yet she hated leaving. This place held significance to the killer, and she wanted to know why.

"Fine," she said. "Get back to the vehicles."

Price was already turning toward the road when she heard something. A sound beneath the wind.

Sinclair’s body fell still.

“Agent Sinclair?” Price questioned.

She lifted a hand, silencing him.

The wind pushed through the ravines, rustling the brush and kicking loose dirt over the sand. But beneath the gale lay something else.

Movement. Not an animal. Someone was out there.

She turned to Price. “Fan out. Stay within eyesight of each other. Check the ridges, the brush, and search for footprints.”

Price frowned. “You think someone is⁠—”

“Yes,” Sinclair said.

Price drew his sidearm and signaled to the others. Holcomb and Alvarez moved in tandem, their weapons ready, flashlights searching for whatever had made the noise in the darkness. Sinclair’s team wasn’t easily rattled. Tonight they were jumping at shadows.

She let them move ahead and followed. Someone was studying them from the darkness.

Sinclair touched her weapon, thumb resting on the safety. Her eyes flicked over the rocks, the skeletal trees, the deep shadows that seemed to breathe.

A killer was here.

17

Bell crouched behind a jagged outcrop of rock, the stone pressing against her back. She steadied her breath and stayed quiet. Coyotes howled in the night. But the predators were the least of her problems.

Not fifty yards ahead, Special Agent Vera Sinclair moved through the desert like a specter. Her team spread out in a disciplined formation, weapons raised, flashlight beams sweeping the ridges and scrub. They were looking for someone.

A curse slipped from Gardy’s lips. “That’s Sinclair.”

“In the flesh,” Bell whispered.

She should have known.

Of course Agent Vera Sinclair was leading the investigation into the Arizona murders; she was a bloodhound when she caught a scent and never stopped until she found her prey.

Bell had worked with Sinclair when they were both climbing the ranks. Sinclair had been sharp then. Now she was lethal.

And she wasn’t just here for the killer.

She’s here for us too.

Beside Bell, Wolf remained motionless. He was watching Sinclair with an unsettling sort of calm.

“She is skilled,” Wolf said.

Bell shot him a sharp glance. “Don’t tell me you admire her.”

His lips curved into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “I understand her. You and Sinclair think alike. Your instincts led you both to the same place. You came here because the killer was drawn to it. So did she.”

“She also came here to hunt us.”

“Yes. And she’s very close.”

Gardy swore again under his breath. “Then we need to move.”

“And walk into the open?” Wolf asked. “She’ll have her team kill us before we can raise our hands.”

Bell had been hunted before. By men with knives, by psychopaths with their own sick games. But Vera Sinclair wasn’t a killer—she was something worse. Sinclair was a hunter who believed she was right, not unlike Wolf.

Fifteen yards away, Special Agent Vera Sinclair stood in the open desert. The agents were getting closer. Bell’s heart began pounding like a war drum.

Utterly motionless, Wolf held the hunting knife. His breathing didn’t change, and Bell knew he could eliminate two agents without making a sound. But there were too many this time. And she didn’t want the serial killer to murder innocents.

Gardy kneeled just beyond Wolf, pressed into the shadows of a boulder, gun braced against the rock. He wasn’t one to panic. Years of experience kept his nerves in check, yet it was clear that he recognized how close they were to dying. In a matter of moments, the agents would spot them and riddle their bodies with bullets. Would Gardy fire back at his former colleagues?

“Fan wider,” Sinclair ordered, her voice carrying in the night. “Sweep every ridge. Someone is here, and I want to find them.”

Bell’s blood ran cold.

A flashlight beam sliced over the edge of the rock where Bell hid. She lowered her head. If the agent took one more step forward⁠—

“Nothing over here,” Agent Holcomb called from further away.

Two agents pivoted, moving toward the fugitives’ position. They were coming too close.

Wolf cocked his head toward the agents. If Sinclair’s team spotted them, Wolf would move first. He would take out the first two threats; Bell and Gardy would deal with the rest.

No, it couldn’t come to this. These were agents Bell respected. She couldn’t kill them.

Not even to save myself?

The first agent stepped on a pool of pebbles five yards away. “I heard something in this direction,” he said.

Then a coyote howled a few hundred yards away. Bell turned to see eyes in the darkness.

The agent stopped, body stiffening, hand dropping to his sidearm.

Another howl. Something skittered against the sand. A rabbit, maybe, or some nocturnal scavenger fleeing the encroaching danger.

“Agent Sinclair?” Price asked.

Sinclair responded with frustration. “That’s our cue. Back to the road.”

The agents turned away. Bell closed her eyes and leaned her head against the boulder. The FBI agents had come within inches of capturing Bell and her team. Next time, they wouldn’t be so lucky.

Along the highway, engines kicked on. The vehicles pulled away. Taillights vanished into the black.

“She almost had us,” Bell said.

“And she’ll come again,” Wolf added.

When the howls started once more, Gardy aimed his weapon toward the sound. The cries came closer, overlapping, filling the night with a chorus of hunger.

Bell’s fingers tightened around her weapon as she scanned the darkness. Shapes shifted in the night. Were it not for their gleaming eyes, they would have been nothing but shadows.

The coyotes had grown bolder. They weren’t content to observe anymore.

A snarl to Bell’s left sent a bolt of lightning up her spine.

Gardy took a step back and aimed his gun. “They’re testing us.”

“They’re deciding if we’re prey,” Wolf said. “I suggest we make it clear we are predators.”

Bell didn’t dare to move.

A lean shape lunged into the moonlight. Its yellow eyes glowed in the dark.

Bell barely had time to react before a second coyote shot in from the right, angling low, trying to flank them. The first snapped at Gardy’s leg, its teeth grazing his boot before he kicked out, sending it skidding back into the dust.

Another shape crept behind Wolf.

Bell raised her weapon and fired into the sky.

BOOM.

The gunshot echoed off the faraway hills, shattering the pack’s nerve.

The coyotes yelped. Their formation broke. Sand flew up in a frenzy as they bolted, darting back into the shadows. Feral eyes flashed at Bell before vanishing into the desert.

Then silence.

Bell’s ears rang from the shot. She stood frozen, chest heaving, gun still raised.

“I hope Sinclair didn’t hear that shot,” Gardy said.

Wolf sheathed his knife. “Back to the vehicle.”

“The Escalade is west of here. A quarter mile. I hope to hell we can find it in the dark.”

18

Delaney screamed as the coyotes pushed harder against the gap. Their snarls filled the cramped space.

She shoved at the rocks and dirt, blocking as much of the opening as she could. But the animals were relentless. Paws scraped against stone. Claws raked through the debris she had piled before the entryway.

One of the animals forced its muzzle through a gap, wet nose sniffing. Then—teeth. Snapping, gnashing.

Delaney kicked the muzzle. The coyote yelped, but another took its place.

They were squeezing through.

She braced herself. The stick. Where was the stick? She groped through the dirt, her fingers brushing over the rough wood.

Then the world exploded. A crack shattered the air like thunder.

The air vibrated from the sound. She knew the blast wasn’t thunder. It was a gun.

The pack scattered. The coyotes yelped and bolted into the night. Delaney didn’t move. Her lungs dragged in too much air, and her vision blurred, turning dark at the edges. She was hyperventilating.

The teenager squeezed her eyes shut and pressed herself against the back of the enclosure. Her fingers curled against the dirt, trembling and tingling. Her head swam. Too much oxygen made her dizzy. She was going to pass out if she didn’t stop.

Think. What did they teach in health class?

Breathe slow. Count. Control it.

She forced herself to inhale through her nose, deep and steady.

One… Two… Three…

Then hold it.

One… Two…

Then she released her breath.

One… Two… Three… Four…

She repeated the process, holding on to reality as if it were a frayed rope.

In. Hold. Out.

After several cycles, the fog lifted from her mind. Her heart still pounded, but the dizziness faded.

The night was silent now, but someone was out there. And they had a gun. Had the police found her father and their vehicle?

Hope sprang into her chest. But she stopped herself from crawling out of the hole. The gunshot could have come from the killer.

Somewhere down the road, her father’s body lay beneath the stars and moon. What had happened to him? She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to force the memories to surface.

There was something missing. A void when she’d lost track of time and events.

She pressed her fingers against her temple. Her head throbbed with a dull, constant pain. Someone had hit her. But her father must have fought back and saved her before succumbing to his injuries. Dad had saved her, and she’d left him to the buzzards. Her throat tightened.

Delaney knew she was suffering from memory loss. Her breathing slowed as she struggled to piece together what she remembered.

They had left Phoenix early in the morning and driven into the desert. She could remember him saying she would have her chance behind the wheel.

“Your turn, kiddo.”

On the shoulder, he tossed her the keys. They traded places.

Then her hands were on the wheel. She started driving. Delaney remembered the feeling of control, the thrill of the open space around them. She had laughed.

Then what? Had there been another driver on the road?

She pressed her forehead to her knees, forcing herself to dig deeper. Something had happened. Something terrible.

She reached for the moment, trying to grab it before it slipped away.

Pain.

Nothing else. She couldn’t remember the attack. She couldn’t remember who had done this.

The night fell silent again. She listened but couldn’t hear the coyotes, and no more gunshots ripped through the desert.

Delaney inched forward and removed the brush from the opening through which she had barely passed. The stone had scraped her raw on the way in, and now it resisted her escape, snagging her shirt, tearing at her already lacerated skin.

She gritted her teeth and forced her way out. Blood wet her arms and legs. She stayed low and looked across the quiet terrain. The wind was stronger now. She shielded her face from the grit.

Delaney needed to find the road, which would lead her to the SUV and Dad.

Her stomach churned. What would he look like when she found the body?

No. Don’t think.

She started across the uneven ground, avoiding the patches of loose sand where her feet threatened to sink. The wind had erased her footprints. It also devoured any sign of where she had come from.

She studied the landscape. Rocks. Sand. Scrub brush. More rocks. The road should have lain straight ahead. But the terrain looked wrong. Where was the road?

She turned in a full circle, looking for a recognizable piece of land.

But it was all the same. Barren and dark. It went on forever.

A bitter, awful realization settled. She was lost.

She had been a fool to leave the road, a fool to think she could flee into the desert and find her way back. Now she would pay for her mistake.

19

The only sound in the night was the hum of the engine. Sinclair assessed the dark horizon as she drove. The glow of the dashboard painted greens and reds across her face. Her intuition told her she’d left the dumpsite too soon, yet the coyotes would have surrounded them had they stayed a minute longer. She wouldn’t place her agents in harm’s way.

As she checked the GPS, an explosion drew her eyes to the mirror.

Was that gunfire?

It cracked through the stillness.

Sinclair pressed the brake.

“Price,” she said.

“I heard it.” Price was already reaching for the radio. He clicked the receiver. “Unit Two, this is Price. We’ve got a gunshot—repeat, a gunshot—south of our current position and back the way we came. We’re turning around.”

A voice broken by static responded. “Copy that, Unit One. We’re flipping back.”

Anyone in the desert after nightfall was up to no good. And anyone with a gun was dangerous.

The gunfire had come from the spot they had just searched. Perhaps her team had not been the only people studying where the killer placed the bodies. That suggested Bell and her team of fugitives were out there. Or perhaps it was the killer himself.

Sinclair turned the wheel, easing the SUV onto the shoulder in a wide arc. The tires kicked up dust, skidding slightly as they hit soft sand.

Careful. She needed to gain traction before the tires sank into the sand. This wasn’t a place to get stranded.

The SUV groaned but followed her command, pivoting southward.

Price turned to her. “Who fires a gun in the desert?”

“I think you know who,” she said.

“The agents?”

“Former agents. Don’t make me correct you again.”

“As you command, Agent Sinclair.”

The fugitives were here. She felt it in her bones.

Bell moved fast, her boots kicking up sand as she led Wolf and Gardy through the moonlight. The desert stretched like a silent graveyard, its ridges and gullies offering both concealment and danger.

The coyotes were regrouping.

She could hear them—low yips and howls, the sound of a pack finding its nerve again. They weren’t done with the hunt.

“We need to get to the Escalade,” Gardy said, glancing over his shoulder. “Before those things catch up.”

“We’re close,” Bell whispered. “Keep moving.”

She retraced their path, using the same ridges and outcroppings they had used before. The Escalade was just beyond the next stretch of sand, hidden where they had left it, away from prying eyes.

Then two sets of headlights appeared.

Bell stopped.

The black government vehicles roared down the highway in the distance, their twin beams slicing through the dark, bouncing over uneven asphalt.

Sinclair was coming back. She must have heard the gunshot.

Bell pushed Wolf and Gardy down behind a rocky outcrop, flattening herself against the stone. The headlights cut across the desert and swept dangerously close.

The vehicles were moving fast.

“I was afraid of this,” Wolf said.

The beams swept across the road before the vehicles slowed down.

Could Sinclair see them? Were the FBI agents about to spill out and flood the desert with flashlights and guns?

“Any ideas?” Gardy asked, staring at Wolf.

“Move,” Wolf said. “If you want to live.”

Wolf grabbed Bell to get her going. The serial killer led them away from the Escalade, away from the road and deeper into the darkness.

Was this a mistake? Their GPS wouldn’t work out in the desert. If they got lost, they’d never make it back to the road. Sinclair wouldn’t need to chase them anymore—she and the other agents could gather whatever remains the animals didn’t pick off their bones.

But Wolf understood how to survive. And right now, staying out of sight was the only thing that mattered. Bell had to trust him.

She followed.

Gardy swore under his breath but did the same.

The three fugitives disappeared into the night, moving through the dunes like phantoms. Gusts of wind blew sand across the tracks and covered their escape. But the wind also devoured the breadcrumbs they would require to backtrack.

Bell sprinted, her breathing controlled as she followed Wolf into the shifting blackness. Gardy’s feet crunched stones and brush right behind them.

The flashlights were far, but the agents wouldn’t give up. Beams cut across the ridges and gullies, searching. The FBI was on foot; Sinclair and her team knew someone was in the desert.

Now the trio had strayed too far from the highway. Bell felt disoriented, and Wolf suddenly slowed and looked around the terrain. He realized it too.

Bell cursed. This wasn’t how she’d planned to die.

As Wolf removed a gun, Bell spotted a hiding place. A narrow rock formation jutted from the earth, with a deep, jagged crevice cutting into its side. It was just wide enough to wedge inside and deep enough to keep all three out of sight.

Bell grabbed Gardy’s arm and jerked her chin toward the crevice. He caught on and followed.

Wolf slid in after them, pressing his back against the stone.

They squeezed deep into the shadows. Bell panted in silence. The air smelled like sunbaked minerals. Through the opening, she saw a flashlight beam slide across the ground.

Wolf appeared not to move, but now he held the gun in one hand and the hunting blade in the other. Gardy pressed his eyes together and appeared conflicted. Bell wondered how her partner would react if the FBI agents found their hiding spot and came inside. Would Gardy fire on innocents?

The agents passed, and the lights moved to their left. Bell drew a deep breath and grounded herself. They were safe. For now.

But the desert had swallowed them whole. And she didn’t know which way was out.

20

Sinclair’s team moved in tight formation behind her. They had been chasing the unknown shooter for too long. She knew they couldn’t continue for much longer. Doing so would leave them in no-man’s-land.

She was about to order them to retreat when Price stopped short.

“Hold up,” he said.

Sinclair turned to the agent. He was staring at a small outcrop of rock, a natural indentation in the earth that looked deep enough for someone to crawl inside. Deep enough to conceal the gunman.

She took a step closer and shined her light in the opening.

The entrance was partially blocked with brush, broken sticks, and loose stones.

Someone had been here.

“Tracks,” Holcomb said, kneeling before the entrance. “Coyotes too. A whole pack. They were circling this spot.”

“Looks like somebody used this place as a shelter,” Price said. “The question is, did the coyotes get them?”

“Think that opening is large enough for an adult to squeeze through?” Alvarez asked.

“I don’t know.”

Sinclair crouched and picked up a stick. Someone had snapped it in half. Squeezing into the space was impossible with so much debris lined up at the opening. At Sinclair’s command, the others cleared the entrance.

Her jaw shifted back and forth. “Who are we chasing? Price, contact that sheriff and let him know we’ve got an unknown person hiding in the desert.”

Price clicked the button on his radio. “Agent Price to home base.”

“Home base here, Agent Price,” the dispatcher said.

“We found tracks and a hideout. Someone was here recently.”

Static crackled, followed by their second unit responding, “Copy. Any signs of whoever it was?”

“Not yet. Requesting backup. Sending you our coordinates.”

After the radio call ended, Price looked at Sinclair. “How do you want to handle this?”

Sinclair’s gaze hardened. There was a possibility that their shooter still lurked inside. “Going in,” she said. “Cover me.”

Price nodded, drawing his weapon. Holcomb and Alvarez mirrored him.

The team entered the crevice one by one. The air inside was stale. Sinclair’s breath felt short, though she knew the impression was in her head. She didn’t like close spaces. Here, the rock walls were narrow, forcing them to move single file. She searched the interior and found scratches along the walls.

A sound came from the shadows that pooled in the corner.

Sinclair barely had time to react before Holcomb swore and staggered backward.

Something hissed.

Then Holcomb’s gun went off. A deafening crack, followed by chaos.

“Snake!” Alvarez shouted, pulling back as Holcomb collapsed on his side.

Sinclair swung her light down.

The rattlesnake coiled near Holcomb’s boot, its tail still twitching in agitation.

Holcomb groaned, clutching his leg just above the ankle. “Son of a⁠—”

Price kicked the snake aside and fired another shot. The rattler went still.

Sinclair dropped beside Holcomb, already assessing the wound. Two neat puncture marks lay just above his boot. Blood welled.

“Holcomb, talk to me,” she said.

“Burns like hell,” he gritted out, his breath coming faster.

Not good. She removed her belt and used it as a tourniquet, securing it just below his knee.

“We need evac, now,” Sinclair said.

Price was already on the radio. “Home base, we have a snakebite. Requesting immediate medical response.”

Static. “Copy that. Contacting the ambulance service now.”

Agent Holcomb was already pale, sweat slicking his forehead despite the night air. His breathing was shallow and uneven. How would they get him back to the highway without a stretcher?

Sinclair tightened the tourniquet and locked eyes with Price. “How long?”

Price glanced at his watch, calculating. “Venom can take effect in as little as fifteen minutes. Depends on how much he got and where the snake bit. We’ve got maybe an hour before serious systemic effects start. If it hits his lungs⁠—”

“We won’t let it get that far,” Sinclair said.

“I can walk,” Holcomb protested, letting out a strained breath.

“Yeah? Feel like taking a jog, tough guy?” Alvarez said.

Holcomb tried to sit up, but his hands were shaking. His leg spasmed, his calf muscles tightening. He wasn’t walking anywhere.

“We’ll carry him,” Sinclair said. “Get me options so we can get him to the highway.”

“We need a stretcher,” Price said

“Make do. A stretcher won’t materialize.”

Alvarez clasped Holcomb’s hand. “He needs out of here now.”

“We could do a fireman’s carry,” Price suggested, but Holcomb was six feet, nearly two hundred pounds. Carrying him through the sand?

“I don’t see another choice,” said Sinclair.

Price and Alvarez threw Holcomb’s arms over their shoulders. Sinclair hefted the injured agent’s legs. A vein pulsed in her neck. Good lord, it felt like the man weighed two thousand pounds.

His skin was ashen now, cold despite the sweat, and his pupils appeared dilated.

Price said, “He’s fading.”

Sinclair growled and strained to keep hold of the agent’s legs. “Holcomb, stay with me.”

Holcomb’s lips barely moved. “Remind me to put in for hazard pay.”

She almost smirked. Almost. Her boots sank into the sand. The desert was an ocean that rose to her calves. They only made it a few hundred feet before Price and Alvarez lost hold of Alvarez’s arms.

“Keep going,” Sinclair ordered.

“One second,” Price said, catching his breath beside Alvarez.

“We don’t have a second.”

Alvarez braced himself. “On three.”

“One. Two. Three.”

They lifted Holcomb, securing him with the fireman’s carry. The injured agent groaned.

“We’ll get you there, Holcomb,” Sinclair said. “Stay awake.”

A minute passed, then another. Struggling across the desert, it seemed as if they were getting nowhere. Sinclair’s shoulders screamed in protest as she adjusted her grip on Holcomb’s legs. Every step was a battle. The desert waged war, tossing sand into her eyes as if it wanted to prevent their escape.

The ground shifted beneath Sinclair’s boots, dragging her down like quicksand. Every step forward felt like a step back. Her muscles burned. She couldn’t breathe.

Alvarez grunted, sweat trickling down his face. “He weighs a ton.”

Price swore. “His eyes are closing. Hurry.”

Holcomb moaned weakly, his body limp, his head rolling against Price’s shoulder.

Sinclair spared a glance over her shoulder. Holcomb’s skin had gone waxy. His lips appeared dry and cracked.

“Holcomb,” she said. “You listening to me?”

A sluggish response. They were losing him.

Alvarez stumbled, nearly dropping his side of the carry. “We can’t make it to the highway.”

“No more breaks,” Sinclair snapped. “If we stop, he dies.”

They pressed forward, but her own arms were on fire now. Holcomb gave a shuddering breath, and for a terrible second, Sinclair thought that was it.

No. The venom shouldn’t have progressed this quickly.

Unless Holcomb was having an allergic reaction. If that was the case, all hope was lost.

Flashing lights appeared on the horizon. Was that the highway? Lord, it had to be.

The distant wail of sirens came next.

Price sucked in a breath. “We’re almost there.”

Sinclair dared to look. Through the darkness, she could see the asphalt, so close and so far.

“You’re almost there, Holcomb,” she said, adjusting her grip.

She could do this. She had survived worse.

With a cry, she hefted the dead weight of Holcomb’s legs. Price and Alvarez echoed her shout. They struggled toward the road as the sirens drew closer. The headlights burst over the ridge.

A sheriff’s department patrol truck came first, skidding to a stop. The ambulance followed seconds later.

The moment the first deputy jumped from his vehicle, Sinclair barked orders like a commander on a battlefield.

“He’s envenomated!” she yelled. “Lower leg bite, maybe forty minutes ago.”

Paramedics rushed out of the ambulance and unfolded a stretcher. The other agents collapsed to their knees as they handed Holcomb off, but Sinclair remained on her feet. She refused to acknowledge her exhaustion. Her arms were numb, and her legs felt as if she’d waded through mud.

The paramedics loaded Holcomb into the ambulance, working fast. One called out, “Heart rate’s dropping. Starting IV.”

Sinclair followed them to the ambulance before the doors slammed shut. Tires screeched as the ambulance whirled around and headed toward town. The taillights vanished.

Alvarez sat heavily in the sand, rubbing his face. “He’s gonna make it, right?”

Price bent over, hands on his knees. “Holcomb is strong.”

Sinclair massaged her arms and caught her breath. She would give the sheriff’s deputies a full briefing. Then she would find the shooter who’d led them into the desert and placed Holcomb outside death’s door.

If it had been Agent Bell and her fugitive killers, Sinclair would make them pay with their lives.

21

The dream came as it always did. A memory, twisted by time and darkness.

The house was too quiet. He stood in the hallway, small hands gripping the wooden doorframe. Did he dare breathe?

In the kitchen, Mother was crying. The sound wasn’t loud—just a quiet, breathless thing, like the way an animal whimpered when it knew it was about to die.

He should have gone back to bed. He should have closed his eyes and pretended not to hear.

But he hadn’t.

Now he stepped forward, heart hammering, drawn toward the soft sound of desperation. His father stood over her. He was a giant blocking the light.

“You made me do this,” his father said.

The boy didn’t understand. Not then.

Not until his father raised the belt again, the leather hissing as it cut through the air.

Not until Mother stopped making a sound.

No!

Not until the boy learned what it meant to be powerless.

Weak.

The dream shifted, as it always did.

Now he was older, standing in that same hallway, but the walls were rotted, caving inward like a dying thing. His father was still there—but the roles had changed.

