I’ll uncover it.

Alister nods confidently. “I agree. But what made this guy show up here? He’s been dormant for over half a year, now this.”

I brought him here.

The words burn at the base of my throat as I hold them back. There’s been a question plaguing me since I first glimpsed the Harbinger scene, and there’s only one person who can answer it.

If I wouldn’t have resisted Kallum at the ritual site, if I wouldn’t have refused to play into his delusion of the sick and twisted connection he believes we have, if I would have accepted him, accepted us together… Then would there be a victim at all?

He looked me in the eyes and vowed he could find the victims.

He said I needed him in order to save them.

Then I told him I’d never need him for anything ever again.

Demonstrating his claim in the most violent and gruesome manner wasn’t only a punishment, it was his proof.

The sky has lightened to a dull, overcast gray with the morning break. I glance down at the sun-bleached boards before I return my gaze to Alister. “I don’t know why the killer is here,” I say. “But it’s clear his delusion has devolved, and that’s what I’m going to focus on.”

Alister studies me intently, adjusts his shoulder harness. “You’re a hundred percent sure this is the same guy.”

I wish I wasn’t. “Chalk was used to portray the victim’s face in the likeness of the death’s-head hawkmoth,” I say, pushing my bangs from my eyes. “It needs to be confirmed by lab testing and compared to the other scenes, but I can say with a degree of certainty that it’s the same technique.”

A detail that very few people would be privy to. If you only have news stations and media outlets to view the Harbinger crime scenes, it’s easy to mistake the depicted skull on the victims’ faces to be paint.

For a brief second, I meet Kallum’s eyes, and I see the mischievous gleam.

Professor Percy Wellington was the fourth victim of the Harbinger that proved to be a crime of passion dressed up like a copycat murder. The very murder Kallum is now being remanded to a mental hospital for committing shared this commonality of the crime.

A drumbeat sounds in my head, a flash of a vision follows, and I see the lug wrench tipped in blood held in my hand…

I blink back the encroaching memory.

Kallum cocks his head. “That’s a very specific detail,” he says, an echo of what I once said to him at the Cambridge crime scene. “A detail like that would only be known to the officials who worked closely on the cases.”

“And the killer,” I fire back.

His smile is arrogant. “Right. The killer would know all the details.”

A mirrored smile spreads across my face, and it’s completely inappropriate for the moment, and I’m sure makes me look deranged.

Agent Alister regards me with a measure of hesitancy. “All right. Good,” he says. “I’ll trust your assessment on this. He’s our guy. That’s where we’re focused. Which makes my next request not so much a request.” He brings out a folded slip of paper from the inseam of his suit blazer. “We have a lot of fast-moving parts, and since there was a, uh, situation with Dr. Torres, he wasn’t able to refer a psychiatrist to Professor Locke—”

“I’ll do it.”

My abrupt offer to take Kallum back on as his field psychiatrist jars not only Alister, but also Kallum. Both men look uncertain, but it’s the twist of Kallum’s full lips that digs beneath my resolve to make me question if I really have this under control, or if I just handed him exactly what he wants.

“Halen,” Alister says, and I see Kallum bristle at the agent’s familiar use of my name. “I was going to suggest for you to refer another doctor.”

“That would take time.” Impatience bleeds through my clipped tone of voice. “Which is limited, and you’ve stressed we need to utilize our resources. Is there a conflict with me overseeing Professor Locke in the field?” I take the form and hold out my hand for a pen.

Alister hesitates a moment before he concedes. He’s a man who likes to be in control, and this situation is getting dangerously close to the opposite. Though he has little choice if he wants his task force to find the suspects and the victims.

“Since you understand our strained resources, then you can appreciate I’m only able to put Special Agent Hernandez on detail with Locke.”

I glance at the agent in a black suit and earpiece hanging back on the boardwalk. It’s not as if two agents were able to leash Kallum the first time. I sign my name on the form, placing myself in charge of Kallum’s mental health. The irony is grim.

“Done.” I hand the form and pen back to Alister.

As I step aside to head back down to the crime scene, Alister eases in front of me and takes my chin between his grip, tilting my face up to him.

I reflexively pull back, but his hold is firm. “You’ve been working the scene since I last saw you here, haven’t you?” It’s not a question as he assess what I’m sure are bloodshot eyes and dark bags. His gaze searches my face before he drops his hand. “You’re leaving. Don’t come back until you’ve had sleep.”

I trap a retort on my tongue. Alister’s action was far too inappropriate…and intimate.

Like a pop of kindling snapping the air, Kallum’s dark energy presses against me. I can sense his fury crackling the charged atmosphere stronger than the gathering storm.

I take a step away from Alister as a flash of lightning flickers across the dense cloud cover over the sky. A low rumble of thunder follows in warning.

When I don’t respond, Alister nods solemnly. “Look, I don’t care whose payroll you’re on,” he says. “This is my crime scene, and an overworked profiler isn’t touching my—”

“She’s leaving.” Kallum moves into my periphery like a dark shadow. “I’ll behave myself for a few hours without supervision.”

His words are delivered to Agent Alister with the hard edge of malice laced beneath his quip.

I expel an audible breath at the rise of testosterone as I glance between the two of them. Without a word, I shift my bag strap higher and turn to head off down the boardwalk, leaving the alpha males to their own primitive devices.

As I descend the steps, I pass a woman covered in a Tyvek suit, presumably the medical examiner here to remove the victim.

“We still need to talk.”

I’m almost to my rental, and don’t stop walking. “We did talk,” I say to Kallum, digging out my keys and clicking the fob to unlock the car. I pop the trunk and unload my gear, trying hard to ignore his demanding presence.

Rain pelts the roof of the car. I feel the cool drops on my face. Another roll of thunder travels through the marsh. As I glance up, Kallum is standing beside the driver-side door, hands deep in his pockets.

Agent Hernandez stands behind him at a distance, effectively giving us privacy, though I see his eyes lift to keep track of his charge.

“Please move away from the door,” I say.

Kallum’s drawn features soften at the weariness in my tone. Or maybe it’s the please. I’m too drained by him to keep my fight strong for much longer.

“You think I did this,” he says, inclining his head in the direction of the wetland crime scene.

Folding my arms over my chest, I stare at him and really try to comprehend how he can deny what is obvious. How does he lie so effortlessly? Does he believe his own lies?

“It doesn’t matter what I think,” I say. “It matters what the evidence will prove. Now, move the hell out of my way.”

Kallum’s gaze falls to my crossed arms, to the sliver of skin exposing the rope burn around my wrist. The visceral memory of his touch detonates inside my chest with a resounding shiver.

I reach out and touch the side of the car, grounding myself. “God, Kallum. Just…please go.”

He moves closer and clasps my neck, his fingers braced along my nape as his thumb delicately skims the bruises. I swallow hard against his touch, unable to free the trapped breath, until he finally releases me and steps aside.