Praise for J.T. Ellison’s TAYLOR JACKSON NOVELS

‘Scintillating … Suspenseful … Startling …’

Publishers Weekly

‘Mystery fiction has a new name to watch.’

John Connolly, New York Times bestselling author

‘J.T. Ellison’s debut novel rocks.’

Allison Brennann, New York Times bestselling author of Fear No Evil

‘Creepy thrills from start to finish’

James O. Born, author of Burn Zone

‘Fast-paced and creepily believable … gritty, grisly

and a great read’

M.J. Rose, internationally bestselling author of The Reincarnationist

‘A turbo-charged thrill ride of a debut’

Julia Spencer-Fleming, Edgar Award finalist and author of All Mortal Flesh

‘Fans of Sandford, Cornwell and Reichs

will relish every page.’

J.A. Konrath, author of Dirty Martini

About the Author

J.T. ELLISON is a thriller writer based in Nashville, Tennessee. She writes the Taylor Jackson series and her short stories have been widely published. She is a weekly columnist at Murderati.com and is a founding member of Killer Year. Visit her website, JTEllison.com for more information.

Other novels in the Taylor Jackson series

ALL THE PRETTY GIRLS

14

JUDAS KISS

THE COLD ROOM

THE IMMORTALS

SO CLOSE THE HAND OF DEATH

WHERE ALL THE DEAD LIE

The
Cold
Room
J.T.
Ellison

www.mirabooks.co.uk

For Scott and Linda.

You took a chance, and I’ll be forever grateful.

And, as always, for Randy.

‘Understanding does not cure evil,

but it is a definite help, inasmuch as

one can cope with a comprehensible darkness.’

—Carl Jung

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS FOR
THE COLD ROOM

It takes a village to write a book, and The Cold Room was possibly the most difficult, research-intensive novel I’ve ever written. I owe a debt of thanks and gratitude to the following:

First, the Team:

Scott Miller—my wonderful agent, friend and partner, who never ceases to make me laugh.

Linda McFall—my editor, my friend, my sanity. Without you, these books would be mere shadows of the stories I want to tell.

Stephanie Sun and MacKenzie Fraser-Bub—assistants extraordinaire, whose energy and enthusiasm are always appreciated.

Adam Wilson—my right hand, and sometimes left hand too. I couldn’t do it without you.

Marianna Ricciuto—publicist to the stars and unflagging cheerleader.

Christine Lowman—for dealing with my finicky ways.

Kim Dettwiller—indie publicist and Nashville girl. You rock!

The rest of the MIR A team: Donna Hayes, Alex Osusek, Loriana Sacilotto, Heather Foy, Don Lucey, Michelle Renaud, Adrienne Macintosh, Megan Lorius, Nick Ursino, Tracey Langmuire, Kathy Lodge, Emily Ohanjanians, Margaret Marbury, Diane Moggy and the artists Tara Kelly and Gigi Lau.

Second, the Research, the heart and soul of this novel:

Sean Chercover, for giving me the access point.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, for being so incredibly open and generous with time and expertise, especially: Angela Bell, Office of Public Affairs, Federal Bureau of Investigation

Special Agent Ann Todd, Office of Public Affairs, FBI Laboratory

Supervisory Special Agent Kenneth Gross, Chief Division Counsel, Critical Incident Response Group, FBI Supervisory Special Agent Mark Hilts, Unit Chief, BAU,

CIRG, FBI

Dr Vince Tranchida, Deputy Chief Medical Examiner, Manhattan

Dr Michael Tabor, Chief Forensic Odontologist for the State of Tennessee

Detective David Achord, Metro Nashville Police Department

Elizabeth Fox, Metro Nashville Police Department (Ret)

Shirley Holley, Manchester Public Library, Manchester, Tennessee

Assistant Chief Bob Bellamy, Manchester Police

Captain Frank Watkins, Coffee County Sheriff’s Office

James Tillman, for sharing his Uncle Welton Keif’s term for identical twins, “Born Partners.”

John Elliot, former Interpol Agent, who steered me in the right directions.

Sharon Owen, for the fishing expertise.

Christine Kling, for the boating expertise.

And the Personal:

Zoë Sharp, whose debt can never be fully repaid, for bringing Memphis to life, all the Britishisms (and an amusing and lengthy discourse on the correct term for erections).

The Bodacious Music City Wordsmiths—Del Tinsley, JB Thompson, Janet McKeown, Peggy Peden, Cecelia Tichi, RaiLynn Wood—for everything.

A special thanks to JB, who read, and read, and read this book for me, and my other mother, Del Tinsley, who always cheers me up and cheers me on.

Joan Huston, first reader and friend.

Tasha Alexander and Laura Benedict, for always knowing the right thing to say.

Murderati—you know why.

Rosemary Harris, for bidding on a character name at auction and presenting me with Patrol Officer Paula Simari, and her canine companion, Max.

Charlaine Harris, for bidding on a name in another auction and appears here and forevermore as Special Agent Charlaine Shultz, FBI Profiler.

Elyse Schein and Paula Bernstein, for sharing their incredible journey in the book Identical Strangers.

Evanescence, whose songs more than inspired; they got me through this very difficult subject matter.

All the libraries and bookstores who have shown such unflagging support, especially Murder by the Book in Houston, Davis Kidd in Nashville, Sherlock’s Books in Lebanon, Poisoned Pen Press in Phoenix, the Seattle Mystery Bookshop in … you guessed it, Seattle, and the great staffs at Borders and Barnes & Noble who hand-sell me all over the country.

My incredible parents and brothers and nephews and niece, for constantly believing in me. I love you all. More.

My rock, my love, my Randy, who just plain gets it. Without you, none of this would matter.

And to the people of Nashville. Thank you for allowing me the honour of writing about our great city, for opening the doors and for giving me such great background to work with. Your support honours me. I’ve taken some liberties in this novel for the purpose of poetic licence. All mistakes, exaggerations, opinions and interpretations, especially about the inner workings of Metro Nashville, are mine, and mine alone.

Wednesday

One

Gavin Adler jumped when a small chime sounded on his computer. He looked at the clock in surprise; it was already 6:00 p.m. During the winter months, darkness descended and reminded him to close up shop, but the daylight savings time change necessitated an alarm clock to let him know when it was time to leave. Otherwise, he’d get lost in his computer and never find his way home.

He rose from his chair, stretched, turned off the computer and reached for his messenger bag. What a day. What a long and glorious day.

He took his garbage with him; his lunch leavings. There was no reason to have leftover banana peels in his trash can overnight. He shut off the lights, locked the door, dropped the plastic Publix bag into the Dupster, and began the two-block walk to his parking spot. His white Prius was one of the few cars left in the lot.

Gavin listened to his iPod on the way out of downtown. Traffic was testy, as always, so he waited patiently, crawling through West End, then took the exit for I-40 and headed, slowly, toward Memphis. The congestion cleared right past White Bridge, and he sailed the rest of the way. The drive took twenty-two minutes, he clocked it. Not too bad.

He left the highway at McCrory Lane and went to his gym. The YMCA lot was full, as always. He checked in, changed clothes in the locker room, ran for forty-five minutes, worked on the elliptical for twenty, did one hundred inverted crunches and shadow boxed for ten minutes. Then he toweled himself off. He retrieved the messenger bag, left his sneakers in the locker, slipped his feet back into the fluorescent orange rubber Crocs he’d been wearing all day. He left his gym clothes on—they would go straight into the wash.

He went across the street to Publix, bought a single chicken cordon bleu and a package of instant mashed potatoes, a tube of hearty buttermilk biscuits, fresh bananas and cat food. He took his groceries, went to his car, and drove away into the night. He hadn’t seen a soul. His mind was engaged with what waited for him at home.

Dark. Lonely. Empty.

Gavin pulled into the rambler-style house at 8:30 p.m. His cat, a Burmese gray named Art, met him at the door, loudly protesting his empty bowl. He spooned wet food into the cat’s dish as a special treat before he did anything else. No reason for Art to be miserable. The cat ate with his tail high in the air, purring and growling softly.

He hit play on his stereo, and the strains of Dvořák spilled through his living room. He stood for a moment, letting the music wash over him, his right arm moving in concert with the bass. The music filled him, made him complete, and whole. Art came and stood beside him, winding his tail around Gavin’s leg. He smiled at the interruption, bent and scratched the cat behind the ears. Art arched his back in pleasure.

Evening’s ritual complete, Gavin turned on the oven, sprinkled olive oil in a glass dish and put the chicken in to bake. It would take forty-five minutes to cook.

He showered, checked his work e-mail on his iPhone, then ate. He took his time; the chicken was especially good this evening. He sipped an icy Corona Light with a lime stuck in the neck.

He washed up. 10:00 p.m. now. He gave himself permission. He’d been a very good boy.

The padlock on the door to the basement was shiny with promise and lubricant. He inserted the key, twisting his wrist to keep it from jangling. He took the lock with him, holding it gingerly so he didn’t get oil on his clothes. Oil was nearly impossible to get out. He made sure Art wasn’t around; he didn’t like the cat to get into the basement. He saw him sitting on the kitchen table, looking mournfully at the empty spot where Gavin’s plate had rested.

Inside the door, the stairs led to blackness. He flipped a switch and light flooded the stairwell. He slipped the end of the lock in the inside latch, then clicked it home. No sense taking chances.

She was asleep. He was quiet, so he wouldn’t wake her. He just wanted to look, anyway.

The Plexiglas cage was the shape of a coffin with a long clear divider down the length—creating two perfectly sized compartments—with small drainage holes in the bottom and air holes along the top. It stood on a reinforced platform he had built himself. The concrete floor had a drain; all he needed to do was sluice water across the opening and presto, clean. He ran the water for a few minutes, clearing out the debris, then looked back to his love.

Her lips were cracking, the hair shedding. She’d been without food and water for a week now, and she was spending more and more time asleep. Her lethargy was anticipated. He looked forward to the moment when her agonies were at an end. He had no real desire to torture her. He just needed her heart to stop. Then, he could have her.

He licked his lips and felt embarrassed by his erection.

He breathed in the scent of her, reveling in the musky sweetness of her dying flesh, then went to the desk in the corner of the basement. No spiders and dust and basement rot for Gavin. The place was clean. Pristine.

The computer, a Mac Air he’d indulged in as a late Christmas present to himself, sprang to life. A few taps of the keyboard, the wireless system engaged and he was online. Before he had a chance to scroll through his bookmarks, his iChat chimed. The user’s screen name was IlMorte69. He and Gavin were very good friends. Gavin responded, his own screen name, hot4cold, popping up in red ten-point Arial.

My dollhouse is nearly complete, Hot. Howz urs?

Hey, Morte. Mine’s on its last legs as well. I’m here checking. Your trip go well?

My friend, I can’t tell you. Such a wonderful time. But it’s good to be home.

New dolls?

One. Luscious. Easy pickings. Like taking a rat from a cellar.

Gavin cringed. Sometimes Morte got to be a little much. But what could you do? It was hard for Gavin to talk to people, the online world was his oyster, his outlet. He had other friends who weren’t quite as crude as Morte. Speaking of which … he glanced at the listing of contacts and saw Necro90 was online as well. He sent him a quick hello, then went back to his chat with Morte.

When do you think you’ll be ready?

Morte came back almost immediately.

Within two days. Did you do it like we discussed? You were more careful with the disposal than with the snatch, weren’t you?

Gavin bristled a tiny bit, then relaxed. Morte was right to chide him. After all, he had made a mistake. He’d quickly learned that following Morte’s every instruction was important. Very, very important.

Yes. It was perfect. I’ll send you a photo.

He uploaded the shots, breath quickening in remembrance. So beautiful. Within moments, Morte responded.

My God. That is perfect. Lovely. You’ve become quite an artist.

Thank you.

Gavin blushed. Receiving compliments gracefully wasn’t one of his strongest attributes. He glanced over his shoulder, knew he needed to wrap this up.

Morte, I’ve gotta run. Long day today.

I’ll bet. You be good. Don’t forget, two days and counting. I’ll expect pictures!

Bye.

A picture flooded his screen—Morte had sent him a gift. Gavin studied the photo; his ears burned. Oh, Morte was amazingly good with a camera. So much better than he was.

Morte’s doll had no animation, no movement. Her eyes were shut. Gavin turned his chair around so he could stare at his own dollhouse, his own doll, lying in the darkness. Alone. He’d need to find her another friend soon. If only Morte’s girl was a sister. He didn’t have a taste for white meat.

Another chime—this time it was Necro responding. He asked how Gavin was doing, if there’d been any news in the community. Gavin replied with a negative—he’d heard nothing. Of course, his ear wasn’t to the floor like Morte—Morte was the architect of their online world. Gavin had found his friends deep in a sleepy sex message board, and was so thrilled to have them. They made his life bearable.

He chatted for a few minutes with Necro, read a rambling account of a perfect specimen Necro had sighted on some white-sand Caribbean beach, then logged out. He stared at the photo he’d downloaded from Morte. He was overwhelmingly turned on, and no longer able to contain himself. With a last glance at his doll, he went up the stairs, unlocked the door, locked the basement behind him and returned to his life. It was time for another shower, then bed. He had a very busy day ahead of him. A very busy few days. The plan was in motion.

He was proud of himself. He only checked the doll’s breathing three times during the night.

Two

Taylor Jackson was happy to spy an empty parking spot halfway up Thirty-second Avenue. Luck was on her side tonight. Parking in Nashville was extremely hit-or-miss, especially in West End. The valet smiled hopefully as she turned in front of Tin Angel, but she couldn’t leave a state vehicle with a kid who didn’t look old enough to have a driver’s license, not without getting into all kinds of trouble. She drove past him, paralleled smoothly and walked the slight hill back down to the restaurant’s entrance. She was looking forward to the evening, a girls’ night with her best friend Sam and colleague Paula Simari. No homicides. No crime scenes. Just a low-key meal, some wine, some chicken schnitzel. A night off.

She was early, her friends hadn’t arrived yet. She followed the hostess to a table for four right by the bricked fireplace. The logs were stacked tightly and burning slow, putting out a pleasant low, smoky heat. Even though the weather was warming, it was still nippy in the early mornings and late evenings.

She ordered a bottle of Coppola Merlot, accepted a menu, then lost herself in thought. The envelope she’d addressed before she left for dinner was burning a hole in her pocket. She took it out and stared at the lettering, wishing she didn’t recognize the handwriting. Wishing she didn’t have to address letters to federal penitentiaries, even if they were the chinos and golf-shirt variety.

