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The fucking mob? Now we’re in bed with the Society, the cartel, and the mob. We’re fucked with a capital F. So fucking fucked that we can never be fucked to this degree ever again. Because we will have to kill them all or die. That’s where this is going. I hope Kane has his shovel ready.

I need that pie. And chocolate. And for reasons I can’t explain, Cheetos. The puffed kind. Knowing those things are in my future is the only thing keeping me from turning around, charging at Kane, and slapping him.

Because he hates to be slapped.

But he deserves so much more.

I also need to know where Mark’s sister, the trained sniper, is before she kills someone else, if she’s the assassin, though it appears that way. I snag my phone and try to dial Ellis, who went to Maryland looking for her, only to land in his voicemail. The more I think about him leaving for Maryland alone, the more it sits like shit on my shoes. Dirty. Stinky. Bad.

He was on the committee. He could easily have voted to strip Elsa and Mark’s father, Clyde, of his contract. And that action is why Clyde is reported to have committed suicide. And where the hell is Adams? He’s the acting FBI director and completely MIA.

I round the corner where Jay is waiting on me, and I swear seeing him—normal, kind Jay—infuriates me all the more, and not at him. At Kane. We have people who count on us, who live on the same wavelength and die just the same.

I really have too many men pissing me off right now.

“That didn’t look like it went well,” Jay observes, and I must glare at him because he holds up his hands as if to ward off my wrath. Kane has all of my wrath right now, and unless he does something as stupid as Kane, he’s safe. Or as stupid as himself, for that matter, considering he jumped in front of a damn bullet for me. “You know what happens to nosy people, Jay?”

“Do I want to know?”

“Death is too gentle a punishment,” I assure him and start walking.

He drops back and then hurries to fall into step with me. “That was extreme.”

“I am extreme. If you don’t know that by now, there’s no helping you.”

“The pie and groceries are being delivered,” he says, clearly knowing me well enough to know that food is a safe haven. He’s going to love it when I tell him we have to go to the diner anyway. I might have talked myself into believing that card for the diner Murphy left for me was just a card to a great place with strawberry pie, if not for the missing employee.

“Unlock the SUV,” I order, already rounding the hood and heading toward the passenger door. By the time I’m there, it’s open, and I climb inside.

Jay settles into the driver’s side. “Don’t you have to work the crime scene?”

“I’m not interested in what’s inside that house. I’m interested in what’s not.” I dial Lucas on speakerphone, and it goes straight to voicemail. Again. Next, I dial Tic Tac, and he answers on the first ring.

“Let me guess. You need stuff.”

“Lots of stuff, but let’s start with where the hell is Lucas?”

“Ditto. His phone tracks to his house. I’m one person with about one hundred time-sensitive items I should be researching.”

And he’s smart enough to know he can’t use agency resources when there are government targets, not when we don’t know who’s involved. “Any leads on Elsa?”

“All I can tell you is she had twenty recorded sniper kills in the military. That’s a lot. And her mother had a stroke and died about six months before her father’s suicide.”

“She’s bitter and skilled.”

“Which is why I need help to make traction and get you answers.”

“I get it,” I say. “I’m going to find Lucas.”

Like a good little soldier, Jay cranks the SUV and sets us in motion.

“You need to focus all energy on finding Elsa,”

“Surely she’ll come to you. Her brother was murdered.”

I find myself flip-flopping like a dirty politician who doesn’t have his own mind over who killed Mark Walker—Ghost or his sister. It’s utterly frustrating. I don’t flip-flop. I hate flip-flopping. Maybe because my father is so good at it.

Nevertheless, I do a mental replay of the possibilities again. Elsa could have been at odds with Mark over the revenge killings, and when he threatened to turn her in, she killed him. But as the Ken doll ME pointed out, Mark’s body was posed. Elsa would not pose the body. Ghost would, as a taunt.

I’m back to Ghost did it for about the fourth time.

I’m done with that question.

That decided, I think back to my chat with Ghost, to what he said about finding Elsa. She thinks she’s hiding , he’d said.

He’s smart. She’s killing for revenge, and revenge is an emotion. He’s studied her. He believes he knows what that emotion will drive in her, what she will do next. Maybe he doesn’t think he knows. He knows. Maybe he taunted her. Maybe he’s waiting for her right here.

“Lilah?”

Tic Tac draws me back to the present, and I don’t resist. I’m doing nothing but speculating, and that amounts to chasing my own tail like a puppy Ghost has on a leash. Only he’s chasing me, and I can use that to my advantage.

“Lilah?”

Apparently, I’m still ignoring Tic Tac. I need to be in Purgatory, but I can’t afford the time right now. “Where’s Ellis?” I ask. “He’s not answering his phone.”

“He pings in Maryland, and,” he grunts and says, “Jack, what are you doing? No. Give me that phone.”

