A W A Y

F R O M

S A N I T Y

(A Nina Veil Mystery—Book 9)

K a t e   B o l d

Kate Bold

Bestselling author Kate Bold is author of the ALEXA CHASE SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising six books (and counting); the ASHLEY HOPE SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising six books (and counting); the CAMILLE GRACE FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising eight books (and counting); the HARLEY COLE FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising eleven books (and counting); the KAYLIE BROOKS PSYCHOLOGICAL SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising five books (and counting); the EVE HOPE FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising seven books (and counting); the DYLAN FIRST FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising five books (and counting);  the LAUREN LAMB FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising five books (and counting); the KELSEY HAWK SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising nine books (and counting); the NORA PRICE SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising five books (and counting); the NINA VEIL FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising ten books (and counting); OF the BARREN PINES PSYCHOLIGICAL SUSPENSE series, comprising seven books (and counting); and of the ADDISON SHINE SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising thirteen books (and counting).

THE KILLING GAME (an Alexa Chase Suspense Thriller—Book #1), LET ME GO (an Ashley Hope Suspense Thriller—Book #1), and NOT ME (a Camille Grace FBI Suspense Thriller—Book #1) are available as free downloads on Amazon!

An avid reader and lifelong fan of the mystery and thriller genres, Kate loves to hear from you, so please feel free to visit www.kateboldauthor.com to learn more and stay in touch.

Copyright © 2025 by Kate Bold. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior permission of the author. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

BOOKS BY KATE BOLD

ADDISON SHINE SUSPENSE THRILLER

FIND ME (Book #1)

FIND HER (Book #2)

FIND HELP (Book #3)

FIND HOME (Book #4)

FIND HIM (Book #5)

FIND YOU (Book #6)

FIND HOPE (Book #7)

FIND NO ONE (Book #8)

FIND OUT (Book #9)

FIND DEATH (Book #10)

FIND TRUTH (Book #11)

FIND COURAGE (Book #12)

FIND MERCY (Book #13)

BARREN PINES

THE UNSEEN NEIGHBOR (Book #1)

THE UNSEEN WIFE (Book #2)

THE UNSEEN KILLER (Book #3)

THE UNSEEN WOMAN (Book #4)

THE UNSEEN PAST (Book #5)

THE UNSEEN GUEST (Book #6)

THE UNSEEN FACE (Book #7)

NINA VEIL SUSPENSE THRILLER

AWAY FROM HERE (Book #1)

AWAY FROM HIM (Book #2)

AWAY FROM HOPE (Book #3)

AWAY FROM HOME (Book #4)

AWAY FROM HUMANITY (Book #5)

AWAY FROM MERCY (Book #6)

AWAY FROM SIGHT (Book #7)

AWAY FROM YOU (Book #8)

AWAY FROM SANITY (Book #9)

AWAY FROM INNOCENCE (Book #10)

NORA PRICE MYSTERY

CAN’T RUN (Book #1)

CAN’T HIDE (Book #2)

CAN’T ESCAPE (Book #3)

CAN’T SLEEP (Book #4)

CAN’T FORGET (Book #5)

KELSEY HAWK MYSTERY

DEAD INSIDE (Book #1)

DEAD RECKONING (Book #2)

DEAD TO ME (Book #3)

DEAD SILENCE (Book #4)

DEAD TO DAWN (Book #5)

DEAD END (Book #6)

DEAD OF NIGHT (Book #7)

DEAD CALM (Book #8)

DEAD AND GONE (Book #9)

ALEXA CHASE SUSPENSE THRILLER

THE KILLING GAME (Book #1)

THE KILLING TIDE (Book #2)

THE KILLING HOUR (Book #3)

THE KILLING POINT (Book #4)

THE KILLING FOG (Book #5)

THE KILLING PLACE (Book #6)

ASHLEY HOPE SUSPENSE THRILLER

LET ME GO (Book #1)

LET ME OUT (Book #2)

LET ME LIVE (Book #3)

LET ME BREATHE (Book #4)

LET ME FORGET (Book #5)

LET ME ESCAPE (Book #6)

CAMILLE GRACE FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER

NOT ME (Book #1)

NOT NOW (Book #2)

NOT WELL (Book #3)

NOT HER (Book #4)

NOT NORMAL (Book #5)

NOT AGAIN (Book #6)

NOT SAFE (Book #7)

NOT TODAY (Book #8)

HARLEY COLE FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER

NOWHERE SAFE (Book #1)

NOWHERE LEFT (Book #2)

NOWHERE TO RUN (Book #3)

NOWHERE LIKE THIS (Book #4)

NOWHERE GIRL (Book #5)

NOWHERE TO HIDE (Book #6)

NOWHERE CERTAIN (Book #7)

NOWHERE PURE (Book #8)

NOWHERE SOUND (Book #9)

NOWHERE SANE (Book #10)

NOWHERE TRUE (Book #11)

KAYLIE BROOKS PYSCHOLOGICAL SUSPENSE THRILLER

LAST BREATH (Book #1)

LAST CHANCE (Book #2)

LAST WISH (Book #3)

LAST SHOT (Book #4)

LAST MISTAKE (Book #5)

EVE HOPE FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER

IN HIS BLOOD (Book #1)

IN HIS SIGHTS (Book #2)

IN HIS REACH (Book #3)

IN HIS MIND (Book #4)

IN HIS WAY (Book #5)

IN HIS THOUGHTS (Book #6)

IN HIS DREAMS (Book #7)

DYLAN FIRST FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER

OUT OF REACH (Book #1)

OUT OF TOUCH (Book #2)

OUT OF TIME (Book #3)

OUT OF BOUNDS (Book #4)

OUT OF LUCK (Book #5)

LAUREN LAMB FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER

SOMETHING KNOCKING (Book #1)

SOMETHING CALLING (Book #2)

SOMETHING WRONG (Book 3)

SOMETHING DARK (Book #4)

SOMETHING TO HIDE (Book #5)

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

EPILOGUE

PROLOGUE

“It has to be done. So go do it.”

Speaking the words aloud didn’t make them sound any more convincing to Dr. Emily Cleaver. Exhaustion was weighing her down, heavy and implacable. She’d been feeling it more and more frequently over the past months. Never mind that – over the past year.

Now, thinking of the patient file that needed reviewing before she could wrap up for the day, she found herself, for the first time, wondering if she needed a complete career change.

Although she tried to see the good in every patient, a cynical voice in her head was telling her that some of her patients were irredeemably evil.

Although, when she acknowledged that, it made her think about the uncomfortable reality that one’s feelings were often a mirror for one’s own soul.

These troubling thoughts were a symptom of burnout, she justified to herself. She'd known she would burn out at some stage. The signs had been there. She'd just ignored them as she tried to pack more and more into each working day.

To give more and more of herself, as if by doing so she could somehow atone for a buried guilt.

She stood up from her seat at the dining room table in her small but cozy house, which had a view of a park from her upstairs windows. Turning, she unraveled her dark hair from the knot at the nape of her neck, tugging down the blue top she wore over black pants. She always picked quiet, conservative colors, with high necklines and sleeves that covered her arms at least to the elbow. Professional decorum was important in her working environment, as she struggled to heal her damaged patients.

Was she really healing them, though?

That was a question she felt ambivalent about. In fact, right now, she didn't want to think about that at all. She shivered at the recollection of some of her recent cases and of what was in her patients' minds.

Her probing wasn’t always welcome, or well received. How often had she walked out of a consultation feeling threatened, vulnerable, unsafe?

“You’re a monster. Not me. You’re the monster. Why are you forcing me to go back into my past? You’re going to pay for this. You wait.” The agonized words hissed at her in a recent consult were seared in her mind.

The warning hadn’t been an empty threat. There were others, too. There always were.

One day, this was going to catch up with her. She knew it.

Maybe it was time for a change, if it wasn’t just burnout here, but full on PTSD.

Better not to think of that. She knew any idea of a change was no more than a flirtation with fantasy. Dark and difficult as her job was, she was in it for the duration. It was just that this week was setting itself up to be particularly tough.

“This week has been the longest month ever.” The wry words of a meme she’d seen while scrolling through social media this evening, made her smile, even if grimly, while she headed to the stairs.

Above her, the lights flickered, so briefly she wondered for a moment if she’d imagined it.

There was a rainstorm starting. Drops were splattering against the windows. She hoped the power wouldn’t fail completely. It had been reliable in this area for years, but recently, there had been a couple of outages during strong winds, with trees falling on the lines, and wires blowing loose.

Hopefully, an outage wouldn't happen. Now that she'd steeled herself to head into her small upstairs office and read through her notes, she didn't want anything distracting her.

Emily climbed the stairs, her hand on the polished rail, hearing the creak of the third stair, the way it always sounded. The familiarity of her old house, her haven, with all its quirks. She pushed open the door at the top, and headed into the tiny office, which smelled of wood and paint and carpet.

She scooted the chair back, sat down with a sigh, took her laptop out of her bag, and opened it.

Then, Emily blinked in surprise at the item trapped between the keyboard and the screen.

It was a postcard-sized square. Cardboard – shiny in the way that a photo print would be, but a blank off-white in color. It was completely blank, no writing, no logo, nothing on it at all.

What was this? Had she put it here?

As she grasped it by the edges, holding it up in puzzlement, she wondered if she’d simply forgotten that she’d placed this card inside her laptop.

Then, her next thought was that one of her patients had done it.

Had someone gotten to her laptop? That was impossible, surely. How could it have happened, she thought, with a twist of her stomach. This was like a weird anxiety nightmare coming true.

Emily made sure that during her sessions, none of her patients had access to her laptop. They weren’t allowed near it. She used an old fashioned pen and paper to make her notes, and transferred them to her laptop at a later stage.

But her last couple of sessions today had taken place in her own offices, and maybe one of those patients, who were obviously lower security, had played a prank on her. She had left the room, to look into her receptionist’s office, and confirm a follow up appointment.

A cruel prank, and maybe it had gone further than that, because the laptop’s screen was dead and blank. Had the battery drained?

As she thought that, suddenly, the lights went out.

Emily caught her breath, disoriented in the blackness, reaching out and grabbing the smooth, wooden edge of her desk.

It was so dark in here. She could hear the spatter of rain on the window, protected by thick blinds. Was this an area-wide outage? A fault with her own electrical supply?

Given her dark thoughts earlier, she couldn’t suppress a flare of fear at the blackness now surrounding her.

Groping for her phone, Emily realized she’d left it downstairs, in the living room. She hadn’t brought it up.

She’d have to find her way down again, get to her phone, and see what was going on. She turned, bashing her knee against the side of the desk, gasping painfully as she fumbled to her feet.

Taking one careful step, then another, she held her hands out in front of her, wondering where the door was, when her fingers would touch the painted frame.

But something else happened. Something that perhaps her senses gave her an inkling of, as her nose picked up something unusual – a musky scent that shouldn’t have been there.

Just as her mind was trying to process this, she felt a hand grab her, jerking her forward in the darkness so that she screamed, arms flailing and horror erupting. But even as the scream erupted from her, a sound of pure terror, another hand found her mouth, mashing down on it, suffocating the sound.

Now, somehow, that crushing hand was jerking her around so that she was pressed against the bulk of her attacker, her head crushed against his chest, the hand on her mouth pinning her in place. She knew she should struggle, that she should try to get away, but the blindness and the fear was freezing her.

She worked with dangerous, damaged people, and maybe it would be better to comply? Fighting got you hurt. Keep calm, her training told her. Keep calm, don’t struggle, go along with this attacker.

Even though the terror was a bright flare in her mind, she forced herself to go limp. Whatever this was, she just needed to live through it. Whether it was somebody’s twisted revenge, deliberately targeted, or a random crime, all she had to do was keep alive, assess the situation, maybe try to reason with this person once this suffocating hand was off her mouth.

But at that moment, she felt a pain at the top of her leg. A deep, intense, burning prick – a needle piercing through the flimsy fabric of her pants and all the way into her flesh.

The pain jolted her, but the fear of what this might mean was a hundred times worse. Tipped over into panic, she did what she now realized she should have done at the get-go. She screamed, trying her best to make the sound erupt from behind that clamping hand. She tried to struggle, tried her best to get away from the grip that held her. Emily tried to kick back, to hurt the man who held her, but the pain in her leg was becoming a numbness that was spreading through her whole body.

The grip on her mouth loosened, but too late, because she found herself unable to move. Unable to feel her legs anymore.

She could still hear, though. A voice whispered in her ear, the tone implacable, her frightened mind not comprehending the words at first.

“You know why, don’t you? You know what this is for. It’s payback. Payback. For you. At last.”

A vein of guilt deep inside her opened at those words, and was spreading now, as the strength left her body, and the coldness grew, and soon, even that terrible, whispering voice was stilled.

CHAPTER ONE

What did it take to find the truth when your back was to the wall? What would you be capable of when desperation was staring you in the face?

The questions raced through Nina Veil's mind as she waited by the back door of the neat Wyoming home. It was a wet fall day. Wind was gusting. The downpour was frigid and cold, the rain as icy as sleet. The chill sent a dull ache through her muscles, remembering their time in the enforced captivity of her prolonged coma. Weather like this always made her feel a few decades older than her actual age of thirty-three. And thanks to an injury she’d incurred on her last major case, her right arm was still weak, the muscles not yet strengthened, and the fractured shoulder blade not fully healed. It was still supposed to be in a sling. But not today.

Wearing a dark waterproof jacket and a black cap, Nina was crouched down below the fence line, out of sight of the windows of the other homes.

And as for the person in this house?

The camera surveillance she’d been able to do a few weeks ago had shown her that Mitzi Anders, personal assistant to senator Terence Thorpe, headed out most mornings at eight-thirty a.m.

Very occasionally, she’d stay home, and Terence Thorpe himself would come visiting.

Nina hoped this wasn’t one of those days, because those meeting patterns weren’t predictable. She doubted they were romantic liaisons – she’d seen no hint of that in their body language. She got the sense it was business being done in strictest privacy.

Since it was now nine-thirty a.m., she hoped the house was empty.

The blinds in the living room were open this morning. Usually, when Terence Thorpe came by, those blinds were closed.

Given the fact that Thorpe had accumulated his ill-gotten gains through criminal means, Nina understood his need for privacy when reviewing the secret documents which weren’t kept on any of his office premises.

He'd murdered her father sixteen years ago during a forensic investigation into embezzlement at the company where Thorpe had been the CFO. Nina didn’t know if he’d done the deed personally when her dad had been hired to look into the disappearance of funds, but Thorpe had arranged it. She was sure of it, from the note she’d found in her father’s possessions, showing her that he’d focused his suspicions on Thorpe, who’d then taken him out. Thorpe had killed since then, at least twice that she knew of, though she didn’t doubt the tally was more.

His net was wide, his reach was long, and he was a man who would stop at nothing to hide his tracks, and erase the people who knew his secrets.

And just a couple of weeks ago, Terence Thorpe had met with the FBI Seattle area director, Fenster, to discuss solutions to ‘a problem’.

Planting a bug in Fenster’s office in the FBI building had allowed Nina to pick up that information. She was desperately worried that the problem Fenster had been referring to was herself.

Did Thorpe know she was tracking his activities? Did Fenster suspect that she was homing in on this?

Nina didn’t know. What she knew, with a sick feeling inside her whenever she thought of it, was that Thorpe was extremely effective at erasing people who were a problem to him.

She edged closer to the back door, keeping low. The pattering of the rain was chilling her, but she was barely aware of the cold. All her focus was on the door ahead.

Either this was going to work, and she'd be able to get in seamlessly, or else it was all going to go horribly wrong, and she would have to run for it, hoping that she could get away undetected.

In her pocket, she had the tools she needed.

Nina had some basic skills in lock picking. They were not advanced. If this was a complicated lock, she wouldn’t be able to breach it. If it was relatively simple, though, she’d have a chance to get in, as opposed to breaking in.

And people’s main defenses were their front doors. That was where cameras were most of the time, where the main security was found. It was the place people were the most aware of. Not the humble and out of sight back door, which was often overlooked.

Her hands were cold, and the tight fitting gloves she wore were adding another layer of difficulty to the operation, as she inserted the pick into the lock and maneuvered it. Work with patience, she reminded herself, even though she didn’t feel patient at all. She felt pressured and exposed, knowing that the neighbors behind Edna’s house now had sight of her again, if they chose to look through their rainy windows.

And this damned lock wasn’t cooperating. It was stiff, difficult to turn, and she was inexperienced, and her right arm was weak due to its injury and enforced rest. It throbbed as she moved it, reminding her that she was disobeying her doctor’s orders by taking it out of the sling at all.

Twisting the tools again, Nina wished she’d been able to attend that meeting between Fenster and Thorpe. She’d known the date, she’d known the location. But when she’d taken a look at the coffee shop where they intended to meet, she’d seen it would be impossible.

The place was a tiny, hole-in-the-wall shop that only accommodated four tables. There was no way she could get in there to eavesdrop without them noticing her. No way Daniel could get in there. And with four possible tables, she hadn’t been able to plant a listening device. In any case, she didn’t have any available listening devices at this time. It wasn’t like she had a whole stash of them. She’d never had need of any of these items before.

As she thought that, Nina caught her breath. At last, the tumblers had moved. She’d felt them. The lock had succumbed to her amateur efforts, and she had success.

The lock moved again, creakily, and then, as she applied more pressure, feeling the tremble in her fingers from tension and adrenaline, it slid back.

The back door was now unlocked, and she needed to get inside as fast as she could.

Nina wiped her soft trainers on the rainy doormat. They were two sizes too big for her, just in case she left footprints, and she wore three pairs of socks, all of which were now drenched from the rain that had permeated them.

With no idea if there was an alarm inside, she twisted the handle cautiously as she stuffed her tools back into her jacket pocket.

She’d breached enemy territory. Now, could she uncover the secrets she was here to find?

CHAPTER TWO

No alarm. Heart thumping, Nina listened out carefully, taking stock of her situation, aware that at any moment, things could still go terribly wrong.

There could still be a silent alarm here in Edna Greene's house, linked directly to the police station. Nina would only know that when the police arrived with sirens blaring and it was too late to flee. That would be the start of her new life – with criminal charges laid against her, fired immediately from the FBI – and worse still, in Terence Thorpe's cross-hairs.

Whatever her new life involved, Nina knew it wouldn’t have a long expectancy once Thorpe wanted her gone.

She waited, reminding herself that a few moments of patience might make all the difference. The house was quiet. The only sound was the steady drumming of the rain. She knew she was dripping onto the floor. Nothing she could do about that. She was going to leave wet droplets and damp footprints, despite her waterproof gear, as she tracked through the house. Oversized prints, at least.

As resolute as she’d been to do this, as necessary as she knew it was, she felt vulnerable and scared and like a fish out of water.

If there had been a different choice, she’d have made it, Nina reminded herself. There hadn’t been, and that was why she was here, now. Fighting fire with fire. There was no other way.

Nina stepped forward through the kitchen, which carried the distinctive, lingering smell of toast, and into a short corridor. There, on the right, was the living room, with its blinds open, and a view of the empty, rain-soaked street outside. Trying to keep well away from the window, Nina sneaked past and headed down the corridor. Somewhere here were the secret documents that were so incriminating that Terence Thorpe wouldn't keep them in any of his offices. Having them on the private property of his personal assistant was a clever move.

He hadn’t gotten this far, erased his enemies, accumulated vast wealth, by being stupid. She mustn’t underestimate him.

There was a small bedroom ahead, a guest bedroom. Opening the door with a gloved hand, she picked up a musty smell from inside. The bed was neatly made, a chair with a red cushion stood in the corner, the curtains were closed.

Nina headed over to the cupboard and opened it. Empty and bare. She looked around for anywhere that might hide a safe, knowing that there was a possibility that all the documents were locked away inside one of those. Nothing.

Ahead was the master bedroom, and on the right was a tiny study adjacent to a guest bathroom.

Nina checked the study first, aware of time ticking by. Panic wasn’t a steady emotion. It surged and flared. She felt a choking fear when she heard footsteps on the road outside, and another surge of paralyzing dread when the faint sound of sirens came her way on a gust of wind.

This was it. She knew it. There’d been a silent alarm, and the police were coming for her.

Even though she knew she should run, flee out of the house, get as far away as she could, Nina found that even in this moment, an implacably logical voice was telling her to wait, not to jump to conclusions but to wait.

She froze, listening, feeling relief turn her legs to cotton wool as the sound faded away. The police were racing elsewhere.

Then, she managed to regroup, heading into the study.

A leather-upholstered chair and a small desk were crammed into it. There was a shelf above the desk with a couple of files on it, but they seemed to be personal and household.

Seemed to be? Maybe she should stop jumping to conclusions until she’d confirmed that for herself.

Nina reached up, took down one of the files, paged through.

Nope, this was what it said on the label. Household expenses, warranties, invoices, repairs. And the next file really was Edna's personal income tax and salary statements. She was well paid. Nina guessed that was one way Terence ensured her loyalty.

No sign of a safe in this room, or of any other place to hide anything incriminating. Turning back, she headed into the main bedroom.

Here, there was a hint of fresh, soapy-smelling deodorant in the air. The bed was neatly made. Nina had guessed from the camera footage that Edna lived alone. She hadn’t seen any evidence of cleaners coming in. Doing your own housework was probably the most convenient option if you were in charge of incriminating secrets.

The problem was that she wasn’t finding any evidence of these secrets. Where were the documents she was looking for?

Methodically, she searched the bedroom. The nightstand drawers contained only a couple of novels and a few toiletries. The cupboard contained clothes – a variety of smart yet staid business suits, and some jeans and dresses for casual wear. Looking again, now wondering if she was missing something obvious, Nina still could not find any evidence of a safe. What was going on here? Where were the documents that she was sure must be squirreled away?

She looked under the bed and in all the drawers inside the wardrobe. Nothing, and nothing. Maybe she'd gotten the wrong information. Maybe the papers had been moved. Thorpe might have decided to change things up. It could be the way he worked.

With no success so far, Nina was starting to feel more and more uneasy. She couldn’t stay here much longer. The risk was escalating with every minute she spent in here. She hadn’t seen a hidden camera or any other security device, but the camera would be tiny. Really small security cameras were designed to be invisible and undetectable.

She checked under the thick rag rug in the center of the bedroom floor, wondering if there was a secret hideaway carved into the floorboards. Good guess, surely, but it was wrong.

Shaking her head, Nina felt stubbornly reluctant to admit defeat. There was one place she hadn't looked in the house before she moved on to searching the garage.

And her last-ditch place in the house wasn’t a very likely place.

Or maybe it was, Nina suddenly thought. Maybe, since the blinds got drawn when Thorpe arrived for his meetings, it wasn’t a totally unlikely place.

Nina headed back to the living room, not liking how exposed it was to the outside street. This was a neighborhood where people knew each other well enough to be nosy and concerned. She’d seen its character the first time she’d been here, planting the camera. If someone noticed, they’d give Edna a friendly call.

The living room was ordered and tidy. Nina was suspicious of the level of tidiness that Edna preferred. There hadn’t even been a dirty coffee cup in the sink. The living room was clean, dust free, the blue couches spotless and the cushions plumped, with a cabinet in the corner, whose glass windows showed an array of porcelain cups and saucers inside.

Only the dining room. Nina headed there, impatience now surging, and took a look inside the sideboard.

She was fully expecting to see nothing but immaculate plates and bowls and serving dishes. And they were there. A stack of plates occupied one shelf, with rows of glasses next to them. The next cupboard contained serving bowls and a selection of glass and porcelain vases.

But wait, what was that behind them? There was something behind it. She could see it now, just visible behind the stack of bowls.

Peering around, Nina caught her breath as she saw the scuffed pile of folders, some of which looked fairly new, and others which looked to be years old.

This was it. Her heart beat faster. This was what she needed. She’d hit paydirt in the very last place she’d thought to look.

But at that moment, a sound rang out that stopped her in her tracks, turning her instantly to stone.

It was the harsh, jangling sound of the front doorbell.

CHAPTER THREE

Panic flooded Nina at that sound.

The worst had happened, and now, she’d have to handle it.

Nina forced herself to move, turning in the direction of the front door and glancing through the window.

She couldn't see anything from this angle. All she could see was a section of the garden path. But whoever had come up that path might have seen her crouched over the sideboard.

Who was at the door? What should she do? Hide away?

That would be wisest. Whoever was at the door might not have seen her clearly. They might be a stranger, and a stranger knocking unannounced on people’s doors would expect no answer. Maybe they had a delivery, which they would simply leave on the doormat if nobody came to the door.

Better to lay low, and to hope that they went away.

She waited, jumping when the doorbell rang again, her heart rate spiking even higher.

What should she do if they didn’t go away? How was she going to deal with this?

It must be a stranger, Nina decided. But they might be keeping on ringing because they’d seen her in there. She couldn’t go to the door, though. Not with her drenched clothes, and her hair drawn back from a chalk-white face, and gloves on her hands.

In a few moments, she heard the tread of footsteps departing. Poking her head out, she took a look at who it was.

Two women, with a folder and a clipboard. She guessed they’d been collecting for a charity. They had that look about them. That was confirmed when she saw them walk down the garden path next door and ring that bell.

She wasn’t happy that these people were walking around the neighborhood, alerting people, ringing doorbells, causing activity. Bad timing, and she needed to be as fast as possible, now.

She turned back to the folders, knowing there was a mass of information here, and that she couldn’t remove it all. As much as possible would have to be photographed, however much of it she was able to do before either her time, her nerve, or her luck ran out.

Nina took out the serving bowls and put them on the sideboard. Then, reaching beyond where they had been, she took out the folders and placed them on the floor, and got out her phone.

There were eight folders in total, all with a sheaf of documents inside. The folders themselves were not marked in any date order. There was no indication as to their chronology, apart from the fact that some were more scuffed than others.

All of them were important, and she couldn’t put a value on which were more so. His earlier crimes might be as bad as his more recent ones. She had to try to photograph as much as she could.

Starting from the file on the left, Nina opened it, deciding to do this as speedily as she could.

Photograph, turn page. Click, flip, click, flip, working her way through the pile of documents, moving with such speed that she barely had a chance to take in the contents herself. They didn't matter now. If she slowed down and started reading them, she would be going down a very dangerous rabbit hole. One that might end up being blocked, with no way out.

She kept up her speed.

Flip, click, flip, click. Finishing the first folder, she went on to the second. As she began her task again, she realized that her panic had abated, and in its place was a cold, sure sense of resolve. These were papers that could take him down. They would hopefully provide some real evidence of Thorpe’s misdoings.

Although she was carefully not focusing on their content, so that she didn’t sacrifice speed, she couldn’t help being aware of the type of document they were, as she turned the pages.

Some were invoices, some were statements. Some were orders. There were a lot of letters with various company letterheads, some signed by Thorpe himself. There were a few contracts, which slowed her down as she paged through the documents. There were some agreements. Other letters, too.

As she turned one page, her eye caught a sentence that told her this might have been a threat. The words jumped out at her, fierce and unsettling. No time to look further, or find out who had been threatening whom. There’d be time for that later, if she was lucky.

Finally, she was through with the second folder, and onto the third, still moving as fast as she could. The second folder had been very old. This one was more recent. She could see the folder itself was newer, the papers inside weren’t as yellowed or musty as the ones in the second folder.

Just get it done, Nina told herself. Get it done.

Page after page, photograph after photograph. She was aware that she was aching, in her knelt-down, crouched over position. Her hand was stiff from the effort of holding her phone squarely out over the page. Her arm was trembling. Her shoulder was starting to burn. Folder three was nearly finished though. Now, it was finished, and she was moving on to folder four.

She photographed the first page, then the second one, then the third. It was all going as planned, right up until she heard the noise that she knew meant the end.

It was the sound of the garage door rolling up. And as Nina refocused, tearing her attention away from the photography, she now heard the thrum of a car’s engine.

Edna Greene. It had to be her. She was the only person who used the garage and occupied the house.

She was arriving home much earlier than she should have been.

And Nina had only seconds before Edna caught her, red handed.

Breathing in deeply, Nina found that at this crisis moment, time seemed to slow down. It felt as if she was a dispassionate spectator in her own life, watching herself set the phone down, and grasp the folders, carefully placing each one on top of the next, in exactly the order they had been, and then reaching with the pile into the darkened interior of the sideboard.

But, as she did, she saw a date scribbled on the outside of the thickest folder – one of those she hadn’t yet photographed.

It was the same year as her father had been murdered. She had to take this folder. There might be critical evidence inside.

She yanked it out of the pile and set it aside, before putting the others back, as fast as she could.

A lance of pain went through her shoulder and the pile tilted, and the neutral voice in Nina’s mind told her: Just a couple of degrees more of a tilt, and you’ll lose hold of them, and they’ll all spill out, and then this will all be over.

They didn’t spill, and clumsily, but accurately, she got them back into place. Reaching up, gripping the bowls carefully in her gloved hands, she replaced them, too.

Her heart was drumming in her chest. The garage door was rolling down now, and as Nina closed the sideboard door, she heard the slam of the car door.

Now, grabbing her phone, she was on her feet. Clutching the stolen folder, she raced back to the kitchen.

She reached the back door and wrenched it open just as she heard the connecting door from the garage unlock. Pulling her rain jacket's hood over her head, she shut the door.

There was still water on the kitchen floor and no time to clean it up. No time to lock the back door, either. Edna would know someone had been in here. Someone this efficient wasn’t going to mistakenly believe they’d been careless in locking up.

Nina shoved the folder under her jacket and sauntered away from the kitchen door, even though her back was prickling, and she expected at any moment to hear an angry shout, and footsteps pursuing her.

When she was at the next house, she began to run, feeling ungainly and unsteady in her too-big shoes.

She ran down a side road, turned twice more, and eventually arrived at her rental car, which she’d parked in a camera-free street.