Now the belt was in his hands. And the figure in front of him wasn’t his father anymore. It was a man who didn’t belong. A stranger who had taken something that should have been his.

A different father, a husband, a fraud.

The belt snapped tight around the man’s throat.

Pressure. Gasping.

The sound of the man exerting power.

After the life went out of the father’s body, he turned the corner and ventured down the hallway to his old bedroom. But it wasn’t his bedroom anymore. Someone else was hiding in there. A family who didn’t belong.

He snapped the leather of the belt. They heard him coming and screamed.

The desert was black when he awoke. His eyes snapped open, and it took him a second to remember where he was. Stars sparkled in the sky. The fire had burned down to embers, no longer giving off light.

He sat up slowly, rubbing his hands over his face. The dream had been stronger this time. More vivid.

Maybe because he was so close to catching her. She had proven herself stronger than he assumed, and for that he respected her. But killing her was the only way.

The pieces were falling into place. He exhaled, rolling his shoulders, shaking off the last of the nightmare. Soon, there wouldn’t be any more dreams. Only the void he had built for himself.

He remembered the gunshot. It had cracked through the desert, making him give up his pursuit. Someone else was out here.

The police? Maybe. The FBI? Possibly.

He studied the distant ridges. Did the FBI know he was in the desert?

No. They couldn’t.

But he had learned long ago to be careful. The FBI would never catch him.

He pushed himself to his feet and dusted off his hands. The girl. He needed to find her tracks again. His last lead had been near a rock formation where she had hidden from the coyotes. Intelligent girl. She had lasted longer than the others.

But she was predictable. She would go back to where she had last felt safe.

Back to the SUV.

The girl thought she would find help there, but she wouldn’t.

She would find him.

His lips curled into something that wasn’t quite a smile.

This time, he would be waiting.

It felt as though someone had lit the back of Delaney’s throat with a blowtorch. In every direction, she saw nothing but the black night meeting the ground.

She hadn’t heard the coyotes in a while. But that didn’t mean she was alone. The desert had other predators.

The air was cool now, but the heat from the day still clung to the ground, puffing out of the sand when her sneakers came down. Her tongue felt swollen in her mouth. She had no energy left—no water, no food, no strength.

And when the sun rose, it would burn her alive.

Delaney blinked, trying to concentrate. She had to find the road.

She tried to walk in a straight line and ignore the ache in her skull, the constant pressure behind her eyes. The stars shimmered overhead, and her thoughts blurred with them. Nothing felt real anymore.

A shape came into view. It was a jagged rock. A slanted ridge, half-buried in the sand.

Something about it pulled at her. She had seen it before.

Delaney stopped and turned in a horrified circle. Her own footprints surrounded her.

No.

She had been walking in a circle.

Her knees buckled, and she hit the ground. She was trapped in the endless dark, and she was never getting out.

Delaney’s head lolled forward. Her lips cracked as she whispered to herself.

“I don’t want to die.”

A flash of red caught her eye.

Had it been an illusion? She blinked, barely believing her eyes.

Blue followed red. Her heart pounded. She was looking at the flashing lights of the police. The highway was just ahead.

She shot upright, her pulse surging, her body suddenly alive with frantic energy.

She staggered toward the lights, then broke into a desperate run.

Her legs screamed in protest, her lungs burned, but she didn’t stop.

“Help!” she shouted, voice raw, cracking from thirst. “Please, I’m here!”

The lights kept spinning, but the vehicles were too far away. She ran harder and waved her arms above her head. This was it. Her rescue. She was going to make it.

Then the vehicles pulled away and motored down the highway.

No. No, no, no.

They were leaving. Her steps faltered. Their lights faded as quickly as her last shred of hope.

She collapsed. Her knees hit the sand, and the sob tore from her throat before she could stop it.

The police hadn’t seen her. They were gone. Cries wracked her thin, broken body.

She was utterly alone.

22

Bell emerged from hiding and searched their surroundings. For over an hour, they’d hidden inside a hole as black as night. A long time had passed since she’d heard the FBI agents pawing around.

The wind blurred the landscape into an endless stretch of nothing. Wolf crawled out to stand beside her. Gardy shifted uneasily. No one spoke.

The desert had erased their tracks. They were lost.

She reached into her jacket and pulled out her phone, hoping for a miracle. No bars. She turned, trying different angles. Still nothing.

“Any signal?” Gardy asked.

Bell shoved the phone into her pocket. “We’re in a dead zone.”

Gardy stared at Wolf. “Do you realize how far you led us from the road?”

“If it weren’t for me, Agent Gardy,” Wolf said, “Sinclair and her team would have already captured us.”

Wiping grit from her face, Bell stared into the dark. She had a vague idea of where the road was, but heading that way meant risking a collision with Sinclair’s team.

They were trapped between uncertainty and death.

“Staying this far out will get us killed,” Wolf said.

“No kidding.”

Bell forced herself to think. She didn’t recognize any landmarks. But they weren’t completely blind.

“The wind was coming from the east when we left the road,” she said. “We kept it at our backs while we ran. If it hasn’t shifted, we can reverse our direction and find the highway.”

“If you’re correct, walking into the wind should take us in the general direction of the Escalade. When we get close, we should recognize where we left the SUV.”

Gardy frowned. “That’s still a hell of a gamble.”

“It’s better than walking in circles.”

Bell led the way, easing over the shifting ground. The night was a vast, featureless void, swallowing all sense of direction. The wind clawed at her hair, filled her mouth with grit, and blurred the horizon.

She kept her focus on the wind’s direction, using it as their only guide. Walking into its teeth only worsened conditions, but she saw no alternative.

Keep it in your face. Walk against it.

Wolf followed. Gardy kept muttering about dying in the desert. “How much farther?”

Bell licked her dry lips. “No clue.”

“I hope you’re right about the wind not changing directions.”

She hoped so too. If she was wrong, they wouldn’t survive the next twenty-four hours.

Minutes stretched. The wind shifted, veering to the left. Bell stopped and turned her face, trying to reorient herself. The gusts were coming from the wrong angle now. They were veering off course.

“Adjust,” she said, turning to her right.

Wolf followed without question. Panic danced in Gardy’s eyes.

They walked for another ten minutes with no sign of the road. Bell began to doubt herself before a flashing light materialized in the distance. Whirling emergency lights.

She held up a hand and stopped the others from advancing.

Gardy whispered, “That looks like a sheriff’s vehicle.”

Two additional vehicles stood along the road. The highway was just ahead. But so was the FBI. They couldn’t advance without Sinclair spotting them.

Wolf led them parallel to the highway and kept the fugitives out of sight.

Bell and Gardy followed, keeping pace as voices carried from the highway. If an agent shone a flashlight into the desert, the beam would pick them out.

“Follow the road,” Wolf said. “The Escalade should be a mile away.”

A minute later, the sheriff’s vehicle shot down the highway and headed toward the closest town, with Sinclair’s team behind them.

“They didn’t see us,” Bell said, relieved.

Perhaps it was safe to move closer to the road now. But before she suggested changing directions, she glimpsed footprints.

“I see them,” Wolf said, following Bell toward the indentations.

A dune between the tracks and the road had preserved them for a few dozen paces.

“Who do they belong to?” Gardy asked.

Bell leaned over the tracks.

“FBI?” Wolf asked.

Gardy dropped to his knees. “No. These aren’t from Sinclair’s people.”

“Then who?” Bell asked.

“Look at the size and depth. They’re smaller than ours.”

“Someone young.”

“Like a teenager,” Wolf said.

Gardy followed the trail. He pointed. “The stride is off. Whoever made these was staggering.”

“She was injured,” Bell said.

“Or dehydrated,” Gardy added.

A teenage girl, injured and wandering through the desert.

“Delaney Silas was sixteen,” Wolf said.

“It could be her.”

Bell turned and looked toward where the tracks were heading. If the prints belonged to Delaney Silas, she was moving away from the road.

Was the killer following the girl?

23

Delaney sobbed into her hands. She had done everything right. She had found the road, screamed for help, and run toward the lights.

And they had driven away. Her last chance was gone. What were the odds the police would return to this spot and rescue her?

She swiped at her tears and drew in a shaky breath.

“Stop it,” she chided herself.

Crying wouldn’t help. She had to stay calm and find Dad’s SUV. Her only option was to keep following the highway. If the police came back, she needed to be where they could see her.

So she walked.

Her feet were raw and blistered inside her sneakers. The night blew around her, turning her sweat into ice under her torn clothes.

She whispered to herself between sobs, “Just keep walking. Just keep walking.”

The police never returned. This stretch of the highway looked like all the others. The wind whispered in her ears, playing tricks on her, making her think she heard voices.

Until she spotted a gentle curve. A broken fence post leaned along the road.

This was it—the place where she’d left Dad’s SUV.

But something was wrong. The vehicle wasn’t there.

She looked behind her, thinking she’d made a mistake. But no. This was the place. She saw tire tracks in the sand. Where was Dad’s SUV?

Holding her breath, she lowered her eyes to her father’s body.

And found an empty patch of sand.

“No,” she said, dropping to her knees.

Her hands reached out, as if she could caress a ghost’s head and tell her father all would be well. But he wasn’t here.

Someone had taken him.

Delaney fell back on her heels and cried again, knowing she should never have left him there. If only she could remember who had attacked them, who had left her unconscious beside her murdered father.

She wanted to scream again, as if the police or her father’s spirit might hear her pleas, but her voice felt raw.

Stumbling beyond the dune, she wiped the grit from her burning eyes just in time to see the outline of the SUV she thought had vanished forever. She froze, fear and hope colliding in her chest. It was there, buried up to the tires in the shifting sand, a faint reflection of moonlight dancing on the dull paint. As she made her way around the side, she couldn’t stop the wild flutter of her pulse—some sickly mix of relief and terror—because if the SUV was there, then who had moved it, and where was her father?

The closer she drew, the more she noticed every wrong detail. She reached for the handle and eased the door open, teeth chattering. The keys were no longer in the ignition. That small set of metal that had once given her a chance to escape was gone.

She touched the steering wheel, remembering Dad’s laugh when he told her if she lost control and weaved across the centerline out here, there would be no police to see. How right he’d been. This was supposed to be an adventure, a bonding trip—her father’s way of proving he could be as fun and spontaneous as any other parent. Instead, it had been a rapid descent into a nightmare.

The sound of movement came from the dark, yanking her mind back to survival mode.

Footsteps. Someone was coming.

Someone who had moved the SUV or taken Dad? The maniac who’d attacked them?

Panic seized her. She needed to hide as she had hidden from the coyotes.

Delaney darted away from the vehicle, keeping low, each footstep a careful secret she tried to bury in the soft sand. The air crackled with anticipation, and her heart hammered so loudly she was sure whoever prowled the darkness could hear it echoing. Everything in her longed to scream. She clamped her teeth over her bottom lip until she tasted blood, forcing herself to remain silent.

In the moonlight, the dune ahead stretched like an ominous, rippled wall. She ducked behind it, struggling to find a hollow or crevice where she could slip out of sight. The ground gave way beneath her. She fought to keep balance as she sank. Finally, she settled into a shallow dip.

The footsteps stopped somewhere near the road. Whoever lurked in the desert at this hour was dangerous. Could not be trusted.

As a child, she’d fantasized that she could make herself invisible. Delaney closed her eyes, pressing a palm against her sweaty forehead. The footsteps came closer, and she prayed that the darkness and the shrieking wind would hide her for just a little longer. At that moment, she realized she was living on borrowed time.

More movement came from the dark. She couldn’t see who was approaching. But that meant the stranger couldn’t see her either. At least she told herself that was the truth. She was out of time. If she intended to run, she had to do it now.

She pushed herself out of the hollow and made her choice. Without glancing back, she vaulted around the dune and plunged into the dark expanse, each stride fueled by a mounting terror of someone only steps behind.

The air clung to her skin like static. Every footfall sounded deafening. They were drumbeats that would lead the unknown figure directly to her. Each breath burned as though she were sucking in fragments of glass.

From afar, so faint she might have dreamed it, came a sound that sent her pulse spiking. Not the coyote’s predatory yip but something deeper, more primal, ricocheting off the ridges. It was a reminder that the desert held more than one danger, and tonight she was at the mercy of them all.

The sky stretched into a vast tapestry of stars, indifferent to her plight, and the moon cast just enough light to show dunes that rose and fell like the waves of a midnight sea. She dared a glance over her shoulder, seeing nothing but the inky blackness and the trail of disturbed sand that betrayed her flight. Had the mysterious figure near the SUV heard her?

As she pressed on, Delaney’s throat clenched with thirst. Her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth, a coarse reminder of how long it had been since she’d had a single drop of water. The landscape swallowed time as ruthlessly as it devoured hope, and she no longer knew how many hours had passed since she’d last felt even a glimmer of safety. Her vision swam, and she stumbled over a rock, pitching forward before catching herself on her scraped palms. Agony shot up her arms, and she bit back a cry. Pain didn’t matter, as long as the killer didn’t catch her.

That haunting animal call drifted through the night, this time closer. She didn’t know what sort of creature made such a sound. Was it a wounded predator, some nocturnal scavenger, or something else? In the dark, anything felt possible. She had seen enough horror to expect the worst. She lifted her head, searching for a place to hide. Instead, she found only the smooth, sliding slopes.

Looking back, she couldn’t see the highway anymore. Still she ran, letting fear propel her.

24

The moon tracked across the sky. Dawn would arrive soon, and the heat would soon follow. Bell and the others should have located the Escalade by now, but they were further from their destination than they’d believed. The desert kept playing tricks on them.

“How much longer?” Bell asked Wolf.

The serial killer didn’t answer. That told her everything she needed to know. Gardy looked too shaken to argue. Their guns wouldn’t protect them after the sun rose.

Bell spotted a silhouette and halted, holding up a hand. Wolf and Gardy stopped beside her, their eyes following her gaze. Nestled behind a low, sloping dune, a dark SUV sat concealed from the highway.

She hurried forward, but Gardy grabbed her arm.

“Wait,” Gardy said. “Anyone might be hiding inside that SUV.”

Wolf moved first, crouching as he approached. “The tracks lead around the dune and toward the road. Someone drove it here to keep the FBI from seeing it.”

With Gardy by her side, Bell checked inside the vehicle. The seats were empty. No one hid in the back. Using her phone, she photographed the license plate so she could send it to Harold when they found service.

Bell followed the tire tracks with her eyes. “Who does this SUV belong to?”

“The killer,” said Wolf.

“Or the Silas family,” Gardy said.

Wolf took the lead. The tire tracks led toward the highway. They were vanishing as the wind rolled over them.

Black spots dotted the sand. Blood.

Gardy aimed his flashlight. “See the way the sand flattens beneath the blood? There was a body here.”

Bell looked over her shoulder, sensing eyes in the night. “Where is the body now?”

“Maybe the killer took it,” Gardy said.

“Or the person survived the attack. It might have been the girl.”

The wind hummed over the desert, a dry whisper that carried the echoes of whatever violence had happened there, erasing the last traces of a struggle. It unsettled Bell, the way the sand swallowed evidence as fast as they uncovered it, as if the land conspired against them, protecting secrets that it didn’t want found.

She crouched near the bloodstains, darker than the surrounding sand. Someone had bled here. Yet there was no body, no footprints to show where they had gone.

A survivor? Or a victim dragged away into the merciless unknown?

Wolf stood motionless a few feet ahead, eyes tracking something only he seemed to see. His ability to read the desert, to sift through horror and extract meaning, made Bell shiver.

Gardy swept his flashlight in an arc, the white beam bouncing off scattered brush and fractured stone. Nothing. Not even drag marks. As if whoever had lain here had simply vanished.

Bell straightened, rolling her shoulders. "If it was the girl, she’s still lost in the desert."

Wolf didn’t respond. Instead, he walked forward and paused near a cluster of rock formations, his attention fixed on the shifting dunes beyond. "We’re close."

"Close to what?" Bell asked.

Wolf lifted his hand, pointing through the darkness toward a shadow barely visible against the rolling desert. "The Escalade."

She hadn’t even seen their vehicle wedged between the dunes, a dark shape swallowed by the landscape.

"How the hell did you spot that?" Gardy asked.

With an unreadable expression on his face, Wolf gave the barest tilt of his head. "Because I recognize our surroundings." He approached the hidden Escalade, guided by some innate sense of direction that Bell didn’t quite trust but had learned to follow.

The Escalade sat like a dark relic. Here in the desert, it was nearly indistinguishable from the landscape. The wind had done its work, draping a thin veil of sand across the hood, the windshield, the tires, as though the land had been trying to claim it.

Bell reached the driver’s side and ran her hand along the window, clearing a patch of dust. She peered inside before entering. Gardy aimed his gun.

Everything was as they had left it. No signs of intrusion. No prints leading to or from the vehicle. Gardy reached the back door and pulled the handle. Wolf stepped back, scanning the horizon.

Bell turned to him. “We should keep searching. The girl was here, Wolf. If she’s injured, she won’t last the night.”

He didn’t answer right away.

“Wolf.”

“If she’s smart, she’ll come back to the road,” Wolf said.

“And if she doesn’t?”

Wolf didn’t answer.

Gardy opened the back door and pulled out the duffel where they had stashed additional weapons and supplies. “I suggest we search along the highway. If she’s out there, we’ll find signs.”

Every instinct told Bell to go back, to retrace those footsteps and figure out where the girl had lost herself. She hated leaving.

But Wolf was right. The desert was a graveyard for those who didn’t respect its rules. If the girl had any chance at survival, she would figure out what every lost traveler eventually realized—the road was salvation.

Wolf slid into the driver’s seat and started the engine. The headlights cut through the black expanse ahead. Wolf settled into the passenger seat.

Gardy slumped in the back, gun across his lap. “We only found one set of footprints. That means the killer hasn’t found her yet.”

“How long do you figure that will last?” asked Bell.

25

Staring out at a desert that seemed as endless as her own regrets, Bell rested her head against the tinted window of the Escalade. Wolf drove the vehicle along the highway’s shoulder. Gardy perched on his seat, torso half outside the open window, flashlight sweeping across the dark stretches of sand. Every now and then, he would gesture for Wolf to stop or slow down, then peer at the ground before shaking his head. No sign of the girl’s tracks here.

Bell’s gaze slid across the terrain. She studied the shadows for anything unusual, but her mind wouldn’t stay in the present. It was too busy tugging her into the past, back to that time she had spent so long trying to lock away behind steel doors of denial.

She closed her eyes and thought of the God’s Hand Killer. The name itself sounded like a grim fable passed around in campfires. Yet the serial killer had been real. He was a cautionary tale about the depths of human evil. For Bell, the near abduction was a memory stitched into the fabric of her being, scarring her. She remembered Jillian’s funeral.

The world had imploded for Bell then. Days after, she became the only child to escape the God’s Hand Killer. She hadn’t recalled the details for many years. Her mind shielded her from the truth. But two years ago, when she finally tracked the murderer as an FBI agent, all the memories had come screaming back. She could still taste the bile at the back of her throat, the revulsion mingled with savage triumph as she snapped the killer’s neck and ensured he would never again take a child.

Now she stared into the desert and pictured a lost teen. Someone was lost in the night and waiting for help that might never come. Was it really Delaney Silas? Had the blood on the sand belonged to her father? Had the girl witnessed his murder?

If Delaney was injured, time would be a cruel enemy. This place had tested Bell and her team, and they were better equipped than a sixteen-year-old.

She imagined the girl stumbling through the night, fleeing as Bell had from God’s Hand. That image burned itself into her brain.

A gust of wind hissed through the open window, bringing air so dry that Bell lost her voice. She reached for a bottle of water and stopped, thinking the girl would need to drink if they found her alive. No, when they found her alive.

Wolf slowed the SUV, letting it coast to a stop. Gardy angled the flashlight at a patch of uneven ground, then shook his head after a moment. Not footprints, just strange wind patterns scarring the desert floor.

The wind whipped the hair against her cheeks. “We’re moving away from cell coverage,” she said. “At some point, I want to send that license plate to Harold.”

“Should we turn around?” Wolf asked.

Bell considered her options. Finding out who owned the abandoned SUV was important, but searching for a lost teen took precedent.

“Scarlett?”

“No. We’ll keep driving.”

“There. Look,” Gardy said. He leaned out the open passenger window.

Bell leaned forward. She saw footprints angling away from the road. Like the brief set they’d discovered near the SUV, these were too small to belong to an adult.

Wolf eased the Escalade to a stop. He looked back at Bell. “Your call,” he said. “Shall we follow?”

Bell nodded.

“They’re heading off the road,” Gardy added, sweeping the beam at an angle. “If she keeps going that way, she’ll vanish in the desert.”

“We can’t risk leaving the Escalade on the highway,” she said. “Sinclair might circle back.”

“There aren’t many places to hide an SUV along this stretch of road,” Wolf said. “Give me a moment to find something.”

“Fine, but don’t lose those tracks.”

Part of her longed to jump out and follow the footprints before Delaney stumbled into oblivion. But splitting up was the worst idea. She had to stay with Gardy and Wolf until they found somewhere to hide their vehicle.

Further up the road, Wolf guided the Escalade off the pavement. The wheels dipped into the soft earth. Bell worried they would get stuck, but the vehicle lurched as it rolled over the uneven ground, the suspension groaning in protest. They crawled behind a ridge that offered just enough cover to obscure them from anyone cruising down the highway.

Wolf turned off the engine. Gardy hopped out first, scanning the highway as if expecting Sinclair’s entire team to appear. Bell slid out after him. A blast of cool air hit her face and stirred the hair along her temples. She tasted grit on her tongue.

Into nothingness the footprints continued, faint impressions that said someone—possibly a wounded teenager—was forging away from the highway. Bell pictured Delaney. The girl must be scared out of her mind.

“This way,” Gardy said. He pointed at a break between a series of dunes where the footprints were most discernible, leading into a darkness that displayed no horizon.

Bell checked her Glock. A part of her still reeled from old nightmares, from the time she’d scrambled away from a murderer’s claws as a child. She wouldn’t lose another kid’s life. Not to this desert or whatever monster might roam it. If Delaney Silas was alive, they needed to act before the killer found her first.

Wolf slung a bag over his shoulder. Supplies from the Escalade, no doubt.

In the moonlight, they left the Escalade behind. Somewhere, the coyotes howled.

26

The conference room carried the stale odor of wood polish. Agent Vera Sinclair stood at the head of the table, eyes narrowed as she flipped through pages of reports and pinned another map to the corkboard. The door remained shut and locked. The sheriff and his deputies were not welcome. She knew they were burning bridges with the locals, but it didn’t matter. Scarlett Bell, Neil Gardy, and Logan Wolf were near, and she didn’t want the sheriff to know yet.

Price and Alvarez sat opposite the board. They organized printouts of missing-persons cases. As they worked, they looked to Sinclair for guidance. Both knew not to speak until she started a conversation.

Finally, Sinclair cleared her throat. “Agent Holcomb is stable,” she said, as though that single statement dismissed every bit of concern over the snakebite that had nearly claimed one of her own. “We’ll manage the investigation with the three of us.”

Price tossed a photograph on the table: a grainy satellite image of desert roads snaking toward Phoenix. “We scoured the missing persons’ reports and reexamined the murders. This unsub, if he’s local, may have a home base somewhere closer to the city. We’ve been operating under the assumption he’s out in the middle of nowhere, but the circumference places the killer closer to Phoenix than we thought.”

Alvarez agreed. “When you think about it, the killer has to abduct his victims, pose the bodies in the desert, and return to his home before anyone notices he’s been missing.”

Sinclair had circled one spot on the map in red marker, but now she reached for a blue one and began sketching a new perimeter around the southwestern edge of Phoenix. “We’ve been looking here, here, and here,” she muttered, drawing three X’s on the board in quick succession. “And we got nothing. No recent disappearances, unless you count the Mercer family, who vanished just east of this zone.”

Alvarez studied the new circle taking shape. “So you agree that the killer came from the Phoenix area?”