Winthrop Jackson, IV

FCI MORGANTOWN

FEDERAL CORRECTIONAL INSTITUTION

P.O. BOX 1000

MORGANTOWN, WV 26507

The edges of the envelope were getting frayed. She needed to decide if she was going to mail this letter or not.

She traced the outline of the address, her mind still screaming against the reality. Her father, in prison. And she’d been the one who put him there. Glancing to make sure no one was looking, she slid the single handwritten page from its nest.

Dear Win,

I am sorry. I know you understand I was just doing my job. I had no choice. I would appreciate it if you would stop trying to contact me. I find our relationship impossible to handle, and I want to get on with my life. Mom is still in Europe, but she has her cell phone. She can send you the money you need.

For what it’s worth, I do forgive you. I know you couldn’t help yourself. You never have.

Taylor

“Whatcha reading? You look upset.”

Taylor started. Sam took the seat across from her, dropped her Birkin bag on the floor under the table and stretched her fingers, the joints popping slightly. She grimaced.

“Holding a scalpel all day does that to you. What’s that?”

Taylor shook the page lightly. “A letter to Win.”

“Really? I thought you’d sworn off dear old dad. Did you order some wine?”

“I did. It should be here any minute. Where’s Paula?”

“She got called to a case. Sends her apologies. She’ll catch us next week. It’s just us chickens tonight.”

Sam settled back into the chair, the firelight glinted red off her dark hair. Taylor still wasn’t used to the blunt-cut bangs that swooped across Sam’s forehead. She’d cropped her tresses into a sophisticated bob, what she called her mom do. Taylor thought she looked less like a mom and more like Betty Page with that cut, but who was she to comment?

“What are you staring at?”

“Sorry. The hair. It’s so different. Takes me a minute.”

“You have no idea how easy it is. Though I do miss long hair. Simon does too.”

“I thought about cutting mine. When I mentioned it, Baldwin had a fit.”

The wine arrived and they placed their orders. They clinked their glasses together, and Sam said, “Up to it, down to it.”

Taylor laughed. They’d started that toast in eighth grade. Up to it, down to it, damn the man who can’t do it…. The rest of the toast was a crude allusion to their future lovers’ skill, though they had no idea what it meant at the time. In high school Taylor had embarrassed herself at one of her parents’ many dinner parties by leading a toast with it. When the men roared and the women blushed, her mother, Kitty, had taken her aside and explained why that wasn’t an appropriate thing for a young lady of breeding to say. She wouldn’t tell her why, though, and Taylor and Sam puzzled over it for days. Now, as a woman, she understood, and always laughed at the memory of her disgrace.

She thought of Win then, and sobered.

“I’m trying to shut Win down, Sam. He keeps mailing, keeps calling. I don’t want anything to do with him. He’s poison, and I need to get him out of my life. What if Baldwin and I have children one day? Can you imagine ole jailbird gramps telling stories at Christmas dinner? He’ll either corrupt them or embarrass them.”

“You’re thinking of having kids?”

“Focus, woman. We’re talking about my dad.”

“You’d make a great mother.”

Taylor stared hard at her best friend. “Why do you say that?”

“Please. You’re totally the nurturing type. You just don’t know it yet. You’ll be like a bear with its cub, or a tiger. Nothing, and no one, will harm a hair on your kid’s head. Trust me, you’ll take to it like a seal to water. When might this magnificent event take place, anyway?”

“You mean my immaculate conception?”

Sam laughed. “Baldwin’s still in Quantico, I take it.”

“Yes. He gets back tonight. That’s why I wanted to meet downtown. I’m going to head to the airport from dinner.”

“You miss him when he’s gone, don’t you?” Sam smiled at her, a grin of understanding. Taylor had never needed a man to feel complete, but when she’d gotten involved with John Baldwin, she suddenly felt every moment without him keenly. She’d never felt that way about a man before. When she shared her feelings, Sam had patiently explained that was what love was about.

Taylor’s cell phone rang, a discreet buzz in her front right pocket. She pulled it out and glanced at the screen.

“Crap.”

“Dispatch?”

“Yeah. Give me a sec.” So much for a quiet dinner with friends before a loving reunion with Baldwin. She glanced at her watch. His plane would be landing soon. No help for it. Dispatch calling her cell meant only one thing. Someone was dead. She put the phone to her ear.

“Detective Jackson, this is Dispatch. We need you at 1400 Love Circle. We have a 10-64, homicide, at 1400 Love Circle. Be advised, possible 10-51, repeat, 10-51. They’re waiting for you. Thank you.”

“I’m not on today, Dispatch. Give it to someone else.”

“Apologies, Detective, but they’re asking for you specifically.”

Taylor sighed. I’m your beck-and-call girl.

“10-4, Dispatch. On my way.”

A dead body, a possible stabbing. A lovely way to cap off her day.

“You have to go?” Sam asked.

“Yep. Aren’t you coming? I’m sure you’ll be getting the call, too.”

Sam raised her glass. “Unlike you, my dear, I am still captain of my own ship. I’m off duty tonight. The medical examiner’s office can live without me on this one. Give my love to the valet on the way out, he’s adorable.”

Only Sam could get away with teasing her about her demotion. Only Sam.

“Jeez, thanks,” Taylor said, but she smiled. Getting busted back to Detective had been frustrating and embarrassing, the sidelong glances and whispers disconcerting. But she was determined to make the best of it. Karma was a bitch, and the ones who’d wronged her would get their comeuppance in the end. Especially if she won the lawsuit her union rep had filed.

The food arrived just as Taylor stood to leave. She looked wistfully at the perfectly breaded chicken. Sam saw her eyeing it.

“I’ll have it made into a to-go package and drop it in your fridge on my way home.”

Taylor bent to kiss Sam on the cheek. “You’re the best. Thanks.”

“Yeah, yeah. Just remember you owe me an uninterrupted dinner. Now, go on with you. You’re practically quivering.”

Taylor retrieved her car, made all the lights through West End and finally got caught by a yellow in front of Maggiano’s. The next intersection was her turnoff, and it flashed to red just as she rolled onto the white line.

To her left, Love Circle wound sinuously around the top of a windy hill in the middle of West End. It held too many memories for her.

She slipped her sunglasses off; she didn’t need them. She’d gotten in the habit of putting them on the second she was out of doors lately, especially walking to and from her office. It allowed her to avoid meeting the pitying gazes she’d been receiving.

She fingered the bump at the top of her nose, just underneath where the bridge of her sunglasses sat. She’d broken her nose for the first time on Love Hill when she was fourteen, playing football with some boys who’d come to the isolated park at the top of the hill to smoke and shoot the breeze. Her mother had cringed when she saw the break the following morning at breakfast, dragged her to a plastic-surgeon friend immediately. He’d realigned the cartilage, clucking all the while, and bandaged her nose in a stupid white brace that she’d discarded the moment her mother left her alone. The hairline fracture never healed properly, giving her the tiny bump that made her profile imperfect.

The second time, it had been broken for her. Damn David Martin, her dead ex-partner, had roughed her up after breaking into her house. She’d been forced into violence that night, had shot him during the attack.

The car behind her beeped, and Taylor realized she’d been sitting at the left-turn arrow through a full cycle of lights. It was green again. Good grief. Lost in thought. That’s what the hill did to her.

She turned left on Orleans, took a quick right on Acklen, then an immediate left onto Love Circle. It was a steep, narrow road, difficult to traverse. The architecture was eclectic, ranging from bungalows from the 1920s to contemporary villas built as recently as five years ago. Many of the houses had no drives; the owners usually left their cars on the street. She wound her way up, surprised by the changes. A huge, postmodern glass house perched at the top of the hill, lit up like Christmas. She remembered there was some flak about it; built by a country-music star, something about a landing pad on the roof. She drove past, admiring the architecture.

At the top of the rise, she stopped for a moment, glanced out the window to the vivid skyline. The sky was deeply dark to the east, with no moon to light the road. The dazzling lights of Nashville beckoned. No wonder the isolated park at the peak was still a favorite teen hangout. There was something about the name, of course. It was rather romantic to head up the hill at sunset to watch the lights of Nashville blink on, one by one, a fiery mass of luminosity cascading through the city.

Being reared in the protected Nashville enclaves of Forest Hills and Belle Meade, Taylor sometimes needed to move outside her parents’ carefully executed social construct to find a little fun. Her honey-blond hair and mismatched gray eyes always drew attention, whether she wanted it or not. Coupled with her height, already nearly six feet tall at thirteen, she’d commanded the attention of her peers, friends and foes alike. It wasn’t a stretch that she’d get into a little mischief here and there.

She’d been a regular on the hill for a summer; with Sam Owens—now Dr. Sam Loughley, Nashville’s lead medical examiner—at her side. They’d gotten into the genteel trouble that was expected from well-bred teenagers: smoking stolen Gauloises, sipping nasty-tasting cheap whiskey, hanging out with boys who shaved their hair into Mohawks and talked big about anarchy and guitar riffs. It didn’t last. Their constant posturing quickly bored her.

It made Taylor sad to think back to her youth; the things they called “trouble” back then were increasingly tame by today’s standards. Here she was, newly turned thirty-six, and already feeling old when faced with teenagers.

She’d abandoned the Circle when she was fifteen, didn’t return until her eighteenth birthday. A nostalgic drive with her first real lover, the professor. He’d driven her up there in his Jeep and parked, hands roaming across her body. They’d nearly driven over the edge when her knee knocked the gearshift into Second. He’d taken her to his place that night for the very first time, deflowered her with skill and care.

She smiled, as she normally did when a memory of James Morley first crossed her mind. The thought led to her father, a close friend of Morley’s, and the smile fled.

She needed to mail the letter. Win Jackson was only eight hours away, and he’d be out in a matter of months, having cut several deals to assure him an early release. His missives came with alarming regularity, each begging for forgiveness. His dealings with a shadowy crime boss in New York were behind him. He was going to be on the straight and narrow path from here on out.

She wondered how many times she’d heard that before. Money laundering wasn’t the worst he could have been charged with, but it was the charge that stuck. Well, there was time before she’d have to deal with Win in person. Not as much as she’d like, but enough.

She passed the apex of the hill and the crime scene beckoned to her. Blue-and-white lights flashed, guiding her in. Four patrol cars stood at attention next to a chain-link fence. The K-9 unit was parked at an angle. Taylor recognized Officer Paula Simari’s German shepherd, Max, straining against the cracked window, searching for his master. Ah, so this was the crime scene that had kept her from dinner. It must be a doozy if they were calling in off-duty officers and detectives.

Taylor put her window down, cooed softly at the dog. “You’re okay, baby. She’ll be back in a minute.” Max stopped fretting and sat, tongue lolling out the side of his mouth.

She drove another twenty yards, down the back edge of the hill. All of the attention was focused on a two-story house set back fifty feet from the street. The house was an original Craftsman, built sometime in the 1930s, if she had to guess. The thick, pyramid-shaped columns and slanting roof were well-kept. The exterior was awash in false light; the shake shingles looked to be painted a soft, mossy green, the details slightly darker. The whole house blended perfectly into the surrounding woods. Four joint dormer windows across the second story were square and forward, watching.

She was surprised to see the lawn and porch littered with milling people—a level of disorganization rarely in evidence at a Nashville crime scene. The crime-scene techs were setting up to take photos, video, collect evidence; two patrol officers were standing to one side, conversing in low tones. The command table had been set up on the porch. Uniforms and plainclothes techs were walking around the outside of the house. Neighbors had gathered, silently scrutinizing.

She parked next to a crime-scene van. The side door was open, the contents spilling out as if the tech was in a hurry to get moving on the scene. Paula Simari was twenty feet away. She caught Taylor’s eye, angled her head with a jerk. Meet me inside, the look said. Taylor got out of the car, intrigued.

“Detective!”

A young man signaled her to join him on the lawn of the house. It was deep emerald in the false light, freshly mown; the tang of green onion and cut grass felt so familiar, so right. Normal and unthreatening, just another suburban evening.

But it wasn’t. She shut the door to her car, trying to assimilate the scene. The man continued waving, gesticulating wildly as if she hadn’t seen him already.

Her new partner. Renn McKenzie. Nice enough guy, but she wasn’t willing to get to know him. It was too damn soon. She was still in mourning, recovering from the demise of her team, her career. Her future.

He galloped up to her, breathless. She nodded at him, willing some zen calm into him. “McKenzie.”

“Just call me Renn, Taylor.”

“Jackson is fine, McKenzie.”

“I wish you’d just call me Renn.”

Just Renn. “I’m not on today. I assume you had me called for a reason. Could you fill me in?”

She saw the blush rise on his cheeks. Just Renn had been transferred in from the South sector. He and Marcus Wade, one of her former teammates, had essentially traded places. Captain Delores Norris, head of the Office of Professional Accountability, was the architect of the restructuring.

She would kill to have Marcus by her side right now. Or her former sergeant, Pete Fitzgerald, or Lincoln Ross. But her entire team had been disassembled, and she felt the loss sorely. She was sure Just Renn was a fine detective, but he had his own rhythms, his own demeanor, an eagerness that belied the streaks of gray at his blond temples that was hard to get used to. He was gangly, all sharp edges, no real refinement to his walk or manners. Brown eyes, thin lips, three days of fuzzy golden razor stubble. A decent-looking man, if you liked the enthusiastic type. But he’d only been in plainclothes for about a month, which frightened her. Inexperience could blow an investigation; she was used to working with seasoned pros. Pros she had trained to work her way.

To be truthful, a small part of her liked keeping him off balance. It gave her the sense that maybe this wasn’t forever.

“Sure, yeah. Jackson. Such a harsh name. I assume you’re related?” He looked at her, his face turning blue, then white, then blue.

“Related to …?”

“Andrew Jackson, of course.”

This boy obviously didn’t know his Southern history. There were no direct descendants of Old Hickory—though he’d raised eleven children, none were his own. There was a family connection though, through Jackson’s wife Rachel’s son…. She bit her lip, resisted the urge to scream. None of this had any bearing on her job.

“McKenzie?”

“Yeah?”

“Who’s dead?”

“Yeah. Sorry. We don’t know.” He didn’t make a move toward the house, just stood there.

“Could we possibly go see the body?”

