“How am I supposed to trust your intent here, Kallum,” she says, “leading me into the deserted marsh on a new moon…?” Her questioning voice quivers, either from the chill or our proximity, I’m not sure. But my jacket is of no more use, and I have the sudden, fierce desire to strip it away.

She inhales a steadying breath and finally drags her gaze upward to meet mine. “I think your intent is to maliciously toy with me,” she accuses.

I remain silent. I won’t justify any of my actions.

“Say something now, Kallum…something that will change my mind, or I swear I’ll file the paperwork to send you back.”

“Do you want a clever lie? Or the truth?”

“The truth,” she says with no hesitation.

A deep chuckle booms from my chest. Her eyebrows knit together. I’d think the crease between her brows was cute if her statement wasn’t so untruthful itself.

“We are base creatures, little Halen,” I say. “We can pretend to be more evolved than our heathen ancestors, but we’re just flesh and bone. Carnal desires and the need to be sated. Even the enlightened masters of antiquity caved to their fleshly desires.”

She shakes her head. “That didn’t answer my question at all. Are you fucking with me, Kallum?”

I drag in a lungful of sodden air, detesting that we’re doing this here in a swamp. “Nothing has changed for me since that day I approached you at the university,” I say, setting the truth free.

“You approached me to glean information on the case,” she says, all logical accusation.

“I approached you because I was curious about you. Because your hypnotic eyes and your goddamn perfect, alluring body punched me in the gut, and I’ve never felt such sweet pain.”

She looks down at the reeds, then her flashing eyes pin me. “None of this… Nothing you say makes sense.”

A defeated smile pulls at my mouth. “That’s because you’re so lost.”

Even now, her pain clouds her reason. She’s fighting for a rational grasp on the moment, on her life, and her bottom has all but fallen out, leaving her suspended in an abyss.

I want to be the one to find her. I want to be the one to descend with her to the depths.

I want to be the one to devour her pain.

She swallows hard, tugging my jacket around her tighter. “Did you kill Wellington?” she demands. “Did you commit the Harbinger killings? Did you mutilate those victims, Kallum?”

I appreciate her finally dropping the pretense and asking me outright.

This time, when I move in close to her, I don’t plan to let her escape. “You want the answers so badly it’s driving you fucking mad.”

She raises her chin in answer, a manic hunger waging war behind her eyes. “Yes.”

“I’ll tell you the truth,” I say. “I’ll give you every answer you seek.”

Something in my expression must convince her, because she doesn’t deride me for being delusional or lying. Her features open, urgently willing me to say more. “Okay then. Tell me.”

I lick my lips. “Are you ready to honor your end of the deal?”

She’s indebted to me for more than a desperate deal struck at a visitation table, but let’s start there.

Her silent acceptance of our bargain infuses the stagnant marsh air. As she relinquishes her control, a thrill courses my blood, and the glass lifts to free the venomous spider.

“This is what I want, little Halen.” I trail a finger over her forearm. “Trust my process, my methods. Don’t question the course. Let your reservations go, and when the case is closed, I promise you, I’ll hold nothing back.”

Her eyes search my features, trying to discern the truth or uncover a loophole, but there is only us and the darkness that surrounds us.

“If you give me this,” I say, dropping my hand, “then I’ll reveal every dark truth to you.”

Washed in the pale light of the marsh, she holds my gaze with a measure of uncertainty.

She wants the answers so desperately—how much is she willing to surrender?

After a weighty stretch of contemplation, she extends her hand, as if striking a deal.

With a wicked grin, I accept her hand and pull her to me. I bring her hand to my mouth and place a lingering kiss to the back, my gaze trapping hers.

“You’re going to tell me everything,” she demands.

“I’ll be an open book to you.” A threat, not a promise. “Now, ask me anything you want about Nietzsche.”

Once I release her, she hesitates before making her decision and turning toward the deer carcass. “I have an FBI briefing soon,” she says. “If I can’t give them a profile to narrow down a suspect, then I have to give them a useful lead.”

I rummage around the reeds until I find a decent stick. Then I lower to my haunches and probe the mutilated deer. “Did the local department or FBI process the stag?”

She glances back at the crime scene briefly. “I didn’t see any reports, but I can check. I’ll go grab my tablet.”

“No need,” I say, lifting a section of the shredded shoulder. “Light your phone.”

She does, aiming the flashlight on the decaying flesh as she covers her nose with my jacket from the stench. The remains have been picked over by the crows, making it difficult to discern, but amid the torn flesh is the distinct imprint of a bite mark.

Made by human teeth.

Halen says nothing as she takes pictures of the mark. As she inspects the rest of the mutilated carcass, it becomes evident there are also claw marks from human fingernails. What we don’t uncover is a kill shot. Not from a bullet or a bow.

“What am I looking at, Kallum?” Her low voice echos the brutality of this scene.

“The stag was torn apart by hands and teeth,” I say. “Then consumed.” A primal act that, admittedly, excites me as a scholar as much as it horrifies Halen as a criminologist hunting an offender.

“Sparagmos was part of a secret rite,” I explain. “The Greek translation is to tear or rend a living animal to pieces. Sometimes, even a human being. The primal act itself, of being dismembered, is a sacred sacrifice.”

She takes a moment to accept this knowledge, then: “You said you agreed with me that leaving the deer here was a forensic countermeasure to protect his exhibit.”

“That was before I saw the engravings.” I glance up to lock gazes with her. “And now that I have confirmation here”— I nod to the stag—“I can confidently conclude this scene is not an exhibit.” I stand and look at the trees.

I hear the music, the pipes, the drums.

I smell the earthy notes of wine and taste the copper in the blood.

I sense the energy as the thyrsus impels the earth to mark the damp soil.

I feel the frenzy, the madness.

“This is his ritual ground.”

Halen moves to stand before me. Her expression conveys her surging annoyance. “What engravings?”

It takes longer to reach the hemlock crime scene in the near pitch-black. The darkest hour is just before the dawn, or so Thomas Fuller once said, making the trek difficult until we spot the caution tape.

“You said at the diner your guy wasn’t concerned with getting caught, that he didn’t want to be caught before he was done. Add that to your profile today. Even though he tried to methodically remove all evidence, he left evidence of the ritual at the scene with the stag during the height of frenzy.”

“Suddenly you’re all terminology and level-headed deduction skills,” she says, and I hear the tangle of exhaustion and impatience creep into her voice. “And I don’t follow any of it.”

As we duck under the yellow tape, Halen pans the area with her phone light, careful of the clusters of white, poisonous flowers . “Where?” she demands.

She follows me farther past the marked-off scene to a giant black willow tree. I sweep aside the low-hanging sprays. Along the thick girth of the trunk is an engraving. “The symbol for Socrates.”

She uses her phone camera to capture pictures as I circle the trunk. On the backside is another engraved symbol. “The herd,” I tell her. “Which is the symbolism most associated with Nietzsche.”