Flinging herself inside, shoving the folder on the seat, she caught her breath. With the action over, her hands were shaking. Never mind that, her limbs were trembling, her shoulder blade aching. Starting her rental car, she drove away, keeping her speed steady.

“You did it, Nina,” she whispered, although she didn’t yet know the implications of what she’d done. This had been her only chance, and even though she hadn’t gotten everything, she had at least gotten something. Was it of value? Time would tell.

She felt desperate to look at the folder now, right now, but she knew she had to wait. This was potential dynamite, and she needed to have total privacy before she opened it and paged through. And then, with a cool, methodical mind, she’d need to tackle it.

She now needed to rush to the local airport, where Daniel had organized that she’d hitch a ride with a medical charter plane heading back to Seattle. Keeping her name off the commercial flights had seemed like a good idea, so they’d managed to do it.

Nina wasn’t under any illusions that this hadn’t gone perfectly. Water droplets on the floor. The back door open. The person at the door might have seen her inside. Cold fright flooded her as she acknowledged these were just the mistakes she knew about, and there might be others she didn’t.

Edna Greene would know that someone had been in her home.

Would she connect the dots and realize the intruder was Nina?

If she did, then Nina knew with uneasy certainty that she could expect payback.

Terence Thorpe would seek to destroy her before she could take him down.

CHAPTER FOUR

Heading back into the familiarity of the Seattle FBI office the next day, the weight of what she’d done was still constantly on Nina’s mind, clawing at her attention, distracting her as she thought about the repercussions. She'd put the folder in the safest place she could find. That was all she could do until she had the time to go through it in detail.

“We’ve been called into a meeting with Kevin,” Daniel said, checking his phone as they headed up the stairs.

“Let’s go straight there, then?” Nina said, trying not to let a tone of apprehension creep into her voice. A meeting with Kevin Saunders, their boss? Maybe it was just a routine update, or perhaps a new case had landed. But she couldn't help the feeling of dread that, somehow, he knew and that trouble was going to come crashing down around her.

Passing the offices where Fenster worked gave her a flash of guilt.

I’m working against you, she thought. I’m spying on your interactions with Terence Thorpe – and either you don’t know it, or else, I don’t know that you know.

When she’d gotten back – in the late afternoon due to the medical charter being delayed – she’d saved the photos to a storage device in her apartment at home, and made sure the folder was stashed away, and then Daniel had come over, with takeaways and a bottle of wine, and while he’d been with her, he’d sent all the photographic information to his cloud storage.

There were hundreds of documents – she'd gotten into a rhythm while crouched on the dining room floor, and was surprised by what she'd managed to achieve. It would take a week or two to check them all, and Nina knew she'd need to focus and set the time aside to research every piece of paper that she'd managed to capture.

Now, as she and Daniel walked into the boss’s office, Kevin was typing on his laptop, his face intent. When he saw them, he looked up.

Kevin was the antithesis of chaos. He didn’t let a trace of disorder into his life. His office was always rigorously neat. His brown hair always looked as if it had been cut a few days ago. His expression was always stern, and although Nina knew his demeanor concealed a deep, genuine caring for his team, she couldn’t help wondering if the slight frown on his face was directed at her.

It lasted only a moment, so brief that she was wondering if she’d imagined it.

"Morning, Nina and Daniel," he said, as they responded with polite 'good morning' greetings in turn. "Sit down. There's a case that's landed, and we've been asked to help out in a semi-official capacity."

“What does that mean, exactly?” Nina asked, intrigued. This didn’t sound like trouble for her. That was a relief.

“There was a murder on Monday. The victim is known to the police,” Kevin said.

“Known, how?” Nina asked.

“She was Emily Cleaver, a trauma psychologist that did a lot of work with convicted criminals,” Kevin said. “She was often asked to help debrief, to give post-sentence counseling, and to work with criminals who were sentenced to psychiatric hospitals.”

“That’s a tough job,” Daniel sympathized, and Kevin nodded.

“She was murdered on Monday. Home invasion. Strange circumstances. The power box was tampered with, so the place was plunged into darkness, and then she was injected with an overdose of an anesthetic drug that caused deep sedation, followed by death. The police have investigated, but they’ve made no progress. And because of the circumstances, and Emily’s close involvement with criminal patients, one of the detectives assigned to the case – who I’ve worked with on several crime operations in the past – has asked us to help out.”

“I’ll gladly help out in those circumstances,” Nina said. “I have lots of questions.”

“As do I,” Daniel agreed.

They were surging in her mind as she reviewed the sparse facts that Kevin had set out. Looking at Daniel’s thoughtful expression, his face intense below his dark brown, wayward bangs, she knew that he was also racing ahead, envisioning scenario, motives, and modus operandi.

“it may be difficult for me to answer them as a third party," Kevin said, and Nina nodded. Then, her boss explained further. "Because it's so complex, it involves a lot of different state departments, and because there is a need to stay behind the scenes here, the team leader has asked to meet you informally this afternoon. It'll take you a while to get there."

Seeing Nina’s look of surprise, Kevin added. “She lived in Miller’s Ridge, which is a town east of Spokane. So I suggest you head that way, find a hotel, and book in for a night or two while you assess the situation, and see if you can pick up on anything that he hasn’t.”

“We’ll be there as soon as possible,” Nina agreed. “Say, by three p.m.?”

Kevin gazed at her, taking in her sling, which she still wore most of the time – unauthorized missions into people’s houses excluded, of course.

“This is a case where you can provide perspective, analytical thoughts and input. I don’t want you getting involved beyond that, especially when you’re still recovering, Nina,” he said sternly.

“I’ll make sure of that,” she said, although she didn’t know if she’d be able to keep the promise.

“I think, in the circumstances, it’s better for Detective Whitley to give you the rest of the information himself, rather than working through me.”

“That makes sense,” Daniel agreed.

“By the time you arrive there, there may be more to work with than what I have now. He can explain the situation to you. I’ll put you in touch with him, and he’ll send you a location and a meeting time for later on today.”

“Understood,” Nina said, even though she knew there was a lot she didn’t know.

“And thank you. This is a tough one. And Whitley’s a good detective. I’m grateful for your help,” Kevin said.

Nina hesitated. She didn’t want to overstep the mark here, but there was an urgent question that was in her mind as she reviewed what Kevin had said so far. Before she stood up, she asked it.

“Is there a problem with this case? Over and above the complexity?”

She thought she’d hit the nail on the head. Kevin drew in a thoughtful breath, and she watched his face close up.

“It’s up to you to assess the situation,” he said in terse tones, confirming to her that there were additional complications, but that he wasn’t willing to state exactly what they were.

Nina had never imagined, as she stood up and left his office, that her main emotion would be one of surprise. This case was highly unusual. They were off to Miller’s Ridge on an unofficial mission of assistance, helping out with a case that she suspected was even more complex than it appeared to be.

“Better pack for two nights?” Daniel asked, as they headed back along the corridor. As she always did, Nina glanced in the direction of Fenster’s office. He wasn’t there, and it was closed.

“Yes, two nights, I think. It’s going to be at least a four-hour drive to get there." Since they'd slept over at Nina's place, but taken Daniel's car to work, she said, "Do you want to drop me at my place, and pick me up in an hour? That'll give us time to pack, and we should be there by two-thirty."

Although there were a number of Daniel’s shirts, briefs, socks, and a spare toothbrush at her place – and vice versa – it was easier for both of them to pack from their respective apartments. “I guess we should include some ordinary plainclothes,” Nina added. “Jeans, and suchlike?”

She wasn’t sure, from Kevin’s description, exactly how unofficial their involvement was going to end up being. That would hopefully become clearer when they found out all the things he wasn’t saying.

“Sounds good,” Daniel agreed.

Nina had never thought, as she scrambled into the car, that her main emotion now would be one of relief.

She wasn’t in trouble. Kevin didn’t know what she’d done, and maybe Thorpe didn’t know yet, either.

But right now, two nights out of town sounded like a bonus.

At least she’d be in a place where Thorpe wouldn’t know to find her.

*

With Daniel at the wheel, and the journey punctuated by a series of sleety rain showers, it was ten to three before they arrived in Miller’s Ridge. Daniel parked his car outside the coffee shop where Detective Whitley had said they would meet.

Nina climbed out, stretching, easing the tight muscles in her right arm as she briefly removed it from its sling. The drive had been quieter than usual. She could sense that Daniel was preoccupied by something. Usually, he told her when he was worried, but he hadn’t this time.

Putting it out of her mind, she headed inside.

The coffee shop looked like it was one of the hubs of the town. With a downstairs and an upstairs section, it was about three quarters full, and as she entered, Nina enjoyed the feeling of the transition from cold, breezy and rainy, to the feeling of being bathed in warm, coffee-scented air.

Since they were earlier than the meeting time, Nina didn’t expect to see Whitley there yet. After all, he probably had to travel only a few minutes to get here, not a few hours. His message had said that he’d meet them on the lower level. Seeing nobody who looked like a police detective among the customers, Nina headed for an empty table with a view of the door.

She and Daniel sat down, taking the two seats facing the door, and ordered coffee.

A minute later, the door opened, and Whitley walked in.

He was in police uniform. A tall man, lean to the point of being haggard, with a bony, intelligent-looking face and sandy hair cut very short, he headed straight to their table.

“Agents Veil and Grant from the Seattle FBI office,” she introduced them.

“Detective Whitley from the Miller’s Ridge police department.” The words were polite, his voice brisk and terse, although Nina did clock his glance at her right arm. And after a quick handshake – Nina shaking left-handed, they sat down.

“It’s a fracture,” she said. “Incurred on an old case, and mostly healed. I’m not back on active field work yet, but it won’t keep me from investigating.”

He gave a wry smile. “I didn’t think it would, Agent Veil. I’ve heard a lot about you.”

She nodded ruefully. Her reputation preceded her, but since she was a different person from the more impetuous, volatile person she’d been before her accident, she didn’t know if he’d heard good or bad. Most likely, it was her coma and her recovery. That was what most people knew of her. She didn’t like it particularly because it reminded her of that time, although she accepted that her law enforcement peers usually drew comfort and inspiration from it.

“What’s the situation with the case?”

He sighed. “The situation is complicated. Dr. Cleaver has done a lot of work for the surrounding prisons and for victims. I've known her for years. This has hit us hard. It's shocking."

“It must be very difficult,” Nina sympathized.

“It happened on Monday night. She lived alone, so her body was found Tuesday morning. I believe she was due at the psychiatric hospital. She didn’t arrive, so they tried to contact her, realized something was wrong, and came looking. The power to the house had been sabotaged. So last night, up in her office, she would have been in darkness.”

“Sabotaged how?” Nina asked.

"The power box itself burned out. Someone was in her house and must have jimmied the box to cause a major short in the wires. Then, the same person – we suppose – made his or her way upstairs. They found her and grabbed her – there was bruising around her mouth, indicating that they'd crushed a hand over it. The needle marks that the pathologist found were in her thigh and arm. Massive overdose of a powerful sedative in her bloodstream.”

Nina nodded, taking this in, thinking the reasons why a killer might use such an unusual method to disable and kill his victims. There were many easier ways to murder. What was so significant about the sedatives, and why was this MO being used?

She had no immediate answers, so she shelved these thoughts and focused on the logistics of how he’d committed the crime.

“I’m guessing that the killer must have had either a flashlight, or else, some infra-red capability? Maybe goggles?” she said. “To get from a power box, to upstairs? He knew where she was, and he came very well prepared?”

“One of the two, for sure, but we don’t know which.”

To her, infrared capability was sounding more likely, purely because the killer would have needed both hands to restrain and inject his or her victim.

The psychologist had worked with damaged people, with criminals who had murdered, and she’d been assigned to help them confront their own past trauma.

That was opening a Pandora’s box of little monsters, right there. She suppressed a shiver at the thought.

Their coffee arrived, and Whitley ordered himself a hot chocolate while Nina and Daniel added cream to their own cups.

“How did he – I’m saying he just for convenience – access the house?” Daniel asked.

“The garage window was forced,” Whitley replied. “That’s how we believe he gained entry. It was a rainy afternoon. The water had blown in the window by the time we got there, and there was a big puddle near the car. No sign of trace, unfortunately. Not in the garage, nor at the power box which was in the kitchen, and nothing was found at the murder scene upstairs, either.”

His hot chocolate arrived. Clearly possessing a throat of steel, Whitley gulped it down while steaming hot. While he downed the drink, Nina finished off her coffee at a slower speed, thinking about what he’d said.

An invisible killer. Even though a window had been forced, Nina was wondering if this murderer had been tracking Emily’s movements carefully, knowing where she was likely to be, and maybe also knowing the layout of the house. That reminded her briefly and chillingly of her own recent raid into Mitzi Anders’ home.

To take out a power box required timing, and some level of knowhow.

And why had he done it? Why bother to take out all the lights?

It didn’t make sense to her.

"I'd like to look at all the evidence you've gathered and the postmortem results," she said. "But first, could we go to the scene of the crime?"

She wanted to look at the logistics of how this had occurred.

And also, she wanted to spend more time with Detective Whitley, in the hope that she could better understand the politics behind the decision to call them in. Nina thought there was someone who didn’t want them here.

And she needed to know who that person was.

CHAPTER FIVE

Nina wasn't used to sitting in the passenger seat as Daniel followed the police cruiser through the seemingly nonstop rain. She loved to drive and hadn't been a passenger since those first few weeks after coming out of her coma. With nothing to do but watch the scenery passing by, and think of what they would find at the crime scene, she felt her misgivings rushing back.

Right now, it seemed that only constant, nonstop action could suppress her worries about where she’d been and what she’d done, and how fast Terence Thorpe would join the dots, if he hadn’t connected them already.

With an effort, yet again, she pushed that out of her mind. This case was important, and she couldn't afford to let Kevin down. For the next two days, she needed to put Terence Thorpe all the way out of her mind and focus on what she was here for.

At least being a passenger gave her the chance to look around and take in Miller’s Ridge. She’d probably been here before at some stage of her life. She didn’t remember it, though. As the cruiser headed out from the coffee shop, they passed through a tranquil looking suburban area, and then crossed a wide river to head out of town.

This place was peaceful. There was a small town feel to it, Nina knew, as they passed a covered area that looked like a farmer’s market was taking place under the roofing. Despite the rain and the chilly temperatures, it was clearly well supported, with the parking lot nearly full.

Maybe they’d been here before. She and Daniel could have overnighted here on a mini vacation, perhaps during snow season, doing some skiing, admiring the scenery, heading into town to visit a good restaurant.

Further back, maybe she’d even been here with her parents. This was the kind of place her father would have loved, with its quiet feel, its accessibility to nature, its river, winding through the center of town.

If only she could remember. For a moment, Nina felt a weird sense of nostalgia for not remembering. The story she made up in her mind, in that moment as she stared at the shimmering snake of the river, was enough.

Then, the car turned again, and the river was behind them. A few more turns, and Whitley was leading them into another suburb, hilly and treed, the homes cozy, but set in good-sized gardens. Now with her thoughts focused on what lay ahead, Nina wondered about Emily, what she’d been like as a person, and how she’d felt, coming home every day to serenity and beauty, after working at the harsh coalface of her chosen career all day.

But someone had followed her here. Who, and why?

She took a look around, noting that there were street cameras at the major intersection, but she couldn’t see any on the side roads.

Whitley pulled up outside a house on the corner with a treed garden, the home set back from the road. Immediately, Nina's eyes picked up the flash of color that the crime scene tape offered, the bright yellow harsh against the background of trees and grass, and the home's dark wooden boards.

They climbed out of the car, and headed over to join Whitley as he walked to the front door, digging in his jacket pocket for the key, which was in a creased envelope. His face looked serious as he stared up at the home.

“This is her house,” he said, the words unnecessary, but his tone strangely formal, as if he’d wanted to officially introduce it. “When we arrived, the door was closed. We had to get a locksmith out to gain entry. She’d locked the door behind her.”

And the killer had been there, inside, locked in with her. Nina couldn’t suppress a shiver as she thought about the plans he’d made.

“None of the neighbors we have spoken to so far saw anything. It was raining hard and dark," Whitley emphasized. "Estimated time of death was around eight p.m. There was evidence that she'd had dinner earlier, and then gone upstairs. We think she might have been planning on doing some work. Thus, she was found in her study."

He unlocked the door, and they stepped inside, with Nina breathing in the smell of the place – the air slightly stale, the house in need of some ventilation, having been shut up tight for a couple of days.

There weren't many personal photos or ornaments in the entrance hall or in the living room, Nina saw, glancing that way. She wondered if Emily had distanced herself personally, as well as professionally, from a world that could be cruel and unpredictable.

“There was no evidence down here. Only the forced window.” Silvery streaks on various surfaces bore witness to forensics’ efforts as Whitley continued. “The garage was locked. Her car’s still in there. The interleading door is that one, there.” He pointed to a door near the kitchen.

“And that was open?” Daniel asked.

“It was closed, but unlocked,” Whitley replied.

Nina found it strange that a woman who worked with violent criminals as part of her job would not lock the interleading door to the garage when she got home. The obvious answer was that she had done, and that the killer had managed to unlock it, or get a copy of the key. The more she thought about this crime, the more evident it was to her that he’d been in here before, and done his research.

“The power box is in the small utility room, just off the kitchen. You can see how damaged it was.”

Whitley led them through and then stepped out of the way so that Nina and Daniel could take a look. He wasn't joking. The power box was trashed. Blackened wires, and a sooty residue in the box itself, showed her that this had been serious sabotage. The killer had known what he was doing, and had effectively destroyed the box.

“That could have started a fire,” she said.

“It could have. Maybe he didn’t care,” Daniel suggested.

The sight was disturbing. The entire scenario was chilling. Right now, having a killer invade a victim's private space felt uncomfortably personal to Nina. She'd gone into a woman's home herself, just yesterday. She had also lurked around in there, unwanted and unseen. That mission had made it all the more evident to her how easy it was to do such a thing. With basic lock-picking skills, she'd been able to get where she needed to.

People grew careless. There was a sense that your home was safe. She felt that way when she got inside. She had to remind herself firmly that right now, nowhere could be counted as safe.

“Tell me,” she said, “who was Dr. Cleaver counseling? Who had she counseled recently? Did she work on her own, did she have a partner, an assistant?”

“She had an assistant, Kaylee Morrison. We interviewed Kaylee twice so far. She’s been – well, I guess she’s been reasonably helpful. She’s scared, too.”

Nina nodded. That, she could understand.

“She has been hesitant about giving us patient details. We’re treating her as a project in progress,” Whitley explained.

Nina could imagine that the assistant was scared, but now, she was wondering if there was more to it. That was a source she might have success with, if the assistant felt more comfortable speaking to another woman.

Then again, Daniel also had a surprisingly charming manner about him. Nina remembered many times when she’d hit a dead end, despite throwing herself repeatedly at it, and Daniel had sauntered in with that easy way about him, and that relaxed demeanor, and gotten results.

“Are you able to track down any previous patients from your own research or the psychiatric hospital records?”

“There are a couple who’ve been released from the psychiatric hospital, and we’re in the process of tracking them,” Whitley said, with a note of doubt in his voice. “As far as the prisoners go, one reoffended and is back in jail, and one we haven’t been able to locate yet. This hasn’t gone as fast or as smoothly as we would have liked, which is another reason we’ll be glad of your help.”

This was sounding like a wide field. Suddenly, that suitcase of clothes that Nina had packed for two days was looking like it might not be enough. Several of these suspects might be difficult to track down and even more difficult to question.

Still, there might be progress that they could make in another direction. She glanced at Whitley.

“Can we see the photos of the scene now?”

“You want to go upstairs and view them there?”

Nina didn't want to do that, any more than she wanted to stare at the destroyed power box, and imagine how Emily must have felt as her home was plunged into darkness. But it was important. She wanted to get a sense of the space. A picture of what had played out that was based on real life, not just on flat images.

“Let’s go and have a look,” she said, keeping her voice coolly professional. She guessed that Daniel sensed how she felt right now, because he gave her a concerned glance as they headed back into the entrance hall, and up the narrow stairway that led to the second floor.

It was shadowy up here. The blinds must have been closed against the weather, Nina thought. The bedroom was ahead – and from a glance, it looked tidy and ordered.

And there, on the left, was the study where she’d been overpowered, and where a lethal dose of sedative had been plunged into her body.

The place was tidy, and narrow but long, with the desk and chair inside, at the back of the room. The window was behind the desk, and she saw the blinds were closed. No way of opening those thick blinds easily. It must have been pitch dark in there when the power was out. Emily would have been effectively trapped there when the killer walked up the stairs.

The small study was strangely impersonal – in fact, the whole house was lacking in personal items. Nina wondered if Emily had lived a rigorously ordered and strangely joyless life. That was the impression she got. There were no photographs displayed, few ornaments, no memorabilia from travels. It was like a hotel room, in a way. Maybe that order was a coping mechanism that Emily had decided on to deal with the brutal toughness of her work. Maybe it had caused her to retreat all the way inside herself.

No sign of anything apart from the fingerprint smears, and a few crime scene markers that were still set out and hadn’t been removed.

“I can show you the photos now?” Whitley offered.

Now seemed like a good time to see them, with the scene in front of them. Whitley got out his iPad, and scrolled through, his face intent.

“Here we go.”

She was lying face down, sprawled onto the floor with one hand stretched out in front of her. Still in what must have been her work clothes. Nina guessed the killer must have injected straight through the fabric to reach her thigh.

Why this MO, she puzzled again. What was the killer thinking when he prepared the hypodermic and depressed the plunger? And yet, despite all that careful preparation beforehand, he hadn’t posed her body afterward, or damaged her, or seemingly even touched her once she’d fallen.

Looking at the collapsed body that had lain right here in the office, Nina felt a sense of pity suffuse her.

“There are a few wider shots,” he said. “No sign of a struggle. Given that she worked with a lot of psychiatric patients, her instinct and training might have been to keep still.”

Nina nodded, agreeing with that insight, while taking in the wider shots.

These showed Emily’s laptop open, although the screen was dead and blank. And a card, whitish, that looked about the size of a postcard.

“What’s that?” Nina asked, pointing.

Whitley shrugged. “We don’t know. It was next to the laptop, half on the keyboard, half on the desk.”

“It looks blank? Is there writing on the other side?” Nina asked.

Whitley glanced at her curiously, as if wondering why she was so preoccupied with this item.

“No. Like you said, it was blank.”

“Why would she carry a blank card around with her?” Nina asked.

The detective shrugged, his face perplexed. “We fingerprinted it. There was nothing on it. No trace. No prints, apart from hers, at the corner.”

“And that’s strange, right there,” Nina said.

“Are you wondering if it’s a signature?” the detective said.

On Nina’s wavelength, it was Daniel who answered. “Yes, there’s a chance of it. Anything odd, at a scene, should always be considered.”

“Has it been examined in any way? Under different lights?” Nina asked.

“Not so far,” Whitley said.

“Can we do that? It might lead us nowhere, but at least it rules it out,” Nina said.

“I’ll do it.”

There was an element of uncertainty in his tone, though. Nina wasn’t sure why.

“Is there a problem with it?” she asked. A short silence followed.

The small room felt suddenly oppressive to her.

“Shall we talk about this downstairs?” she asked.

It seemed that the others had been feeling the same way, because both Daniel and Whitley nodded immediately.

They turned and filed out of the small office, with its strangely sad and claustrophobic feel, and headed down the stairs. Complicated? What exactly did that mean, Nina wondered as they walked.

In the entrance hall, where Nina could now pick up the faint, fresh scent of rain, she turned to face Whitley again.

“Whatever this is,” Nina said, “you’re going to have to tell us sooner or later. I understand that there are complications. There’s obviously a reason why we met in a coffee shop, and why we’re here, talking to you at the crime scene, in an off the record way.”

With a sigh, Whitley turned to them, delivering the bombshell that Nina knew she’d instinctively been waiting for.

“It’s my boss, the area chief, Menzies. He heard whispers that we were going to ask for help, and he shut it down big time. It left us in an awkward situation, because we’d already talked to a few other stakeholders, and we’d reached out to Agent Kevin Saunders. But the chief doesn’t want the FBI involved. He’s got issues with the agency, I don’t know why. He’s already threatened me that if I go against any of the protocols he’s put in place, I’ll be in trouble or even face a disciplinary, for disobeying orders.”

CHAPTER SIX

Nina stared at Whitley in surprise. Having pushback from the local police wasn't unusual. It happened from time to time. Some police didn't take well to having the FBI intervene. But this was different because they weren't taking over the case. They were simply offering help to assist in an unofficial way in this complex situation. How could anyone resent that?

Still, it now added yet another layer of complication to the case. There must be a reason why Menzies resented the FBI's intervention. Either the area chief had an ego, or else he'd had a bad experience in the past. Either was possible. It could be that sometime in his history, the FBI had taken over in an officious way, belittled the local police, behaved antagonistically. Nina didn't personally know any field agent in the Seattle office who'd behave in that toxic way, but the history might go further back.

Bad apples could occur on both sides.

“What’s the exact situation?” she asked. Whatever it was, this wasn’t a sustainable state of affairs. Somehow, they were going to have to reconcile the reluctant chief with the fact they were here.

Whitley sighed. “It’s complicated,” he said. “We’d committed to asking you, and had approached Kevin Saunders, when Menzies heard about it, and gave it a firm no. My partner and I argued against it, and things started getting – well, heated. We felt that it would be wrong to cancel, and that we were fortunate to be able to get help on a level that we needed, and that it would be better for you to arrive, and then for us to meet with the chief together and set out our strategy, that you help on an unofficial basis and the police remain in charge?”

“That sounds like the best approach,” Nina said, although she knew that they were coming into a complicated situation with the potential to worsen it.

She glanced at Daniel, who nodded, his face serious. "I can't imagine that he'd object under those circumstances, surely?"

Whitley shrugged. “The area chief’s a good man, but he’s set in his ways and he finds it difficult to change his mind. I’m not as sure as you are – but let’s try. I’ve already asked him if I can meet with him today. He’s out now, in one of the other police stations. He said he’d be able to make seven p.m.”

It was already five p.m. Nina hadn’t even noticed the sound of traffic outside. Suburban Miller’s Ridge really was peaceful and quiet.

“In the meantime, can we get to work?” she said. Surely there was no harm in them accompanying Whitley while he investigated?

“I’m happy to do that. Where shall we start?” he asked.

“I’d like to speak to the neighbors,” she said. “Has that been done yet?”

“We spoke to two sets of neighbors, in the houses across the road,” Whitley said. “We haven’t interviewed the others yet, because they weren’t at home when we came knocking.”

The rain had turned to a heavy mist as the afternoon darkened. Looking over to the house on the left, and the house behind Emily’s residence, Nina saw lights were on in both sets of windows.

“We could do that now,” she suggested.

Whitley looked surprised. “Okay,” he said. “Let’s go do it.”

Nina felt relieved to step out of the house, inhaling the fresh, cool air, feeling as if she was breathing out bad memories, and escaping an environment that had felt more depressing than it should have.

Whitley was consulting his notes, scrolling through his iPad.

“The neighbors on the left are called Mrs. and Mrs. George,” he said. “Shall we go knock?”

Letting him lead the way, Nina followed behind, her mind racing as she thought about the complexities and challenges of what they’d become involved in.

Whitley knocked on the door, and a few moments later, after the sound of the television was muted, Nina heard tentative footsteps approach.

“Who’s there?” a woman called.

“Detective Whitley, ma’am,” he replied in a loud, clear voice, holding his ID up to the door’s peephole.

After a minute, Nina heard the sound of a deadbolt sliding back, and the door opened.

A well made up woman with platinum hair looked out at them, the collar of her smart work top visible from beneath the neckline of a comfortable sweater. Her eyebrows rose as she took in the fact that three people were standing outside. Seeing Nina there appeared to reassure her. The presence of another female caused her tense expression to ease.

“It’s in connection with the murder next door,” Whitley said. “Are you Mrs. George?”

"I am. Do you want to speak to me? But I barely knew Emily," the woman protested, clearly horrified by the thought of the police entering her home.

“We’re looking for any background information, ma’am, and this is something we need to do. Would now be a good time to chat to you?”

“My husband isn’t home yet,” she said, but Nina could see that she wasn’t going to refuse. Sure enough, with a sigh, she capitulated. “I suppose you can come in.”

The sound of the television had started up again, but it wasn't coming from the living room where she led the three of them. Nina thought it was coming from upstairs and that a couple of teens were watching it there.

The living room was far untidier than the pristine neatness of Emily’s place. This was a lived-in room, with a half eaten bowl of cereal on the coffee table which drew a horrified glance from Mrs. Cleveland, who grabbed it up and, after a dithering moment of holding it her hand, placed it on the dining room table beyond.

They all sat down, Nina and Daniel on a black leather couch with squashy, comfortable cushions, the detective on an armchair, and Mrs. George on the other couch.

“These are Agents Veil and Grant, who are offering advice on the case.” Whitley introduced them quickly, before moving on. “Ma’am, were you at home on the night of the crime, Monday night?”

“Yes, I was home. We were all home from about six-thirty. The kids, my husband and I,” she said.

“Did any of you see or hear anything unusual?”

She shook her head. “We did the same as we do most evenings. Dinner upstairs, in front of the TV. We didn’t see or hear anything unusual. Nothing at all. It was a normal evening. When I heard that there’d been a murder committed next door, I was utterly shocked. I couldn’t believe it. This is not the kind of thing that happens here. It’s a safe neighborhood.” Her voice dropped. “My husband and I were very fearful until we heard that she – well, that she’d worked with some disturbed patients in the course of her job. Then, we realized that it must have been one of them, targeting her. It’s the only thing that makes sense, isn’t it?”

Whitley didn’t answer, simply nodded.