“Oh, yeah, sure. Let’s go. She’s in the living room, or the great room, or whatever you call that big open space in the middle of the house. You can’t see her from the front door, the best view is from the kitchen. Not a lot of walls in the downstairs, it’s all open except for a few columns. She’s, well, I’ll let you see for yourself.”

Now we’re talking.

They reached the front steps. Taylor took them two at a time. Just Renn was right on her tail. It wasn’t her imagination; the command center had been set up on the porch of the house.

“McKenzie? Why don’t you suggest they move the command back a bit? We usually don’t have all this activity so close to the scene. There’s a chance of contamination. Crime Scene 101, buddy.”

He looked down at the deck of the porch, chastised. She felt bad for snapping at him, mentally promised herself to be more careful. He was just a kid, learning the ropes. She’d been there once.

“It’s okay. We all make mistakes,” she said. It wasn’t okay, but the damage was already done. She’d sort it out later.

Even with all the people worrying the scene, the interior of the house felt spacious. Teak floors, exposed beams, whitewashed walls, architectural and designer accoutrements. Elegant abstract paintings pranced along their neutral background to an exposed brick-and-stone fireplace.

The mood of the scene bothered her. The lack of concern about the exterior scene, the milling about, the simple fact that she’d been called in all bespoke the worst. Something was happening, something more than a typical murder. She felt a lump form in her throat.

Under the drone of voices, she heard music. Faint strains of a classical composition … what was that? She felt a buzz of recognition, reached into her mind for the name—Dvořák. That was it. Symphony #9. In E minor. Years of training, even more as a minor aficionado, and it had still taken her a moment. Funny how the mind worked. Her fingers unconsciously curled in on themselves, moving lightly in time with the notes. She’d played clarinet growing up, thrilled with her budding expertise when she was a child, mortified by the time she was a teenager looking for some fun up on Love Circle.

Looking back, she was sorry she’d given it up. Playing in a symphony had been one of her childhood desires, supplanted by the allure of law enforcement after a brief brush with the law when she was a teenager. Now she could see how that would have been quite satisfying. It was a game she rarely played—if you weren’t a cop, what would you be? She’d never been in a position to have to think about not being a cop. Now that she felt the jeopardy slipping in like cat’s feet on a fog, she’d started wondering again.

Taylor concentrated on the music. The last strains of the allegro con fuoco were fading away, then the opening movement started. A loop of the New World Symphony, as the piece was more commonly referred to. Bold and aggressive, lyrical and stunning. She’d always liked it.

She looked for the stereo, didn’t see one. The music was all around her; it must be on a house-wide speaker system. It was hard to drag her attention away. She caught the eye of one of the techs she knew, Tim Davis. At least he was on the scene—she could count on him to preserve as much evidence as possible.

“Tim, can you cut the music?”

He nodded. “Yeah. It’s on a built-in CD player. The controls are in the kitchen. I was waiting for you to hear it. The loop is driving us all mad. You know who it is?”

“Dvořák. Symphony #9. Keep that quiet, will you? I want to be sure that detail isn’t leaked to the press. They’ll seize on it and start giving this guy a name.”

She hadn’t even seen the body, and she was already assuming the worst. Not surprising; the whole tenor of the crime scene screamed “unusual.”

“Where are they, anyway?”

Tim glanced out the window. “Channel Five just pulled up. The others can’t be far behind.”

She nodded to him and looked for Paula. She was standing in the open living room, looking toward the back door. The great room of the house was separated from the eat-in kitchen by three columns, which mimicked the pyramid-shaped support columns out front. There was a small knot of people surrounding the center column, a surreal grouping of cops and techs waiting on her. Three things hit her: she couldn’t see a body, the faces glancing her way were visibly disturbed, and there was a fetid whiff of decomposition in the air.

She stepped lightly toward the group, making sure she didn’t tread in anything important. As she passed the column, Paula pointed toward it with her eyebrow raised. Taylor turned and sucked in her breath.

The victim was young, no more than twenty, black, naked, bones jutting out as if she hadn’t eaten in a while, with dull, brittle bobbed hair. She hung on the center column.

To be more precise, she’d been tacked to the column with a large hunting knife. A big blade, with a polished wood-and-pearl handle that was buried to the hilt square in her chest. She was thin enough that the blade, which looked to be at least eight inches, had passed through her body into the wood. Her arms were pulled up tight over her head, the hands together as if in prayer, but inside out. Her feet were crossed at the ankle, demure, innocent.

Pinned. At least, that was the illusion. At first glance, it looked like the knife was all that held her in that position. Taylor shook her head; it had taken strength, or potent hatred, to shove the knife through the girl’s breastbone into the wood behind.

Taylor ran her Maglite up and down the column, the concentrated beam reflecting off the nearly invisible wires that ran around the girl’s body to hold her suspended in midair. Clever. Some sort of fishing line held the body rigid against the wooden post. It cut into her flesh; the victim had been up on the post long enough that the grooves were deepening as the body’s early decomposition began.

The girl’s shoulders were obviously dislocated. Her skin was ashen and flaky, her lips cracked. She was stripped of dignity, yet the pose felt almost … loving. Sorrow on her face, her mouth open in a scream, her eyes closed. Small mercies. Taylor hated when they stared.

She’d read the scene right. It was going to be a very long night.

Paula came to her side, fiddling with a small reporter’s notebook. “Sorry I had to miss dinner. And sorry to ruin your night, too, but I knew you needed to see this. There’s no ID. I can’t find a purse or anything. This place is clean. The neighbors say the owner is out of town.”

“This isn’t her home?” Taylor asked, gesturing to the body.

“No. One of the neighbors, Carol Parker, is house-sitting, feeding the cat, taking in the paper. Owner’s supposed to be gone all week. Parker came in, bustled around getting the cat fed and watered, then turned to leave and saw the body. She ran, of course. Called us. Swears up and down that she’s never seen the girl around. There’s a circle of glass cut out of the back door, the lock was turned. It’s been dusted, there were no usable prints. The blinds were closed, that’s why the neighbor didn’t see anything amiss. The alarm was disengaged too; the neighbor can’t remember if she turned it on yesterday or not. That cute M.E., Dr. Fox? He was here earlier and declared her. He said to bring her in; either he or Sam will post her first thing.”

“Okay. I’d like to talk to the neighbor. Do you have her stashed close by?”

“She’s at her place next door with a new patrol. God, they get younger every day. This one can’t be more than eighteen. We took the cat over there so it wouldn’t interrupt the scene. Last I saw the patrol was talking to it like it was a baby. Not far enough removed from his own childhood coddling, it seems.”

Taylor smiled absently at Paula, then stepped back a few feet, taking in the full tableau. It was impressive, she’d give the killer that. Spiking the girl to the column like she was a butterfly trapped on a piece of cork was flashy, meant to shock. Meant to humiliate the victim.

Taylor longed for the good old days, when getting called out to a homicide was straightforward—some kid had deuced another on a crack buy and gotten knifed, or a pimp had beaten one of his girls upside the head and cracked her skull. As pointless as those deaths seemed, they were driven by the basics, things she readily understood—greed, lust, drugs. Ever since Dr. John Baldwin, FBI profiler extraordinaire, entered her life, the kills had gotten more gruesome, more meaningful. More serial. Like the loonies had followed him to Nashville. And that thought scared her to death. She already had one killer who’d gotten away, a man calling himself the Pretender, who killed in her name. What was happening to her city?

She pulled her phone from her pocket. There was no signal, so she stepped out onto the porch. Three bars, enough to make a call. She started to dial, felt McKenzie beside her. She hoped he wasn’t going to lurk at her elbow at every crime scene. Maybe he just needed some instruction. She closed the phone and turned to him.

“Hey, man, do me a favor. Get them—”

McKenzie shook his head, lips compressed, eyes darting over her shoulder and back to hers with a kind of wild frenzy. She read the signs. Someone was behind her.

She turned and bumped into a small man with brown hair parted smartly on the right. It was thick and almost bushy, stood out from his head at the base of his neck and around his ears. Her first thought was toupee. He was older, easily in his sixties. She didn’t recognize him, which wasn’t too much of a surprise. Since the house-cleaning brought about by Captain Norris and the chief, there were plenty of new and unfamiliar faces at crime scenes, in the hallways, the cafeteria. The crime-scene techs were all the same, but there’d been some serious shaking up done among the detective ranks.

The little man looked up at her. She saw his mouth start to drop open, then he closed it, the back teeth snapping together.

“You are?” he demanded.

“Detective Taylor Jackson, Metro Homicide. And you?”

“You have a problem with my setup, Detective?”

My setup? Who was this guy?

“I must have missed your name,” she said.

“Lieutenant Mortimer T. Elm. You may call me Lieutenant Elm. I’m with the New Orleans police.”

“What are the New Orleans police doing at a Nashville crime scene?”

He looked confused for a moment, then said, “Who said anything about New Orleans? I’m with Metro Nashville.”

Taylor stared at him for a second, then shrugged. “Lieutenant Elm. It’s nice to meet you. Yes, there’s a standard protocol when dealing with static crime scenes. We usually try to station the command post away from the primary scene in order to avoid contaminating the evidence that might be procured from the immediate vicinity.” She realized she sounded completely textbook and hated herself for a moment. But that’s what the demotion had done to her—forced her back into the realm of “there’s only one way to do things.” Great.

His wave was dismissive. He had pudgy fingers, the nails bitten to the quick. Her stomach flopped. A man’s hands were the window to his soul. Lieutenant Elm’s looked tortured.

“This is going to be just fine. The crime obviously took place inside the house, not outside. This makes it more convenient for everyone. There is a threat of rain. If we move quickly, the crime scene can be wrapped in an hour.”

Taylor almost laughed aloud. Wrapping up a homicide in an hour. This guy was from Mars. Or Lilliput.

When she didn’t immediately respond, he took a step back. He stared at her, his eyes slightly bulged, his jaw thrust forward. She was reminded of a frog. She spoke quietly.

“I beg to differ, Lieutenant Elm. The external scene is just as important as the internal. We need to establish a point of entry, need to be looking for footprints, material the suspect may have discarded. It’s anything but okay to be on top of the crime like this.”

“This is the way I want it!” he said, anger bubbling up in his eyes.

She heard a hissing in her ear, felt a tug at her elbow.

“He’s the new homicide lieutenant, Taylor. Our boss.” McKenzie’s whisper was frantic.

Taylor had to put a hand over her mouth to keep from bursting out laughing. This, this, toad was her new boss? Elm was the new homicide lieutenant? Oh, this was going to be priceless.

Elm’s tone changed, sharpened. “You’ll find that this setup is perfectly acceptable. I must deal with another matter. I trust you can handle this scene. I will deal with your insubordination in the morning.” Elm was smug, obviously thinking he’d defeated her. Well, she’d been bullied just about enough over the past month.

“Insubordination? All I did was point out the obvious,” she said. The porch twittered, the officers who’d overheard amused at the expense of the new lieutenant, who was vibrating in his displeasure.

Elm pointed a finger at her. “Do your job, Detective. I know how to do mine.” He stepped off the porch, walked off toward the gathering media. McKenzie appeared at her elbow again.

“I tried to warn you.”

Taylor caught the melodrama in his voice. A rabbit, scared and spooked, that’s what Just Renn was. She smiled at the younger man.

“That, my friend, is a man who got up on the wrong side of the lily pad. Forget about it. I’ve had worse. Let’s run this puppy.”

Speaking of which … she flipped her cell back open and speed-dialed Baldwin.

He answered with a happy, “Hey, gorgeous. My plane just landed. You on your way?”

“Unfortunately, no. I’m on a call, and I think you’ll want to see this.”

He groaned. “Where are you?”

“Tell the driver 1400 Love Circle. You won’t be able to miss it. And hey, stay away from a short man with a bad rug.”

“Do I even want to know?”

“No. I’ll see you shortly.”

She hung up, went back into the house. The victim was calling her, the scene, the case. She’d been drawn in, already fascinated. Dead girl pinned to a post, in someone else’s house. Classical music playing in the background. A message was being sent. By whom, and to whom? Taylor felt the intrigue slip in and grab her. She was going to be too busy to worry about all the changes, and that was a good thing.

Back in the living room, she circled the body again, looked closer at the filament that held the girl’s arms, legs, torso and head in position. It was tied in little knots on the backside of the column. The killer had taken the time to staple the translucent fishing line into the wood to give it extra holding power. This was well thought out, planned in advance. It had taken time to get the girl up on the post. Which meant whoever committed this murder knew that the house was going to be empty, that he’d have a fertile, undisturbed playground. Either that, or they had another body to find, one belonging to the owner.

Taylor stepped three feet back from the post, taking in the rest of the setting. The columns bisected the two rooms; there were crime-scene techs moving around, disturbing her view.

“Hey, can everyone hold up for a minute? I’d like to get some shots here.”

Long accustomed to Taylor being in charge, people moved out of her way.

She fished her digital camera out of her jacket pocket, took a couple of pictures. Something felt strange, and she couldn’t put her finger on it. Maybe later, once she’d had time for her mind to process the scene, she’d be able to see what was out of place. Or Baldwin would.

She turned the camera off. McKenzie appeared at her side, appropriately silenced by the gruesome visage in front of them. Paula took her flanking position and the three of them stood in a moment of peace, watching, reverent. The victim’s nudity was embarrassing McKenzie. Taylor could see him shifting his feet like a little boy out of the corner of her eye.

She ignored him, stared again at the knife pinning the girl to the column. Tim Davis joined them.

“We’re going to have a pissed-off home owner. I’m going to have to cut the post down, I think,” he said.

“Why?” McKenzie asked, puzzled.

“Because there’s no way to get that knife out of her without disturbing the wound tract.” Tim stepped closer to the body, put his thumb on the flat end of the knife handle, exerting pressure experimentally. It didn’t budge, didn’t shift slightly. “See, this thing is jammed all the way into the wood. We’ve gotta cut her down, take a whole section of column with us to the M.E.’s office. No other way to do it.”

“Oh. Yeah, absolutely. Gotta cut it.” McKenzie was nodding like he’d thought of that himself.

Taylor cracked her knuckles and circled the column again. “This thing must be ten feet tall. Think it’s load-bearing?” she asked Tim.

He shook his head. “No. See the line at the top? It’s just decorative, glued then nailed into place. If it were one of the other two,” he gestured to each side of the body, “we’d be in trouble. This one is detached, for the most part. Won’t be too bad to replace.”

