And here is where the tide turns. “The divine ability to deify man through knowledge.”

The night clings to the silence as it wraps us, a cool embrace to suppress all other sounds, an absence of the senses. Now it’s just the two of us in the darkness.

Dr. Verlice has drifted off to my lecture. The stalker agents have lost interest in monitoring me and have inserted earphones to watch their devices.

Halen and I exist in this moment on a plane of our own, where—if I reach her, touch her—she might let me break through.

“So to recap,” I say, resting my palms on my thighs. “Aristotle was the father of Western esoteric religions. The poet Dante even claimed he was ‘the master of those who know’, giving credence to the existence of mystery schools and their hidden wisdom. And the god Hermes gifted this divine, hidden wisdom to man to be passed down from sages to philosophers, and so on and so on. To those deemed worthy.”

“So all the—” she makes air quotes “—divine wisdom was just handed down to select sects. And for thousands of years, no one ever accidentally let the secrets to the universe slip to a wider audience.”

It’s a difficult concept for a student of psychology and logic to grasp. “Here’s a rational construct. Ivy League colleges and their elite alma matters. Their code of initiation and inside secrets, all passed down from generation to generation, all stemming back as far as Aristotle’s first institution of higher learning. The academy wasn’t established for the public, though over the years it did evolve. But the architecture is still in place in every elite school. Only the select few are initiated, and those few go on to become presidents, leaders, CEOs of fortune 500 companies—”

She nods and holds up her hand. Then jots a sloppy note. “Got it. Conspiracy theories…”

I chuckle. “Call it what you want, it doesn’t offend me, Halen. But the people who believe, believe wholly. They believe in this hidden wisdom and its power so fiercely that entire religions have been founded upon its teachings.”

A serious expression traps her features, and I swear she’s made of ethereal matter herself. “And one such person who believed was Nietzsche,” she reasons.

“Thus concludes our intro into philosophy,” I say, stretching my neck.

“Kallum…” She taps her phone to display the hour. “I don’t have any more time for the scenic route. I have to give a detailed update to the FBI in less than three hours.”

Pivoting my body toward her, I move in a little too close. Her breathing shallows, her gaze wide and anxious as I reach down between us. My fingers graze her thigh as I touch her phone to kill the recording app.

A wary edge frames her delicate features as she studies me, waiting for what happens next. The demanding impulse to sweep the stray lock of white behind her ear thunders through me.

“Before we make our final descent into the abyss of philosophy…” I stand and motion for her to join me. “We need to take a walk in your perpetrator’s footsteps.”

A moment of hesitation, then she sets her notebook aside. As she gets to her feet, she crosses her arms and casts a look at the sleeping agents in the SUV.

“You can ask them to join us,” I offer. “If that will make you feel safe.”

She wraps her arms tighter around her midsection, shielding herself from the early morning chill. I remove my jacket and hold it open for her in offer.

Dark eyebrows draw together over cautious eyes, her walls erecting to shut me out. I grasp the collar and dangle the garment out to her instead. “Don’t make me watch you freeze, Halen.”

Resigned, she accepts the jacket and slips her arms inside the sleeves, forgetting about her fear of being alone with me. I suppress a smile at how my jacket dwarfs her, but some other intense feeling licks my insides at seeing her petite body in my clothes.

Halen pushes her hands into the pockets and looks over the jacket. “It’s comfortable, warm,” she says. But her drawn features reveal the distress trying to crack her surface, and how hard she’s pushing back against that emotion.

The yearning to scratch her surface burns through my veins, a threat to consume—but I tamp down the urge. Patience may not be one of my virtues, but delayed gratification is far more appealing than any virtue.

Leaving behind the safety of the lighted crime scene, we start out into the marsh, where the dark is absolute and presses against us like an entity.

“The new moon denotes new beginnings,” I say, tilting my head up toward the moonless sky. “If you believe in that sort of thing.”

Halen treks deliberately beside me, careful of her steps. “I’m not sure what I believe anymore.” Her confession is as vulnerable and transparent as the sky in the open field. “But what I do care about is snake bites.”

She goes to light her phone, and I say, “Leave it off.” She can’t confront her snake, her underworld, if she’s never bitten. “The cosmos are viewed more clearly in the dark.”

“Snake bites,” she stresses, even though she’s wearing mud boots.

Our fear of the unknown, of what we can’t discern in the dark, is an inherent fear. It teases out our universal fear of death.

“The light won’t protect you from snakes.” I glance over at her. “Or any other devils of the night.”

Halen stops walking, forcing me to halt and turn around to face her.

Suddenly, she says, “Before, when I said you frightened me…” She trails off, gathering her nerve. “You don’t scare me the way you want to, Kallum.”

The illuminated crime scene frames her silhouette, transforming her into a celestial creature of myth, the moon goddess Selene incarnate. I have to stalk closer to make out her eclipsed features, and I don’t stop walking until I’m towering over her, so close I can hear her uneven breaths.

She looks up into my face and, this time, I don’t deny myself what I want.

I raise my hand and trap the defiant lock covering her eye. Sweeping my fingertips across her soft cheek, I guide her hair behind her ear, letting the pads of my fingers linger on the delicate curve of her neck.

A violent tremble racks her body. Her lips part, her breath a tease against my mouth, her sweet scent a fiery lash across my senses, as those silvery eyes glisten with starlight and fear and so much want it spears my rib cage.

As I drop my hand, I lower my mouth to her ear. “I think I scare you exactly how I want to, sweetness.”

She takes a reflexive step back, putting distance between us. “You said you wouldn’t touch me.”

“I said I’d try…and I also said I’d try not to call you endearments.” I eat the steps necessary to bring us together. “But we can’t always resist our most coveted desire.”

Her eyes burn as hot as the stars. “Carve it in a sigil on your skin and never think of it again.”

She takes off then, marching past me and heading deeper into the marshland. I follow, because I have no choice, and I’m also not sure if she realizes where she’s going.

I’m not far behind when I see what Halen doesn’t. I capture her around the waist and draw her back against my chest before she can take another step.

The burn of her fear tunnels down my throat, practically setting my insides on fire, as she tries to fight free of my arms. “Let me go—”

“If I do that—” I band my arms around hers, trapping them against her sides and her body against mine “—then you’ll never get the stench of death off you.”

Confusion stills her fight until she looks down, then she instinctively pushes back against me to escape the mutilated remains of the deer.

“Why didn’t they mark this area off?” Her tone has gone from panicked to incredulous as she relaxes into the arms of her perceived killer.

And I’m not above feeling—greedily, wickedly—every inch of her warm body pressed against me.

Awareness settles over her as the silence thickens. The air turns electric, enfolding a heated current around us. As she begins to turn, I loosen my hold and allow her to face me. She doesn’t look up as she presses her hand to my chest. I let her touch sink through me before she pushes out of my arms.