Nina leaned forward, meeting the woman’s gaze. “Did you speak to Dr. Emily Cleaver at all recently, even in passing?” she asked.

“We used to greet each other if we saw each other. We moved here at about the same time, I think, a few years ago, and we had a couple of conversations about the area, why we’d chosen it. But she never reached out to us, wanting to be friendly, and to be honest, we didn’t either. I sensed that she didn’t want friendship. Maybe I was totally wrong.”

She shook her head, uncertainty and regret now visible in her eyes.

“Have you noticed anything unusual in the neighborhood in the past couple of weeks? Any vehicles that you’ve wondered about, any strangers around?” Daniel asked.

Again, Mrs. George shook her head. “We’ve all been busy. We did discuss that yesterday, but we couldn’t think of anything. The kids have been at school, I work, my husband works even crazier hours.”

Nina nodded. This neighbor was being as helpful as she could be, but she just didn’t know.

Thanking her, they stood up and headed out.

Deciding to strike while the iron was hot, they headed straight to the home behind Emily's. Whitley headed up to the door and knocked, and they waited. After about a minute, a high-pitched voice from behind the door said, "Who's there?"

“Police, ma’am,” Whitley called back. Consulting his notes, he added, “Are you Mrs. Trevor?”

The door was opened cautiously. To Nina’s surprise, the woman who was revealed in the small gap looked to be in her seventies, wearing a blue jacket, a pair of tracksuit pants, and a suspicious expression below her short, gray hair.

She sounded way younger than she looked. That piping voice had made Nina think of a woman in her early twenties.

“Detective Whitley, and agents Veil and Grant,” Whitley said. “We’re here to ask a few questions in connection with the crime next door.”

Mrs. Trevor nodded. “Come in,” she said reluctantly. “Mind the cats. Don’t let them out.”

With extreme care, they all sidled through the half open door, under the watchful gaze of a long haired ginger cat who'd positioned himself on the hall table. He was assisted by a shorter-haired, gray cat with lamp-like eyes, who was staring at the police from the shelter of a bookshelf.

Closing the door firmly, Mrs. Trevor led the way into the living room. This was equipped with floral couches, antique tables, and a plethora of photos, treasures, ornaments and collectibles. The side tables were crammed with so many framed family photos that they’d have to be moved to make space for a cup or glass. There was a photo wall above the mantelpiece, which was cluttered with a medley of different items – a small trophy, a porcelain shepherdess, a clock whose hands had stopped at quarter to twelve, a few birthday cards, and a giraffe and zebra made from wire and beads.

In terms of its décor and atmosphere, it was the polar opposite of Emily’s house, and looking at this friendly clutter reinforced to Nina how sterile Emily’s environment had been.

“Have you found the killer yet?” Mrs. Trevor asked, as they sat down.

“The case is a top priority, and we’re assigning all resources to it,” Whitley replied.

“It’s very disturbing.” Mrs. Trevor glared at him in a way that implied she was holding him personally responsible for the lack of progress so far. Maybe she should come to the meeting with the chief, Nina thought. That implacable stare demanded answers. One of the cats jumped onto the arm of the chair where she was sitting, fixing Nina with an equally accusing gaze.

“It is disturbing, ma’am. What we’d like to know first is whether you were home on the night of the crime?” Whitley asked.

“I was home, yes. I was on a video call with one of my daughters in Australia. I got on the phone to her after dinner. That’s late morning her time, of course. We had a nice long chat. I never dreamed that there was anything wrong, although I did mention to her that I saw someone outside, running through the rain.”

“You did?” Whitley asked. Nina’s focus sharpened. Had this woman seen the killer, most likely fleeing the scene? “Can you describe this person?”

She shook her head. “I only caught a glimpse. It was definitely a man, and he was solid looking and hunched over. Not especially tall, I don’t think, average height perhaps. Wearing a big gray rain jacket that covered his head and shoulders. That's all I saw of him. I only noticed him because he passed under one of the street lamps, and I happened to glance out of the window so that I could tell Jackie what the weather was like."

“Do you know what time that was?” Nina asked.

“A few minutes after eight, I guess.”

“And this man was unfamiliar?”

“It’s difficult to say that, since he was covered in a rain jacket,” Mrs. Trevor admitted. “Like I told you, I didn’t see much of him.”

All the same, the elderly lady had noticed something that could be helpful. Knowing which way the killer had fled after the crime might allow them to ask other neighbors along the route, or source camera footage from nearby streets.

“So, he ran past your upstairs window in that direction?” Whitley pointed, confirming the facts, and Mrs. Trevor nodded.

“Do you remember anything else about him?” Daniel asked, but she shook her head.

“How well did you know the victim, Dr. Cleaver?” Nina asked.

“Not well. She was very busy. Worked long hours, and she often used to sit upstairs. I’d see her sometimes, working there, although she usually closed the blinds.”

The neighbor had been observant, and Nina saw now that Emily had been a person of habit, and that if the killer had waited and watched, he could easily have predicted where she would be.

“And did you notice anything unusual over the past few days?” Nina asked.

Mrs. Trevor thought about that, her lips pressed together, but then shook her head in regret.

“I wish I had. But I didn’t. I wasn’t expecting anything to be wrong, and what with the days of bad weather we’ve had, I think most people did what I did, and shut themselves away inside.”

Nina nodded, and they thanked Mrs. Trevor, and stood up.

As soon as they’d walked outside, Whitley checked his watch.

“We’ve got twenty minutes until the meeting time,” he said. “Shall we head back to the police station? While we wait, you could have a look at that card you were interested in, the one found on the victim’s laptop, Agent Veil.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

Nina walked into the police station through the staff entrance at the back, feeling awkward, knowing that the chief was so opposed to the FBI’s involvement. She had no idea how the next half-hour would play out. Whitley’s worried glance around the empty back office confirmed to her that this meeting was going to be a problem.

The office was fairly neat, with a few desks set in the corners, a couple of filing cabinets, a bookshelf, and a coffee machine near the far door. There were a couple of empty cups on the tray. One of the desks had a chair pushed away, and a folder still open, so Nina guessed that someone had rushed out, and intended to come back to work later tonight.

Whitley headed over to one of the neater desks. A pile of folders in the in-tray showed Nina that his workload was substantial. A photo of a smiling blond woman, with a black Labrador on a leash, gave her a hint about his family life.

"The items in the study are all in the evidence room. The laptop itself has been taken by forensics," Whitley told her, taking the topmost file off his desk, and then bringing another chair over so that both she and Daniel could sit opposite him. "They're opening it and are going to see what's on it."

“And Emily’s phone?” Daniel asked.

“That’s also with forensics. It wasn’t on the scene, but was downstairs. They reckon both those devices might be ready by tomorrow.”

He turned the case file in their direction, and then he headed over to a cabinet. He rummaged through it and took out a key.

“I’ll go and get that card from the evidence room so long,” he said.

While he was gone, Nina looked through the case notes. She was on the lookout for anything that had been missed or overlooked, making sure that processes had been correctly followed.

Looking through the notes, she saw that the police had done a good job. What was there had been thoroughly researched. The questions that Whitley had asked were the same ones she would have asked, too, if she’d been first on the scene. The scene had been well handled. Time of death ascertained, forensics well coordinated, and the postmortem details had been added to the file as of yesterday.

Nina took a look at them, carefully reading what the pathologist had observed.

The victim had died within minutes, he had estimated, after injection of a massive dose of sedative.

“Interesting,” she murmured to Daniel. “He states here some additional facts on the drugging process as he guesses it happened. It’s not quite what we first thought.” There had been some crossed wires, for sure.

“What does he say?”

“He estimates that the first injection, a large dose of sedative, was given intramuscularly. That would have caused deep drowsiness, possibly unconsciousness, within a few seconds, but it wouldn’t have killed.”

Daniel nodded. “I was wondering about that. I thought it would have taken an excessive dose of intramuscular sedative to have killed.”

"He used that to overpower her. Then, the pathologist found another needle mark near her elbow. His guess is that a second dose was then administered intravenously after she was out. That would have stopped her heart almost instantaneously. Time of death around eight to ten p.m.”

Niina shivered as she spoke the words, thinking of the methodical, cold-minded approach it would have taken to have plunged the needle into a muscle, any muscle, in the darkness – possibly with infrared goggles – to overpower Emily. And then, calmly and with time to spare, the killer had injected the second, lethal dose into a vein.

Did he want to distance himself from their deaths, making it the fault of the drugs and not his fault, she wondered. Or was there another, more personal reason why he’d chosen this MO?

“So he was as cold as ice,” Daniel observed, as Nina nodded.

“As cold as ice,” she agreed, shaking her head as she considered what it would have taken. Then, leaving no trace behind him, he’d packed up and headed out and left his victim where she had fallen.

But what else had he left?

Maybe nothing. But, especially if he had originally been a psychiatric patient in the criminal system, Nina was wondering if he might have wanted to leave a message – to the police or to the world – referring to what he’d done. And the only answer seemed to lie in that strange, blank card.

Whitley’s footsteps sounded down the corridor.

He was looking stressed as he headed back into the office.

“Menzies is on his way. He’s running late,” he said. He didn’t sound as if he was looking forward to the confrontation. “And in the meantime, this is the card.”

He held out the evidence bag, and Nina took it, looking carefully at the card through the plastic. It did look like an undeveloped photograph. It was the right size and the right type of card, with that faint gloss to it.

She turned it one way and then the other, then took it out of the bag, holding it carefully by the corners.

Was that something? As the card moved from the light of the window to the shadow of the room, she wondered if she'd caught a glimpse of something on it.

“Do you have an ultraviolet light?” she asked. “Because I’m wondering if there’s something written on here, maybe in invisible ink?”

“We do have a UV light in the office next to the evidence room,” Whitley said.

“Let’s put this card under it, just to see,” Nina suggested.

With a nod, Whitley turned back the way he’d come, this time with Nina and Daniel following him. It wasn’t a long walk from one end to the other of this small, suburban police station. He turned right, unlocked a door, and then, opened another a few yards further on that led to a tiny office, about the size of Emily’s compact study.

He fumbled briefly with a switch on the wall, and then, the intense, purple light flooded the room.

Nina took the card out of the evidence bag again, and turned it over, so that it was shiny side up.

Her eyes widened. From beside her, she heard Daniel and Whitley both gasp.

Whatever she’d expected, it wasn’t this. She’d thought the most she would get would be a scrawl, a pattern, a meaningless jumble from which she would fight to extricate sense and meaning.

But this was a message, written in a purposefully neat hand, centered on the card in capital letters, the writing looking dark purple on the gleaming background.

“SHADOWS HIDE THE TRUTH”.

Nina stared at the words, feeling shivers chase up and down her spine.

"Shadows hide the truth?" In incredulous tones, Daniel read the words aloud as Nina thought about their relevance in that darkened room.

Maybe the killer hadn’t just sabotaged the power box so that he could get to Emily unobserved. The darkness might have been part of the message, giving a clue to the twisted reason for his actions.

He’d plunged her into darkness intentionally, although Nina still didn’t know why. What was the truth – his truth, at any rate. She knew it was unlikely to resemble the real truth of the situation.

“It’s the reason for the crime.”

Nina looked at Whitfield as he snapped off the light again, hiding the card’s message.

“It is, but what does it point to? A psychiatric patient?”

“You said you were tracking down the people that Emily had treated, who’d been released from the psychiatric hospital?”

“Yes, we are. I don’t know if you got that far in the case file. That information is right at the back,” Whitley said.

“We need to look into it urgently,” Nina said. “Both the patients who were released from the psychiatric hospital, and also from the prison.”

“Here’s another thought,” Daniel said. “Have there been any escapees that Emily was treating in the past? Because it could be that somebody is trying to erase what she uncovered in them.”

“Escapees? I don’t think so. But I’ll check that. I’ll check it. I’ve already been on the phone to the prison, and the psychiatric hospital, today. Everyone’s anxious to know what’s going on, and they all want answers. Maybe they can look back in their records. This could be older, couldn’t it? Emily has been working with the prisons a long time. At least ten years.”

The evidence of this strange, stark, neat message had clearly disturbed Whitley. And, as they filed out of the room, his shoulders tensed again as he heard a voice from down the corridor. Loud, authoritative, and with an angry note in it.

“Whitley? Where are you, and what’s going on? I understand you’ve got unauthorized personnel assisting here.”

With a twist of her stomach, Nina knew that Menzies had arrived.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Nina heard Whitley give a soft, but heartfelt, curse, as he turned in the direction of the voice. He squared his shoulders as he strode down the passage, with Nina and Daniel following closely.

“Menzies? We need to have a discussion.”

Reaching the lobby, Nina saw Menzies standing near the front desk. He was a broad faced man, with a neatly cropped head of graying hair, a matching mustache, and a slight paunch that stretched out the front of his uniform. His arms were folded in front of him, and when he saw the three approach, his eyes narrowed.

“What’s the meaning of this?” he asked. His voice was deep and gravely.

“We need to talk about this, sir," Whitley said again. "We have an opportunity. The Seattle FBI office agreed to make two agents available to us. They're here now and are willing to help assess the case and offer their advice. They've already –"

Nina guessed that in his gabbled explanation about the FBI being onsite, Whitley had planned to say that they’d already helped to unlock a piece of evidence, in the form of the card.

But he didn’t get a chance.

Furiously, Menzies interjected, his face flushing a deep red.

“It seems to me as if my direct orders have been defied,” he snapped out.

"Sir, this was prearranged before you said you didn't want them on site. Agent Saunders had already deployed these two agents. They're here now, they're willing to help. Not to take the case over, but just to offer help. Don't you think this is something we should consider? Agent Grant and Veil have already –"

Watching as Menzies’ thick brows drew even closer together, Nina could already tell what the answer was going to be. Yet again, poor Whitley didn’t get a chance to finish what he wanted to say.

“Listen here, Whitley,” his boss said, “when you receive a direct order from me, that’s what it is. An order. This is a sensitive case.”

Nina had to admit that she thought it was extremely bad form of Menzies to have this conversation within earshot of the officer at the desk, and whatever members of the public might walk in. Regardless of what was being decided, the correct place for a discussion like this was in a private office and not out in the police station's lobby. Especially if it was, as he'd just pointed out, a sensitive case.

“Sir, we need all the help we can get. The agents have already made a breakthrough.”

Menzies turned to Nina and Daniel, shaking his head.

“Agents, I’m sorry for the misunderstanding. My apologies for wasting your time. This case is remaining under the control of the Miller’s Ridge police department, and we don’t need any outside assistance. We’ve had a bad experience with the FBI interfering in the past. In fact, I believe we had a case go cold specifically because we had outside interference, and it led to a power struggle, agents and their egos butting in, and in the end, there was no conclusion to it. I promised myself that it wouldn’t happen again. And it won’t. Not on my watch,” he said firmly, removing his glare from Nina and Daniel, and transferring it to Whitley again.

“But sir –”

“Whitley, I’ll speak to you tomorrow morning. You can consider this an official warning for now. Agents, you’re not needed. No disrespect, but I suggest you make plans to return to Seattle as soon as you’re able to.”

No disrespect? Watching the officer in astonishment as he turned and strode out, Nina was wondering how he could possibly have shown more disrespect.

As the chief marched out, the officer at the desk quickly ducked his head, pretending to be busy with some paperwork, to avoid the embarrassment of having witnessed this public telling-off.

“I’m so sorry about this,” Whitley mumbled. His face was red.

“Shall we talk back there?” Nina turned, heading to the back office, not wanting any more of this soap opera to be shared by anyone except themselves.

She strode down the corridor, stopping when she got to the privacy of the office, turning, and heaving a sigh.

“Whitley, I appreciate that you asked for help. I believe help is needed. But in the circumstances, it’s going to be impossible to offer it to you.”

She stared from the detective, who looked crestfallen, to Daniel, who was frowning in a troubled way.

“Nina’s right,” Daniel said. “There’s no way we can intervene. Not when your boss is so determined to keep this case exclusive to the police department.”

Shaking his head, Whitley spoke in unsteady tones.

"I can't believe how that went down. I knew he'd be obstructive, but I thought if you were here already and prepared to help out, it would be a better outcome. I'm so sorry. I feel as if I've misrepresented myself and this case to you and to Agent Saunders. My team and I agreed on it. We had no clue that our decision would be overridden this way."

“I’m sorry, too,” Nina sympathized. With a dragon like Menzies in charge – although maybe he was more of a dinosaur – she didn’t see any future in which they’d be able to help. “Kevin was very keen for us to help you. He holds you in high regard. But maybe there are other circumstances that might affect our involvement.”

She had no idea what they might be, but the chief had sounded adamant.

“I don’t see that there are,” Whitley said, shaking his head. “I wanted the best outcome for the case. I had no idea there was historic bad blood with the FBI. How can the chief know about that, but not us?”

Daniel shook his head. “Could be an old investigation that was undercover, or sealed for some reason.”

“Unfortunately, that kind of conflict can compromise the situation,” Nina said. It was no surprise to her. She’d seen it in the past. Never as much of a game changer as this particular instance, but it had proven to be a stumbling block. Despite her memory gaps, she had at least one similar argument with a police officer clearly in her mind, after the FBI had kindly arrived to help out.

“I feel it’s the wrong decision, and I’m angry about it,” Whitley insisted.

Nina nodded sympathetically. “Probably, it is the wrong decision. I can ask Kevin for his advice. He’s the one who wanted us on board to help. We could ask him if he’d be willing to speak to your chief directly.”

It was a possibility that she didn’t hold out much hope for, given how adversarial Menzies had already proven to be. But it was the most they could do to resolve the situation.

“Let’s sleep on it, and ask Kevin to do that in the morning. If Menzies agrees, we stay,” Daniel said. “And if not, at least you’ve got more than you had. You’re on the right track. You’ll get there.”

Whitley shook his head, grimacing, clearly feeling very differently.

"I feel we're stalled and that we need help. This is not the type of crime we're used to dealing with here," he emphasized.

“We’ll have to see what tomorrow brings,” Nina agreed.

She couldn’t help feeling a sense of defeat as she headed out. They’d come here geared up to help after a serious crime had been committed. And they were being prevented from doing it.

Nina didn't want to say anything more as she and Daniel headed out after shaking hands with Whitley. But her biggest worry was that this killer, now on the loose, might not stop at one.

CHAPTER NINE

Everyone had their secrets. That was the thought at the top of Daniel's mind as he and Nina headed out of the police station. Everyone had their secrets. The chief of police clearly did. Emily Cleaver must have done. And the killer wanted his or her secrets to die along with her, forever hidden in the shadows.

Daniel had secrets, too. He didn’t want to, but right now, he was forced to.

He had secrets he was keeping from Nina, although he didn’t know how long that would be possible for.

"Shall we go find someplace to eat?" he asked her as they headed to the car. With a wry grin, trying to cheer the situation, he added, "Let's pretend this is a vacation."

His light tone concealed his grim depression that they hadn’t been able to help. It was frustrating and worrying. He wondered if the chief of police fully understood the complexity of the situation. What did he know that Whitley didn’t?

“I guess we must. An overnight vacation in this peaceful town, with a side order of light investigation, and a telling-off just for added atmosphere,” Nina added.

Her tone told Daniel that she, too, was trying to make the best of things. But he knew she was mad. Nina didn’t like being told no. That was a strong personality quirk she had. More than that, though, she hated it when she was unable to help out after a violent, criminal act had been committed.

Daniel could sense the frustration in her. He, too, was deeply frustrated by the outcome.

They headed out of the police station, climbed into the car, and Daniel drove down the road. On the drive there, Nina had booked them into the most central hotel, a large, generic but well-equipped hotel just off the town's main street. Now, he drove there, and they took their bags out of the car and headed inside.

They’d booked one room, and as they checked in and took their bag upstairs, Daniel felt a flash of relief, and more than that – of joy – that this aspect of their lives was working out.

He knew that nothing was forever, and that they had a turbulent history as lovers, that might end up repeating itself as old memories emerged. But for now, the way he and Nina were together – it was like he’d dreamed of it being in the old days. It was ninety percent good days, and only a few times when they misunderstood each other, and when Nina’s tempestuousness, or Daniel’s stubbornness, resulted in a few seething hours where they didn’t speak to each other.

He could live with that. Especially seeing they were both working on it.

Now, Daniel carried both their bags up the flight of stairs to the second floor where their room was located. Despite Nina’s protests.

“I can take my bag,” she said.

“You,” he reminded her, “have a broken shoulder blade.”

"Fractured," she argued. "And the six-week rest period is almost up."

“Four and a half weeks is nowhere near six weeks,” Daniel countered, with a flash of amusement at Nina’s conveniently hazy math ability. “Plus, a couple of days ago, you went without your sling for a while. Are you really telling me your arm felt better after that?”

She stared at him mutinously, her slender face defiant, a stray lock of pale blond hair making her look like a fallen angel as it waved over her cheek. Then, she sighed.

“Okay. Thank you.”

They headed up, into the room, which had enough height to have a view over the town, onto the rolling farmland beyond. Pretty, Daniel thought. It was like a vacation town.

They took their jackets – Daniel took his trusty black leather jacket, while Nina took her deep red coat with the fake fur collar. Rain wasn’t expected again until tomorrow, but the air was cold and the wind strong.

They headed out, crossing the street, to the node of restaurants on the next corner. The air was very fresh. He moved closer to Nina, walking in step with her. Their hands clasped, her fingers warm in his.

“Burgers, steak, seafood, Indian?” Daniel had a question in his voice as he went over the possibilities. He knew already which one she’d pick.

“Indian. Has to be, doesn’t it?” she asked.

“I reckon you’re right.” She was the more adventurous eater of the two of them, the one who always tried the new place, the new type of cuisine, who pushed the boundaries. And they both had a love for hot food.

They headed into the spice-scented interior of the Curry Den. It was decorated sumptuously, in red and bronze and bright blue, the place warm and cave-like, the maître d’s smile welcoming.

“Please, sit. We have one table left. Just one.”

The place was busy. Daniel couldn’t help glancing around in a suspicious way, just in case area chief Menzies had also decided tonight was curry night. But there was no sign of him, and Daniel felt a sense of relief as he headed to the table at the back.

Secrets. They were on his mind again. He wanted to send the text he needed to and preferably do it without Nina noticing.

They had a look at the wine list, and she ordered a fine Chardonnay. While she took a look at the menu, Daniel opened his own, and discreetly sent the text he needed to from behind its leather-bound cover.

“All okay there?”

He kept his phone on the table, ready for when the answer came in. In the meantime, he also scanned the menu, seeing that the place did some Thai cuisine as well as Indian.

His phone buzzed again, luckily just as the waiter was bringing the bottle of wine and pouring some for Nina to taste. Again, Daniel was able to discreetly glance down at the screen.

“I haven’t been past yet.”

If Nina knew what he was doing, she might be mad at him. Or she might tell him to stop. He didn’t want her to be mad at him, and he definitely did not want her to tell him to stop what he was doing. Not when he considered it important right now. So although he didn’t like having secrets from her, right now this was a necessary evil.

It wasn’t like he was cheating on her, or spending money from a joint bank account, or any of the many things that Daniel knew they would both consider unacceptable.

But he was checking up on her because after her outing to Wyoming, he was worried. He couldn't dislodge the nugget of concern in his mind that this was one step too far, and that Terence Thorpe was going to join the dots, and that the outcome would be violent and damaging and possibly even deadly.

So he’d asked a friend of his, in the local police, to do a drive by and a walk around, and check that Nina’s apartment was all okay, and that there was nobody suspicious lurking around. He knew she had security there. Cameras in the lobby, and a guard. But guards took breaks, and cameras could by bypassed, and when he thought of this man Thorpe destroying her, just like he’d destroyed her father, the sense of fear in Daniel felt so huge it threatened to choke him.

He didn’t want her to know that he was doing this, because when he’d hinted at getting her additional security the other day, she’d shot him down in flames, saying that she was safe enough and there was no need for anything extra. He thought her words were a symptom of denial, and it was better to be safe.

He didn't know if Nina hadn't seen the text exchange. Maybe she had seen it. Was she looking at him quizzically as the waiter poured his wine in turn? Hurriedly, hoping to distract her, Daniel said, "Food. What shall we order?"

Paging through his menu, they discussed the choices.

“We could order a few things to share?” Nina suggested.

“I think that’s a great idea. As long as the selection includes lamb samosas. They’re my pick.”

“I’m leaning toward the prawn breyani. And we could also have the channa masala.”

“That’s the chickpea dish with tomato?”

“Yes. That’s the one.”

“What is it with you and these strange vegetarian dishes?” he teased.

“There’s nothing strange about a chickpea, other than you’re naturally suspicious of it, since it’s a vegetable,” she teased back. “Now, if you’d learned to eat up your veg when you were a kid, this wouldn’t be an issue.”

“I was the postcard boy for beef burgers, ham sandwiches, and zero nutrition outside of that,” he admitted. “It’s a miracle I achieved adulthood, really. I once kept an apple in my schoolbag for three solid months without eating it. Luckily, we went on a school trip to a farm, and I was able to feed it to the pig.”

“You’re never too old to learn, hopefully.” Nina’s hand caressed his and he felt a rush of emotion so powerful that it threatened to overwhelm him. This was love, this stupid banter, this holding of hands, seeing the look in her eyes, and knowing that the same soppy, doting look was in his own.

Then his phone buzzed again.

It broke the moment. Maybe she felt his inadvertent tension. At any rate, she looked away, her gaze moving from his, and the waiter, seeing the moment, hurried over to take their order.

That gave Daniel the chance to check his phone again, glancing down, and feeling his blood pressure rise as he read the message there.

"Not happy about security. I see the camera is broken. Not currently up in position in the lobby."

The camera broken?

Daniel’s stomach twisted, hard, as he feared what this might mean. It might be nothing, a simple case of equipment failing, or else, it might be a precursor to something planned.

Please, be safe, he prayed, looking again at Nina. Please, be safe.

Because with this case now on the rocks, and their help rejected, they’d be heading home tomorrow – and into danger again.

CHAPTER TEN

She’d been a good person. As he dug the hole, the spade slicing easily through the wet ground, the killer had time to reflect on his actions, and their consequences.

It was pitch dark, but he wasn’t wearing the goggles that he’d bought. They were hidden away right now. He wouldn’t be dumb enough to bring them out to the woods in the evening, after this had happened and the police resources, though meager and inadequate, were on high alert.

Nope, he was now a different person, an innocent person, who’d taken a casual walk through the woods before detouring to pick up the spade that he’d left here, deep in the undergrowth, a few days ago. He’d thought of everything, including how to dispose of the incriminating evidence, and this was part of his plan.

It was time to dig, to bury, to cover up. And it was also a time for sad reflection. Genuinely sad, he thought, as the muddy soil spattered down onto his boots. He wasn’t a psychopath, in fact, he was the opposite. He was a kind, caring and good man. That was why committing this murder – and he acknowledged it was murder – had been very hard.

Emily Cleaver had been a heroine, in her way, and by his own actions, he’d brought down an icon of the therapy profession, a brave woman, who’d gone out of her way to help others, and who’d carried her own burden of sadness and regret.

The killer acknowledged the truth because there was no reason to evade it. Emily Cleaver had done a lot of good in the world, and he felt a sense of bitter regret that things had to be this way.

Since he’d researched her carefully, and meticulously, he had gained an in-depth knowledge of the contribution she’d made to society, the work she’d done with offenders, the courage she’d shown in exploring their trauma.

It would be difficult to replace her. That, he knew. He’d seen the media reports, the shock and sensation that had followed her murder in the town where such things were unheard of.

The police, of course, were miles behind. That, he’d anticipated. He’d known there would be delays and politics and that the course of justice was bound to be diverted.

Inevitable, really.

He remembered the photo he’d taken of the scene itself. He wasn’t disposing of that, although he knew that technically, he should, because keeping it was dangerous. But he hadn’t done that. It was hidden away in a secret file on his phone.

It had been risky to do such a thing, but he'd needed to. It was important to capture what he'd done. It meant a lot to him to see her body lying there, even though his emotions were mixed. Grief, regret, but also a sense of peace and a strange flare of triumph – that after all this time, the job that had needed to be done had been completed. It was finished. She was finished, and that meant the scales had been tipped back to where they should be.

“Emily Cleaver,” he said aloud. He tested the words, pleased that he was able to speak them in a level voice, no emotion audible. He’d shed tears, actual tears, as he’d walked away from the house. Disposing of the hypodermic had been a sad affair, remembering how that had gone, remembering her terror. He’d felt bad. Regret had seared through him. Of course, it hadn’t stopped him from being careful, and making sure that he disposed of the needle and the toxic residue safely and untraceably. He didn’t want anyone to be hurt. He didn’t want an animal or a kid to suffer. That would be terrible. All he wanted was justice, and now, he was on the path to achieving it.

The hole was deep enough now. He’d gone down a foot and a half. He’d put the cap back on the bloodied needle, which had been used twice. The first load of drugs into the muscle, to subdue her. And then, the rest into the vein, enough to kill. He’d researched it thoroughly, and procured the drugs in a different state, with the help of an accomplice who worked for one of the hospitals and who had a serious recreational drug problem himself. A combination of threats and enticement had done the job, and gotten him what he needed.

As for the electrical box? That had been easy enough to sabotage, and he’d gained the materials he’d needed from another source. He knew enough about the workings of electricity to make that part of the job easy.

Killing had been harder. It had been sad and difficult, and he’d wrestled with his conscience both before and after.

In the end, though, the implacable voice inside him had spoken too strongly to be ignored, reminding him that this was necessary and right, and that if the scales were to achieve balance, then he must remember that the bad outweighed the good.

He held the hypodermic in his hand, and although it was almost dark, a faint, reflected light glistened through the trees, gleaming off its plastic length, and the capped needle.

It had done its job. And he sincerely regretted it. Burying this needle felt as if he was burying her.