“Okay, Tim, do what you need to do. Try to delay a few minutes for me, though. Baldwin is on his way. I’d like him to see this intact.”

He nodded at her. “I’ll go get the saw.”

Taylor stepped back and considered the victim again. She couldn’t shake the feeling that she’d seen this before. In addition to that, one very obvious incongruity screamed out at her.

She turned to the patrol officer on her left. “I have a question for you, Paula.”

“Shoot,” Paula said.

Taylor pointed at the dead girl. “Where’s the blood?”

Three

John Baldwin decamped from the taxi ten minutes later. Perfect timing.

Taylor glanced around but didn’t see Elm anywhere. She’d have to introduce him to Baldwin, and based on their brief exchange, she had no idea how he would feel about the FBI being at their scene. When she was the lieutenant, it was her call, and she was always willing to have a fresh set of eyes. Elm struck her as the type of cop who would get territorial. Well, she’d cross that bridge when she got to it.

Taylor watched Baldwin walk up the drive, vivid green eyes taking in everything until they settled on hers. She wondered what he saw there, sometimes. He was a veteran of crime scenes, had been the lead profiler on hundreds of cases. He knew the score. Knew what kind of monsters lurked in her head. They lurked in his, too.

Her mind was drawn away from the crime. She forgot how big he was when he was away. As tall as she was, she still had to look up at him. She loved that. In the dark, his black hair looked like midnight, his angled cheekbones highlighting his mouth with shadows. As he got closer, she could see he hadn’t shaved, the soft stubble growing back at an alarming rate. Hmm.

He didn’t kiss her, though she wanted him to. It wasn’t professional—she knew that—but she hadn’t seen him in two weeks and she missed the feeling of him next to her. He did caress her arm, just above her wrist, and it burned as she walked him to the sign-in sheet, then into the house.

“Make it quick,” she said quietly. “We need to get her body down so the techs can finish up in here. And the new lieutenant is around somewhere. He might kick up a fuss that you’ve come.”

Baldwin nodded. He still hadn’t spoken, was simply processing. That’s what she liked about him. There was no extraneous bullshit, no posturing. Just an incessant curiosity about what made people do bad things. That was something they shared, a core desire to figure out the why behind the crimes.

She escorted him over to the body, then stepped away and let him assess the scene.

His lips were set in a tight, thin line, and she could see the dark circles under his eyes. He was exhausted. Working a case always did that to him. His job as the head of the Behavioral Analysis Unit, BAU Two, was to guide the various profilers who worked for him, and to give the various law enforcement entities requesting help a thorough rundown of what they were dealing with. Taylor knew that it went deeper for him. He wanted to do more than look at crime-scene photos and pump out a report. He liked to get in the field, to smell the scene, see the crime in situ. Well, she was giving him his heart’s desire with this one.

Baldwin broke his verbal fast. “Where’s the blood?” he asked.

Taylor smiled. “I said the same thing. There’s something else totally bizarre. There was a classical piece from Dvořák playing on the house’s intercom system.”

“Really? Hmm.”

“The owner of the house is allegedly out of town. There was a piece of glass cut out of the back door so our suspect could turn the lock. The next-door neighbor is caring for the cat—she came over and found the body. She couldn’t say if the music was on or off when she arrived—she wasn’t paying attention. We included the CD in the evidence gathering. The lack of blood, the music, the position of the body—I can’t help but think this is a ritual. That’s why I wanted you to see it.”

He ignored her for a moment, moving back and forth between the wall and the column. He spoke absently. “The suspect could have been playing the music to cover any noise he might have been making. Taylor, step over here with me a second. Look at the wide view.”

She went as far back as the house allowed, to the bay window on the west side of the kitchen. He went with her, standing quietly while she looked. She had taken a picture earlier from this angle, a wide shot of the room face-on to the body.

“Okay. What am I missing?”

“Look at the painting on the wall by the door, in the left upper quadrant, line-of-sight to the column.”

That was it. The strange sense that something wasn’t right, the feeling that she was missing something. It was there in front of her the whole time.

“Son of a bitch. She’s posed just like the painting. Who is that, Picasso?”

“Yes. Demoiselles d’Avignon. The victim’s arms are up over her head, a perfect imitation of the center of the painting. And this was Picasso’s most famous piece from his African Period. Your victim is black. He’s accurately mirrored the painting. There’s no blood. But the race …”

He drifted off.

“What is it?” she asked.

“Taylor, you don’t want to hear what I have to say. I’m having a hard time believing it myself.”

“It’s too early to surmise that we might have a serial on our hands.”

“It’s not that. Actually, it’s much worse.”

“What then?”

“I think you may have my serial on your hands.”

Four

Baldwin waited for Taylor’s mind to register what he’d told her. Hell, he needed it to register in his mind.

“What are you talking about?” she asked.

He spoke quietly. “How much do you remember about a killer named Il Macellaio?”

“I don’t. Not that much. Only what you’ve told me. He’s a serial killer in Florence, Italy, has been working for a number of years. Doesn’t the name translate to ‘the Butcher’?”

“Yes. Il Macellaio has been around since 2000 or so. He’s ruthless, and he’s very, very good at what he does. He poses his victims to emulate famous paintings, leaves a postcard of the painting behind so we know exactly who he’s imitating. Of course, that’s after he tortures them. He keeps them alive as playthings for a while before he kills them. His earliest victims’ cause of death was actually starvation, though his latest were starved and strangled, like he got tired of waiting. He has sex with the bodies, a final farewell, before he stages the scenes. Until now, we’ve not had a lot of physical evidence to go by. Did you get a cause of death on your victim?”

“Ugh. Necrophilia?”

“Worse, much, much worse. Necrosadism. Il Macellaio’s pathology developed to the point where his fantasies about having sex with corpses wasn’t enough. He was driven to actually capture and kill women to act out his fantasies with. Very, very rare. Starvation is a cruel way to die. It’s somewhat passive-aggressive, actually, which is fascinating, considering he’s being driven by his desires to kill. I’m not entirely sure why he does it, though I’ve got some ideas. And looking at this girl, she’s certainly gone without nourishment for a while.”

“Lovely. I’ll make sure Sam is aware of the background. The COD isn’t apparent but you’re right, she’s ridiculously skinny. Bones sticking out everywhere. Did you notice the knife went all the way through her chest and into the post?”

“I did. You’ll have to—”

“Cut it down. I know,” she interrupted, signaling to her crime-scene tech. The young man with solemn eyes Baldwin knew as Tim Davis nodded grimly and went to work with his hacksaw.

Taylor was pacing in short bursts. Baldwin led her a few feet away so they could talk privately.

“Baldwin, is it possible that Il Macellaio has come here from Italy? And why? Nashville isn’t exactly on the beaten path of most world travelers. New York, Los Angeles, I can see. But us?”

He scrubbed his hands through his hair to help him think, not caring that it would be standing on end. “Part of what I’ve been dealing with in Quantico is a report from London. The Metropolitan Police at New Scotland Yard have three murders that bear an eerie resemblance to the Florence cases. If I’m right, and Il Macellaio went to London, it’s within the realm of possibility that he could come here.”

“What would take a serial killer from Florence to London, and then to Nashville?”

“You ask an excellent question. We had a break in the Florence case last week. Finally got some DNA. We’re waiting for it to clear the Interpol databases, see if they have a match, and it’s running through CODIS. I expect we’ll have the results back sometime tomorrow. You know how things shake out. We might get a name, we might be off on another wild-goose chase. If we get a name, I’ll probably have to head back up there.”

CODIS. The wundertool. The combined DNA index system could match killings and killers. Baldwin sent a brief prayer of thanks out to Sir Alec Jeffreys for finding the DNA fingerprint that led them to this point. One day, there would be DNA on file for every criminal in every country, and there would be instantaneous matches.

Taylor was appropriately intrigued. “That’s awesome, babe. How’d you get DNA after all these years?”

“Long story or short?”

She waved at the scene in front of them, Tim sawing away at the post, cursing in G-rated, first-class Southern style—dagnabit, almost had you, dadgumit, get back here—and he had to fight back a smile. She met his eyes and he could see the mirth bubbling in their stormy depths. She liked that Tim kid.

“I’ve got time,” she said. “Tell me about your murders.”

“That’s got to be one of the most romantic things I’ve heard you say.”

“I knew there was a reason why you love me,” she whispered.

“I do love you. Desperately,” he whispered back.

He felt a hand on his arm. A short man, bristling with indignation, stared up at him.

“Who is this, Detective?” the man snipped.

Taylor made eyes at Baldwin for a second, then did the introductions.

“Lieutenant Elm, this is Supervisory Special Agent John Baldwin, Unit Chief of the Behavioral Analysis Unit at Quantico.”

“And what, pray tell, is the FBI doing at my crime scene?” Elm’s face was turning red, a pot ready to boil over. Baldwin stuck out his hand to shake.

“I was in the neighborhood and Detective Jackson suggested I take a look. This isn’t exactly a run-of-the-mill murder.”

“I don’t remember inviting you, Mr. Baldwin.”

“It’s Doctor, actually, sir. My apologies for the intrusion. But I must tell you that this looks like the work of an organized killer, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see him strike again. I would be more than willing to sit down with you and give a profile.”

“Profiling,” Elm spat. “Voodoo, mind-reading crap, if you ask me. I think we’ll be just fine without your help, Doctor. That is all.”

Elm marched away from them. Baldwin glanced at Taylor. Her face was suffused with blood and she was biting her lip. He’d seen that look before; she was torn between laughing and cursing.

“That’s your new lieutenant?”

She nodded.

“Well, this is going to be fun. At least he didn’t try to bodily remove me.”

“That happens?” she asked.

“You’d be surprised,” he said lightly. “Where were we?”

“Florence, where I’d rather be right now.”

He smiled at her. “Don’t try to distract me. It won’t work. Right. Three bodies ago, back in Florence in 2004, the carabinieri’s very sharp crime-scene technician found a hair with an intact skin tag in a puddle of water in the kitchen where the victim was found. It didn’t match her DNA. They put it in the system and kept it flagged, just in case. Last week, we got the call from the Met. They had a series of murders that they determined were serial, and asked for a consultation. When I looked at the crime-scene photos, I saw the signature of our Italian boy. But the beautiful thing is, the techs at the Met found an intact hair, too, this time curled in the back of their second victim’s throat.”

“Ugh.”

“Yes. There were enough similarities between the cases that I insisted we test the two hairs’ DNA immediately. Two hairs in five years. We’re crossing our fingers that there’s a match between the two. If he’s committed any other crimes and is in the database, we might get a lead. Who knows? If the DNA matches, then at least I can confirm that he’s on the road. That’s what I’m waiting for.”

“But how long does it take to starve a woman to death? It seems like the time frame is too short for this to be a part of the series.”

“If you subscribe to the rules of three … three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food. That’s not a perfect formula, but close enough. Deprived of water and food, a small woman could easily die within two weeks. Maybe less. The last London murder scene was over a month ago. He could have made it to the States, taken your victim, starved her, then posed her. It’s feasible. Any postcards around?”

“Not that I’ve seen.”

Taylor was quiet. He could feel her thinking. After a moment, she spoke again.

“See, there’s something else odd about this scene. I need to go do a ViCAP search. It wasn’t my case, wasn’t even in Nashville. It was south of us, in Manchester. But I remember reading something in the Law Enforcement Bulletin about an unsolved murder three years or so ago where classical music was playing when they arrived at the scene. Tonight, the CD player in the kitchen had that Dvořák piece playing on a continuous loop. Do you have any of that in your cases?”

“No, we don’t.”

“The owner of the house might have left it on accidentally. We pulled a palm print off of the casing, so we’ll see. I’m relatively certain that the body was transported from another scene. The lack of blood on the girl’s body and on the floor … she was killed elsewhere.”

“Probably. There wouldn’t be a lot of blood in a starvation case anyway.”

“There could have been two people involved, one to hold the body against the post and one to tie the fishing line around her body. It might be hard to control alone, but a strong man, starting at the victim’s feet, could have managed easily. The girl’s toes were two feet off the floor. He could have had her in a fireman’s carry, slumped over his shoulder, while he tied the line around her ankles.”

“Or he might have looped the line around the bottom and tied it loosely, then inserted the dead girl’s legs into the loop. Tighten it down, and voilà, there’s a base to start with. He could have slowly worked his way up the body.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” she said. “That’s how I would do it if it were just me.”

Elm was in the kitchen now, imperiously bossing around the videographer, Keri McGee. Taylor cringed at the sound of his voice. Baldwin knew how hard this was for her—the past few weeks had taken their toll on both of them. Maybe a big, juicy case would be a welcome diversion, even if they were being overseen by Napoleon.

He tried to draw her attention back to the victim. “Slamming the knife through the victim’s body with enough force to embed it that deeply into the wood was overkill. She’d been dead long before she had been placed on the post. There’s rigor leaving her jaw and some decent lividity on the edges of her legs.”

Taylor’s focus returned immediately. “So she lay on her back at some point soon after death,” she said.

“Did you notice the fishing line eating into her skin?”

“Of course. There was also some petechial hemorrhaging in her eyes, but not so much that I’d automatically assume she’d been strangled. Hopefully Sam will have her in the morning for the autopsy. She’ll get to the bottom of it.”

Baldwin took the hint gracefully. There was more work to be done, things that he wasn’t needed for. “Why don’t I go make some calls? Is there someplace …?”

She handed him the keys to her pool car. “It’s the one right by Tim’s van. I’ll be with you as quickly as I can. Thank you for coming out.”

He longed to kiss her, but simply nodded and left. The post was coming down as he walked past, the girl riding the wood, still solidly attached by the fishing line and the knife sunk deep into her chest. It looked like half a crucifixion. Nothing he’d forget for a long while.

Taylor rubbed her eyes, forcing the itch of sleep away. It was two in the morning; the crime scene was winding down. Elm’s prediction that it would only take an hour was six hours off.

Tim had successfully removed the body of the victim, still attached to a nearly seven-foot-long column of wood by the fishing line and the knife. It was a wild scene. Getting the dead girl in an appropriate horizontal plane so she could go into the body bag had been tricky, and they couldn’t close the bag all the way. Despite the victim’s low weight, the column was heavy. People on both ends of the post heaved and strained not to drop her, to preserve the evidence.

