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The problem was that Ella’s brain had fallen off the genetic assembly line before they’d installed an off switch. Everyone else in her field – Ripley, Luca, all those one-time agents she’d been paired with – had the ability to concern themselves with mindless tasks unrelated to solving mysteries. But for Ella, a case without a solution was like listening to half a song. You never felt right until you’d finished it.

And that was why she was still sitting at her laptop at midnight. Since she’d interviewed Jeremy Caldwell, she’d gotten some answers – just not the ones she wanted.

Three people had confirmed that Caldwell had been at the county fairgrounds on Monday night, and digital timestamps proved that he was live streaming until the early hours of this morning. That meant his alibi checked out, so he was innocent, at least of murder.

Then there was the community group Caldwell had mentioned. Baptism of Fire. Ella had discovered that such a group had indeed existed, and they’d met exactly where Caldwell had said. But the group had disbanded and their members had presumably scattered to the wind, Lazarus included.

But while her leads had dried up, Ella had discovered one useful thing. Now she knew that no one sees me related to a proverb, she concluded that the message from Grant’s scene – no eye will see me – would follow suit.

And it did.

She’d printed it out and pinned it to her war board. The eye of the adulterer observes darkness, saying: 'No eye will see me,' and he will cover his face.

It might not have gotten her any closer to figuring out the killer’s identity, but it was a pattern, and the mention of adultery all but confirmed what the L in Grant’s forehead stood for.

Ella’s phone buzzed. She checked it and found a text from Luca.

I’m at mom’s house. Took me ages to get here. How are things there? x .

She shot a reply back. Got two bodies, no leads and five sins to go. Stay safe, please x.

Before Ella could resume her train of thought, Ripley poked her head around the door.

‘Dark, it’s nearly midnight and I don’t do late nights anymore. You coming or what?’

'I guess so. This support group has disbanded, and I can't find anything about this Lazarus guy. Maybe Caldwell made him up.'

‘You don't believe that.’

‘No.’ She didn't. Caldwell's description had been too specific, and his words had tumbled out of his mouth unaccompanied by suspicious body language. ‘Mia, you ever wonder if we just make things worse?’

Ripley slinked into the seat opposite her partner. ‘Jesus, here we go.’

‘You know what I mean. If we didn’t give these psychos attention, maybe they wouldn’t slit people’s throats.’

Ripley found a stress ball on the desk and launched it at Ella. It bounced off her shoulder and rolled under a filing cabinet. ‘This isn't about the case anymore, is it? This is about D.C.’

The mention of home sent Ella's stomach into free fall. Back there, someone was targeting people close to her. Here, a killer was branding victims like cattle. There was no connection between the two, other than the fractured architecture of minds that fed on human suffering. Two killers separated by four hundred miles but united by that peculiar algebra of the psychopathic mind.

‘Yeah. I got two people killed, and not for the first time.’

‘This is a ridiculous conversation,’ Ripley said.

‘Is it?’ Ella pushed away from her desk. The need to move overwhelmed her. ‘The more we profile them, the more we understand them, the more they evolve. They’re like bacteria. We study them, write books about them, turn them into case studies. And they study us right back.’

‘Yeah. Sure, let’s just let killers roam free and do whatever they like. You’ve seen Mad Max, haven’t you?’

Ella furrowed her brow. ‘You don’t watch films.’

‘I’ve had a lot of downtime recently. But my point stands. It’s not your responsibility to stop them committing murder in the first place. It’s their responsibility to not go around killing people.’

‘I get it. It just feels like we’re all in the same circus.’

‘We are. Trust me, Dark. The world keeps spinning whether you’re saving it or not.’

Ella nodded, though the concept felt alien to her. The weight of responsibility had been her constant companion for so long she'd forgotten what it felt like to set it down. Would the world really keep turning if she stopped pushing it?

As if on cue, footsteps thundered down the hallway. Detective Westfall burst through the door, gasping like he'd just sprinted here from Cleveland. His tie hung askew, a detail that bothered Ella more than it should have. Death made people forget the little things, like straightening their ties or buttoning their coats. It reduced them to their most essential instincts: run, hide, tell someone who might make sense of the senseless.

And Ella already knew, with the terrible clairvoyance that comes from having stood over too many bodies, what Westfall was about to say.

‘Rebecca Torres,’ Westfall said. ‘City council president. She’s dead.’