“You were a fine woman, Emily Cleaver,” he said aloud. “You led a good life, mostly. I regret having to do what I did. But I think you know why I had to do it. Don’t you? I think you do know. At the end, I think you knew. You kept the secrets, just like the rest of them.”

He paused, hearing only the sound of his own breathing in the still air. Listening more carefully, he heard the drip-drip of the water off the leaves, as if the forest itself was weeping, too.

He dropped the hypodermic into the grave he'd dug for it, hearing the tiny sound it made as it landed. Then, he bent to work again and began filling the grave that contained the traces of her blood and the implement that had sent her to her death.

He’d merely been the messenger.

He stared around, making sure he was alone, and for a moment, terror surged inside him as he saw a silhouette in the depths of the trees. It was a woman, solid and thickset, wearing a dark windbreaker, a scarf obscuring her features. She was holding a walking stick in her hand.

His heart pounded as he saw that she was watching. Had he been found out? He’d been seen? Surely, all of this wasn't in vain?

“Are you real?” The breathing comment burst from him as adrenaline surged. She was smiling implacably, but at those words, her expression changed. The arrogance in her face was replaced by a strange wariness. And a moment later, he was uncertain if he had seen her at all.

As he watched her, she seemed to disappear, and it was as if the trees rearranged themselves, and she had never been there at all.

He took a few steps toward the place where he'd seen her. His chest still heaving, he narrowed his eyes as he peered into the foliage. Nothing there. Nothing there at all. It was as if his gasped question about whether she was real had called her bluff. For a few more moments, he stared at the place where she had been. She didn't come back. Finally, he was sure he was alone. And it was time to go.

His hands were aching, his back was stiff from the effort he’d put in, as he turned away, trudging out of the woods. Warily, he searched the trees for any sign of the solidly built woman, because he didn't trust her not to return.

It felt as if the leaves were like a puzzle, one of those puzzles that you stare at for hours and then finally see the hidden shape that was there all along. But as hard as he looked, he could not see her again. It seemed she was really gone. He reminded himself not to focus on this distraction, but to turn his energy to the job ahead.

This was only the start.

The toughest job was the one he’d shouldered first, but there were more to do.

Next one up, he was looking forward to, with none of the bitter regret he’d felt about Emily Cleaver.

This next man?

He deserved to die.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Nina couldn’t suppress a sense of disappointment as she opened her eyes. She and Daniel had failed, and unless Kevin could stage a miraculous intervention, they’d be heading home today. Given Menzies’ attitude, Nina wasn’t banking on this happening.

It was deeply frustrating for her to have to turn her back on any case. Particularly one where a potentially dangerous patient of Emily’s might have been the perpetrator.

She turned the theories over in her mind, finding it impossible to simply put the case aside, because it was unsolved. It didn't matter if it was no longer her case, and they were not allowed to work on it. Once an investigator, always an investigator. It was searing her that a killer had done this, sending such a strange, hidden message.

Nina didn’t like that message for many reasons.

Top of the list was that it was too much like a signature.

A signature – the calling card left by serial killers, who wanted to send their perverse message to their victim and to the world.

The problem with that was the word ‘serial’.

A serial killer didn’t stop at one murder, by definition. They killed again.

Particularly in view of Emily’s profession, Nina was worried that a patient who was a psychopath might not stop at one.

In the silence, she thought about the problem, trying to calm her mind, because there wasn’t anything she could do. The decision was out of her hands, and hopefully, Menzies would give Whitley the support he needed to catch this killer.

It was unusual to wake, and hear things so quiet. Her apartment, and Daniel’s, both had a main road nearby. Nina was used to the noise of ambient traffic from the time she awoke, unless it was in the very early hours. Here, in this smaller town, with the hotel set back in a garden and a few blocks from the main road, the silence was noticeable.

Must be why Daniel was still slumbering.

Nina took a moment to admire him, his eyes closed, his face serene in relaxation, that defined jawline now darkened with stubble. She never looked at him without feeling a surge of desire. Never. Although, admittedly, it had taken her a while to recognize that feeling again after her coma. At first, it had just seemed like a spine-tingling awareness that had prickled her skin and tugged at the pit of her stomach.

She still didn’t know all the times they’d shared, but it comforted her to know that there would be more times ahead now, and that they were a couple who were rebuilding their relationship stronger than before.

Finally, Daniel was stirring, and Nina scrambled out of bed, pulled on her underwear and a shirt, and headed over to the coffee machine. Might as well get a brew going – this coffee looked good.

She checked the time, seeing it was seven-thirty a.m. Neither of them had set an alarm, since there was no pressure to get up early. The earliest that Kevin could reasonably engage with Menzies was around eight a.m.

“That was a good sleep,” Daniel said, stretching, and then frowning, just as she’d done, as the reality of the situation hit home. “It’s a shame we’re probably going to have to go back.”

He walked over to her and put his arms around her, holding her close, but gently, because of her damaged shoulder blade. He gave her a brief kiss on the lips, and her stomach swooped.

She held him in turn, left-handedly, feeling the taut muscles in his back. Yesterday had been a disappointment, but for this moment, embracing the man she loved, Nina was counting her blessings.

Then, reluctantly, they stepped away from each other and refocused on what had brought them here.

“I don’t like quitting this case now,” she agreed.

“Especially after seeing a signature,” Daniel said, focusing on the exact same detail that had made Nina uneasy.

“That is troubling me, too,” she agreed.

While she poured the coffee, Daniel got on the phone to Kevin, to update him on Menzies’ decision.

“We’re unfortunately going to have to head home unless you can persuade Menzies that we need to be here," Daniel said to Kevin. "He's got a history with the FBI and doesn't want to work with us."

He didn’t have the phone on speaker, but from the annoyed clacking on the other side, Nina could tell that Kevin was far from happy with this.

“Yes, I know. There’s even been a signature found at the first scene. It’s very shortsighted of him, I agree. Okay, I’ll wait to hear what you say and what he says.”

Daniel hung up with a sigh. “Kevin is going to speak to him, but he agrees that if there’s that level of prejudice, and he already feels as if we came in without his permission, that it will probably not be successful, so we’d better start packing.”

“Let’s do that, then.”

Nina thought that Daniel looked even more troubled than she did. She wondered if there was anything else bothering him, as he piled his clothes into the small travel bag, and then helped her with her one-handed packing efforts.

At that moment, Nina’s phone rang. Heading over to where it was still charging up, she looked at the caller ID. It was Whitley calling. He probably wanted an update, and she’d regretfully have to tell him that it was no news, with a strong chance of failure.

As soon as he spoke, she heard the tension in his voice.

“Agent Veil, there’s been another murder. We’ve just been called. The victim is a well-respected judge, and it looks like the same MO.”

*

It changed everything, although Nina would far rather it hadn’t.

Daniel was on the phone again as they sped out, heading to the pin drop that Whitley had given them, questions surging in Nina’s mind as she waited anxiously to hear the result of the call.

What was the connection between these two victims? Why had the judge been targeted?

And most importantly of all – would they be able to stay on it?

“Right,” Daniel said, hanging up. “We’re staying on the case. Kevin’s just had a quick talk to Menzies. With this second murder, there’s no way that Menzies can say no. If he tried to, then he knew that Kevin would escalate it.”

“I’m guessing he’s still not overly enthusiastic?” Nina asked, fidgeting with her seatbelt as Daniel sped down the side road to where the pin drop was now getting inexorably closer.

“Correct. He’s not thrilled with the idea, but he knows that there’s no choice now. He’s busy setting out a whole list of rules and protocols to state that the case is still under the police department’s control, and that we will not act without his authority.”

Nina shrugged in her current one-shouldered fashion, brushing off the automatic sense of frustration she felt at this pettiness. Truth was that Menzies needed all the help he could get, and he knew it, and they were in a position to help with a situation that had now veered from dire to disastrous.

Two killings would throw this small town into a state of panic.

“We’re here. It’s the big house up on the hill.”

Daniel pointed to the hillside ahead, which overlooked a large nature reserve, with darker tracts of forest punctuating the meadows. Glancing briefly at this idyllic scene, Nina turned her attention to the cameras. Were there any here?

She didn’t see any street cameras, although she noticed that a couple of the houses they passed were well secured. This must be one of the wealthiest areas of the town. The police cars parked ahead were attracting a small crowd of neighbors, who had filtered out from the large properties and were standing on the sidewalk opposite the victim’s home.

Daniel parked at the end of the row of cars, and they climbed out.

"Has Judge Reardon been murdered?" a middle-aged woman called, her voice anxious. Dressed in a red business suit and carrying a briefcase, she was clearly on her way to a high-powered job.

"We have been informed that he has been murdered, ma'am." Nina turned to face her, speaking in polite tones. "We're on our way in. Did you see or hear anything unusual last night or early this morning?"

She wasn’t yet sure what time the crime had occurred. But there were only headshakes from the bystanders. None of them had seen or heard anything, although Nina knew that not all the neighbors might be among this crowd, and they would still need to knock on doors.

For now, though, it was time to go in and face the scene.

She headed up the pathway to the big, white painted front door. It was set squarely in the center of the double story gabled house, with small, decorative window boxes, and a huge maple tree in the front yard.

Crime scene tape had been stretched around the porch pillars, and Nina ducked under it before walking inside.

There were a couple of police that she recognized from yesterday’s scene, and Whitley must have been looking out for them, because he hurried over, his boots treading over the gray and white patterned tiles in the entrance hall, and his face looking drawn with worry.

“Thank you for coming here. I guess you know that you’re now authorized to be on the case? I’m just sorry it had to play out this way.”

“I am, too,” Nina said, as Daniel nodded. “What’s the situation here? Can you give us some background?”

“Yes. Come this way.”

Whitley led them past a marble bust on a pedestal that stood near the far archway, and veered right, then left. They passed an elegant dining room with a long table and some still life paintings on the walls, and an entertainment area with a big screen TV, and then, Whitley went down a flight of stairs.

“We think the power must have gone out, and the judge came down here to look at the box. Just like Emily Cleaver, he was killed with two doses of sedative. Coroner has already identified a needle mark in the back of his arm, and another one in his right vein at the elbow.”

The basement was now brilliantly lit, thanks to a spotlight that had been placed there. The power box was on the right hand wall at the bottom of the stairs, and it didn’t look damaged, Nina saw. Presumably, the killer had simply turned off the power and waited for the judge to head this way.

Looking down at the scene, which was lit by the spotlight's harsh glare, she saw a flashlight on the ground, near the victim's outstretched hand.

He was lying face down, sprawled in an ungainly way, and he was wearing a moss green dressing gown and tan slippers. His graying hair was rumpled, and Nina wondered if he’d been in bed at the time.

It was a sad, shocking sight. There was something poignant about the sight of that body spread-eagled on the cold concrete floor. The basement was stark and unglamorous, and clearly it hadn't been touched by the decorators who had made sure the rest of the house was so beautiful.

Maybe he’d seemed like a big man in real life, presiding over his courtrooms, but Nina thought now that he looked fragile.

Then, her eyes fell on the card.

That had been placed near his left hand as if he'd been carrying it and then dropped it. It looked identical to the other card, and she wondered if it held the same message, or a different one.

“Same MO as last time,” the coroner said, looking up from behind his mask. “No sign of any struggle, but there is evidence of bruising and bleeding around his mouth, and then of course, the needle marks.”

Nina could imagine how the killer might have hidden upstairs in the dark, and then, when the judge had descended the stairs in the faint light of his bobbing flashlight beam, he could simply have crept down behind him, crushed his hand over the judge’s mouth, and then, plunged the needle into his arm.

It would have been easy – quick and brutal for a killer who had now done this once before and was operating with deadly confidence.

"Anyone got a UV light here?" she asked, but the cops shook their heads.

“We’ll take it into the station,” Whitley said.

“Do you have an approximate time of death?” she asked, turning to the coroner.

The coroner nodded. “He was killed between ten p.m. and midnight, I would estimate.”

So that confirmed Nina’s theory that he’d been in bed. Since this home did have a front door camera, the killer must have entered the house by a different door, or a window, or maybe even crept into the garage when the judge arrived home, and lain in wait.

“Who found Judge Reardon’s body?” Daniel asked.

“He was found by the housekeeper, who arrived at work at seven-thirty a.m. as usual. She has a key, and lets herself in the back door. She saw the power was out, headed straight down to the box, and found him there. She called us straight away. She was very distressed, so we let her go home after interviewing her. I hope that’s okay?” Whitley looked worried, as if he didn’t want to compromise a case that had just exploded in their faces.

“Did she notice anything else wrong?” Nina asked, but Whitley shook his head.

“She rushed into the house – possibly a couple of minutes late – went to fix the power, and got the shock of her life. She said she’s worked here five days a week for a few months now. I believe the last maid retired. She didn’t have much to do with the judge, as he was very busy and she hardly ever saw him. Most days, he left before she arrived.”

Nina nodded, imagining the scenario. She didn’t think that re-interviewing the housekeeper needed to be a priority. There were bigger priorities.

“Who was the judge’s closest family member? And his closest work colleague?” she asked.

“He has a brother who lives about an hour away, but they were apparently not close. And in terms of work, I’m not sure. His offices were at the local courthouse, and one of us needs to head that way and break the news. Do you want to do it?” Whitley offered.

Nina nodded. “

Daniel and I can go there and see who he worked with," she agreed. "And what cases overlapped with Dr. Cleaver’s.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

The offices that adjoined the Miller’s Ridge courtroom were basic. Nina took in their red brick walls, gray tiled roofing, and then, a row of wooden doors along the corridor.

She hoped that whoever Judge Reardon's assistant was, he or she would be in the building and ready to speak to the police.

They’d showed their ID to the security guard at the gate, who’d let them through without any questions. Now, as she and Daniel headed to the third door along the row, Nina saw that the light was on in the office, and she could hear a woman’s voice from behind the door. The speaker’s tone sounded calm and organized. That gave Nina hope. As long as she stayed that way after hearing the news.

Nina tapped on the door, and after a moment, the voice called, “Come in?”

She pushed the door open and entered.

A woman with a regal bearing, and her graying hair in a top knot, was typing at a furious pace on a laptop keyboard.

“Morning,” she said, when she saw the FBI, leaning forward and peering over her spectacles to check their IDs. She didn’t look overly surprised to see them – yet. Nina guessed she was no stranger to having law enforcement knock at the door for various reasons. “How can I help?” she asked.

She was sitting at a smaller desk, facing the door. On the desk was a name plate that read: Charmaine Gardner: Assistant. To the side, by the far wall, there was another, larger desk that Nina guessed the judge had used. And on the other wall, there was a row of five chairs.

Time to deliver the shocking news.

Standing in front of the desk, Nina said, “I’m so sorry to tell you this, Ms. Gardner, but Judge Reardon has been murdered.

Charmaine's eyes flew wide, and she stared at Nina in utter disbelief.

“Murdered?” She repeated the word in a shrill tone that was a world away from the calm voice in which she’d greeted them.

“I’m afraid so. You might have heard about the death of Emily Cleaver?”

Charmaine’s eyes were even more shocked now.

“Yes. Yes, I did hear about that. It was terrible. Are you saying this death was somehow connected?”

Nina nodded.

"Judge Reardon was murdered in the same way as Dr. Cleaver.”

Charmaine shook her head. She raised her hands to her forehead and closed her eyes, and for a moment, she simply sat.

Then, she let out a deep breath.

“I can’t believe this is true,” she said, lowering her hands, and meeting the agents’ gazes once more. “Did he suffer? This is horrifying.”

“He didn’t suffer,” Nina said. “It was quick, and probably happened late last night.”

Charmaine nodded. “He was expected in for a briefing just now, and I was about to call him and remind him.”

“We need information urgently,” Nina said. “We need to track this killer down, and find out what cases, or individuals, he and Dr. Cleaver had in common.”

Now, Charmaine was overcoming her shock, looking more coherent again.

“Of course, yes, I can see you need that. I just don’t know where to start. I guess with sentencing? Should I look through the list of people that were sentenced, and see how many of them were sent to the psychiatric ward or the prison where she worked?”

“That would be a good start,” Nina said.

“I don’t know who would have been recommended to Dr. Cleaver, though,” Charmaine said. “I think you’d need to ask the prison or the psychiatric hospital for that information, but of course, I can make a start this side.”

“We’d appreciate that list as soon as possible,” Nina said. “And another thing – was the judge being threatened at all? Did he have any troubling phone calls, did any previously sentenced people get hold of him?”

She pressed her lips together, shaking her head in a troubled way.

“That’s difficult to say. Very difficult to say. The reason is that people who make those kind of threats might not do it directly.”

“How do you mean?” Daniel asked.

"They might call the main courthouse number and ask to speak to the judge. Calls like that are screened at the main switchboard. It's very unlikely that Judge Reardon would ever know about them. I believe that if serious threats were made, then the police were notified, of course, but very often, it was just – well, hot air, as the judge himself liked to say, and we didn't waste time or resources in following up. Generally, the switchboard operator would issue the caller with a warning, and hang up.”

Nina nodded. Pursuing this angle was going to be difficult, but she had another question that might help them make progress.

“What about the judge himself? Was there anyone he sentenced in the last year or so that he felt particularly troubled by?”

“The violent cases,” Charmaine said unhesitatingly. “The violent cases are the ones that always troubled him, and I can make a list of everyone who he sentenced, who committed crimes involving violence. He was always harsh on violent offenders.”

“Thank you,” Nina said. “We need it as soon as possible.”

“I’ll do my best to get it to you this morning,” Charmaine said, and Nina could now see that she looked stressed all over again.

“Anything else?” Nina asked. “Was there anything troubling you recently?”

Charmaine looked dubious, and for a while, Nina wondered if she was going to refuse to speak her mind. But then, she drew a decisive breath.

“I worked with the judge for a couple of years,” she said, “and he was a fair person, but I couldn’t help thinking, sometimes, that he was troubled, and that there were things he wasn’t telling me. Sometimes he’d be snappish, ask me to leave the room, take a private call or even go outside the office completely. I always thought that they must be related to his personal life, and because of that, I never asked. But yes – I do think there was something bothering Judge Reardon, even though I have no idea what it was.”

*

“Next stop is Dr. Cleaver’s offices,” Nina said to Daniel. They needed to speak to Emily Cleaver’s assistant, Kaylee Morrison. She’d been interviewed by the police before, but Nina hoped that they might be able to get new information from her.

“It’s not far away,” Consulting the map, Daniel plotted their next stop, which was just a couple of blocks away. Cleaver’s offices were equidistant from the courthouse and the police station, and in this town, those were a mile apart.

They headed to the pin drop, with Nina hoping that a night’s sleep might have helped Kaylee to regroup after the terrible news of yesterday. That was better than having regrets that they couldn't have gotten to her sooner. She felt frustrated that they hadn't been able to hit the ground running on this case and get to work on it yesterday. It might have made all the difference if they had.

Daniel parked outside these offices, which were a step up from the courthouse. They were two-story, white painted, with stone detailing on the corners, and small beds of flowers surrounding them. The grass was damp, and the flowers bedraggled from all the recent rains – past their best, but still adding a touch of optimistic brightness.

Nina headed to the main door of office number three, which had a discreet sign “Psychologist’s Rooms.”

She tapped on the door, and in a moment, a latch was released and the door sprang ajar. Nina guessed that whoever was inside had taken a look at them on the camera and decided they were safe to be admitted.

She walked inside, immediately coming face to face with a woman who had a lean, stressed face and a wild head of curly chestnut hair. She was wearing a black jacket, and she was flipping through a folder. The room, which was furnished in a basic way with generic pale brown desks and a coffee table, smelled sweet and fresh thanks to the three large arrangements of flowers on the table. Sympathy bouquets, Nina guessed.

“Good morning. Are you Kaylee Morrison?” Nina asked, showing her ID.

The woman closed the file with a bang, and nodded. "Yes, I am. You're the police, of course? I'm very stressed right now, I must say. This all feels like too much, and I’m overwhelmed. I’m not sure what I can tell you – there were police here yesterday and they questioned me for about an hour.”

“We’re FBI,” Nina said, allowing Kaylee to take a better look at the ID. The assistant looked to be in her late twenties, and Nina was sure that she must be utterly shocked and overwhelmed having to cope with this all.

“FBI? Why are the FBI investigating this?” Kaylee asked.

"Because it's a serial crime. Judge Reardon was murdered late last night in the same way," Nina said.

Just as Reardon’s assistant had done, Kaylee looked appalled.

“This is a double murder?” she gasped. “Who’d want to kill either of them?” She obviously reached a conclusion herself, because her face hardened. “Is this some criminal who both of them were trying to help and rehabilitate? It must have been.”

“Were you unsure about that yesterday?” Nina asked.

After some thought, Kaylee nodded. “Yes, I was, because I – well, I just didn’t know. Dr. Cleaver had a fiancé a few months back, and he was utterly toxic. He was the first person that I thought of when I heard this had happened.”

Nina wasn't ruling out a toxic fiancé. Such a person could easily have committed one crime and then another as a cover-up.

“I’d like his name, please,” she said.

“His name is Steve Smith, but the police did say that they were going to speak to him yesterday.”

So Steve Smith might already have been cleared. Nina would have to check with Whitley what he did yesterday, so that they could be sure not to duplicate their efforts.

“Now that you know the judge is also a victim, how does that change your thinking?” she asked.

Kaylee hadn’t invited her to sit – she’d been too distracted and shocked to offer her and Daniel a chair – but Nina lowered herself onto one of the chairs on the other side of the desk, feeling that Kaylee would be more at ease without two officers towering over her. Daniel did the same thing.

“I guess, to me, it makes it obvious that it must be someone that they both dealt with. You know, Dr. Cleaver did consult with some damaged people.”

“Who stands out in the past year or so?” Daniel asked.

Kaylee hesitated, and Nina quickly added, “Confidentiality is not an issue now. You just need to give us the names. Their records are all in the public domain anyway, since they have spent time in prison, or in the psychiatric ward.”

“I’ll need time to get it all together, but there’s one who stands out,” Kaylee said in tones that sounded unsure. “I’m not really up to date on the circumstances. He was paroled, but he still kept coming for monthly counseling – it was part of his parole conditions. His name is Jason Wright, and he was paroled from the psychiatric hospital. He’d be my very first choice if I was thinking of a patient who was unstable and – well, who was also dangerous. Dr. Cleaver never liked having to go and consult him, and she was always very quiet afterward.”

“That’s good to know, and is there anyone else?” Nina asked.

“There are a couple of other people who were very violent, and who she always had to be careful about on the consults, but they’re still in prison,” Kaylee said. “And there are one or two of the older patients that Dr. Cleaver always spoke about as if she was scared of them. But those, I’d have to look up as they were before my time. I’ve only been working here for a year.”

“I would appreciate it if you’d look up the others,” Nina said,

For now, though, they had what they needed – a lead to a violent and unstable man.

As they left the offices, Daniel was already checking up on his phone, calling the local police.

“Hello. Charmaine. Yes, it’s me. Agent Grant. I’d like to know if Judge Reardon handled the case of Jason Wright. He’s recently been paroled from the psychiatric hospital, and I understand he’s moved, so I also need to know his address.”

Daniel waited, listened, and then gave a decisive nod.

“Thanks,” he said.

As they hustled out to the car, he said to Nina, "The good news is that he did get sentenced by the judge. The bad news, apparently, is that he's broken his parole conditions. He didn't check in the day before yesterday, and nobody knows where he is."

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Nina gritted her teeth as Daniel sped along the main road. They were heading out of town, to where Jason Wright’s last known address was. He’d been assigned to an apartment building called The Winds. Supposedly, he was occupying apartment number forty.

But now, after missing his parole check-in, Nina wasn’t sure where he would be. She felt worried by the turn this case was taking.

At least the morning traffic, such as it was, was over now, and the roads were clear. They’d get there fast, and then, they’d need to strategize about what to do.

It depended on who was there. If they were lucky, they might knock on the door and come face to face with the man they needed. If they were not so lucky, they’d need to improvise.

Up until now, she’d thought this was a scenic town, but as Daniel turned the final corner, heading down to an industrial zone at the bottom of the hill, Nina saw that they’d reached the bad side of it.

The apartment buildings flanking the road looked elderly and decrepit. The paving was uneven, and there wasn’t a trace of grass, flowers, or any greenery. Only puddles in the driveway from all the recent rain, with a couple of pieces of trash floating in them.

They parked outside, and Nina climbed out, avoiding the sour-smelling puddle as she headed for the lobby. A couple of men who were speaking at the desk at the far end of the lobby turned around as they walked in, staring at her suspiciously. She had no idea if security existed in this place. Neither of the men looked like guards or doormen. The elevator was all the way up on the sixth floor, with the display blinking rapidly in a concerning way, so she veered in the direction of the stairs.

Her footsteps echoed off the concrete walls as she climbed – heading up to the fourth floor where the apartment they were looking for was located.

Their boots tramped along the scuffed corridor until they reached door number 40.

Nina raised her hand and knocked, causing the door to rattle in its ill-fitting frame. There was no sound from the inside except the echoing resonance from her knock. She had an instinct for these situations, and it was telling her that Wright had fled this place of residence.

Daniel walked back along the corridor and peered through the grimy window, where Nina saw the blinds were askew, leaving a gap.

“Can’t see anything in there,” he said. “Bed looks stripped. No sign of any other furniture. I think he’s run for it.”

“Where to?”

Nina felt her stomach clench. This could be part of a warped revenge plan that Wright had dreamed up. He was clearly a problem inmate, and Emily Cleaver had been scared of him, and to her, things were adding up.

“We need to knock on the neighbors’ doors,” she decided. Place like this, it might be a good few before they got the answers they needed. They might not get them at all. People here didn’t trust the police. At least, thanks to their informal association with the case, they were in plainclothes and not in uniform. FBI jackets would have created another layer of distrust.

“I go left, you go right?”

A nod from him.

Nina headed to the door on the left and knocked.

She listened. No answer. She wondered if someone was inside and simply not willing to open the door.

Nothing she could do about that. She moved on to the next door, knocked again. Voices from around the corner told her that Daniel was getting information, but the tone of the voices didn’t sound promising to her.

This time, she heard shuffling footsteps approaching, and in a few more moments, the door was opened by an elderly man. Wrapped in an old jacket, wearing slippers, he stared at her suspiciously.

"I'm Agent Veil, FBI," she began, seeing his eyes narrow instantly as she announced herself.

“I don’t speak to FBI agents,” he snapped, and the door closed in her face.

Nina heaved a sigh. That was short but sweet. All she could do was move on.

But as she turned away from that door, she heard the one behind her open again – the one where there hadn’t been an answer earlier.

Now, it was ajar, and the man inside was staring at her curiously.

He had long hair which, about six months ago, had been bleached. Now, yellowed ends contrasted with darker roots. He wore a scuffed leather jacket and around his neck was a thick, fake gold chain.

“Hey there,” he said. “Were you knocking on his door just now?” He pointed in the direction of Wright’s apartment.

“Yes, I was hoping to speak to Mr. Wright,” Nina said.

"I wasn't going to answer the door because I thought you were one of his lowlife friends," the man muttered. "The best thing to do when they come here is to stay low. But then I thought I heard you say you were FBI?"

“Correct,” Nina said quietly, showing her ID.

“Okay. FBI,” he said thoughtfully. “Does that mean Mr. Wright has committed some kind of a felony?”

“We’re searching for him to get information on a crime,” Nina said. “He has also broken his parole conditions, though, as we found out when we started looking for him.”

“He’s that kind of guy. Always in trouble. Sometimes bad. He’s erratic.”

“Would you know where he is?” Nina asked.

“I don’t know.” The man looked dubious. “I can’t quite remember. Too busy worrying about how I’m going to hold my head high when I go out with my friends tonight. It’s been a rough month. I play guitar, and you know, this time of the year, with the weather, the gigs aren’t as good as they are in the summertime.”

Nina could pick up a hint when one was dropped, and she wasn’t averse to paying for information when it came from a neighbor who was likely to be well-informed. Especially since Wright had violated his parole and finding him was going to guzzle police resources.

“I happen to have a hundred dollars on me,” she said, “and I’m willing to give it to you to help you out with your evening tonight. But in return, I hope you’ll be genuinely willing to help me out with this.”

A deal was being made. Would it be what she needed?

She looked at his eyes, at the muscles in his face. Those were the tells. Was he planning to lie? Or was he going to honor the deal?

She thought he was going to honor the deal, if only because he didn’t want this neighbor here anymore. Self-interest was playing a role here.

"That's kind of you," he said. He watched as she took her wallet from her purse and took out two fifty-dollar bills awkwardly with her left hand. He looked at the money with an expression that told Nina he really needed it, as she handed it over.

“Thanks,” he said. “If it’s any help to you, I have heard him cozying up to his girlfriend the last few days. The walls are very thin here, and it’s easy to overhear conversations that get loud. She was trying to persuade him to move out and stay with her, goodness knows why, because he’s trouble in anyone’s book. But I haven’t heard him here the last couple of days, and I obviously haven’t heard her either, although a few other people have come knocking. Maybe he’s been running up debts, and there was more than one reason for this sudden move.

“Any idea what her name is?”

“Her name’s Sharlene. I’ve heard it often enough when they fight – or the opposite.” Grimacing, he gestured to the walls, with Nina guessing they were thin. “And if you want to know where she lives, then I can tell you that, too. She works as a waitress at Stoney’s. It’s the bar a few miles out of town, and she lives in one of the rooms above it.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

By any stretch of the imagination, Stoney’s was a dilapidated place. Between this and the apartment building they’d just visited, Nina felt as if she was getting a guided tour of the rough side of town.

Daniel slowed as they wound their way behind a row of warehouses, and past a small mall that looked as if it had failed about thirty years ago, and been derelict since then.