After that, the rest of the evening had gone smoothly.

Elm had vacated the house about an hour earlier, which was fine by her. She’d seen him talking to one of The Tennessean reporters who’d made an appearance, prayed he’d shown a modicum of discretion. Dan Franklin, the department’s spokesperson, had shown up and handled the media after that. Some of the news folks were still hanging around; nothing else had captured their attention. A quiet crime night in Nashville, which guaranteed this murder would make the morning news.

Taylor had been avoiding the media all night, refusing to give a statement, leaving that to Franklin. She hadn’t forgiven them for their role in her demotion, for running with the allusions and innuendoes planted by a man out for revenge against her. For showing videos of her having sex with her old partner; tapes that were made without her knowledge or permission. Every time she thought about the humiliation she’d endured, having to watch herself on television.

Stop it, Taylor. What’s done is done. They are the media. You were newsworthy. Leave it at that. It wasn’t personal. You’d investigate each and every one of them six ways to Sunday if you thought they’d done something illegal. Why should they be any different? Everyone needs to feed the family. Focus.

She went back to her mental wrap-up of the crime scene. Footprints had been found in the woods behind the house, and cigarette butts, but they were far enough removed from the actual scene that Taylor was skeptical that they’d come from the killer. Every bit had been processed, of course, the techs putting together the molds, spraying the ground with Dust & Dirt Hardener, making impression casts of at least four different shoe prints. If they found a suspect, they could look for a match to test against the shoe impressions.

There was still the issue of transport. The killer had gotten the body to the house somehow, but so far the canvas of the neighborhood had turned up nothing of use. No one had seen a car or van around the area that didn’t belong. Of course, considering how many people tooled around Love Circle for fun, she suspected the residents were inured to the sight of strange cars.

There were tons of kids that roamed this area at night. They were usually harmless, looking for a quiet place to smoke some dope and drink, neck, and ponder the questions of the world. Not surprisingly, the regulars scattered when the police had driven up the hill, melting away into the night. They’d be back. Taylor would wait them out, talk to them another night. Maybe a stranger had noticed something.

The odds that one of them was her suspect … well, she never assumed. She would wait for the results of the investigation, let the evidence be her guide.

She’d talked to the neighbor, Carol Parker, had gone at her hard to make sure nothing was missed. The woman sat on her couch, hefty thighs encased in brown knit firmly pressed together, feet flat on the floor, her round face white. She held the Siamese cat from next door, stroking the fur obsessively as she relayed her actions during the past few days house-sitting. No, she hadn’t noticed any cars today, she’d been at work. No, she didn’t realize anything was amiss until after she’d fed the cat and turned to leave. No, she couldn’t remember if she’d heard music, but the owner usually left some sort of noise playing, a television or a radio, for the cat, so she wouldn’t have thought it strange. She thought she’d turned the alarm on when she left the previous day, but might have forgotten. No, she didn’t remember touching anything but the front door and the cat’s dish; she’d seen the body and run.

Taylor went through her every move, then gave up after twenty minutes. The woman didn’t have anything that would be of use to them tonight. Maybe in the morning, when the shock of the evening wore off, she’d be able to recall anything that seemed out of place. She had given Taylor the name and cell phone number of the house’s owner. His name was Hugh Bangor, and Taylor left him a voice mail asking him to call her as soon as he received the message. Parker said he was in Los Angeles, but didn’t know where. If that were the case, it would certainly be tomorrow before he’d be able to come home.

He was in for quite a reception—Taylor planned to interrogate him extensively. Though the neighbor was adamant that Bangor was a great, stand-up guy, it’s not every day that a dead body was arranged so artfully in your living room while you were conveniently out of town. He was certainly a suspect.

Taylor wandered through the house one last time, assimilating the scene. A fine black film covered all available surfaces. The house had been dusted for prints and many exemplars had been taken, including the magnificent palm print on the CD player. She’d love to get lucky, to get the prints into the system and get a match tomorrow. The victim had been printed as well, and her exemplars would be inputted into the statewide iAFIS database to look for a match. The integrated automatic fingerprint identification system was strong and quick, and could give them an answer within minutes if a match was located.

Taylor walked to the glass coffee table. Nothing unusual—coasters, an oversize art book on Spain and a catalogue raisonné of Picasso’s life work. She used the tip of her pen to spin the book around toward her. Baldwin had mentioned that postcards had been left at the Macellaio crime scenes, postcards of the painting the killer was imitating. Well, this monograph of Picasso’s work wasn’t a postcard, but it might be a good substitute. She bagged the book, just in case.

Despite the confusion when she first arrived, Taylor was comfortable that the scene had been managed, that they hadn’t missed anything. She stopped in front of the now-ruined column, which looked like a freshly sawed mangrove root. She turned in a circle, then went to the door, closed it behind her, and sealed the scene.

Taylor walked out onto the porch. Simari had just left, Max sleeping peacefully in the back of the cruiser. Just Renn had packed it in, too, as had the rest of the crime-scene techs. All that was left was the occupied car of the patrol officer who would assure the scene wouldn’t be disturbed overnight by kids or vandals, and a Channel Four press van. Taylor was annoyed at their presence. Couldn’t they edit their package back at their little castle on Knob Hill? As if they’d heard her thoughts, the engine revved and the van slid away into the night.

And Baldwin, of course, sleeping peacefully in the front seat of the unmarked. Poor guy, he was tired enough to crash in her car. She needed to get him home.

It was a pleasant night. Morning. Whatever you called those dim predawn hours, the deepest part of the night. The woods were alive, crickets and cicadas competing for air time, the blackness of the night almost sultry. A calm had settled over Love Circle. The chaos had been replaced by nature’s serenity.

Taylor took a deep breath, felt some tranquility slink into her shoulders. It was the evidence they hadn’t found that disturbed her. A knife through the heart should be a bloody mess. Taylor had talked briefly to Sam, who promised to handle the autopsy personally in the morning. Taylor wanted to witness, and wanted McKenzie to accompany her. He’d paled when she told him, but nodded stoically and promised to be there. This would be their first postmortem together, and Taylor wasn’t sure what to expect from him.

Either way, it was time to go home. She stifled a yawn, waved to the patrol, and got into the car. Baldwin woke, smiled sleepily at her.

“Sorry it took so long,” she whispered, then leaned over and kissed him. He kissed her back, hungry, and it took all of her control not to throw her arms around him and slide into the backseat. She disengaged herself, laughing. It had been too long.

“Let’s go home.”

“I think that sounds wonderful.” When he reached over and took her hand, she was struck by the full circle she’d come tonight. First love to true love on Love Hill. Not a bad life’s work.

She drove down the hill one-handed, listening to the dispatch crackle—”10-83, shots fired, repeat, 10-83, 490 Second Avenue, Club Twilight. Officers please respond.”

Shots fired on Second Avenue had practically become a daily standard. Let someone else worry about that. The B-shift homicide team was responsible for these overnight calls. She just needed to make it home. She was tired, no doubt, but her mind was whirling. The same word kept winding through like the loop of the Dvořák piece.

Another. Another. Another.

Five

The house looked barren when she pulled into the driveway. She’d neglected to leave the front lights on—of course, she’d expected to be home hours ago. Baldwin had fallen asleep again on the drive; she hated to wake him, but didn’t have any choice. She shook him lightly and he opened his eyes with a yawn.

“Sorry, babe. We’re going to have to go in through the front, I don’t have the garage door opener. I left it in my truck. I hate bringing the unmarked home.”

“Okay. Yeah,” he murmured.

They got themselves inside the house. She’d forgotten to turn the alarm on again, and Baldwin gave her a chastising look after he armed it.

It was past 3:00 a.m. Though Baldwin could sleep in, Taylor would have to be up in a few hours to start a fresh day. Her newly demoted status meant she had much less freedom in setting her own hours, the biggest chafe of all. She was expected to be in the office at 8:00 a.m. and work through to 3:00 p.m., but so far, she’d never had an actual 8:00-3:00 day.

Setting hours for a homicide detective was a moot point. You catch a murder at 2:45 p.m., you’re on until you’ve cleared the scene and the paperwork is done. As a lieutenant, she had the luxury of letting other people do the work and report their findings to her. That part of her career was temporarily on hold.

Baldwin wavered against her shoulder; he was asleep on his feet. She brushed a kiss against his lips and sent him up to bed.

Elm. How in the world had Mortimer managed to make lieutenant? He was going to be a difficult man to deal with, she could see that as plain as day. Cranky, nasty, like an ill-tempered yappy little dog. Insubordination. Yes, she probably should have bit back that last comment, but really, how big an idiot could you be? The officers on the metro police force received endless training. Hell, even the most amateur forensic enthusiast with a working knowledge of crime television and fiction would know not to make such freshman mistakes.

She dropped her weapon and badge on the counter, pulled her ponytail holder out, letting her hair cascade down her back. She opened the wine fridge, took out a bottle of Masciarelli Montepulciano d’Abruzzo. She poured a glass, put the bottle on the counter, grabbed a handful of grapes from the fruit bowl, nibbled a few and chased them with a healthy gulp of wine. The message light was flashing on the answering machine, four new messages. She hit play, then stood in front of it, left arm draped against the wall, her forehead on her forearm, the wineglass by her side, listening.

A political pollster. Delete.

A reminder that she had a dentist appointment next week. She left that one, just in case she forgot.

Baldwin, his deep voice filling the room. Just letting her know he was in early, that he loved her, and planned to ravish her as soon as they got home. Fat chance of that.

She replayed it twice, a smile on her lips. She took a sip of wine and waited for the next one.

There was silence, then static. A chill moved up her spine, she stood straighter. Then a high-pitched voice, almost childlike. “Not. Me.”

The click that followed made her jump. Her heart began to race.

She set her wine down on the counter. The caller ID showed the last number who’d called as Unknown Name, Unknown Number. She hit star sixty-nine for an automatic redial, but a quick beeping told her that it wasn’t going to work without the correct area code.

Damn. She played it back three times, each time feeling a fresh wave of chills whip through her body. Part of her wanted to blow it off, assume that it was just a wrong number. But her instincts were on fire. She’d never heard the voice before, but she knew exactly who that was, and what the message meant.

He called himself the Pretender. He’d been a disciple of a serial killer in Nashville known as Snow White. Snow White had been dealt with, but the Pretender had slipped through the net. Every once in a while, he reached out to her. As recently as last month he’d made his presence known in Nashville, taking care of a pesky threat to her security. In a decidedly gruesome fashion, at that. He’d left what Baldwin termed a “love note” anchored to the dead man’s chest.

What a chance to take, calling her at home. The Pretender wasn’t careless, that much she knew. There had been a trap on their line for the past couple of months, but it would take more than a three-second call to trace.

The message freaked her out on two levels. One, the simple fact that he was still watching her made her toes curl. He was close enough to know about the murder scene tonight, and that was exceptionally unsettling.

Two, her instincts about this evening’s murder were right on. The ritualistic posing, the secondary crime scene, all pointed to an organized offender who had done this before. And would most likely try to do it again.

Baldwin needed to know. After her run-in last month with the assassin the Pretender had so unceremoniously murdered, she didn’t hesitate. She ran up the stairs and flung herself on the bed. He jumped up with a snort.

“I’m not entirely dead to the world, woman. I thought you’d never come to bed. Come here and let me—”

“He called.”

Baldwin stopped, his hand frozen on Taylor’s thigh. “Huh?”

“Our boy. He called the house and let me know tonight’s crime scene wasn’t his.”

She didn’t have to explain further. Baldwin knew that the Pretender was out there, waiting to strike, waiting for the perfect moment to catch them off guard. Every murder they worked, they were forced to stop and think about him. He preyed on their minds.

Baldwin’s rage eliminated all traces of sleepiness, palpable and deadly. The more controlled his voice, the angrier he was. This was as tight as she’d ever heard him. “He called the house.”

She didn’t know which scared her more, the constantly evolving relationship with a mass murderer, or the rigid fury in Baldwin’s voice.

“Yes. At least, I assume it’s him. He left a message. It said, ‘Not me.’”

She heard Baldwin breathe deeply, mastering his emotions. “Son of a bitch. Let me hear it.”

They made their way downstairs. “I wouldn’t worry too much,” she said. “It wasn’t what I’d term threatening. I imagine when he’s ready to strike, he’s going to have a blast setting the stage.”

“That’s exactly what I’m afraid of. And you let me judge for myself. You need to stop downplaying this. He’s dangerous.”

He sounded so possessive, so intense, that it felt like he had stopped her on the stairs and slipped his arms around her body. Amazing how even his voice made her feel protected. Not that she needed protecting, of course, but it was nice knowing she had a fallback position.

In the kitchen, Baldwin replayed the message several times, then made a call, to Quantico, she figured, to see what the trap showed. She took the wine and went into the living room, booted up the laptop, retrieved the cord for the camera, and uploaded the pictures from the Love Hill crime scene. Busy work. Something to take her mind off that voice, the crawling terror that pervaded her senses. Despite what Baldwin thought, she did take the Pretender seriously. She dreamt about him. She caught herself looking over her shoulder, wondering if he was watching her. She’d made some changes to her routine to try and throw him off, but if he was mailing her letters and calling her at home, none of that mattered. He knew where she was, all the time. He knew where she slept, where she was most vulnerable. She had the brief urge to suggest that they move, but it wouldn’t matter. The Pretender was far too clever for his own good.

“Damn,” she whispered. She took a drink of the Masciarelli and willed her stomach to stay put. She needed a distraction, and the computer was ready. Baldwin had installed an e-mail program directly into her photo well. She selected the twenty or so pictures she’d taken and sent them to her work e-mail address so they’d be there fresh for the picking in the morning.

When the files finished uploading, she opened the slide show and scrolled through them, slowly, recreating the sense of the scene in her mind. The music. Fishing line. The Picasso book. A very posed corpse.

Not. Me.

She shook it off, forced the voice from her head. The crime-scene pictures were in vivid color, but they didn’t capture the intensity she’d felt at the scene. This murderer was sending them a very clear message. If she could only decipher it before he felt compelled to tell them again.

Baldwin came and sat next to her, rubbing her leg through her jeans, then inserting his hand into the opening and running his warm fingers delicately up the back of her calf. It made her shiver.

“Now that you’re awake … you mentioned the postcards left at the Macellaio crime scenes? I bagged a Picasso monograph that was on the coffee table. I’ll ask the owner if it’s his—it might have been left by the suspect.”