Sinclair paused and stared at the circle of lines on the map. “Exactly. The unsub watches his targets before he takes them. Randall Silas and his daughter live in Phoenix.”

“Okay, but we’re talking about 1.65 million people in the city.”

“Start by narrowing the search to the Silas’ neighborhood, the father’s workplace, and the daughter’s school. Figure out where these people spent their time. Shopping centers, parks, even the local farmer’s market. Our unsub saw them in Phoenix and chose them for a reason. I want to know what that reason is.”

“I’ll start the search process.”

“It’s possible he’s collecting victims along urban fringes.” She pressed the marker cap back in place. “Given how these bodies keep turning up in the wasteland, there’s a good chance he’s slipping back and forth from the city.”

Price rubbed the back of his neck, glancing at Alvarez. “This means more ground to cover,” he said. “Keep in mind, we’re dealing with access points to the desert around the outskirts of Phoenix.”

“We only need one,” Sinclair replied crisply. “Find that single location he’s calling home. Once we do, we’ll tear his world apart.”

“And what about Bell, Gardy, and Wolf?” Alvarez ventured. “Are we still going to keep that under wraps from the sheriff? The man is suspicious as hell right now.”

Sinclair’s lips thinned, and she glanced pointedly at the closed door. “The sheriff is more than suspicious. He’s angry, but I don’t have the time or patience to explain that three fugitive ex-FBI agents—two accused of murder, one a known vigilante—are operating in his jurisdiction. Once word of the fugitives spreads, the media will scare them into hiding. I intend to catch them before the sheriff blabs his fat mouth to the press.”

Price’s eyes hopped to the board. “The sheriff will figure it out eventually. You know that.”

“I understand.” Sinclair shrugged, her posture rigid, refusing to give an inch. “I’ll cross that bridge when I have to. All that matters is stopping our unsub from killing another family and bringing Bell, Gardy, and Wolf to justice.”

The three agents exchanged a glance that spoke of dogged resolve and the danger of a mounting war. An unspoken agreement passed between them. The time for half-measures and courtesy had faded into the bleak night. Until Sinclair stopped Scarlett Bell and her killers, she would do anything necessary to keep this investigation in-house.

Sinclair ran her fingertip along the new circle on the map, then drew a line out to the highway. She didn’t speak, but a voice in her head asked the question she knew Price and Alvarez were asking too.

Was it already too late? Were Randall Silas and his daughter dead?

She pulled out her phone, scrolled to the BAU’s number, and hit the speaker button. It was late or early; she’d lost track of the hour. In this line of work, time blurred.

On the sixth ring, someone picked up. “Behavioral Analysis Unit. This is Agent Fields.”

“This is Special Agent Vera Sinclair, FBI. I’m working a high-priority case in Arizona, and I need immediate access to records on Agent Scarlett Bell, previously assigned to the BAU.”

“Scarlett Bell?” Fields repeated, as if testing the name. “I’ll need your clearance code, Agent Sinclair.”

She reeled off the alphanumeric sequence, ignoring the flame of anger in her chest. Fields recognized her voice. Why was he playing games?

Once upon a time, Bell had been the model agent—eager, brilliant, a rising star the FBI pinned its hopes upon. Now she was a fugitive. Sinclair despised the messiness Bell had created. The case had garnered national attention. That was terrible for the Bureau’s image.

“Clearance confirmed. Hang on while I bring up her file.” There was a pause. “You want the short version or the deep dive?”

“Short for now. We have a time crunch.”

“Understood. Scarlett Bell, formerly BAU, specialized in profiling serial killers with a certain signature—particularly those with an inclination to target families. Her recruitment was tied to a personal childhood tragedy, something hush-hush about the God’s Hand Killer. She was the only survivor, though the exact details remain sealed.”

Sinclair remembered Bell’s link to the God’s Hand Killer. How had that slipped her mind? She’d been so fixated on Carter’s death and the fiasco around Wolf that she’d failed to connect Bell’s personal demons with this new Arizona killer.

Fields continued, voice hoarse with fatigue or perhaps concern. “Bell’s friend was murdered. Officially, Bell underwent mandatory psych evaluations and showed signs of profound survivor’s guilt. The BAU used the empathy she developed toward child victims in countless cases. She was good. Too good, maybe. She caught up with the God’s Hand Killer two years ago, but the stress triggered repressed memories. Reports suggest she still has nightmares and exhibits hyper-fixation on protecting family units, especially children.”

Price tapped his pen on the table and looked at Alvarez.

This was the psychological thread Sinclair needed. Bell would never abandon a teenager alone in the desert.

Sinclair could almost see the puzzle pieces slotting into place. “Agent Fields, you’ve been a great help,” she said, forcing authority into her tone. “Appreciate it.”

Fields paused. “If I may, Agent Sinclair, I can’t believe Bell and Gardy are on the run. Murder seems so unlike them.”

“Know this, Agent Fields: The enemy lives next door. It’s up to us to recognize the signs. If you hear anything about Bell, contact me immediately. That’s an order.”

A confirming murmur, then the line cut out.

“I forgot Bell was the sole survivor,” Sinclair said. “The God’s Hand Killer fiasco. That changes everything.”

Price nodded in understanding. “If she sees this lost girl as a surrogate for Jillian, Bell will never let go.”

“So if the girl is out there, running from a killer, Bell’s going to do whatever it takes to find her first. And that means Bell is in the desert. Our unsub might be too.”

Bell wouldn’t give up this hunt if it meant saving a child from the same fate she’d once escaped. Wolf and Gardy wouldn’t leave her side. If Sinclair played this right, she would catch a killer and three fugitives.

“Bell’s biggest vulnerability is also her biggest strength,” Sinclair said. “She won’t stop for fear of the FBI or anything else.”

Price shut the laptop. “So when we find our serial killer, we’ll find Bell, Gardy, and Wolf.”

“And then we’ll end this. Dead or alive.”

No one argued.

“Move out,” she said, taking the photograph of the Mercer family from the table. “The sun will be up soon. We still have a killer to catch, and three fugitives to bring in.”

27

Once more, Delaney awoke with a gasp. Grains of sand spilled from her face. The sky was a merciless blue, and she had to squeeze her eyes shut as the sun lashed out. The bitter taste of anxiety lingered on her tongue. She’d collapsed and fallen asleep.

Thirst scorched her throat. It felt as if she’d swallowed embers. Her body was taut with aches and pains.

With effort, she forced herself into a seated position, arms quivering. The day was already blazing, but the worst was to come. She blinked away spots of light that danced in her vision and tried to remember how she’d made it here.

Last night felt like a dream. She’d found her father’s body gone, and someone had concealed their vehicle behind the terrain and stolen the keys. Then footsteps and a chase through the night.

And now the sun.

She rubbed the back of her arms. The skin was red with sunburn, raw from too many hours without shelter or water. Somehow, she’d collapsed out in the open. The fact she wasn’t dead felt like dumb luck.

Unsteadily, Delaney rose to her feet. The desert stretched around her in a silent halo. Nothing moved except the wavering heat rising off the sand.

Water. She had to find water. Food would be nice, too, but she’d settle for quenching her thirst.

As before, cacti could provide some hydration if she was careful about the spines.

But which cacti were safe? She remembered gnawing on a prickly pear pad in a half-delirium. Had that been yesterday or the day before? Her memory was a blur. The prickly pear hadn’t made her sick, but she had no guarantee she’d find another.

Delaney looked for green shapes amid the brown-beige monotony. Each step drove grit deeper into her shoes, scalding her toes. She needed cover.

She kept glancing behind her. Whoever had followed her last night might still be on the hunt.

The teen shook her head. Just keep moving.

Eventually, she spotted something that might have been a cluster of spiny plants poking through the sand. Going closer, she recognized half a dozen prickly shapes that could be barrel cacti or some other variety.

The cacti’s thick, rounded pads appeared unwelcoming, bristling with needlelike spines.

I can get moisture from a cactus if I cut away the outer layer. Watch for toxins, though.

“Careful,” she mumbled. “Careful…”

She tugged a short, jagged rock from the sand and edged closer, taking in the menacing glint of the spines. Her hands shook from fatigue, but she pressed the stone against the base of the cactus pad, chipping away at the tough outer skin. If she could peel just enough of the waxy surface, maybe the fibrous interior would yield a trickle of moisture.

Managing a few awkward incisions, she pried back the green flesh. The bright interior, slick and shimmering, dared her to risk a taste. If she swallowed the wrong part, or if this cactus was the kind that caused severe stomach upset, she’d be trading one misery for another. But the dryness in her mouth screamed for relief.

She pressed her lips to the sap, letting a dribble of liquid roll over her cracked tongue. It was bitter, tasting of earth and something sour, but not as bad as she’d feared. She closed her eyes, focusing on the slow trickle that momentarily slaked the fire raging inside her mouth. When she pulled away, a surge of dizziness made her wobble, and she sank to her knees, panting.

Delaney nearly retched. She clung to the cactus, ignoring the prickles that scratched her palms.

A shape shifted behind the next dune. Perhaps it was just the heat distorting her vision. Or her father’s killer.

She had to move. There was no shade in sight, and she wasn’t certain she could consume more cactus without paying a worse price later.

Steeling herself, she choked down another mouthful of the bitter sap, coughed, then spat out a few pulp bits that tasted foul. It wasn’t much, but maybe it would buy her a few hours. Perhaps it would be enough to keep her from dying.

Through the rippling air, she thought she could see a cluster of boulders a few hundred yards away. It might have been a mirage, but it was all she had.

One last glance back found nothing but her own tracks. Even those vanished in the rolling wind. The emptiness taunted her, reminding her she was going to die. She could sense the eyes of a predator. Animal or man? Before long, the terrain would claim her.

Clutching the stone in one hand and a ragged piece of cactus flesh in the other, Delaney walked toward the boulders.

He crouched at the edge of a rise, long fingers sifting through the sand from which the wind had partially erased the impressions. Every few minutes, he discovered traces of the girl’s presence that vanished almost as soon as he saw them. The desert was doing its best to obscure her path, but he wasn’t worried. He understood how she thought, the way fear churned logic into reflex. She would return to the highway, or she would collapse from thirst and heartbreak, and he would be there either way.

He rose. The sun scalded his forehead, but he felt nothing except the pulse of certainty that guided him. She was fleeing blindly, chasing mirages of safety. He could almost hear her breathing, that choked sob that must have echoed across the dunes last night when she realized rescue had passed her by.

The nightmare returned and stopped him in his tracks. His father standing in the kitchen, belt coiled in one thick fist. A belt that whispered warnings of pain each time it cracked against the air. And in that memory, he became small again, rooted in place by a terror that squeezed the breath from his lungs.

He hadn’t moved or cried out. He just watched. A single strap of leather held all the power in the world. That recollection seeped into his bones like poison. He despised how quickly it unmoored him, how easily it reminded him of the first time he’d felt a monster’s shadow pass over him.

Never again. He forced the memory away. He was the monster now.

The desert grew hotter, but he knew its rhythms and had spent enough time in its kingdom to move with confidence. He paused at the broken tangle of a cactus, the spines scattered like tiny knives. A smear of greenish liquid told him the girl had tried to drink from it. Brave thing. And desperate. She wouldn’t last much longer. She would falter, and that’s when he would catch her.

He picked up a piece of the flesh, still clinging to a sliver of moisture, and let it slide across his tongue. Sour, but not poisonous. He followed her lead and broke off another pad and eyed the spines, which he stripped away with his knife. Cutting into the flesh, he drank with greed.

As he finished, he tossed aside the pad and cut into another. That was enough for now. He couldn’t risk making himself ill.

The man studied the skyline, half-expecting to spot her fleeing silhouette. The wind ruffled the edges of his shirt. Somewhere behind those glaring hills, she was stumbling, half-dead from thirst, certain she was in returning to the highway yet drifting into ever-deeper peril. The knowledge sparked a triumphant feeling in his chest.

After hesitating to plunge the knife into her belly, he’d given her a chance to survive. He never saw the rock she was holding until it struck his temple and knocked him cold. The girl was a fighter. But she would die like the others.

His father couldn’t scare him anymore. The man had died like a dog in prison.

The belt had been nothing more than a tool of control. Even during his hour of powerlessness, he’d felt a savage clarity, an electrified certainty that one day he’d be the one holding the power. He would decide who needed correction, who deserved retribution.

As he climbed over a pile of rocks, his foot slipped. He yelled and clutched his ankle, which lay wedged between two pointed stones the size of cinderblocks. Agony raced up and down his shin.

“Fool boy,” a voice said behind him.

He turned his head, but no one was there.

Wincing, he wrestled his ankle free. Blood soaked his pants cuff.

No matter. If he could walk, he could find her. Pushing himself up, he experienced another surge of pain. It took him a moment to steady himself and continue forward.

The footprints were gone again, but he already sensed where he would pick up the trail. The girl needed to escape the heat. She would seek shade, maybe a crag of rocks or a cluster of parched shrubs. It didn’t matter. He was getting closer. The desert was his domain.

One hand went to his belt, though not the old leather strap from his youth. This was a modern thing, practical. He might not need it for her. She was fragile enough now, probably delirious.

A single hawk soared overhead, circling as if eyeing something far below. He smiled.

Even the wildlife knew a meal was close.

28

They trudged through a land that seemed to push against them. Bell licked her lips as she beckoned Gardy and Wolf to stop. She saw a knoll of sand and scrub, nothing more than a meager bump in the otherwise flat horizon, but it would do well enough for a moment of rest.

She fumbled inside Wolf’s pack, which was already caked with dust, and retrieved a bottle of water. As she unscrewed the cap, the smell of plastic and stale water assaulted her nose, but it might as well have been perfume. A dryness had settled deep in her chest, and she could tell by Gardy’s pallor that he wasn’t faring much better. Yet after the first sip, she refused to indulge. Only a trickle of water slid past her cracked lips before she forced herself to cap the container again.

“One more swallow each,” she said, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. Her voice sounded rough, used up by the heat. “Save at least one bottle for the girl.”

Gardy ran a sandy forearm across his brow. “If it’s really Delaney Silas,” he said.

“It’s her,” Wolf said. Standing a few steps from them, he surveyed the landscape with hawklike focus.

Throughout the morning, they had glimpsed footprints here and there, spidery tracks half-filled. None led toward the highway, where the girl might find salvation. She was wandering in the wrong direction.

God, let her be alive when we find her.

Bell squinted at the horizon. The old guilt of losing Jillian pounded at her like a second pulse. She couldn’t let another innocent die, not while she had the power to save Delaney.

“Which way, Wolf?” Gardy asked.

Wolf pulled off his cap, wiping the sweat from his forehead. “The last tracks we saw curved south. She’s heading in the wrong direction. There’s a ridge line that might give us a vantage point.”

“Lead the way,” Bell said.

She capped the water bottle and stowed it.

Their shadows stretched behind them, pale streaks that looked more like phantoms than companions.

Wolf set the pace, reading the terrain with ease. Gardy trailed behind, searching for coyotes, law enforcement, or a killer. Somewhere in the distance, a hawk cried.

As soon as they picked up the girl’s tracks again, the desert erased them. The sun maintained a ruthless grip on the land, glaring down from a sky too brilliant to stare into, and the three travelers moved without speaking, trying to conserve their voices. Bell’s legs burned, but she refused to let the terrain slow her pace.

Occasionally, Wolf gestured at a new imprint in the sand. But most of the time, they walked without finding any clues. After another hour, Wolf spotted more tracks meandering back and forth in a ragged pattern that spoke volumes about the girl’s state of mind.

Bell coughed out a mess of grit, imagining the desperation that must have taken hold of the teen. The girl was walking in an erratic arc. Each skidding step revealed more than direction; it spoke of a body growing weaker, a will twisting under the weight of dehydration and starvation.

“Hey,” Gardy said, crouching in the sand. “There’s something else here.”

Bell and Wolf approached, careful not to obliterate the markings. At first, Bell couldn’t see anything but uneven ridges of dust, all blending into a rolling landscape. Then she noticed a second set of prints, half a stride from where the girl’s footprints wandered. They were larger than the girl’s, heavier—or so it seemed, though it was impossible to be certain. They belonged to the killer, the one who hunted families for reasons none of them fully understood yet.

“It has to be him,” Gardy said.

Wolf’s expression darkened. “If he’s following her, he’s catching up. Her tracks weave, but his gait appears strong.”

Somewhere deep inside Bell, anger ignited. The lost girl was older than Jillian, yet Bell felt the same fury stirring. I’ll die before I allow him to take this girl.

Standing, she shielded her eyes from the blowing dust. The wind curled around them like a living thing, harsh and unsympathetic. “We can’t let this scum find her first.”

“I will pose his remains in the desert, as he did to the others,” Wolf said.

And Bell believed him.

Gardy tapped the sand from his boots. “The killer is close. We should move faster. But we have to be careful. The desert offers too many hiding places, and he may be watching us right now.”

That thought made Bell swing her head around. She searched for unseen threats, knowing that when the killer showed his face, he would give them little time to react.

She squared her shoulders. She had survived the God’s Hand Killer, and she would overcome the desert and reach this girl in time.

29

The SUV cruised along the barren highway, the tires thrumming over the cracked asphalt. Inside, the air conditioner couldn’t keep up with the day’s heat. Agent Vera Sinclair sat in the driver’s seat, posture rigid, eyes never leaving the horizon, while Price rode shotgun with a map spread across his lap. In the back seat, Alvarez stayed quiet, alert as he scanned the endless desert through the windows.

Price cleared his throat, flipping a page of notes. “Any new word on Holcomb?” His voice was subdued, caught between professional concern and genuine worry.

Sinclair exhaled through her nose, a sound that betrayed her irritation. She didn’t have an answer, and Holcomb’s status wasn’t the priority. “We’re out of coverage,” she said. “Last update said he was stable, but until we get closer to a tower, I can’t confirm. Doesn’t matter. We’re here to bring three fugitives to justice.”

“And catch a serial killer.”

“Of course.”

Price nodded, though the line of his jaw tightened.

Sinclair remained laser-locked on the task at hand: the three fugitives—Scarlett Bell, Neil Gardy, and Logan Wolf—who had undoubtedly inserted themselves into the fray. She would catch the unsub too. But three killers took precedent over one.

Outside, the sun rendered the terrain a stark canvas of scorched tans and blanched whites. This stretch of the highway looked the same as any other.

Eventually, Sinclair slowed the SUV to a crawl. Something crawled out of the ground—a jagged horizon that stood out against the flat terrain. She narrowed her eyes, a prickle of intuition sparking at the base of her neck. It was an oddly shaped ridge, blocking a swath of sky.

“Are we pulling over?” Alvarez asked.

“Yes,” Sinclair said, steering the vehicle onto the shoulder. The tires kicked up pebbles which rattled under the chassis. She cut the engine, and for a few breaths all three agents sat in quietude, listening to the wind moan across the expanse of nothing.

Price frowned, glancing up from his map. “What do you see?”

“I’m not sure.”

Yet she was. This place tickled her memory and brought her back to the crime-scene photographs. So many families posed behind a rise in the terrain, close to the road, yet invisible until someone investigated.

Sinclair popped open her door. She couldn’t shake the feeling that behind that distant ridge lay a secret someone wanted her to see.

She turned back to her team, hand resting on her holstered sidearm. “Come on. This is why we’re here.”

No one argued. Price and Alvarez exchanged a glance before climbing out. Together, they set off toward the monstrous dune.

A gale hissed like a rattler across the ground as Special Agent Vera Sinclair led Price and Alvarez around the towering dune. Up close, it was even larger than it had seemed from the highway, a jagged crest that curled like a surf of golden grains frozen in the heat. Her boots sank into the powdery ground, forcing her to fight for balance. Something lurked beyond this ridge.

Yet when they rounded the dune, nothing but emptiness greeted them. No sign of a killer.

Price let out a slow breath, wiping sweat from his brow. “What am I supposed to be looking at?” he asked in a low voice.

“Nobody is here, Agent Sinclair,” Alvarez said. His tone was gentle, but the implication was clear. Alvarez thought Sinclair was wrong.

But she was never wrong about these things. “The killer was here. I know he was.”

Price shrugged at Alvarez. “With all due respect, ma’am, there’s no sign of anyone.”

She ignored them both, her intuition screaming that she was missing something obvious. This terrain feature reminded her of the dunes she’d memorized from the crime-scene photos. Their killer used natural formations to stage his scenes—families posed behind rises in terrain, close to the road, invisible until some unlucky soul investigated.

Sinclair sank to her knees. For a moment, she felt as though she might collapse. Instead, her fingers dug into the sand, scooping it away, handful by handful, frantic as if her sanity depended on digging.

“Agent Sinclair…” Price said, taking a step toward her. “What are you doing?”

She barked an order over her shoulder, her tone a lash of authority. “Help me dig. Now.”

Alvarez’s jaw dropped. “We don’t even⁠—”

“Dig. I want to see what’s underneath.”

The two men hesitated. No doubt they thought she was mad. But they followed orders and dropped to their knees, scooping sand away in broad swipes, the abrasive grains scouring their palms.

Minutes passed in a dragging haze of sweat and tension. Sinclair clawed faster, refusing to consider the possibility that she might be wrong. Then her fingers skimmed something stiff and cold, distinctly unlike sand. She froze.

Her stomach twisted. Her first instinct was that she’d found a rock, a chunk of buried scrap. But the texture was all wrong—firm but pliant. With trembling care, she scraped more sand away, revealing the shape of a human hand, fingers curled as if trying to cling to some last hope of life.

“Oh, God,” Price choked, dropping back on his heels. Alvarez swore and scrambled to dig faster.

Working in unison, they uncovered more. A shoulder, an arm, the outline of a torso.

Sinclair’s throat constricted. A wave of anger and despair welled up, but she forced it aside, pressing on.

A few feet away, Price and Alvarez unearthed two more bodies. One small—a young boy. The other an adult. An entire family, huddled together in the sand, taken by a killer’s knife. Even buried in dust, the features were recognizable enough for Sinclair to know, with a rush of certainty, who they were.

“The Mercers,” she said. “Luke, Grace, and their son. He looks about ten years old to you, doesn’t he?”

Neither man responded. There was no need. They all knew whom they’d found.

Price slumped, pressing a hand to his mouth. Alvarez bowed his head in prayer.

Sinclair’s anger flared again, molten and relentless. Her mind conjured the unsub’s face, yet it refused to materialize. The killer had brought her here to see his handiwork, to know she was too late again.

She rose to her feet. “We need a forensics team. And we need to find the monster who did this.”

Unable to look at the bodies any longer, Sinclair turned away.

When Price and Alvarez failed to move, she whirled on them. “I said, call it in!”

30

Delaney couldn’t catch her breath. The heat hammered the desert, forcing every creature with sense to hide. Yet she had nowhere else to go. She needed some shade before her body shut down.

Ahead, her eyes slid across three potential shelters—silhouetted lumps, shapes that might have been rock outcroppings, low desert vegetation, or half-buried structures. In her half-delirious state, she couldn’t tell which. But she knew she couldn’t reach them all. Her legs threatened to buckle with each footstep, her lungs roiling like a furnace.

The first form, a spindly grouping of shrubs, offered slivers of shade too small to do more than shield her ankles. The second possibility looked like a cluster of tall boulders leaning drunkenly against one another, with a narrow space beneath where she might crawl. But even those seemed too far away—her vision played tricks, telling her the distance might be greater than it appeared. Sweat dripped into her eyes, stinging as she tried to blink away the glare.

The third silhouette loomed closer. It was a low mound of rock, or maybe an ancient piece of desert debris, scoured and beaten by wind and time until it resembled a natural formation. She couldn’t read it clearly, but her heart clung to the possibility that it offered shelter.

Every step became an exercise in raw will. Her pulse throbbed in her skull, and her eyelids drooped as though she might drift off. The signs of heatstroke were all there. Dizziness, confusion, the pounding headache, and the eerie sense that the world around her was curving at the edges.