Although Nina was sure that Stoney's brought some much-needed activity to the area after dark, right now, it looked as rundown as the tenement they'd just left.

“I thought Miller’s Ridge was a scenic town.” She murmured the words to Daniel before they climbed out of the car.

“Yeah,” he replied. “I thought so, too. Seems we’re getting a guided tour of the less scenic side of it.”

“Well, probably better this time of the day than later.”

Stoney's was a big, sprawling building made from harsh-looking concrete blocks, with a tin roof and small windows that looked as if they'd been reluctantly set along the sides. Sparingly, Nina thought, as if they didn't want too much daylight getting in there.

The place was surrounded by more worn paving, and Nina guessed it might not only be a stopover for locals wanting some fun, but also for truckers heading inland.

Right now, though, the massive parking area was almost empty. Only a few cars were nestled against the side of the building, and Nina wondered if all of these belonged to the people who lived above.

The second floor of the building looked low and squat, as if it had been an afterthought, pasted on above the first. It only covered half the floor area, at the back, where Nina guessed the offices and storerooms were down below.

Daniel headed straight around the back and parked next to a dusty red Ford.

They climbed out. Stacked on the concrete, Nina saw a row of beer kegs, and a few black trash bags that were probably stuffed to capacity. There wasn’t a soul around. The bar itself was closed up tight. But there was a steel staircase leading up to a walkway on the second floor.

“Let’s go up and see?” Nina said.

Daniel nodded.

She headed up the narrow, steep stairs, using her left arm on the rail, and listening out as she got up higher. She didn’t hear anything from behind any of the doors.

Starting with the one all the way at the end of the passage, she knocked.

Nothing. Not a sound from the inside. Glancing at Daniel, she moved on to the next one, and as she reached it, she heard a giggle coming from the inside.

There was a rattling noise that then got all her instincts flaring because it sounded like a window being opened.

Opening a window, now? Why? Did somebody suddenly need air on this cloudy, breezy morning?

Daniel saw her listen to the sound, and immediately, he said, “I’ll head down again and watch the back. You knock.”

She couldn’t argue about that division of duties. Not when she was recovering from a fractured shoulder blade. Chasing a suspected criminal down wouldn’t be so easy in a sling. Not impossible, though. She was ready for it if she had to.

Nina waited at the front door, giving Daniel some time to head around the narrow walkway that bordered the upstairs section.

As soon as he’d disappeared from her sight, she knocked on the door, hard.

There was a pause. Nina listened out. What had happened to that giggling? Had the person inside vaporized – or was plan B hastily being made?

She suspected there was because nobody was coming to the door. Raising her hand, she knocked again.

And then, she heard a noise from behind the building.

A shout and a scuffle, and the noise of desperate, thudding footsteps.

Nina tensed, her legs ready to run, her arm clamped to her midriff in the protective posture she now used whenever she had to move fast. And it looked as if moving fast would be needed.

Where was Daniel? How far had he gotten in pursuit? Was he close enough to keep the fleeing fugitive in view?

Even though Nina hadn't yet had sight of him, she knew this was what must have happened. They'd probably seen her and Daniel arrive from their upstairs windows. Perhaps they'd been expecting such a visit. And they'd definitely had a contingency plan in place. Now, the question was – how could she help, with one working arm?

Getting around the building seemed like the best plan for now.

Nina turned and rushed along the walkway where Daniel had gone, needing a view of the back area so that she could figure out what she needed to do.

Her boots skidded on the slippery walkway as she rounded the corner. And there was Daniel, already racing down a dirt road that headed south, at the back of the building. He was in furious pursuit of a man dressed in faded jeans and a gray hooded jacket.

That man was running, as if for his life, down the winding track that led into an area of woods and scrubby bush.

Nina drew in a deep breath. Despite Daniel immediately racing around the side, the fugitive had been ahead. And it looked to her as if he knew where he was going. He had a contingency plan in place for if law enforcement had arrived.

She couldn’t get down there in time to run. Glancing at the window he must have escaped from, Nina saw it was firmly closed. The girlfriend had retreated back inside.

From here, though, she could see the road from higher up than Daniel was now able to do. From this elevated vantage point, Nina saw that the narrow dirt road split a couple of hundred yards further on. One route led deeper into the trees, narrowing further until it was little more than a walking trail. The other veered to the right, and staring through the trees, Nina thought that it joined up with a main road on the other side of the woods.

So, if she jumped into the car now, then she could head in the direction of the main road, and cut Wright off if he decided to go that way.

No time to waste. Nina turned, racing down the stairs, and rushed for the car. Daniel had left the keys under the seat. She grabbed them up, and climbed one handedly into the car.

Starting it up, she flung it into reverse, sped out of the parking lot, and burned rubber getting onto the road.

Where was the side street?

Flying down the road, Nina kept an eye out for the side road that she had spotted from her aerial standpoint. Was it there?

Nope, that was just a trail. The road was further on.

It was a dirt track, rough and rutted, with giant puddles forming glittering hazards. The car splashed through, one side tilting steeply down and causing Nina to grab the wheel tighter with her one functional hand. Even though it was in a sling, the other hand tensed involuntarily, sending a jolt of pain through her shoulder blade.

Doctors’ warnings surged in her mind. She’d had enough of those to last her a while.

Nina knew she couldn't afford to be back in the hospital again. She didn't even want to go there for a minor issue like re strapping a shoulder blade. It brought back too much trauma, dimly remembered from the hazy days of her coma. She had to be careful. But at the same time, she needed to be able to help Daniel as soon as possible, because this suspect was moving like lightning.

“Where the hell would he be?” she muttered to herself, her voice barely audible to herself over the roar of the car’s engine and the splashing of the tires through water.

Wrenching at the wheel, she narrowly avoided a jutting rock, barely visible in a puddle the size of a lake.

She hit the gas, sending the car surging forward as she rounded a bend, feeling the tires slide and gritting her teeth as she saw a solid tree trunk looming ahead. Using gas, steering, and sheer nerve, she was able to veer past the tree, missing it by inches.

She hoped this risky roller coaster ride would get her results. If she was wrong, he wouldn't be here at all and she would have wasted her time, and might even have gotten further away from where she needed to be. If she was right then she had a chance of stopping this runaway man and helping Daniel.

“Where is he?” she asked herself through gritted teeth.

Ahead, the track branched into two, which she hadn't seen from higher up. One of the branches plunged steeply downhill while the other followed a tortuous zigzag path through the trees. So, she needed to take a gamble now. Left or right? Nina felt her heart pound with the pressure of making the right call. This runaway, who had violated his parole, could easily disappear in the terrain he knew well and they did not.

Summoning up the map in her mind again, Nina decided that the zigzag path was the more likely choice. And she wasn't going to slow down. With her left hand clamped on the wheel and her right hand curled into a fist within the sling, she began winding her way through the thick trees which offered very little visibility.

If she only knew where Daniel was now. But all she could do was guess, based on her knowledge of him and the fleeting glance she'd had.

Powering round another hairpin bend, Nina felt a flare of excitement as she saw two running figures ahead. There was Daniel, she had found him. She was about a hundred yards behind him, but it should be easy to close the distance seeing she was in a car and they were on foot.

Although she knew her running prowess would not help her now, because she was behind them, what she did have was the noise and threat of the car itself. Fugitives didn't like hearing loud engines behind them. She decided to use that as her secret weapon in this chase.

Mashing her foot down on the accelerator, Nina felt the tires stick, slide and then grab in the mud. The engine roared, a sound that she knew would intimidate a fugitive fleeing for his life or his freedom. But she had more. Holding the steering wheel steady with her knee, Nina slammed her hands down on the car’s horn.

The sound blasted through the trees, shockingly loud, and it was enough to startle the fugitive into looking around. Wright glanced over his shoulder, his body language full of fear and doubt. That minuscule pause was enough to get Daniel within grabbing distance of Wright.

His hand shot out, grasping the jacket, and as Nina watched, Daniel yanked it back.

The effect was dramatic. Wright’s shoes slid in the slippery mud and he cartwheeled backward water and stones flying up in the air as he yelled in concern.

Flinging the car door open, Nina knew they'd done it. Daniel had Wright down on the ground now, the lean, scruffy man shouting in a voice that combined anger and fear.

“Police!” Daniel shouted. Not the first time he'd introduced himself to Wright, but definitely the first time that Wright was listening.

As Nina rushed up, she heard Daniel add in breathless tones, “Why didn't you listen when I told you to stop earlier?”

Wright's voice was filled with anguish as he replied. “I didn't know you were the police!”

“Strange,” Daniel observed, his voice imbued with cynicism. “I guess the little matter of your missed parole check-in wasn't on your mind at all then?"

“I was - I was busy. These check-ins are oppressive,” Wright complained. “How is a man supposed to live his life with these dumb rules controlling your time?”

Now, Nina was on the scene, breathing hard, but ready to add her own input to this conversation.

“Mr. Wright, you'd think it would be convenient for you to have the police knocking on your door instead of having to go all the way to the police station. And yet when you saw us, you fled immediately. So that excuse does not wash with me.

Now that she was looking at him closely, Nina saw that Wright was above average height, broad shouldered though skinny, and that his mud spattered face had a sly tilt to the mouth and eyes. She remembered that he had spent years in the psychiatric hospital, and she was sure that he'd learned to say what he knew people wanted to hear. He was sneaky. That was her first impression.

“Hands in the air,” she ordered. The jacket he wore was bulky, and she didn't want to be surprised when he pulled a knife hidden in one of the pockets. Or even a gun.

She'd expected an argument, but maybe he was too out of breath to want to resist further. Giving her a look bordering on evil, he raised his hands.

Daniel stepped forward immediately and patted him down. With a quizzical expression, he pulled out a small crumpled plastic bag from the inner pocket of the jacket. Nina's gaze sharpened as she saw the residue of off-white powder it contained.

There were already other reasons why Wright might have opted to skip his parole check-in. Now, she and Daniel needed to drill down into his movements to find out if the most serious reason of all was true.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

When Nina walked into the local police station with her suspect in tow, Daniel gripping him firmly by his arms, she looked around to see if Menzies was anywhere in sight. He might have given them permission to work on the case, but that didn't mean he was going to greet them enthusiastically or like the fact that they were working with his detectives.

There was no sign of him in the lobby, and she couldn't hear his voice coming from anywhere beyond. Maybe they were lucky.

“Good morning,” she greeted the officer at the front desk. “We called ahead to say we would be interviewing the suspect. Is there a room available?

"Yes, ma'am,” the officer said, with none of Menzies’ unfriendliness. “The room is ready and you can process the suspect in the back office.”

He rubbed a hand over his bristly red mustache as he gave Jason Wright a satisfied glance. The look spoke volumes. Nina knew that these crimes had stretched the local police to their limits, and apart from Menzies, the others were all grateful for the FBI's help.

As Daniel led Jason Wright through for processing, Nina had another question. Leaning forward, she spoke in a quiet voice to the red-haired officer.

“The card,” she said. “The one found at the scene. Did you get a chance to put it under the UV light?”

That had been on her mind during the furious chase. Before they went into the interview room to face up to Wright, she wanted to know what wording had been on that seemingly invisible card.

"Yes, ma'am," the officer replied. "That card had a message just the same as the other one.

“You mean exactly the same wording?”

“I believe the message was slightly different. I have a photo of it here. Whitley said I should show you.”

The officer opened his iPad and started scrolling through while Nina leaned forward, eager to see what this was and how it differed. The officer found the right image and turned the device toward Nina, allowing her to read the words that had been scrawled on the photograph.

In bold uppercase letters that looked jagged and angry, the message read, “GUILTY UNTIL PROVEN INNOCENT.”

Thoughtfully, Nina stared at the words, wondering what insight they gave her into the killer’s mind. With two phrases now, she could see the similarities between them, and she hoped she could start to understand what this killer was implying.

It was clear to this man there had been a travesty of justice. But she had no idea how justice was defined in the tortured mind of a killer. It might have nothing to do with prisons or courts, but with something that he deeply believed had been unfairly dealt out to him. Why were the messages hidden, though? It was as if he wanted to deliberately keep the words secret.

At any rate, now that she had these two messages she could use their content in the interview, and hopefully she could lure Wright to revealing the truth.

Louder voices down the passage told Nina that the processing had been done and that Wright was ready for his interrogation.

She headed to the small room and opened the door, seeing that Daniel was busy positioning Wright at the desk.

"So far, Mr. Wright has been cooperative," he said. "For that reason, I've told him that we won't be needing the handcuffs at this stage.”

Nina could hear the veiled threat in Daniel's words which were spoken for the benefit of Wright. Daniel was reminding him to behave himself. Nina wondered if he would. Now, as he slouched behind the desk with a defensive expression, he looked a world away from the man who had sped through the trees in a desperate attempt to avoid them. She hoped that the truth of his predicament had now settled on his shoulders and that he would not try to play games.

The room was chilly, and Nina adjusted the air conditioning before taking her seat opposite him and next to Daniel. Wright wasn't meeting her eyes. He was staring down at the desk, his bedraggled hair flopping over his forehead.

Nina warned herself be on the lookout for lies, evasion and denial. Wright had spent years in the psychiatric hospital after committing a string of violent crimes. His admission to the hospital rather than the prison had been a borderline case, she guessed. She personally thought he should have spent the time in prison. She knew that the authorities were generally good at picking up people who were faking instability, but she wondered if he had slipped through the cracks.

Perhaps that was why Emily had been so nervous and scared when she had to deal with him. Maybe she had sensed that this man was not truly in need of her help, but rather using the system to his advantage.

Nina reminded herself that she might be unfairly judging him. Now she needed to drill down to his real motives for fleeing the police and missing his parole check in.

Letting the silence build, she waited. Silence made a lot of people uneasy. It created a vacuum which people would often seek to fill through sudden conversation. In those blurted comments, much truth often lay.

“You guys, you're just bullies. You're looking to pin something on me.”

Sure enough, Wright was following the pattern that she'd predicted he would. Unable to handle the resounding silence and the combined stares of the two FBI agents, he was starting to babble.

“You know why you're here?” she asked him.

“I'm here because you agents probably couldn't find the man you needed and now you're looking to arrest somebody to make yourselves look good. That's who you are. That's what you do. It's why I hate you. You think I'm kidding? People are afraid of me for good reason when I get angry with them.”

The accusation was flung in a breathy voice. It told Nina something. It told her that Wright was admitting to wrongdoing. She wasn't surprised by that. Guilty or innocent, the man was clearly still connected with the criminal world. He saw things, he heard things.

Guilty until proven innocent. The card’s message resonated in her mind.

But she didn’t know the extent of Wright’s crimes. Not yet.

“Do you remember the last time you had a therapy session?” Nina asked him. “You were assigned to a therapist because of your unstable behavior and the way you reacted when you were arrested for your original crimes. You were offered help, and Dr. Cleaver was assigned to help you.”

His shifty demeanor and the way he gazed at the desk with even more focus told her that he knew about Emily's death.

“That therapist was hopeless.” Still scowling at the desk, Wright gave his verdict. “She never solved my problems. The only reason I sat through those sessions was because I had to. I hated all of them.”

Nina leaned forward. “That's not what I asked you,” she reminded him. “I asked you if you remembered the last time you had a session.”

He didn't like being corrected; his ego flared. Raising his head, he glowered at her through surprisingly pale eyes.

“Of course I remember.” Defensiveness oozed from his tone.

“Do you remember what you discussed?” Now, Daniel joined the conversation, his attention entirely focused on their suspect.

“If you want to know the truth, she started going way back into my past. That's not a place I like to go. I warned her she shouldn't do it. She pushed ahead with it and I told her nobody goes there. Nobody. That's like a closed door, I'm not willing for anyone to open it." Now, he stared from one of them to the other with a sly grin that Nina didn't like at all. “You know the saying, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas? It's the same with my past.”

“So that session made you angry?” Nina asked.

“It all made me angry. I don't want anyone digging around in my mind. I know she was killed, and I didn't do it, but there are plenty of people who could have done it. Maybe you should go out and look for the real killer instead of harassing me?”

“I'm sure you'll be shocked to hear this, but your word is not good enough,” Nina said. The fact you missed a parole check in and the fact you ran from us provide a lot of evidence that you had something to hide.”

“Hide? You're accusing me. You're just like her. Exactly the same. You want to root around in my mind, and that's not going to happen. I admit I missed a parole check-in. I was trying to find alternative accommodation. My girlfriend kindly asked me to stay with her for a while. I've been no trouble there. You can ask her. Ask her if I've raised a finger to her or to anybody else, all caused any trouble down at that bar. The answer is no. I've just been living my life quietly, and I made one mistake. One.” He jabbed his index finger into the air as if proving his point.

She knew she couldn't ask him too much about his past because he'd already given her very strong clues that he would shut down if she tried. Whatever Emily had unearthed there, Nina decided it was best left hidden. Nina had glanced at his file, and seen that the reasons for Wright being sent to a psychiatric hospital were his instability, previous drug use, juvenile record, and extremely aggressive behavior toward other prisoners. He'd been evaluated, and the decision had been made based on everyone's safety. Although the medical side of his file was sealed, Nina guessed he must be on medication now. Whether he was taking his meds correctly was something that she supposed his parole check-in would confirm.

What was important was whether he had channeled that anger to kill his therapist and the judge who had sentenced him to such an unfair outcome - in his mind at least. And that was what they needed to find out now.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

“Tell me where you were last night,” Nina asked.

Wright glowered at her, his frown shadowing his forehead in the interview room’s bright light.

"Last night? Last night, my girl and I were hanging out together in her place. There was a lot of noise from the bar. But we stayed nice and quiet. I already know that you won't trust what she says because you’ll claim she's shielding me.” A note of self-pity was evident in his voice.

“How about Monday night?”

As she looked at him carefully, Nina saw his face change. Now, Wright was looking furtive, just the way he had done when she'd first walked into the interview room.

“I'm not going to tell you that,” he blustered defiantly. “You can't expect to dig all the way into my private life when I'm an innocent man who’s not guilty of these murders. The previous night, I met up with someone and then went out with a few friends. Private.”

“Without a confirmed alibi, you do realize you won't be going anywhere anytime soon.” Giving him her best glare, Nina got forceful. "You are already facing serious charges. You broke your parole, and we found evidence of hard drugs on your person. You need to be working with us, not against us. We could put in a good word for you and maybe the consequences will be less than there would have been. There won't be no consequences, I'm not going to lie, but it all depends on you now.”

He didn't want to go back to jail. She could see that. The problem was that she guessed the previous night had been spent doing something that the law wouldn't approve of. That was why he was being so cagey now.

“I really can't say. You're just looking to victimize me, man. It's happened before, and it will happen again I know you, I know your type. You just want to see me back in prison, maybe not even the psych ward this time, but somewhere worse. You've got a grudge against people like me.” Wright was breathing hard, his aggression rising, and Nina saw that he truly believed what he said. The police were the bad guys in his world. He was afraid of them and was suspicious of them. Nothing was going to change that, not now. She needed to get past this and focus on what his activities had been. Daniel clearly felt the same as his next question showed.

“If it's something to do with the drugs, that's already on your sheet,” Daniel reminded him. “You're not going to make things worse by giving us more information on that. In fact, if you give up a name of a contact that can help us, then it might be a better outcome for you. It's up to you. That charge is already there. But if you can tell us who sold them to you, and whereabouts you were last night, then it might improve your outcome. Your choice.”

Daniel's hard persuasiveness was getting results, which Nina thought it was ironic since her partner usually managed to win suspects and witnesses over with his charm. Now, there wasn't a trace of that to be seen. His face was thunderous, and Wright was quailing.

“Alright. Wait.” Wright's face had paled. “Look, do I get protection if I tell you where I was and who I was with the night before last? It was a once-off, just for fun, just so that my girl and I could have a treat. I wasn't selling or dealing. I don't do that, never have done.”

Nina exchanged a glance with Daniel. She wasn't averse to doing him this favor, but she wanted more.

“I'm sure you know that if we are going to show you any leniency, then we need real, good information. We need to know the name of this dealer and all the details on your meet up. If you're honest with us, then we might be able to do something about reducing the charges you face.”

“You need to know my whole life history, man, and all my secrets,” Wright complained.

“We have to know some of them,” Nina clarified. “We’re looking to solve a double murder.”

“That judge deserved what he got,” Wright grumbled. “He was a vindictive man and everyone knew that if you stood in front of him and you had any violence on your sheet, even if it was self-defense, he’d take you down. He didn't care.”

Nina ignored the protests, moving on to what she wanted to ask next. “Where were you Monday night, and who were you meeting?”

His forehead was furrowed and now he was staring at the desk again, but this time in a thoughtful way rather than a defiant way.

“I don't know if I should tell you this.”

“The fact you're deliberating about it means it's probably something we need to know,” Nina encouraged him.

He sighed, a prolonged exhalation of breath, and she knew he had come to a decision.

“Look, there’s something you need to know,” he said.

Nina waited, suddenly feeling as if this interview room was much smaller than it had been. She was aware of the activity outside, of footsteps passing by, the voices of cops.

“If I tell you who it is, and it gets back to him, I'll be in trouble. He is trouble. He’s just moved into the area, and he’s a hard drug dealer. He doesn’t play nice. He’s going to take over the trade in this town. And I want your word on that.”

“You have our word,” Nina said.

“If you pass me my phone, I'll show you what's on it,” Wright said.

Daniel got up, walked over to the box on the shelf in the corner of the room, and took out Wright's battered phone. It gave a bleeping sound, indicating the battery was low. Nina hoped he'd manage to find what he needed to before the battery ran out completely.

Wright looked pleased to be reunited with his phone. A smile curved his thin lips as he picked it up and stared at the screen, making Nina wonder if his girlfriend had sent him a message. Either that, or his dealer was checking in.

He scrolled through the messages and then turned the phone on Daniel's way. At last, Nina could see that he was cooperating in a genuine way. This wasn't a token effort, but she still needed to make sure that he wasn't trying to mislead them.

“This is the messaging from Sunday night. You can see we organized the meet up at about seven p.m., Monday. I was alone. He gave me what I needed. And then you see here?” His finger moved over the screen. “Here, you can see how I messaged my girlfriend's friends. The meeting point was the bar. There were about five of us there, and we had a good time. The barman can confirm we were there all night because we played in the pool tournament and I reached the finals. We didn't harm anyone. And I was going to check in for my parole, honestly I was. Just late.”

Daniel scrutinized the screen intently, and Nina knew he was going to leave nothing to chance.

“Alright,” he said. “That's confirmed. But what I don't know is the name of this man. I'm guessing Fargo is a nickname, isn't it?”

“That's how I know him. I don't know him any other way or by any other name,” Wright protested.

“Where did you meet him?”

“We always meet behind the old warehouses. That's where he does his business,” Wright explained. “But I mean it when I say I don't want him to know that I gave him away. You think I hate the police? Well, Fargo told me that he doesn’t fear the police because he simply pays them off.”

Fargo might have provided Wright with an alibi, but he sounded like big trouble, and Nina didn’t like the sound of these payoffs. The police were going to have to hunt him down before he got his claws embedded in Miller’s Ridge.

You must have a number for him?” Nina asked.

“That changes a lot. Best way to find him is to go looking behind the warehouses. Most evenings he's there.”

“Any chance of a description?” Nina asked. “Remember, we have a deal. And that involves more than just giving us hints and nicknames.”

Nina saw that Wright was biting his lip. Only for a moment, but the nervous gesture gave away exactly how he felt about Fargo.

“He's a big guy. He has a few tattoos. Shaved head, but he usually wears a black wool hat.”

“I see.” Daniel nodded. “Until we've got the local police to look for him, you're going to stay down in the holding cells. We don't want you warning him.”

Nina saw that Wright didn't look that upset by the prospect of spending a few hours behind bars. It seemed that when the alternative was going straight out to face the wrath of Fargo, the holding cell was suddenly a far better option.

“As long as you mean what you say, that I'm going to be protected,” he reiterated. “I wouldn't warn him. He's not the kind of guy you would warn that you told the police about him. That's why I want to make sure that I'll be safe.”

They'd started out chasing a fugitive, but in the end, his alibi had resulted in another break for the local police. She and Daniel were earning their keep in Miller’s Ridge, Nina thought wryly. Problem was that this had taken time that they could have been spending in search of the killer.

Now, they urgently needed to get back to that.

She closed the interview room door behind them and headed straight to the lobby to notify the local police that Wright would be their guest for another few hours.

“Take him down to the holding cells,” she said. “He's cooperated with us so far and although there are other charges against him, they might be adjusted thanks to what he's given us.”

Quickly, she summarized the details of the new drug dealer in town, and where he was likely to be in the evenings.

“Noted, and I’ll set this up with Chief Menzies,” the officer said. “And is there anything else you need me to do in the meantime regarding your case?”

“Yes,” Nina said. The protocols that would be the most helpful were top of her mind as she replied. “Have you set up a hotline number for the public to call in?”

When he nodded, Nina continued. “We need to take all leads seriously. If this killer is local, which I think he is seeing both his victims work in this area, then it may well be that someone has seen or heard something that can help us.”

“We'll be sure to give the hotline calls top priority, and we'll follow up on every lead,” the officer assured Nina.

A sense of urgency simmered inside her as she thought about the consequences of failure or even delay. Now that she and Daniel had been accepted on the case, they needed to prove themselves. Otherwise, Menzies would have even more of a grudge and a reason to mistrust the FBI. And that wasn't even as serious an issue as the threat that this killer posed to the people living in this town – the innocent people like Emily and Judge Reardon.

With both victims having so many mutual work connections, there was a lot of common ground between the two. Nina wanted to be sure that they weren't missing out on something that was so obvious they might not even have noticed it.

“So,” Daniel said as they turned away and walked outside to the car. “Where to now?”

“I think we need to look at the crossover between the two victims. There may well be other people in common who had a grudge against them both. I'd like to go to Emily's offices again and ask if we can take a closer look at her records.”

Daniel nodded. “A couple of hours’ research could give us a lot more insight on that,” he agreed.

Glancing at her watch, Nina saw to her consternation that it was already well into the afternoon. A day that had seemed so full of promise ever since they'd been co-opted onto the case was flying by, and the leads so far were only leading them further into a complex maze of problems.

She wasn't even going to let herself think about the most terrifying scenario of all, which was that this killer hadn't stopped yet. Already on a short interval, she feared at any time they might receive the call to say another body had been found.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

A sense of victory surged through the killer as he lurked in the trees outside the humble wooden house, set in an acre of ground near the town's edges. This was going so well.

He rubbed his hands together in glee and satisfaction, allowing himself a moment of lightness that took him out of the dark places where his thoughts were usually mired. Usually, his mind was as dark and cold as a murky winter's day. But now, it felt as if a ray of sunshine was penetrating the gloom that had smothered him for as long as he could remember, and it was the killing that had freed him.

He was preparing for the next of his victims, an urgent one, one that he was looking forward to the most, because this one was triggered by a bitter feeling of resentment. For so long he had had to bear the burden of knowing what this man had done. For so long, he'd seen him go about his daily duties, watched him striding down the street, walking into his workplace, knowing that he was respected and obeyed by all his employees but that he didn't deserve even a shred of respect.

“You are hypocritical and you are corrupt and you haven't deserved the life you've had,” the killer whispered. “And it's time to end it.”

He had pondered over the dilemma of using a different MO for this, the most evil of his targets yet. But in the end, he had decided that at heart he was still a compassionate man. He shouldn't allow himself to become twisted or darkened by the contemptuous acts that his target had committed. He had to expose their misdoings while making sure that he kept the higher ground, and that meant giving them a compassionate death.

Of course, this man presented by far the biggest challenge simply because of who he was. And for that reason, the killer had planned very carefully. Of all the victims that he had targeted, this man was the one that he had had to watch the most closely. He'd actually fitted the others in around this victim's schedule.

As he thought that as he waited, he heard footsteps behind him and tensed. He half rose to a standing position, staring around, his heart pounding hard. How was this possible? He'd been found out!

A woman with a broad, smug face was striding toward him. It was the same woman he’d seen in the woods. She was carrying a walking stick with a curved handle at the top, which she was using every couple of strides to support herself as her gumboots clumped through the mud on the path. There was a steely expression in her eyes as she looked at him. He could feel her energy exuding from her. It was a strong force, implacable, and utterly wicked. It was the arrogance of somebody who knew they would always be above the law.

“So, there you are?” she said. “I knew I'd find you.” There was a laughing tone to her voice. No, it was a mocking tone. She was sneering at him as she took out her phone.

“Time to call the people who’ll put you away forever,” she taunted.

Breathing hard, he stared at her. Terror boiled in his mind. The feeling threatened to overcome him completely. It was too late. He'd been found out.

But, just as he was about to cut and run, he remembered there was something else he could do. Calling on his memories, he hoped he could figure out what it was.

There was something he needed to do now in order to continue, before fear paralyzed and completely. What was it? He'd done it before. He felt as if his mind was fumbling for the solution, mired in a mix of terror and confusion. Then, in a rush, light dawned. He took a deep breath and stared at her. Really stared at her. “You can't do that because you're not real,” he told her. “Because you're already dead.”

The magic worked.

Slowly, like smoke, the image of the woman evaporated. She didn't even leave a footprint behind her. She had only been visible in his mind. And he guessed she would always be, because she was the one person he would never be able to give payback to.

Even though he'd been able to banish her, that encounter had been disturbing.

Reality was blurring. It was as if the line between what was real and what was his imagination was becoming less distinct. He didn't like that, but he guessed it was inevitable. Maybe it was the meds he'd been on, finally having the damaging effect that he'd always suspected they would.

For days, he had carefully watched this victim’s movements, and he'd managed to get a good sense of his routine.

In some ways, this target was a man of strict habits, every day the same. But in other ways, the nature of his work meant that at a moment’s notice his schedule could change. So, for that reason, there was always going to be an element of risk in this takedown.