“That’s a great thought.” He grew silent. “I’m sorry,” he said.

“For what?” she asked.

“I can’t keep you safe from him.”

She sighed. “You do that every time you look at me, Baldwin. And don’t you forget it.” She kissed him, and her heart pounded in a much more enticing way. He tugged at the button on her jeans, slipped her arms out of her shirt. She wrapped herself around him. It didn’t take long. It had been a while for them, and they were both anxious to make the connection. There would be plenty of time for candles and music; right now, all she wanted was to feel Baldwin inside her, to remind her that she was alive. His beard made the insides of her thighs feel red and burned, and she got carried away and raked his back with her nails. The depths of her passion for him never ceased to surprise her. She’d never felt so totally and completely in lust and in love at the same time.

Breath ragged, they clung together on the couch. Baldwin fell asleep in her arms, and she smiled into his dark hair. God, it was good to have him home.

She reached out a hand and managed to get her wine. Debated slipping upstairs into the pool room and having a game, think through the night’s work. She’d have to get up in a few hours anyway. Almost reluctantly, she set the wine on the table and closed her eyes, let her breathing deepen and match Baldwin’s. There would be plenty of time to deal with monsters in the morning.

Thursday

Six

With a whopping three hours of sleep under her belt, Taylor rose at seven so she could get a run in before she had to go to work. Baldwin had bought a treadmill for their bonus room so he could run off his excess stress, and she’d found it helped her, too. She was dreading today. She could only pray that the troll she’d met last night wasn’t really going to be her new lieutenant.

After a quick three miles, she showered, put her wet hair in a ponytail, dressed in a new pair of dark denim jeans and a black cashmere T-shirt, then jammed her feet into her favorite pair of Tony Lama cowboy boots. Elm would probably be one of those sticklers for the dress code, but damn if she was going to wear slacks and pumps to work. She figured as long as her badge and weapon were visible, it was quite apparent that she was dressed for the job.

Downstairs, she grabbed a Diet Coke and shrugged into a black leather car coat. Summer was nearly here, but it was still getting chilly in the mornings. Weird weather. She backed out of the driveway, debating. Should she go to the office to face the music with Elm, or should she go to Gass Street, to Sam, and witness the autopsy of their victim from last night?

Her cell phone rang. Speak of the devil. Punching the talk button, she smiled as she greeted her best friend.

“Howza,” Sam said, and Taylor burst out laughing. It was code from their high school days at Father Ryan. Howza was one of their ways of letting the other know they’d gotten in trouble with the nuns. Neither one could remember where and how it started, but it stuck.

“Who are you in trouble with?” Taylor asked.

“Me, in trouble? I hear it’s you who’s in hot water.”

Taylor groaned. “What did you hear?”

“That you told off the new guy.”

“And where, pray tell, did you hear that?”

“Your new dick is in my lobby.”

“Just Renn?”

This time Sam laughed. “Just so. He’s here to witness the post. He was worried that you were getting reamed by the new guy, and that’s why you’re late.”

“I’m not late.”

“No, you’re not. He’s early. He was waiting for me when I got here, and I was early. You need to give him some saltpeter or something, get him calmed down.”

“Doesn’t that affect his Johnson?”

“Probably wouldn’t hurt that either. I think he’s got the hots for you.”

Taylor rolled her eyes. “Great. Thanks for the warning. I’ll head into the office before I come to you.”

“By the way, you may want to avoid the paper. It seems your new boss gave the reporter a lot of detail from the scene. You may want to talk to him.”

“I tried that last night. He wasn’t listening.”

“Try harder. See you in a bit.”

Sam hung up before Taylor could reply. Damn. It was face-the-music time.

Traffic was unbearably light. Just her luck. She was downtown, pulling into the parking lot of the Criminal Justice Center before the clock turned 8:30 a.m.

The CJC was one of those never-changing entities in her life. In one way, shape or form, she’d been here at least five times a week for the past four years. And for the previous nine, she’d been filtering in and out, bringing suspects in for booking or questioning, meeting with superiors, taking exams…. Thirteen years of her life, this had been her home base. Stocky gray cement with a red-and-brown brick facade, the close smell of the Cumberland River, the back stairs with an industrial ashtray littered with cigarette butts, all served to make her feel a familiar sense of calm.

It was the inside of the building that had undergone the dramatic transformation.

The new chief had systematically decimated everything the Metro Nashville Police Department stood for, accomplished, and created during the thirteen years she’d been a cop.

The changes had begun subtly—a command shift here, a group moved there, and Taylor hadn’t worried about it too much. A new chief would certainly have new plans. And then he started replacing the upper levels of management with his own people.

He followed with a Machiavellian administrative swoop, moving many of the criminal investigative detectives into the six separate city precincts. By splitting up seasoned teams and bringing in new people, the homicide close rate of eighty-six percent dropped to a measly forty-one. Decentralization of the homicide teams had been only one of the huge shifts in the past few years. Buyouts and early retirements cut a swath through the experienced ranks of the detective division—all of the Criminal Investigative Division groups had been affected.

Despite the vociferous complaints by the rank and file, the realignments went on. The new chief publicly claimed that the crime rates were dropping dramatically, when in actuality there was simply some creative accounting going on. One of the new guidelines that upset Taylor was the new definitions for rape. An assault could no longer be called a rape unless there was penile penetration. Taylor knew a few women who’d gotten away by the skin of their teeth, had been forced to fellate an attacker, had been beaten and terrorized, but it was only categorized as a sexual assault.

It burned her to no end, these little petty political plays. Her force was being dismantled, slowly, but surely.

Her own world had suffered the most dramatically of all. Taylor’s team was known as the murder squad. They worked out of the old offices, handled high-profile cases. To be on the murder squad, you had to be the cream of the crop. As the homicide lieutenant, Taylor had run it for three years. The loyalties of her men and women were unassailable, and they’d managed to get past the decentralization and keep on solving crimes, which was the only purpose they had.

But Captain Delores Norris was the new head of the Office of Professional Accountability, and hated Taylor with a passion. They’d gone head-to-head, and for now, Taylor had lost, and big. Her team had been split apart, reassigned to other sectors and her boss, Mitchell Price, fired. Price was fighting tooth and nail to get his job back, and the Fraternal Order of Police was backing him to the hilt. They just needed time to make the case and take Metro to court.

By breaking her away from Lincoln Ross and Marcus Wade, trying to force her sergeant, Pete Fitzgerald, into early retirement, Delores Norris guaranteed herself a spot on Taylor’s shit list. But getting Taylor demoted two spots, back to detective … Well, Taylor was fighting that with her union rep strong at her side. Totalitarianism had no place in this police force, and it would, eventually, be eradicated. All it would take would be a massive mistake on the chief’s part, or a mayor with the balls and foresight to concede his city was being torn apart.

But for the meantime, if Taylor wanted to keep her job, she had to show up in her old office and play nice. And that’s exactly what she planned to do.

She was about to swipe her pass card when the door swung open. A group of young Academy cadets clattered out and down the stairs, happy and joking. One solemnly stopped and held the door for her. Once the path was cleared, she smiled at the young man and entered the CJC.

She followed the blue arrows embedded in the linoleum floor to the Homicide offices. The halls were relatively quiet and she was inside the small room within moments.

Lieutenant Elm stood in the door to her—no, his—office. His arms were crossed, his bushy brown hair smoothed into place. He greeted her with a smile, which completely caught her off guard. She almost saw his third molars as the smile widened, a pink tongue nestled deep inside.

“Good morning, Detective,” he said. Pleasant, non-threatening, disarming. Taylor wasn’t falling for it. Her senses went on immediate alert.

“Good morning,” she said, stopping in front of him, arms behind her back, spine straight. She waited for the dressing-down, but it didn’t come.

“Come into my office, if you will. I’d like to cover some ground with you.” He pivoted, and entered the tiny little space that used to be her office. She followed him, sat in the chair next to the door. There was just enough room for her to stretch her legs out; the tip of her right boot touched the corner of the door. Elm sat behind the desk. The scarred wood was free of paper, the normal detritus that built up—pens, pencils, Post-it notes, referral sheets, call sheets—was all neatly stowed away.

Something drew her eyes to the ceiling. For as long as she could remember, by the window, there had been a ceiling panel with a large brown water stain on the corner. She’d asked the facilities manager to have it replaced countless times, and the requests had fallen on deaf ears. But this morning, the stain was gone, the panel replaced. She didn’t know if that was a coincidence or whether Elm had actually managed in one brief morning to do what she’d struggled to accomplish for years. Coincidence, she decided. No other decent explanation.

“So, Detective. We didn’t get off on the right foot yesterday. And that’s a shame, because I see that you have an exemplary record and certainly are capable of taking orders from a superior.” He paused, looked around the room like he was speaking to an audience. His gaze finally settled back on her. “Such a shame that you’ve had so much trouble lately. I assume there aren’t any more, ahem, surprises, in your closet?”

Taylor stared at him. “Excuse me?”

Elm waved her umbrage away. “You might have mentioned that the FBI agent who crashed my crime scene last night was your fiancé.”

“That has no bearing on my job. Dr. Baldwin is the leading expert in the field of criminal profiling, and has worked cases with Metro in the past. With great success, I might add.”

“Yes, I heard that. Don’t get so defensive with me. I’m willing to let him help with this one, so long as he doesn’t get in my way. So let’s just put last night behind us and start fresh, shall we?”

He stuck a hand out across the desk.

“Morty Elm. I’m from New Orleans, I worked with the chief down there and was very happy to come onboard when this unfortunate situation warranted your, well, let’s just call it disciplining, shall we?”

Before she had a chance to speak, he continued.

“I’d like to establish a few ground rules. I like to be kept informed of everything my detectives are doing, so you’ll report in regularly. I prefer to read your updates, so if you’d be kind enough to turn in a detailed sheet every evening of your day’s accomplishments, that will make my life grand. I’d also like a full rundown of where you stand with each of your cases, and your plans for solving them.

“I run a tight ship, so I expect you to be at your desk by eight, and to adhere to the dress code. Jeans are not suitable for my detectives. You will sign in and sign out every time you leave the office. In addition, you will find a listing of what is appropriate and what is not on your desk. I spoke with Detective McKenzie this morning, he seems like a fine young man. You have considerably more experience than he, so I trust you’ll be comfortable mentoring the detective, teaching him the ropes.”

“Of course.”

“Then we understand each other. No more surprises at crime scenes, Detective. That’s all I have for you right now. I’ll expect that status report by five. You may go.”

She struggled to reconcile the man with his words. Smiling and friendly this morning, making reasonable statements, yet still lobbing comments full of allusion. The shot across the bow regarding the videotapes was uncalled for. She could just imagine Elm and Delores Norris in the Oompa’s office, lights off, watching Taylor in all her glory with her dead ex-lover. She didn’t know who to be more furious at—Norris, Elm, or David Martin, for putting her in the situation in the first place. If he weren’t already dead, she’d like to strangle him.

Last month, after videotapes of Martin and Taylor having sex surfaced on a pay-as-you-go Web site that featured amateur, unwillingly taped pornography, she’d broken a few rules to solve the case. She was being summarily disciplined for her actions defending herself.

Elm’s dictates were ridiculous. Written plans for solving her cases? It would take two weeks to write out her assumptions and thoughts on the forty or so open cases she’d caught over the past few weeks. And establishing the ground rules was one thing, but dismissing her without an update on the most current case? Sloppy. Just like she suspected, Elm wasn’t there to be a cop. He was going to be an administrator. At least he wasn’t fighting her about Baldwin.

She gathered herself. “You don’t want—”

Elm shook his head vehemently.

“I said you may go. I have other duties to accomplish this morning.” He gave her a brief, feral smile and nodded at the door.

She stood, biting her lip, holding back the invectives she’d prefer to spew.

“Close the door on your way out, please,” he said.

She pulled the door shut a little harder than necessary and walked to her desk. There was a sheet on it, color coded, with starred items. The appropriateness list, she assumed. She balled it into a wad and tossed it into the trash unread.

She sat down hard, yanked her ponytail holder out, ran her hands through her hair, stopping for a moment to massage her temples. Elm was certifiable. One thing at a time, she told herself. Focus. Focus on the case.

If she wanted her old job back, solving this case and showing his incompetence was paramount.

She put her hair back up, took a deep breath, then pulled out a reporter’s notebook and started making herself a list. There were several items that needed to be accomplished today, and she wasn’t going to let King Toad get in her way.

The list was straightforward. Need to talk to neighbor again, need to talk to home owner, need to revisit the case in Manchester, file the ViCAP updates, check iAFIS for a fingerprint match and check on that palm print, gather crime-scene reports from all of the patrol officers, create the murder book, report in to Page. As she wrote, her mind slowly shifted away from Elm and onto their unidentified victim.

“You’re lost in thought.”

Taylor jumped. A.D.A. Page was standing by her left elbow. She hadn’t heard the woman slip in.

“Lost is the operative word in that sentence. How are you, Julia?”

“Curious why you didn’t call me the second you woke up this morning. The Love Hill case? You know I love a good serial killing in the morning.”

“Jesus, don’t say that. Speaking it aloud might make it come true.” Taylor showed her the list she’d been drawing up. “I was just making some notes on what I’m doing on the case today. You’re practically at the top of my list. See?”

“Goodie. So fill me in now instead of later.”

“I don’t have much to go on just yet. We’ve got some little bits of trace evidence, lifted some prints, but until the post is done, I won’t know more.”

“The press is claiming it’s the beginning of a serial. They’re calling him the Conductor. I want your honest assessment. Do you think this is someone who might do this again?”

Taylor noticed that Page’s right eye had a blue fleck deep in the brown. She’d known the A.D.A. for years, how had she missed that? She was avoiding the answer. Page crossed her arms, preparing herself as if she already knew what Taylor was about to say.

“Yes,” Taylor answered.

Page’s chestnut curls bounced as she leaned against Taylor’s desk. She was a small woman—leaning, she was eye level with Taylor sitting. She always made Taylor feel huge.

“Seriously?”

“Seriously. I’m going to run a ViCAP search here after the post, see if we can’t find something similar out there. This was pretty sophisticated. Either he’s trying to get media attention or he wants us to see how brilliant he is. But the Conductor. Where did they get the name from?”

Page gestured over her shoulder at Elm’s office. “The new guy told them there was a CD playing classical music.”