The next thing I know, Jack is on the line. “I still say going to Maryland feels like a lame move on Ellis’ part. Elsa’s too smart to take her phone with her to kill a government official, and how can the Director of Homeland Security not think of that?”

“I’m still here,” Tic Tac says, letting me know we’re on speakerphone on his end too, now, but I’m thinking about what Jack just said.

Why indeed , I think. What does Ellis know that we don’t know? Too much , I think.

“It’s like something the cop does in a B horror flick,” Jack continues. “You know everyone is going to die because he’s the idiot that’s supposed to be saving them.”

But who is Ellis saving, besides himself? If he wasn’t pinging in Maryland, I’d think he was on the run. Does he think he knows the next target? I pull the list of committee members from my pocket that Ellis gave me. Has he warned them all they’re in danger?

Jack is talking, talking, talking, presently about Dexter. “The brilliant thing about Dexter is that he was a serial killer in plain sight. He seemed normal, almost too normal, and Elsa’s essentially a—”

“Stop talking, Jack. Tic Tac?”

“I’m here.”

“I’m texting you a list of everyone on the committee that killed Clyde’s contract, thus will be a target for Elsa. Find out where each one is now. And get me phone numbers for every one of them. And,” I sigh, “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but get me a line to the president.”

“I—you— the president ?”

“That’s right. Get me a line to the president.”

He’s silent.

“ Tic Tac. ”

“Okay. On it. I’m putting you on hold.”

At this point, we’ve pulled into the driveway of Lucas’ place, and Jay halts in front of the door. I motion for him to get out and then text the list to Tic Tac that I should have given him before now. It’s a full five minutes later when Tic Tac comes back on the line. “He’ll call you back.”

“Said every powerful man avoiding a woman who wants to bust his balls,” I mumble, and then firmer, “Work on the list.”

“The VP is on the list?”

“Yes, the VP is on the list. Now you know why I want to talk to the president.”

“That’s not why. You don’t trust Ellis.”

“When have you known me to trust anyone?” I don’t give him a chance to reply. I hang up. I didn’t trust Murphy. I sure as fuck don’t trust Ellis, perhaps to the extreme. He just got to Maryland. He can’t answer his phone while raiding Elsa’s place, which is apparently where assassins for the government get trained.

I should at least give him the bad girlfriend. I dial Ellis and get thrown into voicemail again. I try three more times. Finally, I text him: Call me before I do something crazy. There are ideas in my head. That’s never a good thing.

I don’t wait for a reply. I’m perfectly capable of texting and yelling at Lucas all at once. I’m a good multitasker. I exit the truck, and Jay is standing by the front door.

I climb the steps to meet him. “Did you ring the bell?”

“Ten times while freezing my ass off waiting on you. Nothing.”

I pat his arm. “Poor cold baby. Fuck the police academy. You need a cushy office job with a warm heater, a pretty receptionist to flirt with, and bad grocery store cake for birthday parties.”

With that, I offer him my back and hurry down the stairs. Apparently, Jay, too, can multitask, as he groans a complaint and follows me at the same time.

I hike it right and round the house and then come around by the pool, with Jay tight on my heels. I’d teach him a lesson about safe distances by stopping and letting him crash into me, but there’s no time for tears and hard-earned lessons. I need Lucas to get to work. He can find a needle in a haystack if it starts with a keyboard, and Elsa and her next victim are that needle.

Once I’m at the sliding glass door, I don’t bother to knock. If it didn’t work on the front door, it’s not going to work on the back. Besides, I don’t want to lose the chance to throw ice water on him to wake him up. Lucas never locks the back of the house, and the door slides open easily.

I shove the curtain back and listen for any sound, unease niggling at my belly. I lift a hand, telling Jay to stay back. My hand settles on my firearm, and I ease through the archway to find a couple empty pizza boxes and whiskey bottles. Obviously, Tic Tac wasn’t wrong. Lucas is drinking again, but the leap of my pulse is confirmation that that is not all that’s going on here.

I draw my weapon and ease to the right to peek into the bedroom, then step inside, find the bed unmade, clothes on the floor, and the master bath messy as fuck, but all clear. Once I’m back in the living area, there’s a popping sound, like a beer can opening, that draws my attention toward the kitchen. I hurry that direction and round the corner.

Lucas is sitting at the kitchen table, a beer in hand and looking like a homeless person, not a beach bum, with his hair matted and standing on end, but he’s not alone.

There’s a fifty-something man sitting across from him, his hands in front of him—his roped hands in front of him. And I know who this is. I met him at one of my father’s events. He’s Pocher’s head of security, who was somehow dumb enough to get captured by my dumbass drunk cousin.

“What is this, Lucas?”

“If anyone knows the details of our parents dying in that plane that night, this bastard does.”