Right now, he was crouched behind the thick, grainy trunk of a tree. His boots were planted in the mud, something that he knew was risky. But not as risky as it could have been because he'd checked the weather forecast for the day. There was rain expected this afternoon. Steady, soaking rain. It would become wet enough that this area under the tree would turn into a sea of mud, his footsteps eradicated.

He was returning from a place even deeper in the woods, the place where he buried the second of the hypodermics, this one used on the judge. It pleased him to think would soon be more buried up there. He doubted there would be found anytime soon, although he harbored a fantasy where decades down the line, someone who was digging up the ground for whatever reason, perhaps to clear some forest, stumbled across that hypodermic and wondered at its origins. Burying it had been easy in the mud.

He chuckled at the thought that the weather was on his side. The weather was cooperating with him, helping him in his mission. The elements were with him. The wind and the rain were cooperating. After all, those two forces had been around at the original time, that pivotal moment when all his actions had become necessary.

He didn't want to think back to that. It still caused him too much pain. That time was something he had tried to put out of his mind forever. It was far better to look forward, to think of a life where everyone who deserved it was dead.

Now, he wouldn't need to go far. From this standpoint, he had a perfect view of the house he needed. All that was required now was patience, and to wait until darkness. Under the cover of night, when his next target came home, he would perform the murder that would bring him the fiercest joy. Already he could feel his hands sweating at the thought, his breathing coming faster, even his pulse rate increasing.

He knew that this time, the target might be aware of him. It would depend on how much self-insight the target had. Perhaps he had none, and believed he was perfect, just like most human beings did, even those ones who committed terrible acts.

But he wasn't banking on it. He was very aware that this target might be on the alert and on the defensive. For that reason, he knew this would have to be fast. It was going to be the killing that threw the town into the biggest state of panic yet.

Once again, he felt that strange blurring in his mind, the sense that things were shifting. He reached out a hand to the tree trunk to steady himself. Then he took that same hand down to his jacket and touched the pocket, feeling the reassuring shape of the item inside it.

In his pocket, he had the card he needed to leave at the scene of this killing. He thought it was his strongest message yet. So that it would remain pristine, and so that it would be free from fingerprints, the card was in a sealed plastic bag deep in his jacket pocket.

He couldn't wait for the world to figure out this latest hidden message.

However, he was being very careful. Especially seeing he was now aware that reinforcements were on the case.

It wasn't just the police anymore. The FBI had come on board.

He'd only realized that after a while, because for some reason, those sneaky feds were in plain clothes.

Speaking to a few people, asking a few innocent questions, his suspicions had been verified. It had made him furiously angry at first. He'd felt as if this case was getting unfair attention. There were other murders, surely? Why did the FBI have to flood to this town so fast?

But after a few hours of seething, he'd come to terms with it. In fact, he decided it made these kills even more important. It showed the world that nothing was going to stop him, nothing at all. Not even the highest echelons of law enforcement could keep him from his deadly agenda.

He was still confident they wouldn't catch him in time because he had planned the arc of his killings so well. By the time they caught up, he would be long gone. He knew how to disappear. It was fortunate that he'd managed to make the connections that were helping him do it. Fake ID's was surprisingly easy to come by, and the right people with the right connections could get all the necessary information verified, even on national databases.

For a fee, anything was possible. Money bought happiness, or in this case, revenge.

At least this killing would bring him the sense of closure that he had been craving.

He was eager for this target to come home for the very last time.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

As Nina was striding towards the car with Daniel beside her, a police cruiser pulled up and Whitley got out. Immediately, Nina saw that the detective looked stressed - his forehead was furrowed, his mouth was tense, and he looked angry.

“Everything okay?” she asked.

He shook his head, his harassed expression intensifying. “There are problems, but I’ll give you the good news first. I've managed to clear Emily's toxic ex-boyfriend, Steve Smith.”

“That's helpful,” Nina said.

“Yeah. We finally caught up with him this morning. Not that he was exactly willing to comply with the police. He was mad as hell about being questioned, but eventually he gave us answers when he realized it was that, or being brought in. He was out of town and at a sales convention in Milwaukee. Presence there confirmed for sure. So that's him off the list - not that I thought he was ever on the list.”

Nina nodded. Smith also hadn't been top of her list. But every suspect ruled out meant a narrower pool. However, the fact that Whitley had cleared an important suspect, but was still looking completely stressed, was worrying.

“So, what's the bad news then?” she asked.

He sighed heavily. “Menzies is still giving us uphill. He's focusing on the wrong things. I shouldn't say this to you, I know. It feels like I'm complaining behind the boss's back, which I guess I am.”

“What's going wrong?” Daniel asked, concern in his voice.

“He's refusing to allow routine projects to be delayed for the sake of this case. I've had to spend a few hours doing something completely pointless that another officer could have done. I know he wants this solved, we all want this solved, but why does he have to make things so difficult?”

Nina nodded. She got him. Menzies was definitely that manager who exacted petty revenge at a later stage if things didn't go the way he wanted them to.

He hadn't gotten his way with the FBI being sent home, and so this was his payback. He was taking it out, whether he realized it or not, on the person that he considered responsible for the inconvenience of having to admit the FBI into the case. That was Whitley.

Why was he being so obstructive? Could there be a deeper motive? Nina knew that sooner or later, she’d have to confront that possibility.

“I'm sorry to hear that,” Nina said to Whitley. “At least you have ruled out the ex, and we're on our way to take another look through Emily's files. Her assistant never got back to us with the list of problem patients. I don't think she's going to, so we're going to go there and make sure we get it."

Whitley pressed his lips together thoughtfully. “That's good,” he said. “Because even though this case is still unsolved, we have a press conference this afternoon. The local media are demanding answers, and they deserve to get those answers. The whole town’s in a state of fear.”

Nina nodded sympathetically as he continued. “One of the problems with this case is that we've had to deploy so many police officers for false alarms and to escort our more vulnerable citizens in places where they feel at risk. We can't ever refuse to do that. This is what we're here for. But it all takes time and resources, and we're running out of both of those, fast.”

“If we get any answers, we'll let you know straight away,” Nina said. “With any luck, we might have a new lead, or at any rate some new information, before this press conference. What time is it?”

“The conference is at five p.m.,” Whitley said.

“And is Menzies going to be leading it?” Daniel asked.

“Yes. He is.”

At that moment, the growl of a car engine caused all their heads to turn. Nina saw that the man they'd just been talking about was behind the wheel. Menzies did not look pleased. His face was grim, and he too looked as if he was having a bad day. Tires scrunched and brakes squealed as he pulled up impatiently in his parking bay.

Climbing out of the car, he gave the two agents no more than the briefest of nods.

“Get inside,” he barked to Whitley. “We have an update meeting, starting now. If you spend less time talking and more time working, we'd be further ahead.”

With that angry and unfair comment, Menzies stomped into the police station, leaving Whitley to follow. Whitley didn't say another word to Nina or Daniel, but his face was flaming red.

Nina found it difficult to control her own temper. She hated unfairness, and it was exactly what she was seeing now. There was no need at all for a superior officer to deliberately go out of his way to humiliate one of his detectives in front of other law enforcement officers, and yet that was what Menzies had done. And it wasn't the first time.

“He still doesn't want us on this case,” Daniel muttered. He was staring with equal dislike as Menzies disappeared inside.

“You're right,” she said. “I guess Emily's ex isn't the only toxic person that poor Whitley has had to deal with today.”

Daniel smiled ruefully at that. They climbed into the car, and sped off in the direction of Emily's rooms. Nina felt determined that when they arrived at the offices, they were going to find the answers that she was sure must be hidden somewhere in her patient files.

As she and Daniel approached the neat building once again, Nina guessed that the psychologist hadn't spent much time in this pretty, well-appointed space. Most of her work had been in the grim environment of prisons and psychiatric wards. Nina was sure it was that environment that had killed her, but she hoped the roots of the murder would be found buried in the psychologist's records.

Daniel parked outside the offices, and they walked in.

As soon as she saw the agents walk in. Kaylee leaped to her feet, and Nina could see that she looked just as stressed as she’d done earlier.

“I know I told you that I would get the information to you,” she said hurriedly. “But I'm not sure if I'm allowed to.”

“Why is that?” Nina asked. Behind Kaylee, she could see the office was neater than it had been this morning, the big desk completely bare. She could imagine how Emily Cleaver might have sat at that desk, dealing with her patient records. Now, everything had been cleared away. There was a feeling of finality in this space.

It made Nina angry about the murders. It wasn't just a life that had been taken, it was so much more than that. It was the effect that Emily had had on other people's lives.

Her own coma had made her deeply aware of the impact that every medical professional had on those who were compromised and battling, and the doctors, nurses and physios who were her heroes during her return to health and strength.

The fragile connection between Emily and her patients, that lifeline of communication, was now broken, never to be repaired.

Upset about this, Nina’s mood was not improved by the assistant’s unwillingness.

“Well, it's confidential. You see, these records belong to people who, well, they're troubled. That's why they saw Emily, I mean Dr. Cleaver, in the first place. They needed her help. I don't want to have any lawsuits coming my way, and I'm worried that they might. I gave you one name, but isn’t that enough? My boyfriend said I should be careful.”

Frustration rising inside her, Nina decided this woman needed a gentle reminder of exactly what the FBI's role was in this investigation.

“Remember, we are not interested in exactly what is in the files. We don't need details. We just need the most basic of overviews, and also to know if there's anyone you were worried about personally or Dr. Cleaver was worried about,” she said.

“You say that.” Now Nina could see that Kaylee was looking combative. “But I'm the one who's going to be landed with a lawsuit if the worst happens. You'll be gone by then, and it'll be on my shoulders, and I don't feel ready for it.”

Nina glanced at Daniel. This wasn't going the way she wanted it to. It was time to play her trump card.

“I can see that we're going to have to get a warrant.,” she said in a businesslike way. “That'll probably be the best way to go about this. With a warrant, we'll be able to access all the information we need, and it's then not up to you to decide what to provide or to hold back. And as far as getting permission goes, I'm sure that every judge in the courtrooms right now is thinking about Judge Reardon and what happened to him. None of them want the same to happen to them. That warrant will be issued fast. That I can guarantee you.”

Now Kaylee frowned. “I don't want to be seen to be obstructive,” she said. “I work with a lot of the judges. I don't want them to think that I'm hindering you. It's just that I've got to look after myself. I'm a psychology student and I want to have a practice one day and I'd like to get there without a lawsuit hanging over me.”

Nina gave a sigh. “You are hindering us, she explained. You're making it more difficult for us to get the information we need to catch the killer. It's highly likely that one of the patients Emily treated is in fact the killer. If you let us access the records, you'll expedite the process. It might even mean we can save a life.”

“I still think a warrant will be the correct way to go,” Kaylee said. Nina could see she wasn't getting through to her. But never mind the trump card, she tried and failed to play, she also had an ace up her sleeve in the form of her partner.

Daniel stepped forward, talking in the easy way he had when he wanted to be charming yet persuasive. “Look at it this way. You'll end up giving us the information anyway. All that the warrant will affect is the timing. We can either do it tonight or we can do it tomorrow. By tomorrow, there may have been another murder, and I really want you to think how you’d feel about that. Do you want it on your conscience? When what you could have is the reputation of having helped the FBI to solve a horror crime?”

What was it about Daniel, Nina wondered. They could say almost the same thing, but when he said it, somehow a certain type of person listened. And it was clear that Kaylee was that type of person. She was nodding now, a sympathetic look in her eyes.

“Yes, I guess now that you put it that way, you've helped me to understand,” she said. Nina all but rolled her eyes. However, this was not the time to be irritated when they were going to get what they needed.

“Right,” Daniel said. “The best place to start will be with the list of patients. If you remember yesterday, you were going to tell us about any problem patients you had. We'd also like to know if there are any patients with issues who recently stopped treatment. And we'd also like to know if there are any patients that Emily Cleaver was worried about.”

“How do you mean, worried about?” Kaylee asked.

“Maybe anyone whose therapy wasn't going well,” Nina suggested. “Patients who were angry, patients who had deeper issues that she was uncovering, patients who she felt might become dangerous. I know you might not know the details of all of these, but remember, all we're asking you for are the names.”

“Well, I suppose I can get that for you.”

Nina checked the time, making sure that Kaylee saw her do it. Seeing Daniel was her favorite of the two, Nina could at least play the bad cop with impunity.

“Any time now would be good,” she said. “The sooner the better, because we're going to go straight from here to the first of whoever you give us.”

Time was running out. There was an hour or two, maximum, to start working on the problem patients before it got too late. And that meant Kaylee had to step up to the plate and give them what they needed.

“We'll wait right here,” Daniel's tense tone confirmed the urgency.

Kaylee turned away. “Okay," she said. I'll look through the files now, and I'll get the names to you in a few minutes.”

As she waited, Nina gave the room a closer inspection. Although the desk was cleared now, there were certificates on the walls, proving Emily's prowess in her field.

A pot plant stood on the filing cabinet in the corner. While patient care was clearly a priority in this office, plant care not so much. Its leaves looked withered, and it had no blossoms. As Kaylee squinted at the computer screen with her fingers flying across the keyboard, Nina noticed a corkboard above the filing cabinet. It seemed to have some personal testimonials on it. Some were handwritten, others were printed.

Intrigued, she got up to have a better look.

Some of the excerpts were from quite a while ago. Nina read a couple of heartfelt testimonials from people who swore that Emily had healed them. Although most of them were anonymous, with the names of the writers not included, there were a couple that were signed. Nina recognized the names of a local actress as well as an author who had made it big. Emily had done counseling on behalf of some state officials as well - an ex-mayor, a few city councilors, and a couple of school principals, who had all written short testimonials on her expertise in dealing with them or their connections.

Those were the good people. But Nina was interested in the bad.

“Alright.” With a shuffle of papers and a whirr of the printer, Kaylee had come through with the goods. “I've set down the names of the patients that were causing problems. And I've included the ones who stopped their treatments abruptly, or were no-shows for appointments. I thought that might be useful.”

“Yes, that might be very useful, I appreciate it,” Nina said.

“There might be a few more.” Now that she was committed to the research, Kaylee seemed engaged by it. “If I think of any others, I'll send you the names. But the names are all I can send. I can't give further details. Obviously, she worked with a lot of people who have criminal charges against them, so if you want to look them up on your side, then that's not my business.”

She handed Daniel a sheaf of papers.

Nina knew that in these pages, they might find the killer’s name.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Time was short. As soon as she and Daniel were in the car, Nina started paging through the printed sheets.

There were about twenty names. Kaylee had erred on the side of plenty rather than giving them too few. With the time they had available, the issue would now be sorting out which were the best prospects. As Daniel logged into the police systems remotely, Nina thought again about what their priorities were.

“We need to think about the words used. Shadows. Darkness. It's as if there was something covered up. Maybe it's his own secrets?” Nina suggested.

“That's not going to be the easiest to pinpoint, seeing we don't have details on the cases,” Daniel pointed out.

“I guess we can get somewhere if we look at the records.”

Her mind racing, Nina formulated a plan of action that would allow them to examine the majority of the list as fast as possible. First and foremost, they needed to look up the criminal records of the people on the list and see if any of these aligned in any way with the MO of the killer.

Then, the next imperative would be speed itself. The more people she and Daniel could speak to, the better their chances of finding the hidden killer. She knew that this could end up as nothing more than unfulfilling hours of time-wasting research.

As her mentor, retired FBI agent Elaine Collins always used to say: that's policing for you. Sometimes you got lucky but other times you didn't. Sometimes it took a long tough journey of trying and failing, to dig out the person who was hiding.

Elaine had often said to Nina, “You've got excellent instincts. Use them. Let your instincts guide you. If you look at a list of suspects, you have to start somewhere. Why not start with the person that you feel needs scrutiny?”

Nina had argued that fact with Elaine, as she now remembered with affection. “So you mean I look at a list and just pick a random person?”

Elaine had shaken her head, her eyes very blue below her graying fringe, and looking rather amused too.

“You'll never just pick a random person, Nina. Although you don't know it, from the time you look at that list, you will be assessing it based on the age, the name, the background of the people, the area where they live, a host of factors that most probably you're not even aware of. So why not trust yourself? Don't overthink these things when there’s a lot to do. Pick a name, clear it, then pick another. Of course, if there's a way to do it that's more time effective, for instance, if some of the people are all in a certain geographic area and it’ll be faster to handle them in that order, then go for that, but if not? Then trust yourself Nina. That confidence in your own ability is one of the most important qualities that a good investigator can have.”

“Do you have any ideas about how we should start?” Daniel asked.

"Yes," Nina said. “I've actually been thinking of what Elaine would advise.”

Daniel nodded. “You know, you had a look in your eyes that told me you were thinking of her.”

“I did?” Nina stared at him, now with some alarm. “My eyes told you I was thinking of my mentor?”

"Remember, I used to see the two of you in meetings together. I used to see the way you interacted. And the way you two worked on cases and on test cases together. I'd go past the meeting room when you were with her, and I'd see the way you were looking and also the way you were sounding.”

Now that was interesting, Nina thought. That was a piece of information that her memory hadn't offered her after her coma. She hadn't known that Daniel was looking at her in that way, even back then. That he was noticing her. That he'd peek into a meeting room and glance at her as she had her session with Elaine.

“So you say that you can literally tell when I'm channeling Elaine?”

“Well, am I right or wrong?”

It felt good to have some banter at this pressure time and Nina was grateful for the lighthearted moment that they just shared.

“If I can channel Elaine's know-how right now, then I'll be glad," she admitted. "And she always used to tell me to trust my instincts when it came to looking at a list, and to pick out the person that I felt we should start with.”

Daniel nodded, still smiling faintly as he turned his attention to his laptop. Always faster than her when it came to typing and research, it wasn't long before he'd called up the records and was busy allocating the names on Kaylee's list to the offenders who were listed on the police system.

In the meantime, Nina did her own research, remembering what Elaine would advise her to do. Starting with the top name and working down, she did a brief search for news articles, social media and other public domain information that she hoped might give her some more insight into who these people were.

Working in the cramped confines of the car wasn't the easiest, but Nina barely noticed the discomfort and the lack of space. She wedged her laptop onto her lap, using the fingers of her right hand to guide the touchpad, while her more mobile left hand typed in the information she needed.

Soon she was so focused that she forgot she was sitting in a car at all.

Remembering what the elderly neighbor had told them, Nina focused on the men rather than the women. That neighbor had definitely seen a male figure fleeing in the rainstorm, and the victims had been handled with strength when their mouths had been smothered by the killer’s gloved hand to mute their screams.

First on her list was a name that she could find no social media or online information for at all. That always raised red flags for her because it was so unusual. Few people had no online records at all. Whether it was social media pages or work media pages, news articles, or even company records that stated who they were and what they'd done, it was hard to leave no trace whatsoever. But one person on the list was invisible. The man's name was Billy Coombs.

Nina put him at the top of the list.

The next red flag came a few names further down, with Edward Merkel. When she typed that name into the search engine, the results that came up showed her that Edward had been involved in a serious road rage incident a year ago. Particularly interesting to her was that during that road rage incident. In addition to crushing his hand over the other driver’s mouth when she tried to scream for help, he had also vowed consequences if she spoke up against him.

“You will regret this, I promise you,” he had threatened.

“I felt terrified for my life,” the victim had said to the journalist who had interviewed her. “And I still do. He was so… so violent. It was as if he was triggered by nothing. I don't understand it. How can anyone get so angry just from being cut off in traffic? I still feel scared when I go out, wondering if he's watching me, and if this will be the time when he makes good on those threats.”

Reading those words online gave Nina an uneasy feeling. The fear that this road rage victim felt was evident in her words, and she could imagine the sense of threat that she still suffered every day. The silencing might be a theme he had continued with, as the messages on the cards showed, and it was going to be important to interview Edward Merkel urgently.

The third of the people who she decided that they should prioritize was a man called Alex Hogan. The reason that he was on her list was that he was the son of the town’s former mayor. And he had cancelled his appointments abruptly, without any notice, and hadn't resumed them.

This, despite his mother's glowing reference on the notice board in Emily's offices.

At least Kaylee had highlighted the cancellations as opposed to the ones that were on the list for other reasons, so Nina was able to figure out which were which.

“Right, I've got my top three,” she told Daniel.

Wrestling with the online database, which seemed to be slow, he had ended up being slower than she had. Only now that she was no longer focusing on her list was she aware that he had been muttering in frustration as he had waited for the information to refresh. Finally, he finished scrolling through the list, jotted a note down, and then turned to her.

“Mine doesn't narrow it down much,” he said. “There's only one person on this list who doesn't have a criminal record.”

“Well, let's start with that name, then,” Nina said. “Who is it?”

“The only one who doesn't have a criminal record is Alex Hogan.”

Nina nodded. “He was one of the cancellations without notice. He's the son of the ex-mayor.” She frowned. “In a way, I worry it will be a waste of time to go and see him, but at the same time, I'm still intrigued by why he was a no-show for his appointments.”

Daniel peered over at her list. “I'm sure that Elaine would say being intrigued is a reason to go rather than to leave him. If he's close to where we are now, then why don't we stop by?”

"He is fairly close by," Nina said, looking at the address. “But in this town, nobody's that far away from each other.”

“On my list,” Daniel said, “there are a few who've moved away, out of town. Some even out of state. Although the killer could have come back, it does make sense to start with the people that we know are living here.”

“Agreed,” Nina said. “It would have taken research and time to figure out these victim’s habits, and that does point to a local perpetrator.”

“Who are your other top picks?” Daniel asked.

“Billy Coombs because he's invisible online and I can't find anything on him. And Edward Merkel, because he has a road rage record. The threats he made have some parallels with what's happened to the victims.” Nina adjusted her arm in the sling, unobtrusively easing the muscles. She didn't want to tell Daniel, but it was aching after having to twist it in order to use her touchpad.

“I agree with you on Merkel. And I'm with you on Billy Coombs,” Daniel said. “But not for the same reason.”

“What is your reason?” Nina asked.

“Coombs has a history of theft, assault, and I see here there's a note on his record that he attacked a guard in prison and tried to inject him using a hypodermic that he had somehow obtained. It was later found to contain some sort of sedative. The notes here aren't too clear on that incident. Maybe because it represented a security breach in the prison?”

As Daniel spoke the words, Nina wondered if this also was a reason why Billy Coombs didn't have any information on him online. Perhaps he'd been able to get certain things erased.

“When was he released?” Nina asked.

“Just four months ago,” Daniel said. “Apparently, he was a problem prisoner who firmly believed that his sentence was unfair. If you ask me, he's one of the people who scared Emily.” He glanced down at his list again.

Nina's focus was now on the time. It was ticking by and she couldn't stop thinking about the fact that this killer struck at night. It was already getting dark.

“I reckon we split up for this,” she said.

Daniel frowned, and Nina could see instantly that he disagreed with her idea. “I don't like the sound of that, not with the way you are right now. Your arm, you know?” He glanced at her sling in a way that told her he had noticed that she'd been easing her muscles.

Deciding not to confront him directly about this, Nina took another approach. “Let's plot their addresses on the map,” she said.

Daniel called up a map on his laptop. Shuffling between tabs, he quickly plotted the three addresses they needed.

“It's obvious,” Nina said, “that we do need to split up. Look, Coombs and Hogan are on opposite sides of town. From here it's going to take twenty minutes going east to get to Coombs, and west to go to Hogan. So if we each take one, then after we're done with them separately, we can meet up. We can go to Merkel together. He's the one who's the most threatening and most likely to be violent.”

Daniel still didn't like it. He was frowning.

“If you insist on doing things that way, then you take Hogan,” he said.

This was giving Nina flashbacks again. When she'd first come out of her coma, Daniel had always taken the tougher, more dangerous jobs. Once again, he was trying to protect her. But she was okay with that because even she had to admit she was compromised. If they'd been in a situation where he was operating with one arm, she'd also have insisted on taking the tougher choices.

At any rate, thinking of it that way allowed Nina to avoid the scary truth that if she had another head injury, she might never make it out of the hospital or back to the FBI again.

She knew that worry was constantly in Daniel's mind, although she tried to keep it out of her own.

“I'll take Hogan no problem,” Nina said.

With that decided, the next step was to radio for another police car. Luckily, with all the officers on patrol, that was quickly available. Within a couple of minutes, two cars pulled up, and Nina got out of the car she was sharing with Daniel and climbed behind the wheel of the second one.

“You okay to drive there, Agent?” the officer said, looking at her sling as he climbed out, ready to get into the first car with his colleague.

Nina knew that behind her, Daniel was pressing his lips together in agreement.

“I'm not going far,” she said. “This is just to check out a suspect who lives west of here. We're meeting again at a central point, and you can pick up the car from there. It shouldn't take more than an hour.”

But what would happen within that hour? Just as Daniel was anxious about her, so she too was anxious about him. Buzzing down her window, she leaned out. “Be careful,” she called to Daniel.

“And you too,” he said.

Then they were off, driving their separate ways, the headlights of her borrowed police cruiser cutting through the darkness as she headed onto the road going west.

CHAPTER TWENTY

“Great,” Daniel muttered to himself as he hit the gas heading east. “Just great.”

His efforts to make sure Nina stayed safe hadn't worked out at all. Here they were, heading off in opposite directions, both after suspects who were potentially dangerous, even though he'd tried to give her what he guessed was the less violent of the two.

Taillights flashed past him as he accelerated onto the main road. He hated when they went in opposite directions during a case, and particularly at this time when Nina had an injury. Daniel couldn't help remembering that evening when the disastrous accident had happened after they’d gone their separate ways.

She had chased after the suspect – in the right direction as it happened. But the timing had almost killed her. He'd set a trap, and she'd run into it. In the dark labyrinth of the abandoned building site, she'd been chasing too fast, and by the time she realized, she had already been falling, plummeting down into the darkness, and her coma.

He still had nightmares about her fall. He'd wake up from bad dreams where he was watching that play out, unable to prevent it, and he'd find himself covered in cold sweat, shouting out in panic. It was ridiculous, really, because it was all too little, too late. He hadn't been there when she needed him. Again and again, Daniel's brutal soul searching made him wonder – would things have been different if they hadn't recently had a terrible fight and ended their relationship?

If they had been in harmony the way they were now, would he have been there for her? Would they have made different decisions about which way to go and what to do?

These were questions that he couldn't answer, but it didn't stop them from tormenting him. Daniel had to admit he lived in fear of having another set of questions like that to answer again.

Now, he tried to force his thoughts away from Nina's predicament and focus on his own. It wouldn't help to go into a potentially dangerous situation while distracted. If he was injured, he'd be even less able to help her.

There was one thing he could do, though, while he drove, and he was going to do it.

Daniel pulled out his phone and dialed the number of the cop back in Seattle who was watching her apartment.

“Any news?” he asked, as soon as the cop picked up.

“I haven't had a chance to go around there this evening,” the cop said. “I was there earlier today, and the camera is still broken. A doorman was on duty, but he didn’t exactly look on top of the job.”

“Any sign of anyone watching the place?” Daniel asked.

“I couldn't tell that. I didn't have time to spend there. I'm sorry, man, it's been a busy day.” He hesitated and then added, "I did get a feeling about it though. Call it cops’ instinct? It made me think I should go back later, and I will.”

“Thanks. I appreciate what you've done.” Daniel couldn't blame the man. He was doing more than what Daniel had expected from him. It was his own anxiety about the situation that was pressuring him to check up so obsessively.

“I'll try to go around after shift later tonight,” his colleague reassured him.

“Thanks,” Daniel said.

The lack of certainty that Nina's place was safe only contributed to his feeling of uneasiness, which was growing steadily as he headed out of town, refocusing on his suspect. Billy Coombs had a history of assault. He’d managed to get hold of a hypodermic while in prison. And Daniel agreed with Nina that the lack of information about Coombs online was strange. The sooner he got face-to-face with this man, the better.

The area he was heading into was exactly what he'd expected. It was a rundown part of this mostly pristine town.

Small houses were shoved up against each other as if giant hands had pushed them there. Yards were either paved over or weedy. With no garage space, the street was crammed with cars, mostly older models. As soon as he could find a space, Daniel pulled over and wedged the cruiser into the narrow gap. The house he needed was across the road. He climbed out and headed over.

His boots scrunched along the path, which was a mixture of gravel and weeds, as he headed to the scuffed front door. Banging on the knocker, Daniel waited, shifting from foot to foot. He listened out for any sound from inside. In a minute, rapid footsteps approached the door.

It was flung open and Daniel found himself face to face with a man who was surprisingly short, squat and aggressive looking. He couldn't be more than five feet in height, but his shoulders were just about as wide. He was wearing a handlebar vest that hung well below his waist. A pair of gym shorts nearly reached his knees. He stared up at Daniel with a frown creasing his forehead, which was famed by brown, wispy hair. Then he peered at Daniel's ID with even more consternation.

“The Feds are on my front doorstep?” He sounded horrified.

“Are you Billy Coombs?”

“I am, but what the hell is this about?”

“I've been coopted onto a murder case. I'm helping investigate the death of Emily Cleaver. You knew Dr. Cleaver, didn't you?”

Coombs nodded, looking puzzled. “Yeah, she gave me some counseling. It wasn't very helpful, but the prison insisted on it. Since I was going to do anything to get out of there, I went along with it. I don't know why they've even told me to do it. She counsels damaged people. It's not like I'm damaged. I just made a couple of wrong choices way back. Never quite got out of the loop.”

“She was murdered the day before yesterday,” Daniel said. “And since then, there's been another murder. Do you remember which judge sentenced you?”

He was coming in hard, but he didn't have time. If Coombs was guilty, he wanted to push him into a reaction.