When she finally reached her destination, she collapsed to her knees, crawling the last few yards through the scalding grit. Her palm touched something solid and drew back in pain. It was a stone that had sat in the sun for ages. She found a gap just wide enough to slip inside. She flinched as rocks scraped her shins, but a wave of relief washed through her as the temperature dropped.

In the shelter, she flopped onto her side and fought to control her breathing. She needed water. Food, too, but that seemed as distant a luxury as air conditioning and home-cooked meals. She could do nothing but lie there, arms trembling, sweat mingling with dust until it formed a paste on her skin.

The light changed as she stayed put, sunlight creeping at an angle that told her midday was well underway. If she didn’t find a better plan by nightfall, she’d be too weak to move. But the immediate threat was cooking alive.

She knew it was foolhardy to fall asleep. But if she rested, maybe a sliver of strength would return. At night, she could fight her way back to the road. That was the plan, or so she told herself. The possibility that she might never wake both terrified and comforted her.

She pressed her cheek to the ground. Arid dryness clung to her tongue until she gagged. Her thoughts were jumbled, drifting in and out of coherence. A memory surfaced of her teacher guiding the students through a desert survival lesson, joking that none of them would wander into the wasteland alone. Yet she had.

Now she remembered awakening beside her father’s body. Tears spilled out of her eyes, wishing he was here to help her. Dad was gone, and some maniac had hidden the body so the police wouldn’t know what had happened. The same killer was tracking her across the desert.

Her eyelids fluttered and her breath settled into an unsteady rhythm. As consciousness faded, the final thought that rattled through her mind was that she needed to wake up. She had to, if she had any chance of seeing tomorrow.

But right now, her body refused to stay awake. Sleep couldn’t come fast enough.

He lurched across the dunes, each step wobbling as though the ground were tilting him. The sun hammered his scalp, crawled along his neck, and turned his thoughts sideways. Was it the wind or his imagination that swallowed the girl’s footprints? He couldn’t tell anymore.

Each time he glimpsed a scuff in the sand—a toe mark, a heel print—it vanished when he blinked, leaving him to wonder if he had seen anything at all.

He called her name, but the word came out in a shattered jumble of syllables, nonsensical, as if broken glass spilled across his tongue.

“C-come…back…oh…little thing.”

He staggered, dropped to one knee, and stared at the swirl of grit and shadow that danced at the edges of his vision. In that swirling dust, he saw a face. Not hers. A large man, belt in hand, eyes as hard as stone. His father.

“Your fault,” the memory sneered. “I taught you better than this. And now you’ve lost her.”

Was it real? He shook his head, but the silhouette remained. The belt hissed in the air, cracking across an invisible barrier. He flinched.

“Shut up,” he said, trying to banish the ghost of a face that had haunted him all his life. “You’re dead. Not here. You can’t be here.”

Yet the figure grinned down at him. He remembered the belt’s bite, the slash of pain across his skin, the shame that burned deeper than the welts. The phantom before him had murdered his mother while he watched.

He forced himself upright, drenched in delirium. Was he the one chasing footprints, or were they chasing him? He wanted to laugh, or scream, or both. Words tumbled out instead, half-sentences that rang with madness.

“S-sweets for the sweet. Come back. Don’t you dare leave me…You’ll get it, you’ll get the belt if you⁠—”

He spat a bloody clot of drool. A strangled laugh bubbled out, the sound as broken as his mind.

“There you go, my boy,” his father said. “Give her the belt. Give it to her until she learns to obey.”

“She’s the last one,” he told the ghost. “When I stop her, all this will go away. You. You will go away.”

“Is that what you believe, you idiot?”

“Don’t you talk to me like that. You’re not here.”

“I’m always with you, boy.”

Yet his father wasn’t. The terrain lay open now, leaving no sign that anyone had been here beside him.

Then a voice whispered by his ear. “To the right. What do you see?”

He smelled fetid breath and the stink of a rotting corpse. But he obeyed and looked. There was nothing to see except…

Tracks. They spilled over a rise and continued down the opposite side.

He touched his head where she’d struck him with the rock. Oh, he would make her pay. He coughed, spat dryness, and hurried forward. Couldn’t stop now. She was close. He felt it like a second pulse, a savage certainty beating behind his eyes.

“That’s right,” the voice said, always a step behind. “Kill her. Kill the little snot for what she did to you.”

The girl would pay the price. He would dole out the ultimate punishment.

A new shape rose on the horizon: three lumps of something that might be rocky formations or the remains of collapsed dunes. In his fevered sight, they flickered like mirages, but as he blinked away the sweat from his lashes, they crystallized into actual shapes. Shelters. Places for the lost to hide.

Insane clarity clawed at him. She must be there.

The desert offered no other illusions. She would crawl inside one of those lumps, hoping to escape the sun. And him.

A grin cut across his sun-blistered lips. The skin stretched and bled through widening fissures. Red spilled down his chin. He moaned something that might have been his mother’s name. Or the girl’s name. He wasn’t sure.

And all along, the whispers drove him on.

“She’s inside. Just need to find which one. You did it, boy. I didn’t think you had it in you, but you found her.”

He touched the leather belt on his hip. Its power guided him onward, driving him to finish what he’d started. His arms swayed at his sides. Half-blind with thirst, he could sense her presence. When he found her huddled in that pitiful scrap of shade, he would rewrite the story forever.

31

Sinclair stood at the base of the dune with her arms folded across her chest. Two sheriff’s department vehicles bumped and rattled their way over the sand, followed by a forensics van. They drove toward the spot where she and her agents had uncovered the Mercer family.

Though phones were useless this far into the desert, she’d hailed the sheriff on the radio, patching through intermittent static that tried to obscure her voice.

Price and Alvarez stood a few paces away, arms limp at their sides, eyes still locked on the spot in the sand where they had dug. Three bodies. A chilling enough discovery to remind everyone how monstrous this killer was.

The forensic technicians arrived, their faces already shining with sweat as they began unloading a folding table, large plastic crates of gear, and a pop-up canopy for rudimentary shade. They wore desert-tan jumpsuits and wide-brimmed hats, some tugging on gloves, others arranging collapsible stretchers. The operation had a rushed efficiency. No one wanted to linger out here longer than necessary.

“We uncovered three bodies,” Sinclair said, pointing to where a deputy in latex gloves was already marking the perimeter of the shallow pit. “Parents and a child. Seems to match the Mercer family. We haven’t found any other remains.”

A tall, wiry forensic tech named Perez wiped his forehead on his sleeve. “We’ll start with a protective screen and keep the wind from disturbing the site. Then we’ll extract everything we can find.” He gestured to a colleague who was busy assembling a series of metal rods and plastic sheets to form a windbreak around the shallow excavation.

The team went to work. One technician crouched and used a small brush to whisk away residual sand from the adult male figure. Another photographed every angle—click, click, click—while Price assisted in holding a reflective shield that directed light into the shadowed areas.

“Looks like they were arranged before the sand overtook the bodies,” one tech murmured, though her tone didn’t waver from its clinical edge. She angled her camera, zooming in on the father’s arms, half-wrapped around the mother’s torso. The mother’s hands rested near the child’s shoulders, a sacrilegious mockery of a protective embrace.

Alvarez, gloves on, offered a new evidence bag to a deputy who had just discovered a tiny metal object in the sand. It might have been a piece of the mother’s jewelry, or part of a vehicle key ring. No one knew yet.

Every detail reminded Sinclair that this was more than a case—it was a slaughter of innocents. She forced herself to keep her expression schooled in neutrality as fury threatened to break through.

Perez directed the extraction. They would lift the bodies onto the collapsible stretchers, wrap them in protective covers, and label each one. Then they would transport the bodies to the morgue for autopsy, where the medical examiner would confirm identities, cause of death, time of death, and additional puzzle pieces that might guide Sinclair toward the killer.

She took a step back to give the workers room. One by one, the bodies emerged. The father came first. She watched the technicians brace the man’s limbs as they spoke to each other.

“Rigor’s long since passed.”

“Look at the angle of the legs, consistent with postmortem shifting.”

Then the mother. A few gasps slipped out from the deputies. Her long hair still clung to the dried blood that the desert sun had crisped in place. Another spate of camera clicks recorded it for the file.

Finally, the child. His body was contorted in a way that made Sinclair’s chest hurt. She had to swallow the lump in her throat, reminding herself that she was here to catch the devil who had done this, not to indulge her own horror.

Price moved a section of tarp into place, blocking the gusting wind. Alvarez kneeled, placing orange flags. Sinclair noted the looks on their faces. Even forensics workers who had seen plenty of death looked shaken by the sight of a child in a body bag.

The windbreak rattled, tearing a corner from its peg. A deputy scrambled to secure it. Meanwhile, Perez passed a clipboard with the details ticked off to Sinclair.

Three victims.

Approximate scene layout.

Preliminary guess on how long they’d been buried.

This killer had escalated to taking families on a weekly basis.

Sinclair glanced at Price and Alvarez. They all understood. There might be more victims buried in the desert. Maybe Randall and Delaney Silas.

When the last bag was zipped and the stretchers were carried to the waiting van, Sinclair drew a steadying breath. She turned away from the canopy.

Nobody deserved this fate, and she would do whatever it took to stop these murders from happening again.

32

Delaney slept under a canopy of stone, her exhausted body surrendering. Beside her, a scorpion crept out of its burrow, while a tarantula climbed over her bare leg. She brushed at the tickle and the thing crawled away, perching itself on the rocky edge of the enclosure.

In that lightless realm of dreams, an image drifted toward her—a woman’s silhouette, slim but indistinct, haloed by something like sunlight but warmer, kinder than the sun that scorched every living thing outside.

She recognized the figure instinctively, though she had never known this face. Her mother, the stranger who had birthed her and walked away. No name, no trace, only a legacy of silence. Delaney’s father had told her so little, refusing to reveal the woman’s name. He had insisted it was what she wanted, that she never wanted to be found.

Yet now her mother’s features swam into view. It was half memory, half invented hope, eyes the color of dawn, hair that she might have inherited, except Dad always said Delaney looked more like him. A kind grin hovered on those lips, the smile of a woman who might have held Delaney as a newborn. If she had stayed.

Delaney writhed in her dream, tears leaking down her cheeks. She felt the woman’s hand brush against her shoulder, gentler than anything she’d experienced in days. A familiar voice rang through her mind, as though it had always been there, waiting.

“Wake up, sweetheart.” The murmur was soft but urgent, vibrating through the dream like a plea. “He’s coming. You have to wake up now.”

Delaney tried to speak, but her mouth was full of thirst and sand, her words lost in the swirl of half-conscious terror. She stared at her mother’s face, but it blurred around the edges as though the dream were burning away.

She wanted to whisper a million questions. What’s your name? Why did you leave? Do you ever miss me? Instead, she only managed a whimper.

“Shh,” the woman said, pressing a finger to Delaney’s lips. “We can talk later, but you have to run. Open your eyes.” It was a command threaded with desperation. “He’s coming for you. You must run.”

Who was coming?

A thousand emotions tangled in Delaney’s chest—fear, longing, heartbreak, anger. Part of her wanted to throw her arms around this phantom mother and cling to the illusion that she wasn’t alone in the world. But reality tore at the fraying edges of her dream, reminding her of the monstrous presence that stalked her.

He was coming. The killer, the shadow.

Her mother’s form flickered like a candle flame blown out by an unseen figure. “Delaney,” the voice echoed, losing strength, “Delaney, wake up.” Then there was only a ripple, a distortion.

Half emerging from that barren sanctuary of stone and dust, Delaney blinked against the brightness that assaulted her lids. Her eyes darted around, seeking the comforting figure that had left her again. There was nothing.

She drew her knees inward when a scorpion crawled past her toes.

Her entire body shook, the heatstroke not fully letting her go. In her delirium, she almost believed her mother’s apparition had been real, kneeling beside her for one last moment of impossible kindness. But reality was a ruthless desert.

“Mom?”

No answer.

He was coming for her, the dream-voice had insisted.

Then she heard it. A scuffling sound outside her enclosure, as if an unseen figure dragged one foot behind the other.

He was here. The man who had attacked them and taken her father. Why couldn’t she remember?

Delaney shrank against the wall. The footsteps dragged and limped as they drew closer. She sensed a fractured mind and closed her eyes, forcing herself not to whimper as each step rasped against her sanctuary, pebbles rolling across the opening like her crumbling hope.

Words, half-mangled, drifted through the air. “You…can’t hide. Come out and take…take your punishment.”

She willed herself not to move. Don’t make a sound. If he came closer, if he poked his head inside, he would see her lying in the gloom like a cornered animal. She prayed he would leave her alone.

He shifted outside. His shoes scuffed against rocks. The mad whispering rose and fell. “She’s…in here somewhere. Stupid child. Running. Tell me where she is…and I’ll make you…proud.” A ragged breath hitched, followed by a choking laugh. “It’s her fault…all her fault. My belt…oh, you’ll see…”

Delaney squeezed her eyes shut. His voice was unhinged, as though it slithered between consciousness and a nightmare. Any second now, she half-expected a gaunt, mad face to lurch into view, wild eyes locking on her.

She heard a dragging step as he lurched away from her shelter and moved toward the next. A grunt followed, then the scratching of nails against a rock. He was searching the adjacent crevice, convinced she might be cowering inside.

This was her chance. Now. She had to escape before he returned.

She nudged herself forward, claws in the sand, every movement careful to avoid drawing attention. Outside, she heard him muttering a frenzy of broken syllables.

“Come out, come out. Tell me where she is…it’s not my fault!”

His voice stabbed the silence like a rusted blade. She dragged herself into the open, the scorching air feeling like a furnace on her skin.

She had to hide her tracks. If he followed them, she would die.

Delaney glanced over her shoulder and used her palms to sweep the sand over her footprints. The grains burned, but necessity bit deeper than any physical agony. She had to vanish and erase the evidence she had left in this direction.

Her eyes jumped to the next shelter, a squat mound of stone. A shadow moved behind it, tall and thin and horrifying in its spastic motions. The killer’s voice rose in unholy glee.

“I’ll find you! I’ll—ha ha…I…yes, the belt. She’ll see. Little pig…little pig…come out, come out.”

Delaney stifled a cry, forcing herself back. She wiped out as many tracks as she could. The wind cooperated by stirring little flurries of dust, adding to her concealment. She clenched her teeth each time her sneakers stepped on a bed of pebbles, convinced he’d hear and come barreling around the rock to snuff out her last breath.

She inched around a dune. Just a few more steps, then she could run. If her legs could carry her.

Behind her, the madman’s silhouette raised clawed hands into the air. A guttural screech bounced off the stones, primal and livid.

“You think you can trick me? Me?”

A jagged spike of terror stabbed her lungs. She’d fooled him for only a second, but now he knew. He would find her tracks. She didn’t have time to cover them.

His scream crashed through the dune valley with a vow of revenge. The shadow rounded the shelter.

“I’m coming, piggy!”

She bolted, half-stumbling, half-running. The desert whirled into a kaleidoscope of sun-glare and oranges. She didn’t dare look back.

If she did, she would see the wolf.

33

They lay on the leeward side of another outcrop. Bell shielded her face with a grimy sleeve, peering through the heat shimmer at the distant figures loading equipment into a van. A forensic team. She’d watched them carry out three stretchers, each draped in a tarp. Her gut clenched at the sight. The Mercer family, she thought. Three more victims.

Gardy shifted beside her. Wolf, crouched on her other side, kept one hand near his holstered weapon. None of them dared to move into the open. Agent Vera Sinclair would spot them.

Bell focused on the figure issuing clipped directives just beyond the van. Sinclair drove her team like a drill sergeant. There was no mistaking that posture, that commanding edge to her voice, even from a hundred yards away. Bell caught only snatches of her words above the dry wind.

“Double check the perimeter before we move to the next location.” The agent’s stance radiated a coiled energy, like a spring pressed down to its limit. She might turn toward this uncharted section of the desert at any moment.

“If she comes this way, we’re cornered,” Gardy said.

Bell had known this moment might come. If Sinclair set her sights on this ridge, they’d have no choice but to fight. And confrontation likely meant drawing blood, something Bell swore she wouldn’t do unless forced.

Wolf whispered, “We’ll wait until they leave.”

“And if they don’t?” Bell asked.

“Then I will deal with the issue. Quietly.”

Did Wolf think he could murder three armed FBI agents with his hunting knife?

Bell felt a prickle of alarm along her skin at Wolf’s words. He had spoken quietly, matter-of-factly, his eyes locked on Agent Sinclair in the distance. Yet the casual suggestion seethed with violence, as though killing three FBI agents was just another chore on an unending list.

Gardy stirred, exchanging a quick glance with Bell. They’d hunted killers with Wolf before and were aware of his lethal capabilities. But this was different—a cold promise that their old colleagues could die in the dust if they ventured too close.

“You’re not serious,” Bell whispered, voice tight as a garrote. She stared at Wolf, searching for a hesitation in his eyes, some sign that he was only bluffing.

“I’m not in the habit of leaving witnesses,” Wolf said. “And if you wish to remain free, I suggest you learn to do the same.”

“I want to stay out of custody so we can prove our innocence.”

“That will never happen, dear Scarlett. You know this.”

At the stony logic of Wolf’s statement, Gardy grimaced. Bell thought about arguing and reminding Wolf of the lines they’d agreed never to cross. But she swallowed her protest. Sinclair, pacing near the forensic van, had no idea how close she was to them, nor how little mercy Wolf might show if this chase turned bloody.

Bell closed her eyes. She couldn’t keep everyone alive. Sooner or later, she had to choose a side. Their war with the FBI was balanced on a razor’s edge, and if she misjudged things by even a hair, the desert would know more blood.

She hadn’t come out here to fight the FBI. She’d come to save a lost girl from a killer. But if Vera Sinclair threatened to derail her mission, Bell wouldn’t hesitate. She would do what she must to rescue Delaney Silas.

In the distance, the forensic team folded their canopy like a funeral banner and began securing boxes of evidence in the back of the van. Sinclair’s sharp gestures made her agents flinch. Bell, Gardy, and Wolf remained motionless, waiting for Sinclair’s gaze to turn their way. If it did, the emptiness would erupt in violence.

The forensics van’s tires tumbled and hopped over the rutted terrain before catching the highway’s asphalt.

Sinclair watched Price and Alvarez load the SUV, collecting their gear. Now only her SUV and two parked sheriff’s vehicles remained in the scorching landscape, a pocket of order in an otherwise vast sea of drifting dunes.

The sun was lowering and changing color, enough to wash the desert in a burnished glow, turning every ridge and outcropping into jagged black silhouettes. The descent did nothing to thwart the heat. Sinclair shielded her eyes and looked over the sand. She wasn’t ready to leave while the unsub remained at large.

As the sheriff’s vehicles drove away, a shadow caught her eye across the landscape. It was a movement she first mistook for the sweeping shadow of a hawk, one of those unearthly silhouettes that soared over carrion and tore apart unsuspecting prey. The shape glided across a stony ledge, then vanished. Sinclair followed it with her eyes. Hawks rarely clung to outcroppings in that manner. And the shadow was too long to come from a bird.

She scanned the ridge, squinting into the dipping sun, and spotted a dark blur. This shape hunched low. Instinct stirred; someone was watching her. She felt the same dread-laced awareness she’d developed when walking into murder scenes.

A killer was out there.

She found herself stepping away from the SUV, ignoring Price’s quizzical glance. Quietly, she removed her sidearm, keeping it at her thigh, out of immediate view. If it was the unsub—or Logan Wolf—she would not be caught off guard. And if Logan Wolf was here, Bell and Gardy had to be close.

“Agent Sinclair?” Price asked.

She turned her head, eyes never leaving the outcropping. “Keep packing,” she said under her breath. “Act normal.”

“Why?” he pressed, but she silenced him with a hand signal.

Price’s spine went rigid. Alvarez’s eyes snapped from the SUV to her gun. Together they’d waded through enough violence to smell trouble on the wind.

The shape moved again, sliding across the jagged rock, a smear of darkness that spilled across the ground. The Arizona killer? Or the fugitives she’d vowed to bring in?

The silhouette vanished. Sinclair could sense eyes staring back at her.

Fear and excitement shot through her. This was no hawk or coyote, no trick of the sun, but a person crouched behind the stone.

In her peripheral vision, Alvarez stepped forward, but she shook her head once. Any sudden move could spook whoever was out there or start a firefight. Neither outcome appealed.

“Check the gear,” Sinclair said to Price, hoping her voice wouldn’t scare the presence on the ridge. “Then let’s roll.” The words were a ruse, a feint to see if the watcher would move or stay.

For a long time, nothing happened. Then the shape flattened against the ground, as though expecting a conflict. Sinclair’s hand tightened around her gun. She opened her mouth to speak, uncertain if she’d shout or simply raise her weapon.

She wanted to chase, to round the outcropping and corner the stalker. But for all she knew, it could be a trap. She glanced at Price and Alvarez. They waited on her lead.

“Someone’s out there,” she said. “Behind the outcropping.”

“The unsub or the fugitives?” Price asked.

“Does it matter?” she said. “Either way, we’re taking them down.”

“But if there are three of them⁠—”

“I only saw one shadow, and there are three of us, Agent Price. Or have you lost your backbone?”

Even as she said it, a knot of apprehension tightened beneath her sternum. If it was Bell, Wolf, and Gardy, they would fight for their lives. And if the hidden person turned out to be the unsub, he was a monster with nothing to lose.

“Agent Sinclair,” Alvarez said, “what’s the plan?”

“Find out who’s lurking behind that rock.”

She didn’t elaborate further. They were in the crosshairs of an unseen watcher, someone who might vanish into the desert, or a killer who might strike from the shadows.

Sinclair motioned at Price and Alvarez. “We don’t know who or what we’re dealing with, but we’re not letting them slip away. We’ll run a three-point approach. A classic cut-off maneuver.”

Price checked his weapon, showing his readiness to act. Alvarez stood off to Sinclair’s side with his brows knitted.

“Keep your gear minimal. Full sidearms, extra mags, radios on a private channel. No flashlights unless absolutely necessary. Sunset is near, but we still have enough light to see. If you spot someone, call it in before you engage.”

Both men nodded. She pointed off to the left side of the rocky rise.

“Price, circle around that flank. Move low and slow. Use the terrain for cover. I want you to monitor the north slope. If our target breaks that way, intercept.”

“As you command.”

“Alvarez, skirt the right side. Same concept. Use the gullies, the shrubs, whatever gives you concealment. If this person tries to slip away on your side, cut them off.”

Alvarez shifted his stance. “Got it.”

“I’ll approach from the center,” Sinclair said, turning her attention back to the jagged rock. “We’ll keep radio contact. Use channel three. We’re converging from three angles, so avoid crossfire. If we lose visual, we’ll hold position and wait for each other’s location call. Understood?”

The two agents agreed. They’d worked with Sinclair long enough to trust her judgment, even when it took them deep into hostile territory.

“Rules of engagement?” Price asked.

“We’ll attempt a peaceful arrest first. But if they draw on us, respond with deadly force. We can’t afford to be sloppy out here, especially if it’s the unsub. If it’s Logan Wolf…” Her voice hardened. “Protect yourself at all costs.”

Sinclair jerked her head, signaling it was time to move out.

Price took the left flank, angling away in a crouch. Dust plumed behind him in clouds. Alvarez peeled off to the right, gun drawn, hugging the dips of the terrain for cover. Sinclair breathed out, centering herself, then moved straight toward the ridge. Her steps were measured, sidearm in both hands, eyes trained on the stone. Heaven help them if Logan Wolf waited behind that outcropping.

By fanning out, they would box in the unknown figure, cutting off all escape routes. In the descending twilight, Sinclair’s pulse hammered with a warning. Mistakes were lethal here.

Come on. She pushed a bead of sweat off her forehead. Show yourself.

And as she slipped forward, flanked by Price and Alvarez on either side, Sinclair prepared for the worst.

34

Bell peered around the outcropping. The descending sun left the stone ridges cloaked in elongating shadows, the perfect cover for the FBI agents’ approach—and for Logan Wolf.