Taylor shook her head, pinched her fingers across the bridge of her nose. Damn it. She wanted that detail kept quiet. “You have to be kidding,” she mumbled.

“Nope.” She leaned a little closer to Taylor. “Are you doing okay? I know this is hard.”

Taylor sat back in the chair and sighed deeply. “You’re sweet to ask. I’m fine. This is just a hiccup. Besides, I like getting my hands dirty. I spent a long time on this side of the desk, it’s a bit like coming home. I always did love the investigative side of the job, it was the administrative crap that was no fun. So this is the best of all possible worlds right now—I get to follow leads, do the legwork, and hopefully solve this case quickly. It’s why I became a cop in the first place, you know? Right the wrongs, and all that.”

Page stared at her for a moment, then patted Taylor’s shoulder. “You’re a gracious woman, Taylor. I’ll see you later, I’ve got to get to court.”

“Put away the bad guys, Julia. We’re all counting on you.”

“Bah,” Page said, but grinned.

As she left, Taylor glanced at her watch—it was 9:30 a.m. Perfect timing. It would take her fifteen minutes to get to Forensic Medical. She closed the notebook, stuck it in her back pocket, and started from the room. She wasn’t lying to Page; she did have a sense of nostalgia and adventure about all this. Even when she was the lieutenant, she liked to be in the trenches with her team, guiding and directing from the field, instead of from her office.

And truth be told, she’d been a stellar detective, which was a bane and a curse. Do the job too well and you get promoted, with all the attendant headaches. She couldn’t deny that she missed having command of the murder squad, but she’d live. She was still a cop, with a job to do.

She negotiated the rabbit warren to the door, saw the new sign-out whiteboard nailed to the wall to the left of the door frame. She balked for a moment, then moved her magnet to “Out of Office,” wrote “Forensic Medical” in the column next to her neatly printed name and walked out the door. She’d learned one thing during her thirteen years on the force. Sometimes, you pick your battles.

Seven

Gavin had a new voice mail when he returned to his studio this beautiful sunny morning. He listened to it before he shed the messenger bag slung around his shoulders. It was from the primary on his latest job. Her name was Wilhelmina, and she paid well for his services.

“Gavin, the new photos are in. Would you look at them and see what fits the Frist exhibit catalog requirements? The deadline is Tuesday, and we certainly don’t want to be late. Oh, and thank you.”

The thank-you was an afterthought. Wasn’t that always the way?

He set his breakfast—a whole-grain bagel with organic peanut butter and a ripe banana—on his desk and started his computer. The messenger bag went on the chair next to his desk, the one covered in industrial orange-and-brown tweed. All he could afford at the time he bought it, he was pleasantly surprised to see it was more handsome than it looked online. His desk was made of solid oak, a plank, thick and sturdy, across two sawhorses. His chair—sleek, ergonomic black leather—was his prize. He could drop the arms when he needed to work at the drafting table in the corner, under the plate-glass window that overlooked the brick of the building next door.

The computer took exactly three minutes to boot up. He took the time to nibble on the banana and look at the stains of pigeon shit on the exterior ledge above his window. Amazing how they landed in such interesting shapes. It was the velocity from their flight, he knew, but still. He wondered if Jackson Pollock had been inspired by something so simple, so organic. But even an artist of his caliber couldn’t reproduce that randomness.

A chime let him know his computer was booted and ready. He quickly located the e-mail from the Strozzi Palace museum in Florence. He read the brief message, the English broken but passable.

Enclosed please find pictures requested by you for the exhibit to start 11 June.

Grazie mille.

He clicked Download All and waited, watching his screen fill with shot after shot of gorgeous pictures. The Strozzi was a beautiful building, a former palace, home to the noble Strozzi family—sworn enemies of the Medicis. It was a geographical square block of stone and columns and open courtyard. He dreamed of going there one day. To see Italy, walk among the history, the beauty, gaze for hours upon the priceless artwork …

He couldn’t help himself. He gazed at the Strozzi pictures, strolling through time, reveling in the detail, living through the luscious artistry of the photographer. The short angles, the presentation, the perfect balance of light to show off the art were masterful. The paintings breathed colors into his screen; the sculptures so visceral that it seemed the edge of a bicep or the length of a thigh could be stroked, the flesh alive under the finger.

The photographer on this shoot was truly superb. Gavin couldn’t have done better himself. He played a game with himself. There were only three museum collection photographers he knew who were this talented.

If he were to guess. Gavin went through the photos again slowly, deliberately ignoring the line at the very bottom of the page that would give him the answer. The edging was unique, the angles for the light dramatic. It had to be the work of Tommaso.

That was his only name. Tommaso was reputed to be a difficult man to work with, but one of the most brilliant still photographers in the industry. A rock star in the art world.

Gavin snuck a look. He was right. The pictures were by Tommaso. A bloom of happiness spread throughout his stomach. He knew his stuff, that was for sure.

He shot a message back to Wilhelmina, acknowledging he’d received the photos and would have the catalog press-ready by the deadline. Then he started the laborious process of designing.

Gavin enjoyed his job. He was a freelance graphic designer by trade, and often did work for the printers in downtown Nashville. He did contract work for ad agencies, for sports teams, for all of the cultural corporations of Nashville. But the art photos were his true love.

His studio was off Broadway, way off Broadway, in a small storefront that butted up against the alley for a Thai restaurant. The scent of cumin and rotting cabbage was just bearable. As was the price of the shop. He couldn’t work for someone directly. It was better this way.

His desired vocation was photography, but he’d found it difficult to make a living with his camera. He had skills, but his eye was no match for someone like Tommaso. So he’d started his pre-press business, typesetting catalogs and developing Web sites. His work was sought after, and he quickly rose to prominence. He was known as the quirky designer who wouldn’t talk to clients, only took orders online, didn’t return phone calls but sent plenty of e-mails and never, ever missed a deadline. He didn’t like to talk to people if he could avoid it. There was no point. He just didn’t have that much to say. He couldn’t relate. To be honest, there was very little that couldn’t be expressed in an e-mail.

He was good at his job, and people recognized his talents. In a few short years, he had developed a wonderful niche that made him money and allowed him to revel in art. He typeset museum catalogs. He had started small and worked his way in through a side job designing museum Web sites. Once he was established, he did exhibition catalogs and permanent collection catalogs from all over the country. A couple of years ago, he’d gotten big enough to branch into catalogue raisonnés, the monographs detailing the life’s work of a particular artist. He’d done a lovely job with a Picasso monograph last year, and was bidding to do several more.

That reminded him, he needed to look at the status for the Millais. He scanned his e-mail, but there was nothing from the Tate Britain Gallery in London. Damn. John Everett Millais was one of his favorites, he wanted to win that job.

Nothing to worry about. His current job for Wilhelmina was a dream come true. At the moment, the Frist Center had arranged for a once-in-a-lifetime exhibit. A number of paintings from one of the art capitals of the world, Florence, Italy, were going to come to Nashville, and Gavin had been hired to do the catalogs. Which meant oodles of stunningly beautiful pictures from three of the most famous art galleries in the world, the Uffizi Gallery, the Pitti Palace and the Strozzi.

He forced his attention back to the Strozzi pictures, and started in. It didn’t take long to see that one of the photographs hadn’t downloaded properly. Gavin felt it was divine intervention. He could send an e-mail to Wilhelmina, ask her to contact the photographer and ask for him to resend the shot. Or … Gavin felt his heart beat just a bit harder. Why not? He’d always been an admirer of Tommaso, there was no reason why he couldn’t contact him directly. Was there? Granted, the man was exceedingly private—to the point where he refused any interview that wanted a photograph of him. Gavin wondered if he were disfigured in some way. He could understand the desire to let your work speak for you.

Never one to make a move without thinking it through thoroughly first, Gavin sat back in his chair. If he contacted Tommaso, there would be the slightest chance of mentioning his own work. It might open a few more doors; God knew the Italian worked everywhere. Tommaso’s reputation was well-known all over the world. It might give Gavin a chance to explore past Nashville. They could become friends.

He came back down to earth with a sigh. Like that would ever happen. His friends were all dungeon masters.

But before he lost his nerve, he filled out the contact information on the e-mail and sent a quick note to Tommaso’s address.

Dear Tommaso,

I’m a great admirer of your work.

The catalog photographs from the Strozzi collection are utterly superb. Unfortunately, JPEG 10334 did not come through properly. Would you please resend the original shot?

Thank you so much.

G. Adler

Gavin hit send and sat back, breathing deeply. Should he have said Ciao? Or would that have been stupid? What had come over him? Was it too late? Could he undo the e-mail? What was he thinking?

He ran his hands across his scalp, vaguely noting that his hair was growing back. He’d have to shave again soon. No, there was nothing to be done about the e-mail now. As his mother always said, “Don’t do something you might regret, Gavin.” He didn’t really regret it. Chances were someone as big as Tommaso had an assistant who looked at the e-mail, and the message hadn’t come from him directly, anyway.

He forced the action from his mind, vowing to think about it no more. The rest of the photos were fine, he could work around the missing image for now.

He worked quietly, humming under his breath on occasion, placing photos here and there, getting the most pleasing backgrounds, choosing a variety of accent colors and washes, until he felt comfortable that his settings would showcase the photographs perfectly. This was another nice thing about working for yourself—you could spend an afternoon in contemplation of what shades really did show off the Strozzi paintings, keeping in mind the art that might be coming in from the Pitti and the Uffizi. It was a delicate balance. He was always struck by the fragility of the ancient art pieces. Combined with the robust options the computer provided—Old World Masters and cutting-edge technologies made beautiful bedfellows.

All the information for each painting had to correspond and fit onto the pages of the catalogs: its history, dates and provenance, the artist’s background, the artist’s influences, who donated the cash to allow the loan to take place, every conceivable trivia tidbit was sandwiched into the pages. Small public relations kits needed to be made, and special upgraded catalogs designed for the “Friends of the Frist” to take home from the private opening. And then the catalogs would be reproduced for the Web sites and the gallery showings.

There was plenty of work to be done. Plenty to keep his mind occupied, away from the joy that awaited him at home. That was Gavin’s greatest talent. He could focus. Put away one facet of his being to explore another. He’d been compartmentalizing for years.

Eight

Being a member of the Behavioral Analysis Unit meant being on call 24/7, so when Baldwin was working an actual case, there were few breaks and many sleepless nights. Part of it was the nature of the job, but it was also his fault. He couldn’t turn it off. Couldn’t walk away. And that was dangerous. He thought he’d been successful in pulling away a bit over the past year, setting up a home and life in Nashville, only consulting on the biggest of cases. But lately, he found himself being dragged back in, bit by bit.

The problem was, he loved it. He hated the means that brought him the cases, despised what the men and women he hunted did, was constantly amazed at the depths of human cruelty. But as a student of psychology, finding out why some sociopaths choose to become serial killers had become his vocation. His art.

The call he’d been waiting for came at 9:10 a.m. He received the news, said thank you, and set the phone back in its cradle.

The phone call confirmed it. They had a match. The same man had killed in Florence and London. He paced the house, thinking. His mind was in overdrive. Il Macellaio, the Italian serial killer who’d been operating for ten years, had finally made a huge tactical mistake.

Baldwin was tired. So very tired, and so very jazzed. Now they had the confirmation that Il Macellaio had moved his hunting grounds to London three months prior. He’d claimed three victims, all slightly out of his usual victim profile. These were working girls. In Florence, he preyed on students, and he was careful to choose girls who would go unnoticed for a time if they disappeared. Mousy, shy girls who didn’t have a lot of friends.

At the beginning Baldwin assumed he flattered them, seduced them, got them to leave their lives and go home with him. He would hold them for weeks, slowly starving them, until they were so sluggish that fighting him wasn’t an option. Once they died, he had sex with their bodies, then washed them and left them posed, with a print of the painting he was mocking nearby.

Necrosadism wasn’t something he came across every day, though it did happen. The very act of murdering a woman to have sex with her corpse was an extreme variation of necrophilia, which many times was characterized more by fantasies of having sex with dead women than actually going through with it.

But there was something out there for every killer to devolve into, and Il Macellaio was a true necrosadist. He’d started by starving the girls, but quickly moved on to strangulation. Even then, in his later cases, the girls were given zero nourishment, no water at all, so they were weakened, couldn’t put up a fight.

Il Macellaio’s desire was playing havoc with his self-control. In his early days, he wasn’t rushed, was able to sate his needs with a kill a year. Now, he’d gotten a taste for dead flesh, and he hastened the deaths of his victims along so he could have more time with their bodies. It was good news, in a way. When a serial killer’s self-control slipped, you had a chance to catch him.

Baldwin turned back to the files on the table in front of him. The new murders in London, with the prostitutes as victims, shook him. Geographically, serial killers tend to stay in certain areas. To jump countries, well, that was a huge step.

If he had actually crossed to America as well, they’d catch him. Baldwin flipped through the pictures from the Nashville crime scene. So very familiar. The posing, the emaciated body. The one huge difference between the London and Florence killings and this possible American murder was the race of the victim.

All the overseas victims were white. This one was black. And that was enough to give Baldwin serious pause. For a sophisticated, organized serial, a well-defined signature can evolve over time, getting more specific, more exact. Killing methods are perfected, the suspect learns from each crime scene. He figures out what works and what doesn’t, what turns him on and what doesn’t, and adapts. Just like any predator.

But killers didn’t usually start with one race then switch to another. If he’d been equal opportunity from the beginning … but Il Macellaio hadn’t. He’d exclusively killed white women. At least that they knew of.

Baldwin sighed deeply. He sent an e-mail to the Macellaio task force, asking them to pull any unsolved murders of young black women in Florence or London over the past fifteen years. The carabinieri kept meticulous records; the search shouldn’t take too long. The Metropolitan Police at New Scotland Yard were fully automated. They could have their answers by end of day tomorrow.

He was afraid of what those answers might be.

His phone rang, the caller ID showing a London exchange. They’d been faster than he expected.

“This is John Baldwin,” he answered.

A British voice, cultured and aristocratic, said, “Dr. Baldwin? Detective Inspector James Highsmythe, Metropolitan Police. Have you seen the results of the tests you ordered?”

“I have. Nice to meet you, Highsmythe. I’ve heard good things.”

“As have I, Dr. Baldwin. We have submitted a formal request for the FBI’s help in this matter. I trust you’ve seen it?”