And Coombs was looking very uneasy at Daniel's question. “How the hell should I remember that, man? It was, like, months ago. I don't know who it was, I've just been trying to live my life. Put that behind me, you know?” He shifted from foot to foot. “Yeah, I'm sorry. Very sorry she's gone. But I'm not surprised, like I said. She worked with some people who had big issues. Like crazy mental issues, you know? I wouldn't have wanted to speak to them, try to help them. I guess one of them couldn't get past those issues.”

Since Daniel was much taller, it was easy for him to look over the top of Coombs’ head and into the small home’s entrance hall. There were a few bunches of keys on the hall table, and a water bottle, as well as an iPad, which looked new and state-of-the-art. He wondered if this was purchased or stolen or else used in the line of Coombs’ work, if he was working. He needed to ask all those questions. Starting from the beginning.

“When's the last time you had any contact with Dr. Cleaver?”

“The last time I had a session was the last time I saw her. Like I said, I was still in prison. Why would I keep in contact with her?”

“And what do you do now? Are you working?”

“You say that like you expect me to be some kind of deadbeat,” Coombs said defensively.

“Honest question. I'm trying to get background.”

“I'm doing driving jobs – deliveries. I have a friend in the business. He took me on even though the system abused me, and I've got a record unfairly on my name now.”

Daniel wondered what business that was, seeing as how Coombs hadn't mentioned it. Still, maybe that accounted for the new-looking iPad on the hall table.

“How often do you do these deliveries?” he asked.

“A few times a week.”

No need to sound so angry, Daniel thought. Coombs’ record was serious. There was a reason why he was at the top of their list, in terms of his actions at least. Personally, Daniel was wondering If the elderly neighbor would have noticed a shorter man. She had said average height. However, he reminded himself that the neighbor was fragile and small herself. And it was raining. She might have misjudged. It was better to be cautious and not to stop suspecting Coombs until he could be properly cleared.

“Can you account for your time last night?” Daniel asked.

“Yeah, I can actually.” Coombs looked quietly satisfied. “I was driving. On the road.”

“Where and when?”

“I don't know if I should tell you that.” Coombs looked shifty again. “See, I know what you Feds are like. You just want to frame me for something now you're here.”

Guilty until proven innocent? The words on the card resonated in Daniel’s mind as he sighed. “Believe me when I tell you, all I want to do is clear you and walk away. But if you're lying, I'll pick it up and then I'll make things worse for you,” he threatened.

The tone of his voice made Coombs look startled.

“Okay, okay, there's no need to be oppressive. I can show you my logbook. I have a vehicle log. Boss insists on it so that I don't use the truck for anything else.”

Daniel's respect for the boss's forethought increased.

“Show me the book,” he said.

With a martyred sigh, Coombs turned. He stomped into a living room that Daniel couldn't see. Immediately, his suspicions spiked. He didn't like it when suspects went out of sight. Daniel stepped into the entrance hall and peered around the corner, just in case. But Coombs wasn't going for a knife or a gun or a speedy getaway. He was, in fact, picking up a phone off the coffee table.

On the way back, he picked up the iPad from the hall table, opened both the devices, and handed them over.

“Take a look. And then get yourself off my doorstep,” he said grumpily.

Daniel noted that Coombs was watching him carefully as he scrolled through the devices. He guessed that the ex-con was ready to jump in if Daniel started navigating somewhere he wasn't supposed to go. But since he had shown him the map app on one device and the messages on the other, he was willing to stay within his lane. All he wanted to do was confirm that this man hadn't been committing a murder. And as he matched up the map with the messages, he saw that Coombs was, in fact, telling the truth. At the time of the crime last night, he wasn't even in the state. He was more than four hundred miles away, and would only have got gotten back early this morning.

“Thanks,” Daniel said briefly.

“Next time, keep your nose out of my business.” Now that Coombs had been cleared, and he knew he wasn't in trouble with the police, he wasn’t holding back. His tone was even more aggressive. Still, Daniel wasn't here for a fight. He simply turned away. As he strode back to his car, his own phone rang.

With a flicker of worry, he pulled it out, wondering if it was Nina.

But to his surprise, it was Whitley on the line. The detective sounded frantic.

“Agent Grant. Are you available now? There's been a disaster.”

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

As she drove, Nina found herself increasingly worried about Daniel. For sure, he had the tougher assignment of the two. She didn't foresee much danger in interviewing the son of an ex-mayor who had no criminal record whatsoever. This was a box check exercise in a way, and now she was worried that it constituted a misuse of her time. Should they have picked another name from that list? Had her instincts been wrong?

Forcing the thoughts out of her mind, Nina resolved to get this done as fast as she could, so that she could be back on track to help Daniel with the other suspects. It was well past the last of the evening rush hour, traffic was light, and she made good time getting out of town.

Alex Hogan lived on a corner property in a row of neat-looking houses. It was a typical suburban area, the kind of place where well-off people lived. The homes were neatly painted, and the yards in good repair.

Passing tidy home after tidy home, Nina expected more of the same when she reached her destination. Except it didn't work out that way.

There was one property in the row that looked different from all the others. Its unpainted fence and straggling yard set it apart. In the front garden, an untrimmed maple tree arched over the paved path, littering it with leaves, its branches almost blocking the way to the front door. The tree's branches made it difficult to see inside the house, but Nina did pick up a glow of light from the upstairs window. This was the place she needed, where Alex Hogan lived.

Puzzling, she thought. This wasn't what she'd expected. Climbing out of the car, she headed up the path, noticing that the paving was loose, stained and in need of sweeping. She had to duck to avoid the tree branches and wondered if Alex did this every time he walked out of his own front door. He must do. There wasn't another way to get to it.

Reaching the door, she saw that the brass knocker was loose on one side, so as she picked it up, it rattled as well as knocked.

Nina waited, now hearing movement from inside the house. In fact, she picked up the patter of padded footfalls. Then she heard a sniffing noise from behind the door. So at least the household pooch was aware of her presence, and that meant hopefully the house owner would be too.

In another moment, a heavier set of footsteps approached. The handle, which sounded loose and rusty on the inside too, turned, and the door was opened.

A man in his early twenties stared at her.

His face had the pallor of somebody who avoided the outdoors at all costs. His brown eyes looked haunted. His hair was a few weeks overdue for a cut, and the dark red shirt he wore was creased. He stooped over slightly as he stared at her with one hand on the collar of a dog that looked like it might be part Irish setter.

The dog looked as cheerful as he looked morose. Its tail wagged hard as it saw Nina. She had to control herself and not bend forward to give it a scratch on its mahogany-colored head. Instead, she focused on the man in the doorway.

“Are you Mr. Hogan?” she asked.

The man stared at her warily. “Yes, that's me.”

Nina showed her ID. “I'm Agent Veil. I need to ask you some questions.”

The pale man looked worried. “About what?”

“Your ex therapist. Dr. Cleaver.”

“What about her?”

“She’s been murdered.”

Nina had wondered what reaction that would prompt. But even she was shocked by what happened next. Hogan gasped in a breath, clapping a hand to his mouth. The dog gave a small whine, looking up at him in concern.

“I don't watch the news. I didn't know a thing about this. How did that happen? She never deserved that. She was brilliant. She... She really helped me.”

The dog pushed its nose into Nina's hand, and this time she relented. Hogan didn't look like a serious danger. So with the arm that wasn't in the sling, she gave him a quick, affectionate scratch on his head.

“I'm only here because you stopped attending your sessions. If she really helped you, why did you stop? Did you feel you didn't need to go anymore?”

“That wasn't the reason. I guess what happened was – well, I had other problems. She helped me with… with some of my emotional issues. But I also suffered from substance abuse. That got the better of me down the line.” His voice was flat, lacking in emotion, as if he was recounting a time of his life that he didn't actually want to revisit.

“So you took a different path in terms of your counseling?”

“Yeah. I had to go the Alcoholics Anonymous route. I'm still with them. Still attend meetings. I'm clean. But it's… It's been hard.”

It was clear that Hogan had a lot of issues. She was still intrigued by his connection to the ex-mayor. Somehow she thought that the son of an ex mayor would at the very least get a landscaper in to neaten up his garden. Wouldn't his parents organize that? Since he was vulnerable and damaged? Or maybe they’d turned their backs on him.

“Is it correct that your father is the ex-mayor?”

Now, he gave a rueful shake of his head. “That's not correct.”

“Why?”

“A lot of people assume that. But the mayor is actually my mother. She was, anyway. She died a few months ago. Heart attack. Very sudden.”

Again, his voice was flat.

“I'm sorry to hear that. I know she spoke well of Dr. Cleaver.”

Hogan shrugged. “She forced me to go to the counseling. I didn't really want to. It was after an accident and I – well, I guess I was messed up.”

To Nina, it sounded as if he had far more resentment toward his mother than he did toward his therapist. There was a vulnerability about him. She sensed it, even though she didn't understand it. This man was definitely battling demons, but he didn't seem to blame Emily Cleaver in any way for those battles. Instinctively, she didn't peg him as a murderer. But it was still better, to be sure.

“Do you have any connection with Judge Reardon?” she asked.

“Yeah, he was in charge of my case when I had the accident. But he deemed it to be a no-fault collision." Again, his voice was toneless. And Nina couldn't see that there would be any reason for him to want to murder the judge when the judge had kept him out of jail.

“Can you account for your movements last night?”

He shook his head. I was home alone. I guess Ranger can say where I was.” He stared down at the dog, who wagged his tail.

“What about Monday night?” Nina wasn't giving up.

“Same again.” There was a note of apology in Hogan’s voice. “If you’d come past an hour earlier today, I did have company. I had my sponsor for Alcoholics Anonymous here. We just finished having coffee.” Now peeking through into the living room, Nina could see two empty cups and a plate which still contained three cookies. “But he's the only person I've seen for days.”

Although she instinctively felt Hogan wasn't the murderer, she didn't want to leave without having completely ruled him out. He did seem very troubled, and she wished she had more time to find out why, as well as to talk about his movements over the last couple of days. He might have made some calls, he might have done something to prove his whereabouts. Maybe it would be better to invite herself inside and spend a few minutes getting to the root of the issues. But as she was about to suggest this, her phone started ringing.

It was Daniel, which instantly spiked her pulse. Was everything alright? Was he in danger?

“Excuse me,” she said, quickly swiping the call up.

Daniel's voice was urgent. “You need to get back here,” he said. “Menzies has been murdered.”

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

“SILENCE CAN’T BE BOUGHT FOREVER.”

He chortled as he headed into the shadows. That was the message he'd left on the third card. It meant a lot to him, that message, because it was so true.

And his murders were exposing that fact. They were ripping light into the darkness. Tearing the secrets away. For too long, money and power had held a stranglehold over the truth. He’d known what it would take to expose it, and that it would take all his strength and will. But he been ready for it, and so far he had risen to the occasion.

He was particularly thrilled with this last kill. It had been one of the ones he'd enjoyed the most. Unlike the psychologist, for whom he had felt regrets, a fierce satisfaction had seethed in him as he’d slid the needle into the vein of the chief.

His timing had been perfect, and he hadn't felt unsafe for a moment. That dour-faced police officer had come back home at exactly the expected time, and he'd been waiting. He wondered if the chief had suspected something before he clapped a hand over his mouth in the darkness of his garage. Once he’d done that, the chief had known he was about to be murdered. And of course he’d struggled hard. He'd even tried to shout. Despite the struggles, he’d gotten the contents of the hypodermic into Menzies’ arm before he was able to do much harm. His night vision goggles had made it easier, because the chief had been struggling in darkness

He had known he wouldn't escape unscathed from this confrontation, and he had suffered a few bruises. After all, controlling a trained police officer as he struggled for his life was no easy task. But now he knew that he was stronger than he thought. He was strong enough to do everything he needed to, although it had come at the cost of some pain.

And, of course, he'd checked his gloves. They hadn't broken. Sturdy and strong, they'd held up even though Menzies had ripped at them. And that meant his DNA would be nowhere near the scene because his head had been covered.

He was limping slightly as he wove his way through the woodland path. He'd stop along the route to bury this hypodermic, just like the others, in its little grave. He had a place in mind. It would be the perfect spot for it.

And before too long, the police would all converge on the scene. Nothing got cops backs up like killing one of their own. They would be swarming around there like ants, or perhaps like flies. That was a better analogy for death, wasn't it? At any rate, they would all be there, Including those FBI agents. And that meant that he could find the opportunity to pick off his fourth and last victim, the one he'd been waiting for. The one who had started everything.

As his footsteps scrunched along the path, he picked up another set, faintly, behind him. Dread swelled inside him, and he turned. His breath was misting in the dark, cold air, but there was nobody there. Only the trees, but in the dim light, their trunks looked gnarled and threatening.

Turning, he walked on, but now he couldn't shake the troubled feeling that had settled inside him. What if someone was following him? What if he'd been seen? That police chief might have had a guard somewhere around, who’d spotted him just in time. He tried to tell himself that this was no more than paranoia, but his own excuse didn't wash with him.

The footsteps were there again. He could hear them. He wasn't imagining this. Perhaps if you looked around suddenly, he'd spot the follower. Maybe the last time he'd had a chance to hide.

Drawing in a deep breath, he whirled around. As he gazed into the gloom, he saw a hint of brightness. A sick feeling rose inside him as he saw it was her. The stocky woman with her walking stick was here again. Her hand gripped that stick in an authoritative way. She gazed at him with knowingness in her eyes.

“Go away,” he said hoarsely. He wished he had more authority in his voice. “Stop following me. I know what you did. And I'm not going to stop until everyone's paid for it.”

For the very first time. He thought he saw doubt in the eyes of this ghostly woman, who he knew at some level wasn't real, but on another level was entirely convincing.

“That's right, he taunted her.” Now it was time to turn the tables. She’d troubled him enough with her presence so far. It was his turn to put some fear into her heart, or whatever was left of it. “You know where I'm going next? You do, don’t you? You tried so hard to protect him. And at last, you’ve failed.”

He waited, his breath puffing out. And for the first time, he saw dismay in the ghostly woman's eyes as she faded and vanished. He'd defeated her. She couldn't stop him. Nobody could. And in a few short hours, his work would be done.

He turned and walked through the forest again, and this time he knew he was alone.

CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

Shock resonated through Nina as she took in the words. The unlikable police chief murdered? Turning away from the front door where Hogan stood, she took a step toward that overhanging tree, speaking in a low voice.

“Is this the same MO?”

“Same MO.” Daniel's voice was hard. “He headed home about an hour ago from the police station after the media conference. I called him to ask him something, and it just rang. I asked one of the officers to go by, and they found him at home with the lights off. Dead in his garage. Just like the others.”

Nina's heart was pounding. This changed everything. Whoever was murdering these people was clearly seeing a link between them all, and now that link included Menzies. Had Menzies arrested this killer originally? There must be a reason why he had been targeted. Somehow he had been involved.

She felt a sense of utter doom that things had turned out this way. If only they'd been quicker tonight, they could have done more. If only Menzies himself hadn't been so unwilling. His own uncooperativeness had sealed his fate, but there was no point in thinking about that now.

Right now, they needed to move fast. Striding back toward her car, ducking under the tree, Nina knew that there was only one left out of the three suspects they’d originally put at the top of the list.

The fact that Menzies had been murdered within the past hour cleared Hogan. He'd been at home with his sponsor. He’d volunteered that information.

Climbing into the car, she scrabbled together a plan of action.

“We still have one suspect left. I imagine there are lots of police at the scene of the crime. Perhaps we should go straight to Edward Merkel.”

“I think so too,” Daniel said. “I'll meet you there. If he's the killer, we need to bring him in, and fast, because this third death is going to send the town into a state of emergency.”

Frustration and regret seethed inside Nina as she veered onto the road, turning the car in the direction of Merkel's address. If only they'd gone to him first and not ruled out the others. They might have been in time to stop him.

It was hard to quiet that critical voice telling her that she'd failed. But Nina tried hard. There was no point in demoralizing herself, not now, when fast, positive action was needed. Instead, she should remind herself that they had acted in the right way and followed the most sensible protocols. Thinking otherwise is illogical. Merkel would already have been waiting for Menzies. He wouldn't have been at home. All you would have done is waste your time. But he might be there now, straight after the murder, and that means you might get him.

She knew this would be dangerous. And she was compromised. She'd need to be smart and careful to make up for her physical weakness, but at least she had experience of that. The pinpoint on the map grew inexorably closer as Nina sped down the main road, steering carefully with her left hand. Was it her imagination or was the road eerily quiet tonight compared to last night? Perhaps the murders were already gripping the town in a stranglehold of fear.

There were lights ahead. Daniel was waiting for her at the beginning of the road where Merkel lived. With a quick, terse message on the radio, to say that this vehicle was now available, Nina abandoned the car by the side of the road and climbed in beside Daniel.

“Menzies, dead?” That was her greeting to him. His reply was a grim nod.

“I'm sure you've also been beating yourself up over how we should have done things differently,” he muttered.

“Yup,” Nina said.

“I just spoke to Whitley now, while waiting for you. He said that back when he was arrested, Merkel had a huge fight with Menzies. Shouting at him, threatening him, promising revenge. Apparently, it escalated and even got physical. Because it was a few months ago, they didn't think it was significant now. It's not exactly unusual in policing.”

Nina's turn now for a grim nod. She didn't want to think that if Menzies had been more cooperative earlier, they might possibly have found this information out sooner. She didn't think the police chief had done his job well. With a lot of those confrontations in his past, there were probably too many for him to have highlighted out any one, especially when he didn't want the FBI's involvement.

“Now, of course, it’s all exploding,” Daniel said. “The new mayor is pleading with the police to solve this crime. The station is already being inundated with calls. The press are demanding answers. I don't know if it could have been avoided, but I wish this had worked out some other way.”

They headed down the road, which was lined on one side with industrial buildings and on the other side with large concrete faced apartment blocks. Beyond the apartment blocks were a few old houses that looked small in comparison with the looming apartments and were probably scheduled for demolition at some stage. A few battered cars were parked on the sidewalk. And beyond that was a thick, dark stretch of forest.

“Let's check the place out first,” Daniel said.

That was a good idea. As the car eased to a stop outside the house, Nina looked around, taking in the feel of the immediate neighborhood. There were lights on in the apartment buildings, but the industrial area was darkened at this time. In the house where Merkel lived., she could see no lights. He might not be back, or he might be back and hiding.

She climbed out of the car and headed towards the house. On high alert, she was looking and listening out for any sign of a threat, however subtle it seemed. Sometimes, the tiniest details gave away where a criminal was lurking.

The wind was blowing, tossing the trees and sending stray leaves scudding across the damp grass. The shifting and rustling of the branches made it difficult to hear other sounds. Nina stood, straining her ears, trying to accustom herself to the feel of this terrain. Once you had a pattern in place, it was easy to see irregularities in it. But coming into a strange environment meant you had no pattern available. She took a moment, breathing deeply, staring around at the trees, taking in the quietness of the forest and the faint noises from the apartment buildings and the utter desolation of the empty, darkened factories. When she felt more aligned with her terrain, she moved on.

To Nina, this house looked unoccupied. All the windows were dark. She saw that, as she walked around the house. Daniel was treading softly beside her, his footsteps almost noiseless. She knew that he would be assessing the same way she was, and that he probably had the same impression of the place.

When Nina reached the back door, she tensed. This was unexpected. The kitchen door wasn't closed. It hung open.

She took her flashlight off her belt, holding it in her left hand.

The rustle next to her told her that Daniel had done what he did reflexively in these circumstances. He’d dropped his hand to the grip of his gun to make sure it was available if he needed it.

“We go in?” he asked softly.

“Let's see what's there,” she replied.

They headed up to the back door, Nina's heart pounding. She glanced over her shoulder several times before they entered the house. Was this a trap?

The flashlight beams glared over the kitchen countertops, which were scuffed, made of old gray laminate.

She could hear no sound of anyone in the house. But on the far side of the kitchen, she saw one of the bottom cupboards was slightly open. The dark gap in the line of doors attracted her attention. She didn't have a glove on, but as she stepped forward, she used the edge of her flashlight to push the door wider. Nina caught her breath as she saw what was at the back of the cupboard. Three small bottles made of glass and containing a clear liquid. Two hypodermic syringes.

“Well,” she said aloud. Hearing the stress in her own voice. “Looks like we’ve found our killer.”

“Except we haven't,” Daniel said.

Nina nodded. He was out there.

He was hunting his next victim, and now, they were hunting him.

The crackle of the radio cut through the night as Daniel updated the team.

“Looks like Merkel is our suspect. He’s not here. Evidence of the materials used to kill. We need to hunt for him, as he could be nearby.

A voice came over the airwaves. “I’m at the police station, and I’ll be able to look up his cellphone number now.” There was a pause. Her muscles already tensed for pursuit, Nina waited for the orders to be clarified.

More staccato back and forth over the radio. Then Daniel nodded. “Right,” he said. “They're going to try to trace him anywhere they can. While we're here, we need to take a walk into the woods and see if we can track him. His car’s a blue Volvo.”

“We saw that outside, didn't we?” Nina asked. Now, the memory was coming back to her. She'd been on the alert as she had walked inside.

“Yes, I remember it being out there too. And what that means is he didn't leave in his car. He could have borrowed somebody else's. Could even have taken a cab, although I doubt that in this town. Too traceable.”

“Or else he could have walked.” The geography of the area was coming back to Nina now. The swathe of woods acted as a divider within the town, as well as a border around its outside. Menzies’ house was on the other side of those woods. Perhaps a couple of miles walk. That wasn't so far for a killer to go, especially when the woods provided thick, untraceable cover.

The sooner they started, the better.

But, before she turned away from that kitchen door, Nina found herself looking back.

Was there something strange about it being open?

“We need to go.” Daniel's urgent voice interrupted her thoughts.

“Just a minute,” she said. With her flashlight in hand, she walked up to the door. Shining the beam onto the wood, she looked at it closely. Was that a splinter near the edge of the door? Did the wood look freshly marked there?

It might mean nothing. It wasn't enough evidence to change her mind. But even so, Nina found that tiny detail weighing on her mind as she turned away, striding into the woods next to Daniel.

CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR

As they headed deeper into the forest, flashlights swinging from side to side, the crackle of the radio kept Nina and Daniel company. Nina focused on it anxiously every time it blurted to life.

“We've been able to track his phone!” The triumphant words came through. Adrenaline surged inside her. This chase down was a huge cooperative effort, and tracking the phone so quickly was a major breakthrough. In fact, Nina recalled, it was not often that a suspect's phone was actually turned on. Finally, after a run of bad luck, perhaps things were turning their way on the case.

“Where is it?” Daniel's terse question added to the communications.

“We’re getting a GPS pinpoint now.” There was a pause. “Looks like it’s over your side.”

“In the woods?” Nina felt incredulous. This was a stroke of fortune.

“There's a building near the forest’s edge. We’re narrowing it down. Hang on a sec.”

Seeing they were following a path, Nina guessed they might as well stay on it. But at any moment, they might need to break away. She had to be ready.

“We've got a location!” The words exploded over the radio. A moment later, the red dot they'd been waiting for appeared on Daniel's phone.

“Building’s a couple of hundred yards further on from where you are.” That was Whitley’s voice. “I think it might be a bar, maybe an old nightclub.”

“We are on it,” Daniel confirmed. And they were. Ahead, Nina could already see the lights appearing through the darkness of the forest.

Had he gone here to celebrate his kills? As she neared it, she could hear the music thumping from through the grimy windows. The bar seemed to be at the end of a cul-de-sac, and there were a few cars and motorbikes parked along the side of the road.

“I've got his description coming through now,” Daniel said. He showed Nina his phone, and she stared down at an impassive face, a square jaw, close cropped light colored hair and hard, angry looking eyes. It was a memorable face, at least. She'd know it again in an instant if she saw it.

“Right,” Daniel said, putting the radio back on his belt. “Backup’s on the way and it'll be a couple of minutes. I reckon we go in for now.”

Nina nodded. She felt the same way. If they delayed and the suspect slipped out through a service entrance, then they would lose valuable time. This could be just a stop-off on the way to his next victim.

Even so, she took a moment to check out the place, striding around the back, taking a look at possible escape routes, making a note of the double doorway at the far end of the bar, currently closed.

Doing a quick count of the vehicles, she guessed that there were somewhere between ten or twenty people inside. That might mean trouble, if the occupants decided to close ranks. It was a risk, but right now, it was one she was prepared to take.

“Let’s go in,” Nina said, after having done a final weigh up of the situation.

She walked in the direction of the entrance door, hearing the pounding music grow louder as she neared it.

Daniel strode ahead, pushed open the wooden door. It swung wide. Stepping inside, Nina was enveloped by the fumes of beer and smoke that hung in the air. The place was only about a quarter full, as she’d thought from seeing the cars outside.

She guessed it was a later night establishment, and that the customers in here now were the die-hard regulars.

Even though there was nothing to identify the two of them as police, she saw a number of suspicious glances turn their way, just because of the fact they were strangers.

Daniel strolled over to the bar. Discreetly, he produced his ID, and the barman’s look of distrust hardened into angry suspicion, and a couple of patrons perched on their stools at the bar looked aghast.

“Got a couple of questions,” he said in a low, conversational voice.

"What do you want? This is private property, and I can't allow you to bother me or our customers," the barman muttered angrily.

But while Daniel had been, Nina's focus was on the tables at the back. Her gaze sharpened as she saw the man they needed, sitting with two others. She did a quick mental check, remembering the picture she’d seen. It was a match, for sure. He was draining a glass of beer, and he hadn’t seen them yet.

Time to surprise him, and see what happened.

“Edward Merkel?” She shouted the words, producing her ID as she strode toward him, and as she did so, alerted by the shout, Merkel leaped to his feet. A chair crashed back onto the floor. His friends were on their feet, shouting. The anger as the men took in their presence felt like a palpable force. The police were hated here.

And Merkel wasn't going down without a fight. Nina had thought he would run, but in fact he did the opposite. Picking up a stool in his hand, he charged towards them, swinging it wildly.

He wasn't going to throw it, was he? He was going to throw it. With cat quick reflexes as she realized the trajectory of the stool, Nina ducked.

She heard a rushing sound as it flew over her head and crashed against the wall, one of the legs smashing off. The surge of adrenaline that rushed through her only happened after the fact. That could have hit her head and hurt her badly. There wasn't time to think about it, though. She needed to get to this violent, aggressive man who was attacking the police as soon as he saw them.

Daniel was already on his way, rushing between the tables.

“Police. And you're under arrest,” he yelled.

It seemed that Merkel's two friends weren't waiting around. Maybe it was the fury evident in Daniel's demeanor. At any rate, they scattered, leaving him with his fists up, facing off against Daniel.

Daniel wasn't pulling his gun in a place like this. That wouldn't just be unwise, but foolhardy. Instead, he met their suspect head on, fist to fist.

Merkel swung a wide, vicious blow. If it had landed, it would have knocked Daniel out, but Daniel's reactions were too fast. He stepped aside, avoiding the blow, and his own hand lashed out.

As Nina stood guard a couple of paces behind him, Nina couldn't help but admire her partner’s fighting tactics. Even though she knew he was mad, he was still in icy control. His fist hit home right under Merkel's jaw. The big man's head snapped back. Too late, he tried to ride the blow and his leg lashed forward. But because he was off balance, all he did was catch a table with his boot. It clattered down and before he could try again, Daniel punched once more, this time into his midriff.

He was down now, on his knees, coughing. Daniel rushed forward.

“Hands in the air,” he yelled. No time for the suspect to pull a gun or a syringe. The bar was clearing as sirens sounded outside. Apparently two officers were fair game, but more than that was a signal to run away. The other customers were crowding to the side entrance. Shouts of alarm resounded in the smoky air as they rushed out through the side door, letting in chilly wafts of the night air. Even the barman was all the way at the back of his bar, flattening himself against the wall of bottles and staring at the action. You know could see no desire in him to take part.

From the unbalanced way that Merkel scrambled to his feet, Nina wondered if he was drunk. They'd find out soon enough. Police were crowding into the bar. With the suspect cornered and cuffed, it was time to prove his guilt.

*

As soon as Nina walked into the interview room, Merkel’s gaze pinned her. She'd seldom seen a look filled with so much hatred. This man didn't just resent the police, it went far deeper.

He was a big man, above average in height. And he had a presence about him. The way he was sitting with his shoulders hunched over his cuffs gave an impression of barely controlled aggression. If he could have done it, she guessed he would have broken out of those cuffs, leaped across the table and attacked her.

For now, though, he was firmly cuffed, so she sat down opposite him, Daniel doing the same.

“So, Mr. Merkel,” she began. “It seems you knew why we walked into the bar out there in the forest. Were you expecting us?”

He didn't answer, just glowered at her in silence.

Daniel cleared his throat. “You weren't just defensive. You were aggressive. And as my colleague said, it looked like you were expecting us. Maybe that's to do with what you were doing earlier.”

His voice was neutral. However, Merkel clearly took offense at it. He raised his chin, his gaze piercing Daniel.

“You know what? I call the police. I call them the pigs. That's what you are to me. You're pigs. I mean, you walk in to a place where I'm hanging out, I'll try chase you away.” The drunken slur in his voice confirmed what she’d suspected earlier.

“Seems your grudge goes back a while?” Daniel didn’t even sound offended by that taunt.

“I owe you one.” Merkel’s voice was deep and threatening. “Maybe you don't know what I mean by that, but you will. You do something bad to me, and I’ll retaliate.”

Listening to the words, Nina thought they were strange. If this man had already committed three murders, why was he being so overtly threatening? She tried another question.

“How long had you been in that bar?” she asked. Once again, he ignored her.

“Mr. Merkel, it's an easy question. Are you going to reply?” She got nothing but a glower in return.

“It would help if you would answer us. If nothing else, it would prevent us all from sitting here for the rest of the night,” Daniel said tersely.