The silhouettes of three figures fanned out beyond the dunes. They closed in with professional discipline. It was a classic tactic, and Bell felt a surge of dread and longing. She should be fighting alongside the FBI, not against them.

Sinclair’s team knew how to corner a target. Bell saw nowhere to run. If they fled, the agents’ bullets would tear them apart.

Wolf grinned.

“What’s wrong with you?” Bell whispered.

“They think there’s only one threat,” Wolf said.

Bell shot him a warning look. “This isn’t why we’re here. We came to rescue Delaney Silas, not trade bullets with the federal government.”

Wolf’s voice bristled with dark amusement. “Bell, you know as well as I do that running solves nothing. They’ll keep chasing us. Better to ensure they can’t follow.”

She heard the implication in his words. Wolf intended to eliminate these threats. For too long, she’d understood Logan Wolf and the tightrope he walked. But this was something else, a raw willingness to butcher allies she’d once called friends.

“They’re not killers,” Gardy said as he crouched behind the stone. “Agent Sinclair and her team weren’t complicit in Carter’s crimes. They’re good agents, Wolf.”

Wolf gave a shrug and glanced around the rocks to track Agent Alvarez. “Take them out, or they will kill us. There is no middle ground.”

Gardy opened his mouth, but Wolf didn’t wait for a discussion. He slipped around the corner of boulders. In a blink, he was gone, dissolving into the shadows.

Terror shot through Bell’s veins. She knew Wolf’s lethal prowess. If he wanted to, he could silence Alvarez in seconds with the hunting knife. There would be no scream. Price and Sinclair wouldn’t even know Alvarez was dead. Wolf would end the fight quickly.

“He’s going to do it, Bell.” Gardy glared at her. “He’s going to kill them all.”

She pressed a hand to his shoulder. “Whatever happens, we did everything we could to protect this country.”

“We can’t talk Wolf down when he’s in this mindset. He’s a killer.”

The sound of boots on stone meant their enemies were closing in. Her mind splintered in two directions. Freedom? At what cost?

A figure loomed through the gloom, flanking the far right. Even from this distance, Bell recognized the build of the next agent, his weapon raised. Price, she thought.

Dread swirled behind Gardy’s eyes.

“I’ll handle Price,” Gardy said. “If this is the way it has to be.”

“Are you sure?”

“What choice do I have?”

Gardy craned his neck to observe Price’s approach angle, then peeled away, hugging the curve of the rock as he moved. In moments, he vanished from her sight.

Bell’s thoughts raced in overdrive. That meant it was up to her to eliminate Sinclair. Yet the outcropping stood between Bell and the lead agent. In her mind’s eye, she pictured the converging lines of the FBI team, each member trained to take out a killer.

I can’t let Wolf kill them.

She had no plan, no clarity, just the savage knowledge that this confrontation was beyond her control.

A footstep came from the dark. Alvarez was close. He and Price would strike in unison and try to converge on Wolf from opposite directions. But the agents didn’t realize two more threats waited for them.

Bell flattened herself behind the rock. A swirl of sand rose in a gust of wind, and through the haze she glimpsed Alvarez stepping around the far edge of the outcropping, weapon drawn. Price was on the opposite flank, closing in at the same time. Where was Wolf?

The fates answered her in a flash of deadly ferocity. Alvarez made a strangled sound. Wolf, silent as ever, had come from Alvarez’s blind spot. His forearm had clamped around the man’s neck in a sleeper hold. Alvarez’s gun dangled uselessly from limp fingers as his eyes rolled back, consciousness draining away.

Although Bell had expected a flash of the hunting knife, Wolf instead held the agent, applying pressure until Alvarez’s muscles went slack.

Price whipped around the outcropping from the opposite side, scanning for Wolf and Alvarez. In that heartbeat, he missed the movement at his back. Gardy, teeth clenched in a grim apology, shot out of the shadows, dealing a swift blow from behind. Price managed half a gasp before he crumpled to the sand, unconscious.

They had neutralized two of Sinclair’s agents without a single shot fired. But where was Sinclair?

A pebble rained down on Bell’s head and gave her a split-second of warning. An agent’s figure scrambled over the rocky ledge, her silhouette backlit. Vera Sinclair trained her gun down at them. Bell saw how it would end if she did nothing. Sinclair would squeeze the trigger, and she would die in the sand.

Bell moved on raw instinct and vaulted out of cover. She lunged, sweeping Sinclair’s legs with her hand. Sinclair’s eyes widened. A startled shout caught in the agent’s throat as she lost balance. Her gun clattered across the stony surface and vanished into a crevice, out of reach.

Sinclair hit the ground with a rasping breath. Bell panted, unsure if the agent was unconscious or merely stunned.

One second of disorientation was all Bell needed. Sinclair coughed, pushing herself on one elbow as she searched for her lost weapon.

Bell hoisted herself onto the outcropping and jumped on Sinclair. They battled in a tangle of limbs and rolled precariously close to the ledge. Bell glimpsed the drop—maybe eight or ten feet to a steep slope below. One wrong move and they’d both go over.

Sinclair bucked beneath her, snarling through clenched teeth. “You murdering traitor!” She flung her arm out, attempting to claw Bell’s face. Bell jerked her head aside just in time.

Bell shoved with her shoulder, trying to maneuver Sinclair onto her stomach. If she could lock her arms around Sinclair’s neck for a sleeper hold, as Wolf had done to Alvarez, maybe she could subdue the agent with no one getting killed.

“You’re fighting the wrong people,” Bell said.

Sinclair twisted with surprising strength, hooking her leg around Bell’s waist and driving them both against the outcropping’s stony lip. The edge crumbled under their weight, sending chunks of rock spilling downward. Bell gasped, her head spinning as Sinclair took advantage of her momentary shock.

“You killed Carter. And LeClaire.”

“Magnus Carter murdered LeClaire. If you would just stop to listen⁠—”

“Liar,” Sinclair snarled. “Carter was a good man. I’ll make all of you pay for what you did.”

Bell’s breath caught when Sinclair’s knee struck her in the side. A pained grunt came from her throat. She tried to clamp her arms around Sinclair’s neck, but Sinclair surged up, muscle and sheer will pushing Bell backward. Bell realized she wasn’t winning this hand-to-hand fight. Sinclair was too well-trained, too furious, and determined to avenge a perceived betrayal.

They slammed against the rock. Bell’s back arched in pain as the stony surface bruised her ribs. A swirl of panic rose in Bell. She couldn’t let Sinclair fight her way on top. The agent’s face contorted with hatred, her hands closing around Bell’s collar.

“I’ll kill you for what you did,” Sinclair spat, leaning in. “You can’t run from me.”

Bell’s arms trembled. She tried the sleeper hold anyway, hooking one arm under Sinclair’s chin. For a heartbeat, it seemed like it might hold. But Sinclair tore her free hand loose and hammered a sharp elbow into Bell’s gut. Bell gasped, her grip slipping. She was losing.

A shape appeared behind Sinclair. Wolf drove the butt of his handgun into the base of the agent’s skull. Sinclair let out a groan, eyes rolling, her hold on Bell going slack. Gardy pulled the woman away from Bell.

Sinclair collapsed on Bell’s chest, limbs sagging. Bell feared Wolf had gone too far. Was the FBI agent breathing?

Then Sinclair moaned. She was alive.

Bell pried her way free and pushed Sinclair aside so she could breathe.

Gardy’s face came into view. “You okay?”

Pressing a hand to her bruised side, Bell coughed. “I’ll live.” She brushed dirt off her face. Her eyes roamed to Wolf, who crouched over Sinclair, verifying she wasn’t a threat.

“She would have killed you,” Wolf said. “I had to act.”

“You did what you had to do,” Bell said. She turned to Gardy. “So did you. This fight ended without bloodshed.”

“Next time, we won’t have a choice.”

35

Night had dropped over the desert like a suffocating curtain, turning the horizon into a band of charcoal and obsidian. A hundred miles of emptiness stood between Delaney and the orange glow that had threatened to melt her alive. She thought relief would come with darkness, but she was wrong. The killer’s voice echoed over the dunes in a nightmarish lullaby she couldn’t outrun.

Her feet felt nailed to the ground. But she couldn’t stop. Every time she slowed, insane laughter drifted through the darkness. Sometimes she thought it came from the east, sometimes the west. She was never sure where to turn.

The night deepened, black upon black. Somewhere behind her, the killer followed. Delaney didn’t dare look back. She didn’t know if he was twenty yards away or two miles. Only her terror drove her. A thousand times, Delaney imagined a hand brushing her shoulder, certain she felt his fingers digging into her flesh. Each time she twisted around, she found nothing but the starlit landscape.

Why had this man murdered her father? What did he want with her?

She remembered a news story about bodies found in the desert, about a lunatic hunting in Arizona. This man?

A sound to her left made her heart lurch. She crouched against a squat pillar of rock, covering her mouth to strangle a scream. A footstep crunched against the ground, so close it felt like it might be her own.

Go away. Just go away.

The moon was a wicked sickle. She told herself to breathe. If she remained still, maybe he would pass her by.

“Little pig, little pig. Come out, come out, wherever you are.”

A tittering snicker bubbled through the night. A hyena’s laugh. The words sounded slurred. She swore they were coming from the other side of the stone. At any second, she expected a hand to clamp over the top of the rock, nails scraping the rough surface as the maniac’s face rose into view.

She counted the seconds. Gravel shifted. He was moving around her hiding place. If she stayed put, he would find her.

Something—an animal stench, sweat and a rank thing, like decaying vegetation—activated her gag reflex. He stood only steps away, leaning on the stone, sniffing the air for her fear.

“Yes, the belt. I will do as you taught me. She will learn to obey.”

Delaney refused to cry. This monster had taken everything from her. If she breathed her last breath tonight, she would die fighting.

Her body yearned to bolt, but her mind shrieked that running into the open was suicide.

He was inches from discovering her. She bit her lip. With the stick lost, she had no weapon.

The wind died, plunging the night into absolute stillness. She could hear him sucking wind.

“Where are you…” he crooned in a fractured whisper, a lullaby gone sour.

As he circled the rock, she circled with him, always a few steps ahead. He kept coming, as if he’d seen through her ruse.

Then he shuffled away. His silhouette appeared against the black. He dragged one leg behind him.

The trick shouldn’t have worked. It was so simple—something a child would do to fool a sibling. The killer had lost touch with reality, and that had saved her.

Delaney sagged with relief. She just had to keep still a little longer. Let him get ahead of her, then circle around and try to beat him to the highway.

When she couldn’t hear him anymore, she gathered the last shred of her courage and crept out of hiding.

The man had vanished. Delaney wasn’t safe, but she’d escaped again.

He limped through the darkness, one leg dragging like a worthless appendage he would gladly hack off if it didn’t mean bleeding out in the dust. Each time he put weight on his injured ankle, a tremor of pain rattled his teeth. But he kept going. He had to, as the girl was near. She was always near, even if she didn’t realize how close he was to cornering her.

The chase had lasted for hours or days. He couldn’t tell anymore. Time tangled in distorted loops inside his mind. Memories of childhood punishments collided with the present. The heat was gone now, replaced by a night that breathed like a great black beast concealing him. He spoke to the empty air.

“You think yourself smarter. But I’ll show you.”

He leaned against another boulder, ignoring the sting of raw flesh under his torn clothes. The wind hissed, a serpent's whisper, stirring scents of sweat and fear. In his memory, he heard his father’s footsteps, the belt whistling.

The part of him that had once been human disappeared. His husk of a body remained, but another person occupied it. The devil walked in his shoes and wore his clothes. It even spoke in his voice.

“Boy,” he said to the night. “She’s made her bed, and now she’ll lie in it.”

A spasm of rage coursed through him. He spied more footprints leading away. He ground his teeth. She believed she could fool him by wiping away her tracks. The night belonged to him. She wasn’t fooling anyone.

A snarl formed in his throat. “You can’t hide,” he said, the pitch warping into that dreaded fatherly growl he remembered. “Show yourself, or your punishment will be worse.”

He strode onward, unstoppable in his own delusion, seized by the cruel legacy that had shaped him. His eyes searched the dark dunes. He pictured her trembling, stumbling across the sand, looking over her shoulder. He pictured her helpless as a rabbit on open ground, dirty face and frenzied breathing, waiting for the hawk to strike. And in the blackest corner of his heart, he reveled in that terror. He feasted on it—the sense of control it gave him when so much else felt like chaos.

A shift in the wind drew him forward. The night air carried a phantom scent of human sweat. The girl. He smiled through bared teeth, inhaling the dryness that parched his throat.

“You think I don’t see,” he crooned. “Daddy sees everything.”

He pushed off the rock, forced himself into an uneven lope. The girl would run out of hiding spots and he would find her. Then the night would cradle them both in its suffocating arms.

His fevered mind saw her silhouette dart behind a dune. A fleeting image.

“Can’t fool me. I can smell you, piggy. The big bad wolf is coming.”

36

Alvarez and Price lay crumpled on the ground where Gardy had knocked them unconscious. Wolf stood over them, his expression dispassionate. Only the rise and fall of the agents’ chests confirmed they were alive. Gardy carried Sinclair’s body off the outcropping and set it beside the others.

“We should go,” Wolf said. “They’ll awaken soon enough.”

Bell glanced at the two prone forms and shook her head, remembering the coyotes. “We can’t leave them here. The animals won’t show mercy.”

“Not our problem. You professed your innocence, and Sinclair still tried to murder you.”

Anger flared in Gardy’s eyes as he straightened from checking Price’s pulse. “No. I won’t let scavengers devour three FBI agents. If we allow this, we’re no better than Carter.”

Bell gave him a grateful look. She felt the same. They couldn’t sink further into a moral quicksand. Even if it meant risking their safety, they couldn’t abandon unconscious agents to the desert.

Wolf rolled his shoulders. “As you wish,” he said in a tone of reluctant acquiescence. “But whatever your intentions, do it quick.”

One by one, they hefted the unconscious agents. Alvarez was heavier than he looked, and Price dangled awkwardly in Gardy’s arms. Each step to the FBI SUV felt like trudging a mile through ocean waves. Bell’s shoulders ached, her ribs screaming from Sinclair’s blows. But she held her side of Alvarez until they reached the SUV and slid him into the back as gently as they could.

They went back for Price. Gardy hoisted the limp agent, stepping gingerly over rough stones that threatened to turn his ankles with each shift. A whirl of sand trailed them as they loaded Price beside his partner. Wolf watched the road for more officers. Bell thought of Sinclair, wondering how far the agent would have gone had Wolf not stopped her.

“One more,” Gardy said.

Bell carried Sinclair’s upper body, while Gardy supported her legs. The agent mumbled something indiscernible, and Gardy stopped, worried Sinclair was waking up.

“Hurry, before she realizes what’s happening,” Bell said.

The woman’s feet twitched as they crossed the desert. Was Sinclair playing possum? She didn’t have her gun, but that didn’t make her less dangerous.

At last, Bell and Gardy set Sinclair’s limp form beside her agents. They closed the trunk.

“They should recover in an hour or two,” Bell said. “We’ll be long gone by them.”

She tried to ignore the pang of guilt twisting under her ribs. The agents were adversaries, but they didn’t deserve to die.

Wolf slipped behind the SUV’s wheel. He reached under the steering column. When he stepped out, a pair of keys dangled from his fingers.

Gardy stared at him. “What are you doing?”

“So they can’t follow us,” Wolf said. “They won’t sleep for long. I’d rather not have them on our tails.” He tossed the key ring into the air and caught it with a snap. “They’ll have their radios and can call for backup if they’re stranded.”

Bell looked across the sand. “Delaney Silas is still out there, and so is the killer.”

After walking a quarter mile down the highway, Bell located the stolen Escalade behind a rise in the terrain, where they’d hidden it. She clambered into the passenger seat this time. Wolf slipped behind the wheel, and Gardy took the back seat.

The headlights sliced through the swirling dust as Wolf steered onto the deserted road. Bell stared out the window, searching for a human silhouette against the night’s emptiness. Would she see a teen’s figure stumbling by the roadside, arms wrapped around herself for warmth? Each mile they covered deepened her sense of urgency.

Her phone’s screen lit in her lap, a single bar showing at the top. “I’ve got coverage,” she said. The bar disappeared, then came back. She tapped Harold’s number before her luck slipped away.

The call died before it even rang.

Bell swore and again. This time, the line connected.

“Harold? Can you hear me?”

A moment of static. “Bell? It’s late. Where are you?”

“Harold, listen,” she said, talking fast before the signal evaporated. “We found an abandoned SUV. I have the license plate. Let me see.” She rattled off the plate number from the vehicle. “Run a trace. We think it might belong to Randall Silas. We need to confirm if the vehicle belonged to him.”

A clatter of keyboard noises came from Harold’s end. “Running the search now.”

More static. Bell confirmed that one coverage bar was holding firm.

Finally, Harold returned. “Got it. The plate is registered to Randall Silas from Phoenix.”

Bell remembered the blood on the sand. Randall Silas or his daughter might be dead. Had the killer taken the bodies to pose in the desert?

“Run a full background check on Randall Silas. Give me everything you can. Family history, known associates, previous addresses. If Delaney is in trouble, I want to know who she’d try to contact.”

“Got it. I’ll do a deeper dive. I’ll message you if your phone drops again.”

“Thank you. The coverage is awful. If I drop, leave a detailed voice mail or text.”

“Bell, be careful. The FBI is tearing up the desert. Word is that they found the Mercer family. It’s ugly. And they’re looking for you, too. Sinclair won’t stop⁠—”

The line went dead.

Bell stared at the screen.

“Well?” Wolf asked.

“Harold confirmed it was Randall Silas’s SUV. He will get us more on the Silas family. And so you know, Sinclair alerted the FBI that we’re in the desert.”

“We should have killed them.”

“No, we shouldn’t have,” Gardy said from behind.

“What shall I do?”

“Keep looking for a survivor,” Bell said. “I won’t allow myself to believe the girl didn’t escape.”

37

Delaney pressed herself against a rocky shelf in the dark. A trickle of sand slithered down from the ledge above her, dirtying her hair and running down the back of her neck. She had no true shelter, nobody to protect her. She dared to peek around the shelf.

An hour had passed since she’d heard the madman’s ramblings. She told herself that she’d lost him. But the darkest corner of her mind pictured him a few steps away, lurking where the moonlight didn’t reach. He would lurch out of the night and reach for her, giving her no time to scream.

Her thoughts drifted to her father. She sobbed. Dad had been her only family for as long as she could remember. Ever since her mother left her in the hospital, she’d had nobody but him. After everything he’d done for her, she’d left his dead body without so much as a prayer. Had she done the right thing fleeing, or should she have stayed and tried to bury him somehow? But he’d been beyond help, hadn’t he? The killer had made sure of that.

Memories flowed—Dad’s wry humor when they went camping in a little patch of forest near Phoenix; the proud look in his eyes when she showed him her science project in middle school; the way he always fussed over whether she’d eaten enough. He’d always seemed unsure he was fit to be a father, and that had always confused her.

A bitter flutter rose in her chest. She’d once yelled at him in her early teens, accusing him of being overprotective.

“You act like I’m this fragile glass figure,” she’d said.

He hadn’t gotten angry—he’d just looked stricken, as though he realized how adrift they both were without a mother’s guidance.

Paralyzed by fear and desert chill, she wished he was here to fuss over her, to hand her a coat or a bottle of water, to tell her everything would be okay. But he was gone. She would never see him again.

The mother who’d walked out of Delaney’s life remained an enigma. The mysterious woman left behind a heartbreak that had once felt abstract, a question Delaney used to dwell on when Dad wasn’t around—why would any mother leave a newborn? Was Delaney not worthy of affection?

Maybe her mother had been scared or had issues so deep that motherhood seemed impossible. For years, Delaney dreamed up a thousand half-baked reasons, each one a story to fill a gaping hole.

Even with no mother around, she’d also never had grandparents. Dad only ever said his parents had died when he was young. There were no family reunions on the holidays.

She picked at a ragged nail. A breeze scraped the rocky ground, carrying the faint odor of dust and minerals. She could see shapes in the distance—a few cacti or jagged heaps of stone that formed silhouettes against the canopy of stars. Somewhere out there, the killer prowled, a living nightmare.

Dad had tried so hard to protect her, despite seeming unsure of himself as a father. It had always been the two of them, stumbling through life, forging a half-friend, half-parent relationship.

“Dad,” she whispered, salty tears burning behind her eyes.

She wished she could have taken him with her. As if such a thing were possible. She wished she had fought against the maniac who’d attacked them. Or had she? The memory refused to float to the surface.

A crunch of gravel set her pulse soaring. She pressed herself against the stone and listened.

Would she never escape the psychopath? The highway couldn’t be far. She just needed to find it. This time, she’d pick a direction and walk until she found civilization or died trying.

When her eyelids drooped with raw exhaustion, she pictured Dad telling her a bedtime story. She’d giggled at the way he acted out each part. Thinking of that moment brought a smile to her lips. She’d lost him forever, but his love had been true and strong.

She blinked away the moisture gathering on her lashes. The desert offered no comfort, no parent’s arms. All she had was scraps of memory. She tried not to think of how close the killer might be.

Delaney tried again to piece together the fraying threads of their drive into the desert. Her body ached. Yet some corner of her consciousness kept tugging at the missing moments, those terrible seconds outside the SUV when the killer struck.

She shut her eyes and tried to remember.

Breathe.

Something happened. But what?

A memory returned. She recalled the heat of the sun blasting the roadway as Dad directed her to pull over.

Something about a monument he wanted to show her. He said it was a surprise.

A monument? In the middle of nowhere? She couldn’t recall the details, only that Dad had been so excited for her to see something. Then he fell quiet, as if wrestling with some hidden thought.

The killer. When did the killer arrive? Why can’t I see his face?

She remembered hands on her shoulders—calloused, strong. Dad’s hands, maybe guiding her away from the wheel. She was walking toward a dune. Then a sudden rush of motion, a shape coming from behind.

The next thing she recalled was adrenaline roaring in her veins, the metallic tang of fear in her breath. Delaney grabbed the first thing she saw—a palm-size rock lying at her feet. She needed to fight. To save them. To save herself.

She’d fallen or been knocked down. Searing pain in her head. Darkness.

But not before she hit him with the rock.

The killer.

Whose face had she seen in that split second before she lost consciousness?

A wave of dizziness washed over her, and she clenched her eyes, forcing herself to dredge up the recollection. The moment the killer snatched her. The sense of something profoundly wrong—a voice. Dad shouting. She heard him yell her name, words fractured by panic. The killer’s shadow eclipsing her. A savage blow. That was when she’d collapsed, swirling into blackness.

Her breath quickened, mind sliding deeper into the swamp of drowned images. The night receded. She saw the killer’s silhouette, the sun behind him casting a dreadful halo of light around his body. Then, in a flash, she saw a face—eyes that flickered between rage and an even darker glint.

The face wasn’t a stranger’s. She gasped.

Her father’s face stared back at her, mouth twisted in that frozen instant of madness before everything fell apart.

Daddy.

The revelation ripped the air from her lungs.

Delaney screamed.

38

He limped through the darkness, every step sending white-hot pain through his leg. The night swallowed the desert. Randall Silas was a shadow walking.

His father’s voice echoed inside his skull, commanding him to keep going. He was no longer Randall the Foreman, nor the uncertain parent who had once read bedtime stories. He was something else, a feral mixture of wrath and madness, bound to a death song.

Silas imagined the girl hiding just out of sight, fleeing him the way he had once fled his own nightmares. The idea inflamed him. He believed she was near because he could smell her fear on the wind, a desperate, bitter scent that whispered run, hide, he’s coming.

He dragged his bad leg behind him. His body could not impede him. It was nothing more than a vessel.

“Come back…” he mumbled, voice slurred by feverish thirst and the swelling bruise on his temple. “You never…never learn…”

Each word broke into a half laugh, half snarl, as though he found this cat-and-mouse game terribly hilarious. Yet his eyes, wide and unblinking, glittered with the thirst for blood, a hunger that no water could quench.