“I have.”

“Then you will appreciate the nature of the request. My superiors are sending me to Quantico to give you a full briefing.”

“Detective Highsmythe—”

“Do call me Memphis.”

“Memphis. I’m in Nashville now, attending to a murder that looks eerily similar to Il Macellaio. Perhaps you’d like to join me here, then we can head to Quantico to meet the rest of the team?”

“Nashville?” The man sounded surprised for a moment. “He’s struck in the United States as well?”

“It seems there is a possibility, yes.”

“I’ll see what I can do about rearranging the travel arrangements. Barring unforeseen complications, I should be there tomorrow.”

“Good. I’ll get you a place to stay, don’t worry about that. Least I can do for dragging you down here. It will be worth your while, I think.”

“I appreciate the offer. Tomorrow, then.”

Nine

Before she left the house, Taylor had downloaded the Dvořák piece to her iPod. Baldwin had been converting all of her CDs over to the computer, and had installed a plug in her truck’s radio so she could stick the nano in the slot and hear all of her music. It was a wide-ranging and eclectic mix, gathered over two decades. It reflected her alternative tastes, but there was a great deal of classical as well, leftover vestiges of her early days in the orchestra. She didn’t play anymore, but she still loved the music.

She climbed into an unmarked pool car, wishing for her truck’s speakers. She put in the earbuds, hit play and left downtown for the fifteen-minute drive to Forensic Medical. The flow of the Dvořák was calming. She liked the scherzo, forwarded to that spot. The opening was the brand music for something, she couldn’t remember what. Some financial institution, something that had quick television spots that needed the grabbiness as their theme.

She forwarded again to the Allegro. The score for Jaws must have been based on this piece. The two-note heartbeat, the quickening pace—John Williams was obviously a Dvořák fan. It was grand, in-your-face music. She wondered what the killer was thinking when he chose it, then admonished herself. She didn’t know for sure that he had chosen it. She pulled her to-do list out of her pocket and added a note, driving with one hand, writing on her knee. Check with owner about CD.

She arrived at Sam’s office well before the piece ended. She sat in the car for a few minutes, letting it play out. Assuming it was the killer’s music, why had he chosen the New World Symphony? Perhaps that was a message, too. If this was the same man who had committed the murders in Italy and England, why was he here in Tennessee? Did he think of it as the new world? It was such a leap, a serial killer crossing the Atlantic to start killing in her backyard with a slightly different M.O. That seemed so highly unlikely, yet Baldwin was struck by the pictures of the scene. The similarities were unmistakable. She groaned aloud when the next thought crossed her mind. Was it a copycat?

Like she needed another one of those.

ViCAP, ViCAP, ViCAP. That was the first thing she’d do when she left the postmortem. She couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something more to come. Damn Julia Page and her prescient comments.

Abandoning the nano and her thoughts, Taylor entered the building on Gass Street. She couldn’t help but sigh. The scents were so familiar she sometimes didn’t smell them, but today she felt like she’d walked into her high school biology lab. The pervasive, artificial smell of formalin, the reek of death. It was too much to bear. She wondered how Sam did it sometimes, how she could cross the threshold of this place, day after day, and work. She left the twins at home with a nanny and became another person for ten hours a day.

Taylor wished she could do that as well. Just morph, become someone else, someone who didn’t have to think about death all the time. She knew that would never happen. She wouldn’t trade the idea of working with the police for anything. It was important to her to actually be who she said she was, to be the person she’d set out to be in the beginning. Four deaths on her conscience, cold-blooded murders, yet all justified. She was a cop. It was her job. These were the things that she had to do to survive, and to make the people around her, the strangers she loved, safe.

The desk was manned by Kris, a smiley girl with butter-yellow hair and too-big implants. She’d gotten them recently and they hadn’t dropped yet; they stood out on her chest like overfull water balloons. She waved at Taylor and the breasts bobbled joyfully. Taylor waved back and moved to the door that led to the biovestibule that separated the administrative offices from the gut work. She swiped her card and the lock disengaged.

The locker room was empty. She covered her clothes with surgical scrubs, slipped on blue plastic clogs, then went through the smaller air lock into the autopsy suite. Renn McKenzie was sitting on a stool, gazing anywhere but at the action. Sunlight from the skylights shone down on his hair, making the blond strands at his temples glint silver.

Sam was washing the body of a teenager. She was reverent and slow; Taylor could feel her intensity, aching with the need to make it right for this young man. It was heartbreaking, watching her brush the hair back from his forehead, a thick shock of brunette shot through with lighter streaks of caramel, like he’d been in the sun for days on end. Closer inspection showed Taylor that his head was lying flat against the plastic tray. No, that wasn’t right. It was just his face, straight on the table. There was nothing to the back of his head, he was practically two-dimensional.

“What happened to him?”

Sam started, looked at Taylor guiltily. Caught in the act of caring for her subject. When she realized it was just Taylor, she relaxed and went back to stroking the boy’s hair. Only then did Taylor see she was actually using a fine-tooth comb to gather particles.

“Do you remember Alex, from sophomore year? My French tutor?” Sam asked.

Taylor remembered. How could she ever forget? “Yes, I do.”

“Our boy here took a shotgun, put it in his mouth, and pulled the trigger. He did this to himself. The dummy. Just like Alex did.”

Sam’s voice was thick with emotion. Alex had been a bit more than her tutor. Sam had nursed a horrid crush on him for ages. Alex hadn’t ever reciprocated her puppy love. He was a sad boy. Dark black hair and matching eyes, hidden scars inside the irises.

When they were in tenth grade, Alex could stand the torture of life no longer. He wrote a long note, explaining his actions, loaded his father’s shotgun, slipped it between his lips, and shot himself. He had pulled the trigger with his toes.

It was inconceivable to them, at the time. They sat around in friends’ houses, numb, drinking beer and smoking cigarettes, pondering. What could have been so bad in a fifteen-year-old’s life? How had Alex’s world been destroyed to the point he felt the need to take his own life? His note explained his rationale, his father’s coldness, the inability to please. Taylor always suspected it was more than that, but never had the proof.

Sadness overwhelmed her. She looked at the young man on the table, wondered what drove him to despair.

“Do you know why?” Taylor asked. “What might have pushed him to this? Was there a note?”

“No, there wasn’t. But there was a lot of anal tearing. It was pretty apparent that he was being abused, for a prolonged period of time. I’m not sure exactly what his story is, but he doesn’t have biological parents in the state. He was a part of the foster system.”

Taylor felt the fury bubble up from within her soul. “So we have foster kids being raped who kill themselves with shotguns now. Jesus, Sam.”

McKenzie spun on his stool and faced them. “I had a friend kill herself. It was awful.” He spun away and Taylor met Sam’s eyes. That sentiment they understood all too well.

Sam signaled to one of her assistants. “Could you finish this for me? I’ll be back to post him next.”

She walked two tables over to the prepped body of the victim from last night, stripped off her gloves and replaced them with a fresh set.

McKenzie followed them reluctantly. “The prints are back. Her name’s Allegra Johnson.”

Taylor looked at the girl, so insubstantial. The steel table dwarfed her, like it would a child. The wound tract from the knife that had been buried in the girl’s chest glared under the lights, an angry slit.

“She was in the system?”

“Yeah. Solicitation. Shocking. Skinny girl like this—drugs and prostitution were my first guess,” he answered.

Sam and Taylor’s eyes met again. Taylor took a deep breath. “McKenzie, kill the sarcasm. You can never assume, or guess, when it comes to a victim. You end up planting ideas in your head about them, and then you try to make the crime fit your preconceived notion of what makes sense to you. There could be other explanations for her physical appearance. She could very well be ill, or homeless, unable to feed herself. This could have been a crime of opportunity. We don’t know yet why she was chosen. We won’t know until we do a thorough victimology, okay?”

McKenzie’s brows furrowed for a moment while he thought it out. What she said must have made sense, because his forehead smoothed and he nodded. “Okay,” he said. Maybe training him wasn’t going to be as hard as she expected.

Sam cleared her throat, and another tech, a quiet man named Stuart Charisse with incongruously lighthearted curly hair, appeared to help her. He started taking pictures while Sam turned on the microphone attached to her face shield, and started the case rundown. Taylor listened with half an ear as Sam gave the details—date, time, who was present, all the minutiae that was necessary to the formal autopsy process. McKenzie stood next to her, bopping his head up and down in an internal rhythm to Sam’s dispassionate recitation.

Allegra’s body was a mass of wretchedness. Every bone was clearly defined; Taylor could count each rib individually. The girl looked like she’d literally wasted away.

Sam started her assessment. “The body is that of a malnourished twenty-one-year-old female African-American who looks younger than her recorded age. The body was received to the medical examiner’s office naked, attached by fine filament to a post measuring six feet, three-quarter inches long by ten inches square. The filament was wrapped around the forehead, wrists, torso, waist, hips, thighs and feet of the victim’s body.” Sam turned off the mike.

“It was a bitch and a half getting her off that post. The knife was buried two inches into the wood. We documented the whole thing, video and stills. This will be a good teaching case. I don’t think I’ve ever seen something as bizarre.”

Taylor nodded. “Good. That’s the kind of stuff A.D.A. Page loves. Helps for when we catch this guy and try his ass. Was the filament holding her up fishing line?”

“I think so. Trace will tell us exactly what kind. If we’re lucky, maybe he’s some kind of famous bass aficionado and we’ll be able to track the line to his tackle box.”

“Wouldn’t that be nice?”

Sam turned her mike back on and bent over her work. “The body is five foot one inches tall and weighs sixty-nine pounds. Body Mass Index is thirteen point four. The body is cachetic, with temporal wasting, prominent bone protrusions, concave abdomen. Pale oral mucosa, pale conjunctivae with some minor petechial hemorrhage. A vitreous fluid level is taken.”

Taylor glanced at McKenzie, expecting him to freak, but he stood his ground and watched. Good. He was toughening up.

Sam took the victim’s hand, pinched a fold of skin between her gloved thumb and forefinger and pulled gently. The skin tented and stayed that way. The silent attendant took a picture. She moved to Allegra’s abdomen and repeated the action. The results were the same.

“Skin is ashy and has exceptionally poor turgor. No one can say this girl was just plain skinny. I’m seeing severe dehydration, for starters,” Sam said.

Taylor nodded. “About that. Baldwin mentioned something last night. He’s been dealing with a serial case in Italy.”

McKenzie brightened. “Il Macellaio or Il Mostro?”

“How do you know about them?” Taylor asked.

“Oh, I follow serial-killer cases. I find them fascinating.”

Ha. McKenzie didn’t have a clue what it would be like to really follow a serial killer. He wouldn’t be nearly as enthusiastic.

“Il Macellaio. Tell me what you know,” she said.

“Well,” McKenzie began, suddenly blushing at being the center of attention.

She needed to train him away from that, and fast. The minute A.D.A. Page, who was cute as a button and fierce as a shark, got him on the stand, started asking him questions and he blushed, the jury would assume he was lying.

“Relax,” she said. “I’m just curious, okay?”

He continued to redden, though he nodded his head yes. “Il Macellaio likes to have sex with dead girls,” he managed.

“Ugh,” Sam said, but Taylor nodded her approval.

“It’s actually a bit more complicated than that, McKenzie, but you’re right. He’s a necrosadist, a killer that murders in order to have sex with the dead victim. Very rare. And he poses his victims like famous paintings after he’s through with their bodies. Which is where I was going. Baldwin said several of the earlier cases’ COD was starvation, but Il Macellaio moved on to strangulation. I guess he got tired of waiting for them to die.”

Sam had moved on to the next phase of her exam, had the victim in stirrups and was between her legs taking samples. “Yo, we’ve got lubricant here. Starvation and necrophilia, huh? Sounds like a nice guy. If that’s the case for Ms. Johnson, and I can’t say one way or the other until I finish the post, he’d probably need some lube to get things in the right place, if you know what I mean.”

“Why?” McKenzie asked.

Sam kept working, but spoke over her shoulder to him. “When you’re severely dehydrated, all your fluids dry up. All of them. Your blood thickens, your blood pressure drops dramatically, you’d feel sluggish and unable to move around. With no nourishment at all, it wouldn’t take long to be dry as a chip. That’s why her skin is tenting, there’s no fluid in the body to help the skin return to its normal state. It would be a rough way to go. But here’s our pièce de résistance. Stuart, could you help me roll her? Gently, now.”

It didn’t take much to get the girl over onto her face. Taylor saw the pattern on the girl’s back and sucked in her breath.

Sam traced her finger along the girl’s back. “Yeah. Pretty wild, huh?”

McKenzie cocked his head to the side. “Is this lividity?”

Sam shook her head. “There’s a little bit of lividity, but this is more like prolonged exposure to whatever caused the pattern.”

“Burns, maybe?” Taylor asked.

“Nope. I think it was something she was on. For a while. It created massive indentations in the skin, and once she died, the lividity settled in. That’s the only reason we can still see it. She’s been dead for a few days, you see the level of decomp. Lividity would have passed by now.”

Taylor looked at McKenzie. “What time did the neighbor call it in?”

He consulted his notebook. “5:30 in the evening. Said there was no body when she came over in the morning.”

The lab tech documented the scene, and Taylor moved closer to get a good look. Postmortem lividity was one of the most significant clues a cop had to determine whether a body had been moved or not. The girl’s entire back, including her arms and legs, was a dusky black, much darker than her skin, with perfectly round, equally spaced cocoa-colored circles every few inches along her body. The circles were only an inch or two in diameter, and were equidistant from one another. It wasn’t readily apparent at the scene, but her left arm had what looked like a seam down the outer edge, as if it were wedged against something sharp. This was past lividity, this was almost scarring.

Taylor had never seen anything like it. “It’s like she has polka dots. What in the world would cause that?” she asked.

“That’s something you’ll need to figure out. She was certainly on her back for an extended period of time when she was still alive, lying on something that had these holes.” Sam nodded to the tech and they rolled the girl over onto her back.

“Why not on the back of her arms?” McKenzie asked.

“Good question. She was shoved up against something, that’s what caused that line down her arm. Maybe they were crossed on her chest? I don’t know.”

Taylor took a lap around the table, looking closer. The fishing line had cut into the girl’s flesh and the marks were clearly visible, concentric circles around her body. “So the knife to the chest was just massive overkill? That didn’t cause her death? What about the lack of blood?”

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