Merkel’s gaze swung to him again. “I was in the bar for an hour,” he said in a rough voice.

If he was telling the truth, being in the bar for an hour gave him time to do the murders. He could have walked straight there from the last crime scene.

But what Nina was observing was that Daniel was getting all the answers so far.

For some reason, Merkel was more open to Daniel’s questioning. It sometimes worked that way. It might be because Nina was a woman. Some suspects resented being questioned by a female officer, although it was sometimes more complex than that, and there had been some suspects that refused to speak to Daniel and would only talk to Nina. However, she was starting to wonder if her presence here was counterproductive. If that was the case, it might be better to send in somebody else. Thinking that through, she wondered if Whitley would be a better choice.

Nina checked her phone, making sure that Merkel saw her do it. She didn't want him to think that he'd won and that she was leaving because of his resistance to her questioning. She nodded decisively, as if she just received a message, and then stood up. “I’m needed outside. I'll send in someone else,” she said.

She knew Daniel would understand her strategy. She didn't even have to look at him or ask him.

Striding out, Nina closed the door and headed straight to the observation room. There, in the small, musty smelling room that she guessed wasn't very often used, Whitley was waiting with two other cops, watching through the one way mirror.

In a low voice, he updated her. “We've got forensics on their way to Merkel's house. They'll do a full search. Log that evidence. See if there's anything else he's hiding in there.”

“He's not responding well to me,” Nina said. “Do you want to go in and join Daniel there?”

Whitley nodded. “Good idea.”

He left the room and Nina perched herself on one of the visitors chairs that were stacked together near the window that looked through into the interview room. There was silence in the room apart from the quiet breathing of the officers and the occasional scribble as one of them wrote down notes.

But Daniel still wasn't making headway. As Nina tuned in to the conversation again, she heard Merkel violently protesting.

“Yes, I believe all cops should be wiped off the face of the earth, but I'm not going to let you slap fake charges on me because one of them got himself killed. How dare you think you can do that? I want a lawyer.”

Patiently, Daniel was trying to unpack what had really happened, but Nina could tell it was going to be a long battle. And if Merkel insisted on the lawyer, it would be longer still. After all, having a lawyer present was his right. They might have to take him down to the cells for a few hours while he organized a lawyer. Nina didn't think he was the kind of person to have one on speed dial, but you never knew.

Was there anything else she could do in the meantime? Standing up, she left the interview room and headed through to the back office. Nina didn't want to jinx the case with her own thinking, but she couldn't help remembering that one small detail that was troubling her, the fresh splinter of wood that she'd seen on the edge of Merkel's kitchen door.

After all, it did seem hugely coincidental that she and Daniel had found those hypodermics and the sedative drugs so easily. In the kitchen cupboard, left enticingly ajar. Why would somebody be so careless as to do that, just shoving them back into a cupboard, but then when he was brought in front of the police, keep denying everything?

Yes, if he was completely unbalanced he might do that. But Nina didn't think that the actions she'd seen in the three murders so far had been those of a very unbalanced person. There had been a cold, callous logic to the actions. Everything had been thought through with care and some skill in the writing of those cards that only showed up under UV light. Now, as she sat at a desk and checked through the case file notes online, she saw that the third of the cards had been read. The message had been carefully noted down by the police.

Silence can't be bought forever.

Meeting that message, Nina felt chills go down her spine. Of all the messages so far, this was one that pointed most clearly to the original motive for the kills. This wasn't just referring to acts being done in secrecy. It was pointing to an actual cover-up, one in which the police might have been involved.

Goosebumps prickled her arms as she realized this could be why Menzies had been so resistant to the FBI coming in.

He had been trying to hide his own past, fearful that they would expose it.

He fit the profile of someone engaged in corruption. She’d thought from the start that he was that kind of person. That aggression, that bluster, the unreasonable way in which he tried to stop them at every turn until events spun out of his control with the second murder. Even then, he hadn't been cooperative. That attitude was familiar to her. Scratch the surface and you often found guilt hiding underneath, and fear that old sins might be uncovered.

Nina shook her head. This was the worst of all possible scenarios, but she had to acknowledge it might be true.

If this was the case, they were on completely the wrong tangent, because Merkel had resented Menzies, but not due to any cover up. Time was running out. This killer might kill again as soon as tonight. She couldn't stop feeling a sense of doom at the thought that they might have to go all the way back to the beginning and relook at this case from the start. That somewhere down the line, they'd taken a wrong turn or missed a vital clue.

“No,” she said aloud. “That's not possible.”

Forcing away the panic that overwhelmed her at the thought they'd gone so wrong. Nina reminded herself to think logically as well as intuitively. They'd done a lot right on this case. There were certain common factors that, in her opinion, formed the pillars of the case. Those weren't going to crumble just because the wrong man was sitting in that interview room. It was simply a case of looking at the evidence and finding what else was missing. It didn't mean going all the way back to the beginning. It meant a closer look at the truths they knew so far.

“Right,” She muttered to herself, reaching for a pen and a notebook and looking again at the information that was now up on the screen in front of her. “If we've gone wrong with Merkel, then we've been intentionally misled. The killer planted this evidence, knowing that we were going to look at criminals with a common link between the three victims. This killer must have known about the big fight between Menzies and Merkel. That's why he chose to frame Merkel. He planted those sedatives and those hypodermics in his kitchen, taking the gamble that they would be discovered soon, as the manhunt closed in.”

So what did that all mean? How could she take this line of thought further? It meant the killer was a local. Well networked. Possibly with friends or connections in the police or who kept a close eye on local news and gossip. There must be a reason why the common thread between these victims was so significant to him.

A cover-up. That was what she was looking for, a cover up. What did a cover-up mean? It meant that somebody who should have been guilty was found innocent. That a crime that should have been prosecuted was simply ignored or glossed over. What would it take to do that?

It would take intervention from somebody who needed desperately to make sure that crime didn't land on the record. And it would take influence either in the form of money or power. Asking nicely if you had neither of the two wouldn't cut it. A corrupt police officer would only agree to do such a thing if there was something in it for him.

And also, maybe, a corrupt judge. The rot might have spread further than just the police station. It might have extended to the courtroom. Judge Reardon might have received a payoff to rule the right way.

Clinging to her thread of logic, Nina took it further. Had they experienced anything that related to this in their investigation so far?

She nodded. At last, she'd realized where they hadn't looked closely enough. There had been a cover-up, but because they'd been looking for a crime and not the absence of one, they hadn't realized it until that third message landed. The person who was crucial to this case must be the only one of Emily Cleaver's patients who didn't have a criminal record. And perhaps there was a reason why the troubled Alex Hogan, son of the previous mayor, had walked away free after that vehicle accident.

CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

Springing to her feet, Nina rushed back to the observation room. Alerted by the hurried sound of her footsteps, both the cops in there looked around when she burst in.

“Do either of you remember a case involving a man called Alex Hogan?” she asked. “He doesn't have a criminal record. I think it would have been something to do with an accident.” That was what he told her anyway when she stood on his doorstep, looking at a man who was miserable and evasive and had appeared to be carrying a huge burden of guilt.

Both the cops looked surprised as they stared at Nina. Then, the officer closest to her nodded. He was an older man with graying hair and a solid, square face. He rubbed his hand over his chin, the lines on his forehead creasing deeper in thought.

“I remember something about that,” he said. “That was a couple of years ago when that young man was about nineteen years old. He was driving home late at night, and he hit a pedestrian.”

“What exactly were the circumstances?” Nina asked.

“I'm not sure of the circumstances, because he was the mayor's son, of course, and so Menzies handled that case from the start. In the end, it appeared that the woman he killed might have veered into the road, perhaps stumbled on the sidewalk, and it was declared a no-fault collision. It did go to court, but the judge dismissed it. There would have been Judge Reardon, I think. The poor man was very traumatized by it. His mother sent him for counseling, you know, helped him to get over it. It's not an easy thing to do, to cope with something like that. Even if it wasn't your fault.”

Red flags were waving in abundance for Nina. Late at night, a young man driving on his own?

“Was there ever a toxicology report?” she asked.

The square-faced cop narrowed his eyes as he struggled to remember that time in the past. Taking a heavy breath, he replied, “I don't believe there was. He was underage for drinking, so perhaps Menzies didn't think it necessary.” There was doubt in his tone as he spoke the words, though.

Frustration surged inside Nina. That case had been mishandled, and she was sure it was deliberate. When under-aged men alone at the wheel had an accident, it didn't matter if they weren’t  of drinking age. That was even more reason to do the tox screening. No, she was certain that this had been covered up because Alex was the mayor's son. And Mayor Hogan had wanted no smear on her record.

Perhaps it was the mayor's death that had finally triggered this killer to wipe out everybody who had been associated with the case. Whoever he was, he must have been personally affected by the initial accident. Now, she needed to know who had been killed.

“What was the victim's name?” Nina asked. “The one who was killed in that crash?”

The officer shook his head. “That, I'd have to look up,” he said.

As he stood up, Nina couldn't help feeling a moment of sadness for the victim who had been so invisible and so swiftly forgotten, except by the one person who had been determined to avenge her.

She followed the cop to the back office, and he walked over to one of the filing cabinets. Looking at the drawers, he eventually bent down and opened the very bottom one, rifling through it, and eventually pulling out a folder. It was very thin, no more than a couple of pages inside.

“It's all coming back to me now,” he said. “The victim's name was Kerry Denton, aged twenty at the time. It was a very sad situation. We all felt for the family. Kerry was in a coma for a few days, sedated and on life support, before she suddenly declined and they couldn’t save her.”

Nina nodded somberly. Now, the killer's MO was making sense. This was why he'd used sedation to kill his victims, knocking them out and then delivering the killing dose, in homage to what his sister had suffered. That was why he left the blank cards with their secret messages on just the same way his sister had spent the final days of her life in a blank, unknowing state. Thinking of that gave Nina a spine-chilling reminder of her own personal past.

“I remember now, Kerry’s mother passed away soon after that,” the cop said. “I think she had a chronic lung condition that worsened. After what had happened, we did look in on her from time to time, and I remember there was talk that she was becoming more and more frail.”

Nina's heart pounded as she took in this added reason for revenge. Whoever the killer was, he would have blamed his targeted victims for this double tragedy. Not only the loss of Kerry, but also the loss of her mother, whose condition might have been worsened through grief, shock and loss.

“Who was Kerry’s next of kin, besides her mother? Any other family members in town?” Nina asked the question that she knew would decide the direction of this case.

The cop turned the page in the file and read out the name.

“Mark Denton. That was his name. Her brother, a couple of years older than her. I remember he took it very badly, but he refused any help from us.” He was looking at her quizzically now. “You think this is connected? Do you think we've missed something along the way?”

Nina nodded. “We've missed something that could get Alex Hogan killed,” she said. “I'm going to head to his house immediately. Could you send a car around to Mark Denton's place? If he's there, bring him in. I suspect he's the killer, and if we don't get him now, he's going to take the person he blames most of all for his sister's death.”

*

Gripping the wheel with one hand, Nina sped down the road, heading to the house where she'd been just a couple of hours earlier. She didn't know if she'd be in time to save Alex Hogan. The killer could easily have gone straight there from Menzies’ house, detouring along the way to plant evidence in one of the likely suspects’ homes. Mark Denton was invisible. Nobody had suspected him. That was thanks to Menzies, who’d carried the guilt of the cover up on his shoulders, and had been in denial for too long.

She hadn't wanted to interrupt Daniel's questioning in the interview room. There was a chance that Merkel was somehow involved, perhaps a collaborator in this crime, even though Nina instinctively didn't think so. But she didn't want to interrupt the rhythm of the questioning with such an aggressive suspect in case there was a crime to be uncovered. This mission was up to her alone.

The streets were quiet. There was barely another car on the road. The crackle of the radio told her that the cops were still on the way to Denton's house, which was further out of town. He still lived in the old family home where his sister and his mother had resided. It must be filled with memories and sadness.

Even though Nina utterly condemned the killings, particularly Emily’s, she couldn't help feeling a flash of sympathy for the torment the young man must have suffered, knowing that a crime that should have been prosecuted had instead been brushed under the carpet.

Here was Hogan's house ahead. She slammed on the brakes. Wrenched open the door and jumped out.

Immediately, Nina picked up a sad, whining noise. There was Hogan's dog, the red coated cross setter. Standing on the doormat, he had his nose jammed against the front door and was whining miserably. It meant he'd been shut out, and she was sure that meant the killer was inside. The windows were dark, and she couldn’t see a trace of light inside.

Nina raced over to the door. She grabbed the handle, opened it awkwardly with her left hand, and headed inside. Behind her, the dog trotted in anxiously.

There was nobody in the hallway, but as she turned on her flashlight, she saw a chair was knocked over in the living room. There had been a struggle, but where were the two men now? Straining her ears, she could hear no sound. Was she too late? Shivers prickled her spine as she thought she might be.

She didn't want to put the dog in any danger, but every second counted when searching this darkened house, and there was someone nearby with better instincts than hers. If anybody would know where this was playing out, it would be Alex Hogan's loyal companion. Bending down, Nina whispered in his ear. “Hey boy. Hey, Ranger. Where's your owner? Where is Alex? Where's your owner?”

The dog's nose twitched. Then his tail gave a tentative wag, and he walked toward the foot of the stairs. So that was where the struggle had taken the two men. Turning again to the dog, Nina whispered “Stay.”

She had no idea if the dog would obey her, but she didn't want him running into a scenario where he could receive a lethal dose of sedative.

Then Nina climbed the narrow stairs as quietly as she could, but hearing the treads creak and knowing that this might signal to the killer, she was on her way.

As she reached the top, her adrenaline surged. Now she heard a noise. A scuffle and a thump was coming from the door ahead of her, which was partway open. She raced to it, grabbing the handle, flinging it all the way open and shining her flashlight into what proved to be a small bedroom. As he heard her, the killer whirled around, yanking up the night vision goggles he’d been wearing.

Alex Hogan was prone on the carpet by the bed, and he must have received the first dose. He wasn't moving. But since the killer still held a loaded syringe in his hand. Nina was going to guess that Alex was still alive. The killer himself was staring at her, gasping wildly. He was young, in his early twenties. His pale blue eyes were like lamps in his haggard face, his lips were curled back from his teeth, and he was in the grip of a terrible fury.

“Get away,” he yelled in a high-pitched voice. “Get away. This is the last one, the most important one, and you're not stopping me.”

The tip of the hypodermic needle was just inches away from the bulging vein in Alex Hogan's arm. Nina guessed he must have wrapped the top of his victim’s arm with something tight to make sure the vein was prominent.

What could she do? She only had one arm to work with, and it was holding a small flashlight. With her sling, she was unable to leap forward and try to wrench the syringe out of Denton’s hand. That would be reckless. She couldn't afford to reinjure the healing fracture in a struggle. She'd come here knowing the dangers, and now she had to face them as best she could. In this situation, she had only one powerful weapon she could use, and that was her voice.

“Think about what you're doing,” she said, swinging the flashlight beam away from him so that he couldn’t be helped by its glow.

“Oh, I've thought,” Denton said. “I've left the best till last. He took my sister's life. He deserves to die. You can’t stop me. I’m ready. Come any closer, and this needle goes straight into his arm, and I’ll be out the window while you try to resuscitate him." Now, there was a mocking tone to his voice.

“I agree that accident was his fault,” Nina said. “Alex should have had consequences for it and he didn't. He should have done jail time and he didn't. That wasn't his fault. I think he was forced to go along with the cover up and he’s suffered for it.”

As she was talking, Nina was surveying the room. She knew that if Denton tried to go ahead with the killing injection, she would have to move fast. At any moment, he’d use that hypodermic. What was here that could help her?

. By the wall lay an old scuffed laptop bag. There were a few clothes lying around on the floor and draped over a chair on the far side of the bed. There was a dog's water bowl in the right hand corner, half full of clear water. And on the walls were a couple of unframed pictures. Serene landscapes, painted on cardboard, the colors muted.

“I'm glad he’s suffered,” the killer hissed. “You know, I still speak to Mayor Hogan. She follows me even though she’s dead.”

"Is that so?" Nina asked, encouraging him to talk rather than to act.

He gazed around wildly, as if looking for something she couldn’t see. “She’s not here now, but she’s been doing it all day today. She’s corrupt and overprotective and evil. She always thought there were two sets of rules. One for her, and one for the rest of the world. And the people who helped her? They deserve to die the same way Kerry did. So, get out and leave me to it,” he said, his tone derogatory.

“Why don't you stop and think about this?” Nina was using the opportunity to edge forward, but he caught her out in that. In fact, she saw her action had tipped him into panic.

“Stop right there. Stop where you are,” Denton yelled, grabbing Alex’s arm again, and Nina saw to her horror that the time had come. He wasn't waiting any longer. His nerve had broken. He was going to plunge that needle into Alex Hogan's swollen vein.

She did the only thing she could. Left-handed, she grabbed the laptop bag, which was the only available large item she had to throw. And she hurled it at him as hard as she possibly could. It caught him on the shoulder, and his hand was knocked wide. He cried out in rage, but Nina knew this was the only advantage she was going to get.

She leaped forward with her left arm extended, and with all her force, she launched herself at him. She was aiming to take him on the shoulder and to knock that loaded hypodermic out of his right hand.

Her fist collided with his shoulder. The impact jarred her. She knew she had to guard her right hand, but she had three other limbs to work with. Avoiding the sprawled, unconscious man on the floor, she brought her foot forward in a forceful arc, aiming for Denton’s midriff.

Her kick knocked the breath out of him, but he was still struggling, grabbing again for Alex's arm. He still had hold of the hypodermic. Nina made a desperate lunge for his wrist. And this time, she managed to catch it. Avoiding a flying kick and ducking under his flailing left fist, she twisted as hard as she could. The technique she used focused on finding the pressure point where the nerve ran and causing maximum pain and weakness.

It was difficult to do with her left hand, but she had trained for this scenario. She dug her fingers in with all her force and managed to hit the nerve. With a cry, he dropped the hypodermic. Nina stamped down on it as hard as she could and felt glass crush and break under her boot. The murder weapon was now neutralized, but the murderer himself was furious. Like it or not, she was now in hand-to-hand combat with him.

Denton lashed out again, and she managed to duck, knowing any injury to her head could cost her. She had to be careful and protect herself. If only she'd been able to use her forehead, arcing it down into his jaw. But she couldn't do that. Too much risk.

Dodging another blow, Nina was flung back against the wall, the impact sending a lance of pain through her shoulder. If that happened again, he might win the fight. She needed to change tactics, and fast.

Changing things up, Nina used Denton’s own weight against him. As his fists slammed forward again, she managed to catch his arm with her left hand. Instead of pushing or evading, she pulled, going with him, taking his own speed and power forward.

He stumbled over her, and her foot shot out, catching his leg, and tripping him up. Unable to stop his forward momentum, he plunged down. With the grip she had on his arm, he couldn't use it to save himself and he fell head first, his skull making a dull, heavy contact with the wooden floor. Scrambling to her feet, Nina was ready to subdue him further, but there was no need. He wasn't moving.

He was breathing raggedly, but he was out. Her technique had worked, and she'd managed to stun him, at any rate, for as long as it would take her to get the handcuffs on him. As she fumbled with them, she heard the sound of sirens from the street and breathed out a sigh of relief. Backup had arrived. Finally, the last victim was saved, and the killer himself would face the consequences at last.

EPILOGUE

There was something wrong. Nina could sense it as she and Daniel covered the last few miles of the journey back home. The trip had been strangely silent. They'd left mid morning, after finishing up all the paperwork on the case. There was still a lot to do in the police department of this town. For a start, a new chief would need to be elected. Nina was hoping that Whitley would be the chosen one. He seemed competent, experienced and honest, unlike his predecessor. Whoever was in charge would hopefully clean up the town and get rid of the new dealer who’d moved in.

Mark Denton was in jail with a long list of charges against him. Although he'd planted some of the tranquilizers in Merkel's house, which he had admitted to under questioning, there had also been evidence in his own house. Nina had found the cards and the ink that he'd used to create his invisible messages.

There was more than enough evidence to ensure that he would be incarcerated for life, although since Denton had spent a lot of the interview talking to the dead mayor, apparently convinced she was sitting next to Nina, she guessed he would serve his sentence in a psychiatric ward.

If only he tried to avenge his sister differently by exposing Menzies for what he was. Nina wished he'd thought of doing that. But then again, with an uneasy shiver, she knew that exposing corruption often wasn't easy or safe.

Alex Hogan was recovering in hospital, unharmed, apart from a large dose of intramuscular sedative, which had been enough to deeply sedate him, but had caused no permanent damage. For the time being, Whitley was looking after Ranger. Hogan’s original case would be reopened, and it was Nina's opinion that he would admit to guilt in having driven drunk. She doubted that he would be given anything more than a suspended sentence due to the time that had passed the, lack of evidence, and the fact that the police and the mayor were to blame for the cover up, in which she knew his silence had been forced.

But in a strange way, she thought that being able to pay for the crime he knew he'd committed might provide some closure and peace to this troubled man.

You'd think, with all of this, that she and Daniel would have had a lot to speak about during their journey home. But Daniel had been very quiet. The couple of times that Nina had tried to start a conversation, he’d replied in terse monosyllables.

She guessed that he might be mad because she'd gone out alone and confronted the killer, even though she'd made sure to downplay what had happened between them, particularly that last fight. Her shoulder blade was tender as a result of the impact with the wall, and the powerful throw which had taken Denton down. But otherwise, she reckoned she'd gotten out of it unscathed.

If Daniel was mad at her for that, she wasn't going to turn it into a fight. Not when they had so much else to think about, and when every mile that brought them closer to Seattle reminded her that she was returning to her own predicament.

Getting away for two days had made those troubles seem far away. Now, they were closing in on her again as they reached the city limits. Terence Thorpe might know what she'd done, and he might have told Director Fenster. She might be returning to trouble so deep that she wouldn't be able to survive it. Terence Thorpe had taken out enemies more powerful than her. A mere FBI agent, he wouldn't hesitate to crush her. And he could do it invisibly.

Only as they turned onto the road that led to Nina's apartment, did Daniel finally draw in a decisive breath that she knew meant he was going to speak.

“I don't know how to say this,” he said in a hard voice. “I’ve been trying to figure out how to break this to you the whole way home.

She felt her pulse pound. What the hell was going on? Break what?

“What do you mean?” She heard the tension in her own voice now.

Then her gaze turned to the road ahead, where she saw two police cars parked outside her apartment.

“I thought this would happen. I asked a few of my cop friends to stop by and keep an eye out, but they couldn't be there all the time. Nina, I'm really sorry. It must have happened late last night. They found it this morning and called me. I thought it would be better for you not to know about this the whole way home. But your apartment? It's been trashed. Badly.”

Nina caught her breath. This was a worst-case scenario for sure. Anxiety flaring. She opened the car door and rushed for the elevator with Daniel. The ride up to her floor had never seemed so long. As soon as the doors opened, she burst out and sprinted along the corridor, seeing a cop standing guard at her apartment's front door.

The door was splintered. Inside, she gasped as she saw the extent of the destruction. Every object in her apartment had been pulled down, torn apart. Paintings ripped from frames. Glasses pulled from shelves. Bedding sliced open. The refrigerator’s contents strewn over the floor.

The only thing there wasn't was breakage. No smashed glass or crockery. She guessed that working so late at night, they had been careful not to make a sound. This must all have played out in eerie silence.

There wasn't an inch of her apartment that hadn't been upturned. If she'd been there, she didn't want to think about what would have happened to her. The way the fabric had been ripped, sharp blades had been used.

Daniel put his hand on her left arm, gripping it hard. “Nina, you need to do something with this having happened. We need to get you into a protection program or under police guard. Something. Urgently. He knows who you are now. You could have been here last night. It was sheer luck you weren't."

She could hear the urgency and fear for her safety thrumming in his voice.

But Nina shook her head. Her shock, and the feeling of vulnerability after having her own apartment trashed, was being replaced by a steely resolve.

“The folder Thorpe was looking for wasn’t here,” she said. “I hid it elsewhere. I have the photos, too. And the fact he's done this has given me a big clue. It means there's something in there that can bury him. Now, I'm going to move faster than he can. I’m going to find what it is and use it to take him down.”

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(A Nina Veil FBI Suspense Thriller—Book 10)

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AWAY FROM INNOCENCE

(A Nina Veil FBI Suspense Thriller—Book 10)

Kate Bold

Bestselling author Kate Bold is author of the ALEXA CHASE SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising six books (and counting); the ASHLEY HOPE SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising six books (and counting); the CAMILLE GRACE FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising eight books (and counting); the HARLEY COLE FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising eleven books (and counting); the KAYLIE BROOKS PSYCHOLOGICAL SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising five books (and counting); the EVE HOPE FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising seven books (and counting); the DYLAN FIRST FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising five books (and counting);  the LAUREN LAMB FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising five books (and counting); the KELSEY HAWK SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising nine books (and counting); the NORA PRICE SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising five books (and counting); the NINA VEIL FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising ten books (and counting); OF the BARREN PINES PSYCHOLIGICAL SUSPENSE series, comprising seven books (and counting); and of the ADDISON SHINE SUSPENSE THRILLER series, comprising thirteen books (and counting).

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An avid reader and lifelong fan of the mystery and thriller genres, Kate loves to hear from you, so please feel free to visit www.kateboldauthor.com to learn more and stay in touch.

BOOKS BY KATE BOLD

ADDISON SHINE SUSPENSE THRILLER

FIND ME (Book #1)

FIND HER (Book #2)

FIND HELP (Book #3)

FIND HOME (Book #4)

FIND HIM (Book #5)

FIND YOU (Book #6)

FIND HOPE (Book #7)

FIND NO ONE (Book #8)

FIND OUT (Book #9)

FIND DEATH (Book #10)

FIND TRUTH (Book #11)

FIND COURAGE (Book #12)

FIND MERCY (Book #13)

BARREN PINES

THE UNSEEN NEIGHBOR (Book #1)

THE UNSEEN WIFE (Book #2)

THE UNSEEN KILLER (Book #3)

THE UNSEEN WOMAN (Book #4)

THE UNSEEN PAST (Book #5)

THE UNSEEN GUEST (Book #6)

THE UNSEEN FACE (Book #7)

NINA VEIL SUSPENSE THRILLER

AWAY FROM HERE (Book #1)

AWAY FROM HIM (Book #2)

AWAY FROM HOPE (Book #3)

AWAY FROM HOME (Book #4)

AWAY FROM HUMANITY (Book #5)

AWAY FROM MERCY (Book #6)

AWAY FROM SIGHT (Book #7)

AWAY FROM YOU (Book #8)

AWAY FROM SANITY (Book #9)

AWAY FROM INNOCENCE (Book #10)

NORA PRICE MYSTERY

CAN’T RUN (Book #1)

CAN’T HIDE (Book #2)

CAN’T ESCAPE (Book #3)

CAN’T SLEEP (Book #4)

CAN’T FORGET (Book #5)

KELSEY HAWK MYSTERY

DEAD INSIDE (Book #1)

DEAD RECKONING (Book #2)

DEAD TO ME (Book #3)

DEAD SILENCE (Book #4)

DEAD TO DAWN (Book #5)

DEAD END (Book #6)

DEAD OF NIGHT (Book #7)

DEAD CALM (Book #8)

DEAD AND GONE (Book #9)

ALEXA CHASE SUSPENSE THRILLER

THE KILLING GAME (Book #1)

THE KILLING TIDE (Book #2)

THE KILLING HOUR (Book #3)

THE KILLING POINT (Book #4)

THE KILLING FOG (Book #5)

THE KILLING PLACE (Book #6)

ASHLEY HOPE SUSPENSE THRILLER

LET ME GO (Book #1)

LET ME OUT (Book #2)

LET ME LIVE (Book #3)

LET ME BREATHE (Book #4)

LET ME FORGET (Book #5)

LET ME ESCAPE (Book #6)

CAMILLE GRACE FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER

NOT ME (Book #1)

NOT NOW (Book #2)

NOT WELL (Book #3)

NOT HER (Book #4)

NOT NORMAL (Book #5)

NOT AGAIN (Book #6)

NOT SAFE (Book #7)

NOT TODAY (Book #8)

HARLEY COLE FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER

NOWHERE SAFE (Book #1)

NOWHERE LEFT (Book #2)

NOWHERE TO RUN (Book #3)

NOWHERE LIKE THIS (Book #4)

NOWHERE GIRL (Book #5)

NOWHERE TO HIDE (Book #6)

NOWHERE CERTAIN (Book #7)

NOWHERE PURE (Book #8)

NOWHERE SOUND (Book #9)

NOWHERE SANE (Book #10)

NOWHERE TRUE (Book #11)

KAYLIE BROOKS PYSCHOLOGICAL SUSPENSE THRILLER

LAST BREATH (Book #1)

LAST CHANCE (Book #2)

LAST WISH (Book #3)

LAST SHOT (Book #4)

LAST MISTAKE (Book #5)

EVE HOPE FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER

IN HIS BLOOD (Book #1)

IN HIS SIGHTS (Book #2)

IN HIS REACH (Book #3)

IN HIS MIND (Book #4)

IN HIS WAY (Book #5)

IN HIS THOUGHTS (Book #6)

IN HIS DREAMS (Book #7)

DYLAN FIRST FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER

OUT OF REACH (Book #1)

OUT OF TOUCH (Book #2)

OUT OF TIME (Book #3)

OUT OF BOUNDS (Book #4)

OUT OF LUCK (Book #5)

LAUREN LAMB FBI SUSPENSE THRILLER

SOMETHING KNOCKING (Book #1)

SOMETHING CALLING (Book #2)

SOMETHING WRONG (Book 3)

SOMETHING DARK (Book #4)

SOMETHING TO HIDE (Book #5)