He was his father. The madman that had terrorized Randall lived inside him, guiding his footsteps and urging him forward. A savage grin bent his lips whenever he thought he heard the girl’s footfalls skip just beyond the next dune.

He tripped on a patch of loose stones, nearly toppling. The pain drove him to issue a guttural roar. “Ungrateful… worthless… I taught you better than this.” The words came out jumbled, shifting from paternal scolding to unintelligible expletives.

Wisps of memory returned. The mother he’d lost as a child, the father who had taught him fear, the grandparents who’d tried to mend what was irreparably broken. None of it mattered now. All that mattered was punishing disobedience, teaching the lesson he’d learned during his youth.

An image of the girl’s eyes flashed in his thoughts like a stuttering film reel.

“Finish it. Don’t let her get away.”

A laugh gurgled from his throat. He limped faster, scuffing the sand so it sprayed up in plumes around his ankles. No sign of her footprints, but he didn’t need them. She was close. A magnet drew him on.

One more act to the play.

“Daddy’s coming. Come on, sweet little girl. The desert is so lovely…we will stay forever.”

The wind gusted, tossing grit into his face. He blinked, eyes burning. His father’s muscles pulsed beneath his skin. He was a tool of punishment gone mad in the moonlight.

“I’ll find you. I’ll teach you to obey.”

He choked out a curse, veering sideways around a crumbling mound of rock, forcing his body to ignore the screaming signals of agony. He felt spent yet utterly alive in a way that made his vision dance with star-bright clarity.

A scream came from a few hundred yards ahead.

It wasn’t the wind or the coyotes. It was all too human—a girl’s voice. His daughter. A lightning bolt of excitement charged through his veins, and any lingering doubt that he could continue vanished under the crushing weight of his lunatic purpose. She was close.

He growled, voice rasping out like the rusted hinges of a door. “Yesss…”

The word trailed into a growl.

Finish what you started. Don’t let her slip away now.

Another whimper rose from the darkness. It pushed him like a spur into horseflesh; he reeled around a set of boulders, half-stumbling, half-running. The dune slopes glowed under the moon, and his pulse thundered with the knowledge that soon, very soon, he would make her pay.

She had betrayed him and struck him with the stone. The memory kindled a savage conflagration in his chest, a swirling mixture of hatred that commanded him to claim her forever. She would pay for running. Pay for making him chase her across these barren miles.

“Daddy’s coming, little piggy. The big, big, big bad wolf.”

The words sounded foreign, as if they came from a voice that wasn’t his. Somewhere deep inside, a spark of rationality screamed that this was wrong. But the mania barreled over his reasoning like a locomotive.

The wind shifted, and he caught a fleeting silhouette in the gloom—someone crouched behind a ledge. Silas bared his teeth.

Her.

He had waited for this moment, hated how she’d forced him to endure the scorching sun, the freezing blackness. Her disobedience was all for nothing. He was fate. He was inevitable.

Closer.

If she screamed again, he would be on her before she finished the sound. He edged around a boulder, balancing on the trackless sand. There, outlined by moonlight, she moved. She was a pathetic shape, stumbling over the dune’s crest.

Her life belonged to him, to this demon he’d become. The taste of victory stung like salt on his tongue.

He was coming for her. And no dawn would spare her now.

39

Harold hunched over his keyboard. Redthorn Wells was as dead as the night.

The lamp on the table threw jittery shapes across the faded wallpaper, shadows that seemed to move of their own accord whenever the desert wind rattled the boarding house’s ancient bones. His own breath sounded ragged and amplified in the silence, and it occurred to him he had never been this alone.

He ran the background search Bell had demanded. Randall Silas: father, missing person.

The dryness in his mouth reminded him he hadn’t consumed water in hours. But the thought of descending the stairs to fetch a bottle from the storeroom made his hair stand on end. He would unlatch the door and find someone waiting.

After Bell and the others left, he’d secured the boarding house, locking the doors and barricading the entrance with boards and furniture. His efforts didn’t make him feel safer.

A thump made him freeze. He forgot how to exhale.

Was someone inside?

A rat, maybe. Or just the wind. That’s all it was.

He forced air into his lungs and continued typing, ignoring the sweat that gathered at his hairline.

Harold squinted at the screen, picking through official forms, reading about addresses, past citations, any link that might help Bell figure out who the Silas family might contact. The mother had deserted Delaney at birth. She’d simply walked out of the hospital and vanished. People changed their identities to escape their pasts.

He was reading about the woman when another noise came from outside. An engine.

Harold jumped and knocked the chair backward. No one came through Redthorn Wells.

Closing the laptop to snuff out the light, he darted to the window. The boards he’d hammered over the frame allowed a thin vertical gap through which he could peer.

Headlights cut through the night, reflecting against the broken glass of a storefront across the street. Harold pressed himself flat against the wall. A sheriff’s cruiser crawled down Main Street. Its siren and lights were off.

“Oh, no.”

If the deputy stopped, he would be discovered. Harold was a tech guy, not a field agent. He couldn’t fight for his freedom.

Outside, the cruiser’s engine revved. The deputy veered to the left, perhaps seeking a better view of the abandoned buildings. Had the sheriff’s department received the tip that someone was holed up in the ghost town? If the police discovered the solar-powered command center, the laptops, the maps…

He willed the cruiser to keep going. Through the gap, he saw the beams creep across a battered signpost.

Then the glow vanished. The motor’s rumble faded, the sound drifting away into the wide desert night.

Harold slumped against the wall. They hadn’t noticed him. But the hair on his arms prickled. What would he do if they returned?

He paused outside the command center, the old floorboard creaking as if in warning. The silence in Redthorn Wells felt heavier than ever, as if every shadow harbored a watcher. He couldn’t shake the worry that someone might have seen the light from the monitor. In this ghost town, any illumination would stand out like a beacon.

Adding another layer to the barricade of planks and furniture, he draped a moth-eaten blanket over the window frame. Back in the office, he surveyed the dusty desk and opened the laptop. Not good. Anyone outside would see. Harold removed a tablecloth he’d discovered in a side closet and rigged it over the monitor, leaving just enough space for the keyboard so he could lean close to the screen.

Satisfied, Harold scooted his chair closer. He typed a few commands. His mind swam with fragments of the Silas family story: father missing, daughter lost in the desert, SUV abandoned. And now Bell needed to know if there was anything else, some hidden piece of Randall Silas’ life that might reveal where Delaney would go for help, or who would want to kill them.

He started by re-checking the standard missing-person file. That was simple enough: name, address, occupation, a note about Delaney Silas being his teenage daughter, no spouse on record. Next he dove deeper, cross-referencing internal law enforcement databases that housed buried reports. Uncovering hidden truths—this was Harold’s specialty.

Randall Silas’ birth certificate was on file, but it listed no father. The mother had died when Randall was only a few years old. That might explain why Randall was raised by his grandparents. A note about guardianship popped up in a county record. Harold frowned, digging further. He noticed the grandparents’ last name differed from Randall’s. Strange. Maybe the mother had kept her maiden name. Something told him to keep digging.

He tapped a specialized database bridging up court records and police archives. His breath caught. There it was. A partially redacted case from decades ago involved a homicide. The mother’s death. The father had murdered her.

Scenes of a domestic homicide popped on the screen. The father had beaten the mother to death. The details were murky, scanned from microfiche full of black lines and missing paragraphs. Years later, the father died in prison.

Harold’s blood ran cold. Randall Silas’ father had murdered Randall’s mother while Randall watched. A single sentence cross-referencing a juvenile witness sealed it, though it took Harold a moment to parse the official jargon. Witness, minor child, placed under guardianship. No paternal custody.

He knew this was a crucial clue, a crack in the psyche that said more about Randall himself. If Randall had grown up under trauma…

Harold shuddered and forced himself to keep reading, skimming for references to Randall’s father. One line indicated that Randall had been raised in a different state afterward. The words “traumatized minor” jumped out.

“Holy hell,” he whispered to no one. This was big. Bell would want this information. She needed to know about Randall’s history. But could he reach her?

A quick call ended with a message that the recipient was out of the coverage range. He tried again and hit the same roadblock.

Harold sent a text to Bell, hoping she’d see it when her cell coverage picked up again.

Randall Silas witnessed his father murder his mother.

With the message sent, Harold looked over his shoulder. All he saw was a wall of black bleeding from the hallway into the room. He would have closed and locked the door, but an undefinable fear kept him glued in place. The darkness had cruel talons that would clutch him if he ventured out.

A father who’d grown up in a murder household might be prone to…

Bell thought Randall Silas was a victim. But Harold knew he was the unsub.

He refocused on the screen and typed more queries. He hoped a piece of data he’d find would prove Silas wasn’t a deranged murderer.

Because if he was the Arizona killer, he was zeroing in on his ultimate target. His daughter.

40

Agent Sinclair stirred in the darkness, her eyelids heavy and throat painfully dry. A single keening howl broke the hush—a coyote’s lonely cry that lingered like a dirge in the moonlit emptiness. She tried to lift her head, confusion wrapping around her thoughts. Her skull hit the floor. It took several breaths before she summoned the strength to prop herself up on one elbow. Why was she lying in the back of an SUV?

She blinked hard, the ceiling overhead blurring in her vision. Her muscles felt stiff, achy, as if she’d been in a crash. Maybe she had. She frowned, forcing herself to sit up. Her body protested, the side of her head throbbing where she must have taken a blow.

Groaning, she realized she wasn’t alone. Price sprawled in the corner, breathing heavily but alive. Alvarez lay slumped near Sinclair’s feet, his head lolling to one side. The SUV smelled of sweat and dust, the lingering residue of a scuffle.

A second howl rose over the desert, jarring her into consciousness. Nighttime. She glanced at the window, but smears covered the glass, so she couldn’t see much. Still, the silvery glow of the moon was unmistakable.

With closed eyes, she tried to replay the last thing she remembered. She’d been on that rocky outcropping. Her adrenaline roared at the memory of a desperate fight. Bell was there. Scarlett Bell, a fugitive agent turned murderer, according to everything Sinclair had uncovered. They’d locked eyes, trading blows.

Sinclair remembered hearing Price’s grunt, seeing Alvarez slump. Then a flash of motion. Something hit her skull from behind, a lightning bolt of pain.

And then…darkness.

The killers had subdued her. But why would they dump her back in the FBI SUV with her teammates? The fugitives could have slit their throats and left them to the animals.

She swallowed, shifting to check her belt. Her holster was empty. No sidearm. A hiss of frustration slipped past her lips.

She shook Price’s shoulder. “Hey. Wake up.”

He groaned, eyelids fluttering. Alvarez made a muffled sound, coming around like a man dragged from the bottom of a deep well. Relief warred with anger in Sinclair’s gut. None of them were dead, which meant Bell and her partners—those criminals—had shown some measure of restraint. Why?

Alvarez’s eyes finally snapped open. He put a hand to his temple and winced. “Agent Sinclair?”

“I’m here.”

Price managed to sit up. “What happened?”

“We got jumped,” she said, the words full of bitterness. “Bell, Wolf, Gardy. They took us out and left us here.”

Price peered out the window, as if the fugitives were hovering near the vehicle. “They didn’t kill us?”

Sinclair ignored the pounding bruise on the back of her head. “No. But don’t mistake their actions for mercy. They didn’t want our blood on the sand. Bell and her psychopaths are in enough trouble as it is.” She inhaled and grabbed the back of the seat for support. “We need to see if the vehicle is functional.”

Alvarez checked his hip. “My gun is missing.”

Sinclair cursed. They were cut off from help and had no way of defending themselves. She turned on the dome light and searched for the keys. Nothing. The steering column was intact. If she hot-wired the SUV, she could drive them out of here.

“They took the keys,” she said. “And the deputies left hours ago.”

“Maybe they’ll come looking for us when we don’t return to town.”

“So they left us out here without a ride,” Price said. “Let’s pray the battery isn’t dead.”

Sinclair flexed her fingers. She shoved the door open and stepped into the night. The quiet sank its teeth into her. Another howl came from the darkness.

A thousand questions boiled in her mind: Where had the fugitives gone? Was the killer still roaming the desert? Her job was to hunt them both—unsub and ex-agents. Instead, she was stuck with a worthless vehicle and two battered teammates.

Alvarez and Price shuffled out, clutching their heads. Sinclair rubbed the nape of her neck, scanning the horizon. How had it come to this? Scarlett Bell, an agent Sinclair once respected, had attacked her and left the team for dead.

The fight returned to her. Bell had sworn Carter was a traitor. Sinclair snorted. Lies—Carter was a good man. Nothing would change her mind.

She turned to Price. “We’ll walk if we have to.”

“That’s suicide.”

“So is staying here, waiting for Bell to come back and finish the job.”

Alvarez nodded. “We can’t stay put. Those coyotes are getting close.”

Perhaps Sinclair had lost this round, but she would not leave the field in defeat. She gestured for them to gather their meager resources—water bottles left behind, a first-aid kit in the trunk. If Bell thought leaving them alive was a courtesy that would gain her favor, she was mistaken. Sinclair would track them to the ends of the earth. Next time, she would shoot to kill.

A squelch came from inside the SUV and caught all three agents off guard. Sinclair spun on her heel, hand automatically groping for a sidearm that wasn’t there. She exchanged a confused glance with Alvarez, while Price turned toward the sound.

“What in the hell?” Alvarez muttered, carefully pushing open the passenger door. The interior was dark, a pool of shadows rimmed by moonlight that seeped through the windows.

Price ducked in, patting the floor with one hand. “The sound came from inside.”

“Check everywhere,” Sinclair ordered, stepping closer.

Price wedged one shoulder under the steering column. Something lay on the vinyl mat: a device buried in the gloom. He exhaled, hooking his fingers around the shape and dragging it free.

Three radios emerged. Price held them out to Sinclair with one brow arched. “I’ll be damned. They left our radios.”

Alvarez’s mouth opened in disbelief. “Why would they do that? If they wanted to be sure we couldn’t follow them, they could have pitched the radios into the desert.”

Sinclair stared at the radios, suspicion burning a hole in her throat. Bell and Gardy hadn’t murdered them. And they’d left her the means to call for help, albeit after stripping the keys from the ignition.

“Maybe they didn’t want us to die,” Price said. “They’ll do whatever it takes to stay free, but they still respect the FBI.”

“Fool. That’s what they want you to believe,” Sinclair said.

“We can contact the sheriff’s department. That’s something.” Price powered on the first radio. Static hissed from the speaker. He ran his thumb over the frequency knob, verifying it was set to the local channel. “Should I make the call?”

Nothing about this made sense. These fugitives were traitorous murderers. They had allowed Sinclair’s team to live, but there was a hidden motive. She couldn’t fathom what the reason was, but she would soon. Right now, her only concern was procuring another vehicle so she could bring the fugitives to justice.

“Make the call,” she said. “Tell the sheriff’s department we need another vehicle. The FBI will cover the cost. And we need the vehicle fast, because we’re going after Bell’s team.”

Price raised the radio to his mouth and stepped away from the SUV for better reception. Alvarez sank into the driver’s seat, letting out a shaky breath. Sinclair, leaning against the door, traced the horizon with her eyes.

Four killers stalked the desert, and she needed to find them.

41

Delaney’s lungs burned. She sprinted across the shifting desert floor, stumbling over coarse sand and jagged stones that seemed to rise like undead fingers.

Her father—the man she had trusted, the one who should have protected her—was behind her, trying to kill her.

She stole a glance over her shoulder, terror spiking in her body at the sight of him. A silhouette emerged against the starlight. He was limping, an unmistakable stagger in every stride, yet somehow he kept gaining on her. Each time she looked, that hunched shape had advanced closer than before, fueled by some force she couldn’t comprehend.

Madness. A madness she couldn’t recognize, not in the man who had once put Band-Aids on her skinned knees and applauded her at school recitals.

He was unrecognizable now, transformed into a monster. The same father who once made her laugh now wore a savage grimace. She pictured him lunging out of the gloom, hands twisted into claws ready to close around her throat.

How was this real?

She leaped over a mound of sand. The rational part of her insisted this was nothing but a nightmare from which she would awaken. Her dad wouldn’t do this.

But she couldn’t deny the memory that had crashed back into her mind. His face in the sun, wild and menacing, the savage blow that had sent her reeling into unconsciousness. She’d hurt him too, but hadn’t killed him.

All this time, she’d believed he was dead. Now he wanted to murder her.

No matter how fast she ran, the desert refused to let her escape. She tried to quell the rising panic, telling herself she would reach the highway soon. What if the highway was miles away? She had lost track of time and distance, her sense of direction devoured by delirium. Even if she found the road, why would anyone appear to help? No one had before.

A deranged shout yanked her attention back, and her foot snagged on a rock. She pitched forward, catching herself with outstretched hands. The impact jolted her wrists and sent sand spraying into her mouth and nose. She coughed, choking, and scrambled back up. In her peripheral vision, his shape crested a dune, lopsided but relentless. Shambling, she thought. Like something out of a horror movie.

The love he’d shown her felt like a cruel hoax, overshadowed by a horrifying truth. He had waited for this day.

Why was he doing this? What had she done to betray him?

Keep running. He’s not my father anymore.

The wind picked up, whipping the hair into her eyes. She turned her face away from the stinging sand. The shape behind her vanished, swallowed by dust. A second later, he emerged again, a little closer. Always closer.

She whimpered, but she kept going. Despair tore at her resolve—but survival screamed louder.

Don’t give in. You must keep running, because if he catches you, there’s nothing left but darkness.

That voice. It was a woman’s voice. Her mother.

Delaney risked another glance. The crazed beast that had once been her father cackled a hundred feet behind her.

There had to be a way to reach the reasoning part of his mind. The part of him that had once loved her.

Another look back. He was still there, limping but unstoppable. Father no more, only a monster craving her blood.

Bell raised the phone over her head, as if that extra inch might coax a signal from the sky. With Wolf and Bell waiting below, she ascended a ledge and grasped the rocks to avoid toppling backward. Nothing. Just that same black bar staring at her.

Gardy peered across a stretch of dunes that glittered under the starlight. He stopped and braced himself on a boulder. “I heard something,” he said, turning his face up to look at her.

“What was it?” she asked.

“I think it was a scream.”

She hadn’t heard anything. Then again, her hearing remained muffled from the gunfire that scared away the coyotes.

Wolf cocked his head. “An echo distorted the sound, but I believe it came from two miles away. Not easy to pinpoint. We’d be guessing about the direction.”

Bell lifted the phone skyward again, willing some benevolent force to put her in contact with Harold. Their trek through the night had left her blind and struggling to keep a sense of direction.

Had Gardy heard Delaney?

“Screw your indecision,” she said to Wolf. “Give me your best guess.”

“I may lead you astray, dear Scarlett.”

“Just tell her, Wolf,” Gardy said.

After a brief consideration, Wolf pointed toward a horizon broken by low hummocks that looked like a row of stationary camels. Or a gargantuan serpent rising from a dry sea.

Bell scrambled higher, the rock cutting into her palms as she fought for a vantage point. Foot after foot, she climbed the lopsided terrain. At the top, she tried her phone again, a routine she’d repeated every few minutes. She drew in a breath when one flickering bar appeared in the corner of the screen.

“Got something!” she announced.

She jabbed the screen, tapping a received message before the fragile signal vanished. Harold was the sender.

Harold (1:17 AM) Randall Silas witnessed his father murder his mother.

Then more.

Randall Silas = killer. Old records show father murdered mother. Randall witnessed. Possibly a repeating cycle.

Bell felt her blood run cold.

Randall Silas. The father was the killer.

Her world seemed to tilt for a second, the ridge beneath her feet like a grim stage set for a fall.

Wolf met her eyes. “You know who the killer is.”

“I do.”

“Tell me, Scarlett.”

“Randall Silas isn’t a victim. He’s the unsub. He’s trying to kill his own daughter.”

The father they’d planned to rescue was the monster stalking Delaney through the dunes. A man shaped by violence in his childhood, reenacting a horror no one would have believed possible.

Gardy swore. The color drained from his face. “We might be too late.”

“Like hell we are,” Bell said.

She scrambled down the incline and jumped the final ten feet. Wolf braced her fall.

There was not a more horrific betrayal than a father butchering his own child. A murder might be unfolding right now.

The knowledge of Randall Silas’s true nature pushed Bell into an unknown battlefield, where a teenage girl needed her more than ever. And where a man’s lethal madness sought to complete his legacy of blood.

42

Sinclair paced. Grit crunched under her shoes as she tried not to glare too openly at the sheriff. Her impatience tasted like iron.

The sheriff had rolled up in a second SUV a few minutes ago, parking with a flourish of red dust that settled around them in a crimson halo. Price and Alvarez stared into the desert.

The sheriff flipped through a clipboard of forms. “Now, Agent Sinclair,” he said. “We have ourselves a little protocol. This vehicle’s signed out specifically for FBI field operation, so I need your ID, plus the signature here, here, and…”

Sinclair snatched the pen from his hand. “Sheriff, there’s no time for protocol. We have a killer loose in this desert, and my entire team is compromised. I intend to catch this man before the sun rises.”

She made it a point not to tell him about the three fugitives. They were her problem. She would see to it that they didn’t escape.

The sheriff stood firm. “Procedure says I can’t just hand you a departmental vehicle without accountability.”

Every second she wasted was one more second for the unsub to get ahead of her. And for the fugitives, Bell, Gardy, and Wolf, to vanish.

“Sheriff, I have two half-beaten agents and a triple-murder scene to solve. There’s no time for⁠—”

“Ma’am,” Sheriff Donnelly said, “my office can’t loan a second SUV on verbal orders alone. Too many lawsuits in the past. Too many legal issues, you see?”

Sinclair tamped down an explosion. She thought about Carter and Agent LeClaire, two heroes stolen from the FBI.

“I can’t waste any more time,” she said, snatching the clipboard from him. “Where do I sign?”

Donnelly pointed to a line, then another, while she scrawled her name with force. Price cast her a worried glance, but she ignored it. Alvarez watched the distant ridge restlessly, eager to be back on the hunt.

The sheriff flipped a page. “And here. And initial next to that.”

After a flourish of pen strokes, she shoved the clipboard back at him. “There. Done. Can we do our jobs?”

He grunted, pulled out a set of keys, and held them out. “I reckon that’ll do. You break this one, you’re paying for it, not me.”

Sinclair snatched the keys. “Have your deputies close the road. I don’t want anyone leaving this desert without my authority. We’ll call if we need you.”

The sheriff opened his mouth as if to argue, but Price stepped in. “Thank you, Sheriff. We’ll keep in touch.”

A deputy had followed Donnelly here in a cruiser. The sheriff stomped back to the vehicle and shot his deputy an annoyed look, as if to say he couldn’t wait until the FBI was out of their hair. After Donnelly repeated Sinclair’s orders, they drove away.

Sinclair touched her own cheek, feeling a lump rise from the fight with Bell. “I want Scarlett Bell tonight. Dead or alive. Preferably the former.”

Price and Alvarez climbed into the new SUV. As Sinclair took the driver’s seat, vertigo struck her. She gave it a second to pass. Time was bleeding away, and she couldn’t waste time giving in to ailments. Injuries were a sign of weakness.

“Are you all right to drive, Agent Sinclair?” Price asked.

Sinclair glared at him. “Never been better.”

Price settled into the front passenger seat, glancing at Sinclair with lingering concern. He took a long breath, mustering the courage to voice whatever was on his mind.

“Out with it,” Sinclair barked.

“Ma’am,” he said, “we’re still searching blind here. Even with a new vehicle, we’ve got too much land to search and no clues. We don’t know the direction the fugitives were headed or where this killer will strike next.”

Willing the vertigo to subside, Sinclair said, “I’m aware. We have equipment in the trunk that can help us. As useless as the sheriff has been, he procured an important tool.”

Alvarez turned around in the backseat and searched the trunk. “What equipment? In the black case?”

“A drone,” Sinclair said, locking eyes with Alvarez in the rearview mirror. “Lightweight, short-range, but with thermal capabilities. We can use it for overhead recon at any crime scene. Carter authorized the purchase for the office months ago. I figure this is the best time to put it to work.”

“A drone. That’s helpful. What’s the flight range? A mile or two, maybe?”

“About two miles in clear conditions, and a bit more if we maintain line of sight. Battery lasts half an hour, give or take. But we can’t launch it from here and hope to spot our targets. Pick a vantage point where we can do a systematic sweep.”

Alvarez ran a hand over his stubbled jaw, peering out the window at the starry sky. “I suggest we drive along the highway and choose sections to scan with the drone, then move on.”

“That’s the plan,” Sinclair said. “We’ll take it in short hops. Launch, fly a search grid, return, then relocate. We’ll focus on the zone around the Mercer family’s burial first. Then we’ll fan out, checking for heat signatures on the thermal feed. If they’re out there⁠—”

“—we’ll find them,” Price finished.

“Get to it.”

The SUV spat gravel as Sinclair turned off the shoulder. She picked up speed. With a sickle moon overhead, she pressed her foot on the gas, assessing the various terrain features available to them. Her head swam with a stinging mania for vengeance. She wanted Bell taken down. It was high time to send a message: The FBI wouldn’t show mercy to a traitor.

Sinclair locked her emotions beneath a stoic expression. She didn’t want to show her agents that the traitors had burrowed under her skin. This mission required care. A reckless approach could cost them everything. She still had an unsub to locate. Perhaps the drone would find the killer or a missing survivor. It was a long shot, but this was all she had.

“Soon as we’re far enough from these ridges, we’ll pull over,” she said. “Price, you’ll set up the drone. Alvarez, you’ll monitor the laptop. I’ll keep a watch for hostiles on the ground.”

They were on a collision course with a killer and three fugitives who’d proven themselves lethal. But they would have eyes in the sky now. That might give her the advantage that ended this chase.

43

As Bell followed Wolf and Gardy, the desert morphed into something unrecognizable. Instead of the rolling dunes and rocky outcroppings, this stretch of land bore a strange, fractured pattern of salt-crusted clay, forming a spiderweb of fissures that cut deep into the ground. It looked like the husk of a long-dead river, the bed carved by water that had vanished decades—maybe centuries—ago. In the moon’s pale light, each crack gave the earth a skeletal appearance, as if the desert were revealing buried bones. Gardy led the way, listening for another scream.

Her shoulders quaked with urgency, rattled by the images she carried in her mind.

A lost teen. A father turned murderer.

Bell kept pace, stumbling here and there on the uneven clay. The patches of caked dirt offered no give underfoot, only sharp edges that threatened to trip or slice.

Wolf stayed a step ahead, pivoting his head to check all angles, the hunting knife gripped and ready. Bell felt the hunger radiating off him, taut as a bowstring, a lethal readiness that had proven its worth against so many killers. Now she just wanted to find Delaney Silas alive.

A gust blew across the exposed flats, stirring dust that swept over them in a choking cloud. Bell coughed, pressing the crook of her elbow to her mouth. When the way forward cleared, she thought she heard a sound, a single sharp note that might have been the wind passing over cracks or the cry of a suffering animal. She looked at Gardy, who shook his head. He hadn’t heard the sound.

Ahead, the clay fissures formed a shallow depression that snaked into the distance in a dried artery, the walls slick with old salt deposits. Gardy slowed, turning his ear to the wind, and Bell saw hope in his eyes. He pointed, and without waiting for Wolf’s confirmation, he picked up his pace again.

Bell followed. The stars offered a wan and deceptive light. Each breath felt cold, laced with the desert’s nighttime chill. Yet sweat trickled down her spine.

They crossed a ragged slope that dropped them into a lower basin, the ground here becoming cracked mud that sank under her boots. The wind changed direction. That was when she heard it: a shrill, desperate sound that no animal could mimic.

Another scream.

It rang out in the open air, bouncing off the clay walls in a distorted echo, but Bell recognized it all the same. It had come from a human throat.

In that horrifying darkness, the scream could have been Jillian’s, or that of any child who’d fallen prey to a psychopath.

Bell took off in a mad dash toward the sound. Delaney Silas was near.

Behind her, Wolf yelled. “Bell, wait!”

She glanced over her shoulder and saw him surge forward.

“Stay together!” Gardy commanded.

But Bell couldn’t stop. The nightmares of her own youth hammered at the gates of her memory. She had survived the God’s Hand Killer, and she wouldn’t let Delaney face her father alone.

Her boots skidded across the crust, sending flakes and shards of clay scattering. Another cry split the air. To the left? She couldn’t be sure, only that every second might be the difference between rescue and tragedy.

Gardy scrambled to keep up, panting from exertion, while Wolf sprinted to close the gap.

“You will not face him alone,” Wolf said behind her.

“If you want to help,” she said, “you’d better keep up.”

“You have a death wish, dear Scarlett.”

“You’re one to talk.”

Desperation drove her. Gardy pushed hard to keep pace. Monstrous cracks in the earth threatened to twist her ankle if her foot landed in one, but she leaped over them without slowing.

Delaney. A lost girl. A father gone mad. And somewhere in the desert, a deadly confrontation awaited.

“I’m coming, Jillian,” she said.

Bell knew she’d said the wrong name. It didn’t matter. This was for her fallen friend.

Delaney’s lungs seized. She didn’t recognize her surroundings. It seemed she’d stumbled into a dried riverbed, the ground now little more than brittle rocks. She should have welcomed the reprieve—no tracks to follow—but the open flat left her vulnerable. Here, she found nowhere to hide.

Fear blotted out logic, forcing her forward in broken, limping strides. Her legs cramped. She couldn’t accept her father was the one hunting her. He lurked in the night, his voice twisted into something half-human, half-demonic.

When the wind died, she heard him. She didn’t turn around. If she looked, she feared she’d see his leering face over her shoulder, arm outstretched, fingers hooking for her hair.

To her left, the ground sloped in a shallow dip, a broad crack in the old clay. A hiding place. Maybe wide enough to wedge her body inside and vanish from sight. It would trap her if he followed, but she was too tired to continue.

Delaney slid down the lip and fell to her stomach. The ground was sharp under her. It scraped her hands. She pressed herself into the crevice, biting her lip to quiet the sobs. Dusty dryness chafed her throat.

Silence followed. Perhaps she’d lost him.

Limping footsteps slithered into the dip. Then she glimpsed movement. The outline of a stooped man appeared, searching the open riverbed. A moan of anguish or frustration, rising into a weird, keening whimper, turned her insides to ice.

“De-la-ney,” he sang, the syllables jagged and off-key, like a lullaby turned into a curse. “You’re tired, sweetie. Don’t you want to rest? Daddy can help you.”

She pressed her face against the clay. She recognized that timbre, the fatherly cadence. Now it was laced with a sadistic edge that clung like rust to her memories. Her father was gone, devoured by madness.

He advanced. She heard him muttering. A deranged laugh spliced his words.

“You never…obey. I taught you better.”

Another step. He was close enough that she imagined him breathing just outside the entrance, hungry as a beast.

Delaney made herself flatter. If she moved so much as an inch, he’d hear. Above her, the footsteps paused, and the hair on her arms rose. At any moment, he would peer down and see.

Instead, the footsteps resumed, limping a few paces ahead.

“I won’t hurt you, little piggy. Come out, come out, wherever you are.”

The voice broke off into a hacking cough. Delaney clamped her hands over her ears to block it out.

He was so close she could almost feel the clay give under his step. Then he kept going, shuffling off to the right. She dared one shallow exhalation, relief mixing with disbelief. Her father had walked by without seeing her.

She dared to look up. The moonlight caught his profile. It wasn’t his face anymore. That face belonged to someone older. Much older. It might have been a trick of the light, but she swore gray dotted his hair and whiskers. His eyes were wild, glinting with violence and mania. In his hand, he gripped a balled-up belt. Terror knotted in her stomach.

He took another step, then another, each grinding the terrain beneath his heel. Finally, he limped into the darkness. The night seemed to hold its breath.

She forced herself to remain motionless a little longer. Above her, silence. How had this happened? Why was he hunting her?

Desert wind whistled through the cracks in a bleak song. Delaney clenched her fists. She’d never known what true horror was until this night. And it had a familiar face, a father’s face contorted into something unholy.

Still no footsteps.

She couldn’t hide here forever. Finally, she dared to lift her head. The only sound was her own weeping.

Until his grinning face filled the entryway.

“Gotcha.”

44

Agent Sinclair surveyed the moonlit plains. Even in the near darkness, the desert revealed its secrets, one jagged outcrop at a time. Price and Alvarez hunched over the drone’s monitor. A fine layer of grit coated the tires, a reminder of how many times they’d driven off-road in the last hour. And for what?

“Third pass. Nothing,” Alvarez said, scrolling through the drone’s thermal overlay. The small quadcopter soared through the night a couple of miles away, feeding back a high-resolution image of ripples and dunes. This area looked even more barren than the ones they’d checked before. “We’re getting diminishing returns. Too many canyons, too many ridges.”

Sinclair lifted her binoculars and glassed the horizon in tandem with the drone footage. Her body rattled with growing impatience. “Keep looking. They’re out here. It’s only a matter of time before they make a mistake and cross an open stretch. Then we’ll see them.”

Price frowned at the monitor. “We’re nearly at the drone’s limit, Agent Sinclair. I’ll need to bring it back or relocate in a few minutes. And the battery is down to thirty percent.”

She hated these constraints. Recharging the battery would waste more precious time.

“Pull back in two,” she said. “Then reposition and take another pass. If we do enough sweeps, we’ll box them in.”

A part of her worried they might already be too late to intercept Scarlett Bell with her vigilante killers, Wolf and Gardy. She could feel Bell, running through the desert like a coward. She had evaded the bureau until now. But not for long.

“The communication radius is hitting the threshold. Bringing her in.” Price tapped a few keys, guiding the drone on a return path. The real-time feed blurred, the camera adjusting to the slight tilt as it pivoted over the ridges. “We might shift east. Maybe there’s another vantage where the riverbed meets that broad clay pan.”

Sinclair swept the binoculars eastward at the mention of a riverbed. Dry gullies could be the perfect corridor for movement. The gullies cut lines of sight and didn’t reveal footprints.

“Wait,” Alvarez said. “I’m seeing movement.” He leaned closer to the screen, adjusting the thermal. Three shapes, tiny silhouettes etched in ghostly white, slid across the feed, moving in a line that followed some kind of depression in the terrain.

Sinclair’s pulse leaped. “Gimme a visual. Zoom in.”

Price tapped the keys, and the camera magnified the shapes. They weren’t close enough for high resolution, but she could see three figures. All of them armed. One wore a backpack.

“It’s them,” Sinclair said. “Bell, Wolf, and Gardy.” She was sure these three were the fugitives. Who else would be out in the desert, chasing a killer? “Coordinates?”

Alvarez rattled off the grid locations. The shapes continued along what looked like a dried riverbed. Sinclair refused to let them slip away again.

Price studied the topography layer. “We can’t approach from the west. There’s a ridge with a steep incline. Too dangerous. If we come from the highway, we’ll have to travel a mile off-road.”

“Do it. I won’t allow them to escape. Can you fly that thing while we follow in the SUV?”

“I suppose.”

“Yes or no?”

“Yes.”

“Price, fly the drone. Alvarez, keep watching that monitor.”

“What’s your plan, Agent Sinclair?” Alvarez asked.

“I’ll drive until we catch them.”

“Into the desert? We’ll get stuck. This is a suicide mission.”

“Don’t question me, Alvarez.”

Within moments, they piled into the SUV, the drone following the group at a safe altitude. Sinclair fired the engine and turned into the desert. Dust exploded in the headlights, and she wrestled the wheel over ruts and patches of loose gravel. The vehicle jostled violently, but she pressed harder on the accelerator, determined to cover the distance before the fugitives escaped.

“The battery will die in six, maybe seven minutes,” Price warned.

“I still have the fugitives on thermal,” Alvarez said from the backseat.

“Keep them in sight,” she said.

The SUV tore across the desert. Sinclair had a bead on their targets at last. She wouldn’t stop until she had Bell in cuffs or a body bag. Either outcome would serve her quest for justice. She pressed the pedal to the floor, looking into the dark for that dried riverbed, that single corridor that would lead her to three killers.

45

Bell couldn’t hear the screams anymore. Was Delaney dead?

No. She hadn’t run for this long to lose the teenager.

As she ran faster, Wolf yelled behind her.

“In the sky!”

She stumbled to a stop, chest heaving, and followed his pointing finger.

A buzzing sound came from above them. Against the backdrop of stars, a drone hovered, its lights a blinking pulse. In the moonlight, it looked like a predatory insect circling a meal. Bell’s blood ran cold.

“Sinclair,” Wolf said. “The FBI is tracking us.”

Bell cursed. She’d expected a chase. But a drone? Sinclair had eyes in the sky. How would they escape?

She cast a quick glance at Gardy, who’d come up on their left.

“We can’t outrun a drone,” she said. “If they maintain a line of sight, we’re toast.”

Gardy looked up at the overhead intruder. His expression hardened with grim resolve. “I’ll handle it.” Without waiting for an objection, he crouched on one knee and drew his weapon. Wolf moved to give him space, searching the area for potential vantage points in case the bureau’s people were closer than they realized.

Bell watched, torn between wanting to save Delaney and having to neutralize the drone that would bring Sinclair’s squad down on them. Gunfire would draw attention, but it was a little late for hiding.

Gardy took aim and steadied himself, focusing on the faint shape winking against the starlight. His first shot cracked in the stillness, echoing off the lifeless terrain. The bullet missed even as the muzzle flash revealed the anxious lines in Gardy’s face. The drone bobbed, tilting as if spooked. Bell heard a motor in the distance. Was Sinclair driving across the desert? It seemed like a foolhardy move. But if the plan worked, the agents would locate Bell and her team within minutes. She drew her own weapon, anticipating a firefight.

A second shot rang out, clanging into the darkness.

Just as the drone veered away, Gardy fired again. A fierce spark sputtered on the drone’s underside, metal shearing as the projectile punched through. A hiss of escaping energy followed a mechanical whir, and the red light flashed wildly, flickering on and off like a desperate distress signal.

A ragged sputter replaced the hum. The drone pitched sideways, its rotors protesting with a screeching grind. Then it tumbled in a lopsided spiral and plummeted into the cracked riverbed. A glow lingered on the broken chassis. Taillights winked as if begging for rescue.

Bell let out a shaky breath. Gardy had destroyed Sinclair’s eye in the sky, but everyone would have heard the gunshots.

“Don’t let the grass grow under your feet,” she said.

They’d bought themselves a momentary advantage, but who knew how close Sinclair’s team was to catching them?

Bell still had a mission—save the girl. But now the FBI knew where they were. She exchanged a desperate glance with Gardy. Time was a noose tightening around their throats.

She cut to the left, darting around a gnarled thicket of brambles and into a jagged pathway that snaked between craggy boulders. The ground underfoot was a chaotic mess of fractured clay, abrupt drop-offs, and spiny plants—exactly the kind of terrain an SUV couldn’t negotiate at high speed. This route would give them a precious advantage over Sinclair’s team, but it also meant every step would carry them further from the last place where she’d heard Delaney’s scream.

Gardy trailed behind, sweat matting his hair. “We’re losing distance on the girl,” he panted. “This path will save us from Sinclair, but what if we can’t find Delaney?”

Bell understood the risks. “If Sinclair runs us down with an SUV, her team will cut us to pieces. We have no shelter, no heavy artillery. If she catches us, we’ll be useless to Delaney.”

Wolf stopped ahead, scanning for the best route. Walls of stone rose on both sides, forming a narrow gorge with rubble underfoot. “Come on,” he said over his shoulder. “No SUV will fit through here. Get out of sight before they figure out where we went.”

The path narrowed until their shoulders nearly brushed the rock on either side. Loose stones clattered from above as they navigated a sudden drop in elevation, a petrified shelf that fractured along a centuries-old fault line. Each jolt rattled Bell’s ribs, bruised from the fight with Sinclair.

Somewhere behind them, the engine roared again. The FBI was close, but they no longer had the drone. Wolf angled to the right, ducking behind an outcropping that jutted like a spear from the canyon wall.

Gardy caught up to Bell. “What if Delaney doesn’t realize her father is the killer? What if she trusts him?”

Bell’s throat tightened, her mind replaying Harold’s text. “She’ll sense the danger.”

“How can you be so sure?”

She thought back to the stranger who’d emerged from the creek bed near her Virginia home. The first time she saw the man, she knew he was the God’s Hand Killer.

“Because I was. Sinclair will need to continue on foot. We lost her. Find that girl before her father does.”

46

Delaney screamed, but the shrieking wind stole her voice as her father’s face—no, the face of some decrepit man—peered inside. It was her father, but shriveled into a monstrosity older than his years, gray stubble clinging to his jaw, eyes gleaming like shards of glass. She gagged and forced herself backward until she couldn’t move.

He leaned in with his arms outstretched, fingers knotted into claws. The clay ridge she’d hidden in offered no escape as his body blocked the entrance, so close she smelled his stale sweat and the coppery tang of his bleeding injuries. The grin on his lips was all wrong, contorted into a caricature of paternal warmth.

“Come here, sweetheart,” he said. “Time you learned your lesson.”

She kicked out with desperation. Her sneaker met his shin. He grunted, staggering back half a step, then growled through bloody teeth. His eyes widened, blazing with rage.

In the moonlight, his features seemed to warp, each shadow accentuating the deep lines that carved his brow, the hollows under his cheekbones making him appear decades older. He could have been the grandfather she’d never had, an ancient fury animated by an unholy ritual.

“Don’t fight me, Delaney,” he snarled, voice pitching high then low in the same breath. “Don’t you see? You brought this on yourself. Just like she did.”

Delaney jerked away, pressing her back against the ridge. The earth tore at her skin, but the pain barely registered over the terror pulsing through her body. “Stop, Dad. Please. You’re hurting me.”

For a second, recognition passed over his face, as though her plea had penetrated the madness. Then it evaporated, replaced by a chuckle that rattled in the base of his throat. “Don’t disobey me. I told you… don’t run. You can’t escape your punishment.”

She braced again as he lurched forward, hands clasping to seize her wrists. She kicked harder. Her foot clipped his knee. A cry, and he stumbled backward. His face splintered into a hateful snarl.

Delaney’s mind whirled. He’s not Dad. He’s a thing, a demon. Her father was gone, replaced by this creature. She kicked the monstrosity again and drove it back, hoping for an opening so she could slip past it.

But he planted one foot in the clay. His face again twisted into a hideous mask. Gray stubble turned silver in the faint light. The tilt of his head revealed more lines than she’d ever noticed, each etched by a lifetime of nightmares. He canted his head, eyes glinting.

“You never did learn. Now you’ll see. You’ll see why I⁠—”

She twisted sideways and slammed her shoulder into his chest. He tottered, arms pinwheeling, but she felt the raw power in his body. He caught himself with one hand, then rose to his feet. The thing towered over her.

Panic seized Delaney. She saw the mania in his eyes. Nothing could prevent him from finishing what he’d started. His lips parted in a revolting grin. Dryness cracked the corners of his mouth and bled in twin streams, as if he were a vampire.

“Dad, please…”

Her voice quavered with the last shred of love she had for him. But the thing before her only laughed.

Before he could lunge again, she braced her feet against the ridge and thrust both legs into his midsection. He exhaled with a wheeze and doubled over. She clambered fully out of the crevice and stumbled into the open, willing her legs to obey and run.

He reeled around. The age-stricken monster wore her father’s face. His fist opened, and the belt unfurled.

“Delaney, it’s time to take your punishment. You’ve been a bad, bad girl.”

“Stop it, Dad!”

“Your mother. She wasn’t fit to raise you. But I took care of her too.”

“What are you talking about? You said Mom walked out of the hospital.”

“I buried her where no one will ever find the body. She deserved to die. Just like…”

“Just like who?”

“Like Mother. And like you.”

At that moment, she no longer recognized him at all. Every vestige of Randall Silas was lost behind a facade of fury and bloodlust. The night closed around them like a grave.

“This will hurt me more than it will you.”

At that, he bellowed a laugh into the sky.

She took advantage of the distraction and grabbed a handful of grit and stone. When he looked back at her, she whipped the pile into his eyes. He shouted and covered his face, then fell to his knees.

Delaney ran.

47

The horizon appeared the same in all directions. Bell continued toward where she thought she’d heard the screaming, but everything looked the same.

They pressed on through the jagged maze of clay ridges and salt-rimmed hollows. Bell led the way. The moon painted the terrain in silver and charcoal. Wolf ran behind her with the knife still in hand. Gardy brought up the rear, occasionally glancing back, expecting to see headlights.

Out of the dark, a shape hurtled forward as though the hounds of hell chased it. Bell stopped and snapped up her sidearm, prepared to open fire.

A teenage girl, arms pumping, hair a windblown tangle, stumbled into the light. Her eyes flashed with wild terror. Delaney Silas.

Bell opened her arms and caught the girl when she ran into them as if their presence didn’t register. The teen’s legs gave out. Delaney crumpled into Bell.

Behind her, a deranged scream echoed in the darkness, sending ice down Bell’s spine. Wolf wheeled to face the sound. Gardy took a step backward, weapon raised, pointing toward the gloom they had just come from, ready if Sinclair’s team appeared.

Delaney clutched Bell’s sleeves, eyes wide and unseeing. “Help,” she managed, her voice scarcely a whisper. “Are you the police?”

This was a child, battered by horror. Bell softened her hold and guided Delaney to her feet. “We’re here to protect you,” she said. “Delaney Silas, right? You’re going to be okay.”

Delaney stared in confusion. “How do you know my name?”

“Because we’ve been looking for you. Where is he?”

“Dad. He’s…” Her voice cracked. Tears glistened in her eyes. She looked over Bell’s shoulder, waiting for a nightmare to stalk into view. “He’s not my dad anymore. He’s someone else.”

“We know. I won’t let him hurt you.”

Gardy aimed his gun into the swirling darkness. Wolf took a step forward. An unearthly moan drifted toward them, closer now. Randall Silas was close.

“Bell,” Gardy said. “If the FBI is close, we’ll have threats coming from opposite directions.”

“Take care of Sinclair and her team,” she said.

“I can’t remove three threats without firing on them.”

“Do what you must.”

Delaney’s fists clutched Bell’s jacket. Wolf looked back at them, his expression set like flint. There was no compassion in his eyes, only a fierce hunger for stopping a killer.

“This will end here,” Wolf said. “Keep the girl safe.”

“Wolf, be careful.”

But he was already fading into the dark, a specter of vengeance drawn by the smell of blood.

Left behind, Bell drew Delaney close, feeling her quake. The teen cast a frantic look at Bell, searching for reassurance, for an adult’s calm that might anchor her.

Bell held on to the girl. “You’re safe with me.”

The monstrosity that had been Randall Silas slowed to a trudge, his bad leg dragging like dead weight across the ground. His lungs burned with every breath, but he hardly noticed. It wasn’t pain driving him forward; it was fury and a twisted triumph, spurred by the picture he’d formed of Delaney.

In his mind, she cowered before him. Her bare back leaked crimson from whip marks. She cried and begged like a pitiful animal.

She must be near. He heard footfalls in the distance.

“Delaney!” he screamed, tearing apart his throat. His voice rang off the low mesas and boulders. Sweat and dust coated his face, turning his stubble and hair into a coarse mat of grime. “Don’t you dare run from me, girl!”

He expected an echo, but there was none, only the hiss of wind scraping across salt-worn earth. His tongue felt thick in his mouth, tasting of sour adrenaline. He refused to yield. He’d come too far to let her run away again.

Randall Silas snapped the belt at his side, a deadly flick of leather that cut the air with a crack. The sound jolted his senses, drowning out the memories of his father’s voice, the old terror that had formed Silas. This belt granted him absolute power, power he’d once lacked as a boy living in fear.

“Come out. You need your lesson, same as she did.”

His eyes gleamed with that unholy fire, making him look more like the risen undead than the human he had once been.

Silas staggered forward, only to stop again. He bent over, panting. The darkness beyond him pulsed. Shapes and imagined phantoms danced on the horizon, but he blinked them away. He was tired—tired enough for reality and hallucinations to blur together.

Yet he heard something. Voices carried on the breeze.

The police? It didn’t matter. No one could stop him from reclaiming his daughter, from punishing her disobedience.

“Little pig, little pig.” He raised the belt again, a snap that whistled. “The big daddy wolf is here. I’ll huff and puff and⁠—”

He froze. A shadow slithered out of the darkness, taking shape in the corner of his vision like a nightmare coalescing into flesh. For a moment, he thought it was another delusion, a trick of the moonlight, but it moved into the light.

Confusion and anger warred on his face. “Who are you?”

The figure revealed itself not as a ghost, but as a man. A predator. In that instant, Silas realized he wasn’t the only monster prowling the desert.

His grip tightened on the belt as a ripple of unease burrowed through him. Because in the stranger’s eyes, Silas saw a reflection of his own lethal purpose.

48

Ademon hunted tonight, but that monstrosity was nothing compared to the black death that was Logan Wolf.

Even in the patchy light, Wolf could discern the lunacy in the other man’s eyes—an unsettling blend of psychosis and violence that Wolf recognized from a lifetime of hunting killers. There was something aberrant about Randall Silas, as if the air around him crackled with a toxic heat, a man possessed by a specter’s rage he couldn’t exorcise.

Wolf drew closer. The father, if “father” still applied, looked like a shriveled shell of a man, his face lined and drawn, yet with an undercurrent of unrelenting energy. His cheeks were sunken and covered in a rough scurf of tangled gray. His lips were pulled tight over yellowed teeth, cracked by thirst and madness. There was something ancient and horrifying in this caricature of a desert drifter gone rabid.

A belt hung from Silas’s fist. The leather end coiled in his open palm. Wolf could smell the stink of sweat and copper from yards away. If this was the father who’d chased his own daughter into the darkness, Wolf saw none of the regret or conflicted sadness one might expect. If left to his devices, Silas would butcher his daughter.

Garbled words spilled from the maniac’s mouth. “Don’t interfere,” he wheezed. “My child. My rules.”

Wolf said nothing, only advanced, arms loose at his sides. He looked like a lion on the verge of pouncing. Inside, Wolf’s lethal intentions built. This man had murdered innocent families. A vigilante cause honed Wolf’s focus to a razor point.

Randall Silas lunged, lashing the belt through the air in a frantic arc. The move was clumsy, hampered by his tortured leg and delirium. Wolf glided aside, letting the strip of leather cut harmlessly through the air.

The maniac whirled, face twisting with hatred, but his balance wavered. Now he brandished a knife in his other hand. He aimed a second strike, a downward slash that Wolf sidestepped, grabbing the man’s wrist and yanking Silas off his feet. The killer tottered and fought to twist free.

Wolf stayed in control. One smooth pivot and he wrenched Silas’s arm behind his back, forcing him to drop the knife. The killer grunted, spittle flying from his lips, eyes bulging with insane rage.

Another thrash and a half-choked roar, but Wolf was too quick. The fugitive hooked a leg behind Silas’s knees; the man buckled to the ground and lost hold of the belt.

Silas squirmed. He was a beast pinned to the earth by a superior predator. His open mouth quivered, letting out a strangled growl. He scraped Wolf’s face with ragged nails, but Wolf barely registered the pain.

There was no competition here. Silas was no match for Logan Wolf’s training. Hovering over the defeated father, Wolf saw only a bottomless pit where paternal love had rotted away. A father who’d become the devil incarnate.

“You shouldn’t have hurt the children,” Wolf said. “That was your first mistake.”

Silas choked on another curse, jaw clenched, but he couldn’t break free. The scream building in his throat sputtered into a wheeze, and he shuddered, pinned under Wolf’s pitiless hold, all traces of power shattered.

Wolf’s calm radiated a terrifying menace.

“Men like you, men who twist children’s lives into nightmares…” Wolf allowed a hint of disgust to color his refined tone. “You taught me that there is only one path.”

Wolf eased the pressure just enough to let Randall breathe, then pressed down again. The hatred in Wolf burned, all sense of mercy gone.

“You took your daughter’s future. Your own blood. All those families. Did you think you could quiet the voices in your head?”

Silas sputtered, trying to form words, but Wolf’s grip robbed him of air. The killer’s face appeared ancient and childishly fearful, a pitiful contradiction. Wolf leaned closer.

“The desert doesn’t forget. And neither do I.” He tilted his head, regarding Silas like an entomologist studying a venomous insect. “Delaney will never again fear your shadow. You’re finished.”

The hunting knife raked across Randall Silas’s throat. Legs spasming, the killer spat torrents of blood. His eyes bulged like those of a fish. Hot crimson poured forth and fed the desert.

From his pouch, Wolf produced a black sack, which he used to cover the dead killer’s face. The fugitive’s calling card. Not that the FBI would believe anyone else had been responsible for this murder, but he wanted them to see. He wanted Sinclair to see.

Wolf stood amid the broken riverbed. Randall Silas lay dead at his feet. The stars cast a pallid glow across Silas’s out-flung arm, fingers crooked as if reaching for a belt that he would never again yield.

The anger that always coiled in Wolf’s chest was still there. This was how it had to end.

Lifting his gaze to the stars, Wolf inhaled the night air. It felt sharp, cool, slicing his lungs with the sharp blades of regret.

Renee.

The memory of her smile, forever lost, surfaced in his mind’s eye. He remembered her gentle laugh, the way her hair caught the sunlight before tragedy stole her. Everything he’d done since that day was shaped by loss and his vow.

“Renee, I promised I would avenge you by defending the innocent. I always will. This fight must never end.”

With one last glance at the body, Wolf turned away. He strode through the riverbed to rejoin the living. Scarlett and Gardy would be waiting with Delaney, and they would need to hurry. The FBI was sure to arrive soon.

Wolf walked with the calm of a man resigned to the path he’d chosen. No second thoughts gripped him, only the satisfaction that one more monster was gone, and there were others still to chase. In the wind, he swore he heard Renee’s laughter.

If the FBI was coming, they wouldn’t take him. Nor would they take Scarlett.

In a few minutes, the dark shapes of Scarlett and Gardy would resolve before him. They would have the frightened girl in their care. Wolf would lead them away from Sinclair.

But what would they do with Delaney?

49

With God as the only witness to his sins, Wolf returned to the others. Delaney cowered in Bell’s arms as the former FBI agent tried to coax the girl into sipping water. The girl knew her father was dead, and who’d ended his life. In Delaney’s eyes, Wolf would forever be evil.

Gardy, Glock in hand, kept glancing nervously into the dark.

“What are we going to do with Delaney?” Gardy asked over his shoulder.

The girl’s eyes widened, and Bell shushed her.

“Don’t worry,” Bell said. “We won’t leave you and make you wait for the FBI. I swore I would protect you, and that’s what I’ll do.”

“How?”

“I know a former agent I can still trust,” Wolf said. “She works in Arizona. It’s a two-hour drive, depending on the number of police officers between us and our destination. If we can get Delaney to my contact, we will guarantee the girl’s safety.”

“You’re sure you can trust this person?” asked Gardy. “If this contact brings in the FBI…”

Wolf shook his head. “She’s not FBI anymore. Local LEO. She owes me, in her own way. Even if she considers Sinclair an ally, she’ll protect Delaney and won’t turn us in.”

“Good, because I won’t leave the girl in the desert. But the FBI and sheriff’s department will lock down every road out of the desert.”

Delaney gave Wolf a fearful glance. “I knew you weren’t the police. Who are you?”

“Friends,” Bell said. “We can keep you safe if you trust us.”

“Why are you running from the FBI?”

“Because there are some who won’t understand what we did tonight.”

“You’re vigilantes.”

“And you are a very intelligent girl, Delaney.”

Delaney hesitated before speaking. “Okay. I trust you.”

“That’s settled,” Wolf said. “We need the Escalade. With the drone no longer a threat, Sinclair can’t track us. Stick to the hard ground so we leave no prints, then cross the sand when it’s safe.”

Gardy walked up to Wolf. “What about the roadblocks?”

“The sheriff’s department is blocking the way back to town. They don’t have enough officers to guard the desert highway.”

“You had better be right about this.”

“If I’m not, I’ll ensure we make it through safely.”

“Can we make it back to the Escalade from here?” Bell asked.

“Yes, but we’ll need to take a circuitous route,” said Wolf. “Sinclair’s team will come this way. We’ll move perpendicular and leave before they realize what happened.”

“Every second we waste brings Sinclair closer.”

Wolf fixed a steely look on the teenager. “Stay close. Don’t speak or draw attention to us. Do you understand?”

“I’ll do as you say,” Delaney said. Her trust in them was tenuous, driven by fear rather than faith, but it would have to do.

Bell led them out of the broken gorge, forging a path back toward the ridgeline they’d traversed an hour earlier. Every so often, Gardy paused to listen for the agents, certain Sinclair must be sweeping the desert. But the night gave up no signs of pursuit. Perhaps luck was on their side.

They reached the Escalade after a two-hour walk. The first orange stripe lay on the eastern horizon. Soon the sun would emerge, and that would make it harder to drive without drawing notice.

Delaney fell asleep with her head against Bell’s shoulder. Wolf let Gardy drive. The fugitive serial killer wanted his hands free if a cruiser appeared on the road.

Their headlights carved a hesitant path through the dying night. Before long, they were in the middle of the desert, with no one in sight.

The SUV picked up speed. The sunlit signage, battered by time and the elements, pointed them toward their destination.

“Another ninety minutes,” Wolf said.

Bell leaned forward from the backseat. “How will we get back to Harold?”

“Nobody knows about our home in the ghost town, dear Scarlett. Provided we move at night, we can return to our command center with no one seeing us.”

The windshields were bug-splattered and caked with dust, and the SUV reeked of sweat and death.

Bell stroked Delaney’s hair and hummed to the girl. It was almost time to hand off Delaney, and Bell didn’t want to part ways.

Outside a city called Tillman, Wolf directed Gardy to stop beside a wooden fence along a dried-up plot that might have once been a field. In the morning light, a figure waited. She was tall, rugged, face half-hidden under the brim of a sun-bleached baseball cap.

“Stay here while I speak to her,” Wolf said, unbuckling his seatbelt.

Satisfied they weren’t being watched, Wolf marched forward to meet the figure. The woman raised a hand in cautious greeting.

Wolf offered a handshake. He turned slightly, pointing at the SUV. The conversation drifted to the Escalade—Bell couldn’t hear every word, but it was enough to catch the gist: They had a wounded, terrified teen who needed help.

The woman, dark hair peppered with gray at the temples, wore civilian clothes but carried herself with the unmistakable presence of law enforcement. Her voice bore a note of worry.

“The hospital is thirty minutes away,” the woman said. “The girl needs more than patchwork. Probably a psych eval. And the cops will want to know how I came upon her.”

Wolf cut her off. “Tell them the girl arrived in the Escalade on her own—panicked, half-out of her mind. That’s all you know.”

“Is she even old enough to drive?”

“She has a learner’s permit.”

“Good God, Wolf.”

“Do you trust me?”

The woman paused before answering. “You’ve never given me any reason not to.”

“Then go with the plan.”

The ex-agent stepped back, hands spreading in a helpless gesture. “Even to my ears, it’s a shoddy story. You really think the local detectives will buy that she just drove in on her own? She’s a kid.”

“Kids can drive,” Wolf said. “We’re out of choices. Play dumb and keep her alive. Everyone’s happy.”

“Fine. Show me the kid.”

At Wolf’s nod, Bell coaxed Delaney awake and walked her into the open. The girl’s eyes were rimmed red. Delaney cringed at the sight of a stranger, but Bell rested a reassuring hand on her shoulder.

“My contact worked for the FBI and will help you,” Bell said. She resisted the urge to apologize a thousand times for the insane scenario. Instead, she gave the former agent a brief rundown. “The girl’s name is Delaney Silas, but you knew that already. She needs medical attention. We think she’s suffering from dehydration, and she hasn’t had a meal in days. Some bruising and lacerations. Please. She’s been through hell.”

Wolf’s contact sized up Delaney, frowning at her sunburnt skin and the haunted look in her eyes. Then she sighed and laid a hand on Delaney’s arm. “Come on, kid. I’ll get you to a hospital. They’ll check you over and ensure you eat. Then the police will notify your family.”

“I only have a few cousins that I know about,” Delaney said.

“As long as you have their names, I’ll bring them to you.”

Delaney allowed herself to be guided a few steps away. The ex-agent turned back to Wolf. “You sure about this? It seems like a helluva risk.”

Wolf nodded. “Say whatever you have to say. You never saw us. Understood?”

The woman winked. She waved Delaney toward a sedan parked along the road. Bell brushed Delaney’s hair, not wanting to say goodbye.

“You’ll be okay,” Bell promised. “Focus on healing, all right? If you ever need me, ask this woman. She’ll know how to contact us.”

The girl whispered her thanks. There were no more words. The agent loaded Delaney into the sedan and swung the vehicle around.

Despite the glare striking the windows, Bell thought she caught Delaney looking back. Then they were gone.

Bell felt her throat tighten. “Is she really going to be okay?”

“She comes off as brash, but I trust her with my life,” Wolf said.

“Now what?” Gardy asked. “The police will expect to find the Escalade here. How are we getting out? The license plates on this SUV will be scorching hot, Wolf.”

“We can’t risk driving this vehicle again. Wait here.”

Without waiting for Bell or Gardy’s protest, Wolf strode off behind a collapsed barn. A few tense minutes later, an engine whined and metal rattled. Wolf returned behind the wheel of a four-door that had seen better decades.

“Get in,” Wolf said.

“How did you know there was a vehicle behind the barn? Your contact?”

“She ensured we would have a way out of here. When we pass through the next city, we’ll exchange the beater for something more…appropriate.”

“By appropriate, I hope you mean modern.”

“Four-wheel drive and air conditioning. My team always travels in comfort.”

“Oh, we’re your team now?” Gardy asked.

“For as long as you don’t cross me, dear friend.”

50

Agent Sinclair wasn’t ready for this conversation.

The sun was a torch, painting the highway in a golden haze. Price and Alvarez stowed their equipment in their vehicle. The shattered remains of the drone lay in the wasteland.

A sheriff’s cruiser idled along the shoulder. Donnelly confronted her with shoulders squared, as if he could intimidate her. Sinclair glowered back at the sheriff with a patience grown thin by too many dead ends and too few hours of sleep.

“You’re telling me now,” Donnelly said, “that you found Randall Silas murdered, and there was no sign of the girl? And you”—he jabbed a thick finger at Sinclair’s chest—“didn’t think to mention these fugitives before?”

Sinclair’s pulse kicked. She’d had enough of this local show of bravado. “Sheriff, the unsub is dead. That’s what matters. He killed multiple families and attempted to murder the Silas girl.” She cast a glance at the road. “As for the fugitives, I didn’t reveal that earlier because it was need-to-know information—and you didn’t need to know.”

Donnelly let out a huff, fists curling at his sides. “I run this jurisdiction. If there are ex-FBI killers roaming my desert, I have a right to know. I could have⁠—”

“Could have what?” Sinclair snapped, shooting him a glare that made even Price glance over, worried. “Compromised my investigation? Allowed them to slip away? Don’t think your deputies would have been a match for Logan Wolf, Scarlett Bell, and Neil Gardy. They’re trained assassins, Sheriff. My priority was stopping the unsub. Your job was assisting us, not questioning me. We’ve got another problem now. There’s still no sign of Delaney Silas. So if you want to help, find the girl before the vultures do.”

The man’s jaw tightened. “You’re walking all over my authority.”

“I don’t have time to tend to your bruised ego.” She closed the gap between them. “You knew this was a federal matter the minute multiple bodies turned up. My agency has full prerogative to act in any state. And you know we won’t tolerate interference.”

Price coughed behind them. “Ma’am, Alvarez and I are ready.”

“Excellent,” she said, never taking her eyes off Donnelly. “Sheriff, I suggest you focus on rounding up volunteers for a search party. We may have a living victim to find.” Her tone made it clear that was an order, not a request.

“Will you be helping with the search?”

“There is one more grid location to check. We did our job. Do yours.”

Donnelly tried to muster a comeback. He settled for an acid stare, then stalked back to his cruiser, muttering about outside meddling. Sinclair turned to Price and Alvarez.

“You two, finish loading.” Sinclair climbed into the driver’s seat. “We’re covering one more radius near the riverbeds. If the fugitives are still out there, we’ll catch them. And if that girl is alive, we’ll bring her back.” She hesitated, wincing at the throbbing in her temple. “You saw the killer’s corpse, and you recognized the MO.”

“Logan Wolf,” Alvarez whispered.

“As if there was ever a doubt.”

From the corner of her vision, she saw Donnelly yank his radio out of the cruiser, likely calling more deputies. She smirked. Good. Let the deputies search for Delaney Silas. Sinclair still had fugitives to hunt. She had no intention of letting Scarlett Bell and her accomplices escape from the desert.

Price and Alvarez clambered back into the SUV, and Sinclair turned the key. The target radius lay two miles down the road, and she intended to clear the area before the temperature eclipsed one hundred.

51

Aribbon of blacktop snaked through the moonlit desert. They were just minutes out from Redthorn Mills, the ghost town they had left behind. This SUV was smoother and in far better condition than the rust bucket they’d driven before. Wolf had ensured that when he quietly liberated the vehicle from a Phoenix side street.

They hadn’t dared remain in the city any longer than necessary. With Bell anxiously waiting behind the wheel, Wolf had used a disguise during their temporary stay in Phoenix to grab necessities: a bit of food, some extra water, and a first-aid kit.

Escaping the city without tangling with the authorities had required careful maneuvering. Bell drove down industrial side roads while Wolf navigated. Gardy, in the back, used a radio to monitor the police band.

They had followed a patchwork route that weaved around the city’s fringe, passing through several neighborhoods. More than once, they spotted blue and red lights half a mile away and turned down an alley to keep out of sight. Wolf changed the stolen vehicle’s plates using a different set.

Now, Redthorn Mills rose out of the ground. Midnight beckoned, and the town was nothing but shadows.

Bell looked over at Gardy, who stared through the windshield with wariness. Wolf, in the back, was the least anxious. He knew everything about this town.

“Harold must miss us,” Gardy said.

The decaying structures made Bell say, “We’re vampires, coming home to our graveyard.”

The new SUV rumbled over a stretch of divots. Nothing moved. Redthorn Mills seemed more mausoleum than town.

Bell guided the SUV around a mound of debris.

“Home sweet home,” Wolf said, pointing toward the old boarding house. “Park out back.”

Boards and blankets covered the windows. Harold was nowhere to be seen.

With the vehicle concealed, Wolf led them to the front door, where Harold had removed the barricade after receiving a text that the team was back.

Not taking any chances, Wolf removed his gun before unlocking the door. They stepped into the foyer, the way forward lit by a single lamp Harold had rigged in the hall. Bell wrinkled her nose at the familiar smell of stale wood and decades of neglect. Wolf secured the door behind them, sliding the deadbolt and nodding for Gardy to check the windows once more.

Harold descended the stairs, looking as if he hadn’t slept since everyone left. “I was getting worried. Figured Sinclair or the sheriff might have nabbed you on the way.”

“Close calls,” Gardy said. “But we made it.”

Wolf’s burner phone chimed in his pocket. He retreated to a corner and read the message.

“Delaney is safe,” Wolf said, drawing the team’s attention. “My contact confirms she’s at the hospital now. Her vitals look good. She’ll be fine.”

“That’s a relief,” Bell said.

“But the police are suspicious. They don’t buy the story about her driving out of the desert. For her part, the teen is sticking to it. Her cousins are en route to pick her up.”

Delaney was alive, and Randall Silas was dead. The father who’d become a monster was no longer a threat to anyone.

Wolf assessed the group. “Everyone is exhausted, so we will stay here for the night. The boarding house is safe enough. But once dawn breaks, we must vanish. My plan is to stay away for a few weeks. At least until we’re sure Sinclair is back at Quantico and the sheriff isn’t looking for us.”

“A cruiser drove through town while you were away,” Harold said.

“I trust he didn’t see you?”

“No.”

“Then we’re fine.”

“Where are we going?” Gardy asked.

“To another place where justice isn’t being served.”

Another serial killer. Wolf didn’t need to speak the words. Bell already knew.

For a long time, none of them spoke, each lost in their own exhaustion and the knowledge of dangerous roads yet to travel.

“You did well, Harold,” Bell said. “Were it not for you, I never would have believed Randall Silas was alive and trying to murder his daughter.”

Harold gave a self-conscious shrug. “Just did what I could. Now, if you don’t mind, I haven’t slept in ages.”

After changing out of her sweaty clothes, Bell lay in bed cradling her bruised ribs, a reminder of the fight with Sinclair and of too many nights spent outrunning death and the law. She closed her eyes, feeling the heaviness in her limbs, but her mind refused to settle.

Agent Vera Sinclair was a woman Bell respected, even admired. She was relentless, brilliant in her own way. Bell remembered the times they’d worked side by side, back when Bell still believed in the system. But Sinclair saw the world in black and white, with no room for the nuance Bell now inhabited.

How would Bell ever convince Sinclair that Carter had manipulated them and murdered Agent LeClaire? That Bell and Gardy weren’t the villains the bureau had painted them to be, that Wolf’s methods—brutal as they were—had saved more innocents than a broken justice system ever could? Sinclair had her own truths, and Bell’s pleas wouldn’t sway her.

Outside, the wind howled against the boarded windows as though voicing Bell’s turmoil. She pressed a hand over her bruises, wincing as she shifted on the stiff mattress.

Bell almost wished she could meet Sinclair under less dire circumstances—ex-colleagues, hashing out the truth. But that wasn’t possible, not with the government’s accusations against her and Gardy, and not with Logan Wolf as their ally. A bitter smile touched her lips. Someday Carter’s crimes would see the light of day. Until then, the FBI would keep coming.

Bell let her eyelids close. Sleep settled over her in a rough blanket. Tomorrow she would face the dawn and the next step on this dark road, carrying Delaney’s rescue as proof that sometimes the law was too slow, too blind.

And if the FBI wouldn’t acknowledge the truth, she would burn their castle in the sky.

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Published by Dan Padavona

Visit my website at www.danpadavona.com

Copyright © 2023 by Dan Padavona

Artwork copyright © 2023 by Dan Padavona

Cover Design by Caroline Teagle Johnson

All Rights Reserved

Although some of the locations in this book are actual places, the characters and setting are wholly of the author's imagination. Any resemblance between the people in this book and people in the real world is purely coincidental and unintended.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

No writer journeys alone. Special thanks are in order to my editor, C.B. Moore, for providing invaluable feedback, catching errors, and making my story shine. I also wish to thank my brilliant cover designer, Caroline Teagle Johnson. Your artwork never ceases to amaze me. I owe so much of my success to your hard work. Shout outs to my advance readers, including Mary Arnold, Jamie Yelton, Charles Kochan, Marcia Campbell, and Nerrida Wright, for catching those final pesky typos and plot holes. Most of all, thank you to my readers for your loyalty and support. You changed my life, and I am forever grateful.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dan Padavona is the author of The Wolf Lake series, The Thomas Shepherd series, The Logan and Scarlett series, The Darkwater Cove series, The Nia Carter series, The Scout Mourning YA thrillers, The Scarlett Bell thriller series, Her Shallow Grave, and The Dark Vanishings series. He lives in upstate New York with his beautiful wife, Terri, and their children, Joe, and Julia. Dan is a meteorologist with NOAA’s National Weather Service. Besides writing, he enjoys visiting amusement parks, beach vacations, Renaissance fairs, gardening, playing with the family dogs, and eating too much ice cream.

Visit Dan at: www.danpadavona.com