“Wha—” The word died in her throat as a strange heaviness swept through her body, radiating outward from the injection site with terrifying speed.
Rachel tried to spin around, to confront whoever had attacked her, but her legs no longer obeyed her commands.She stumbled forward instead, her knees buckling as if they’d suddenly forgotten how to bear her weight.The room tilted sickeningly, the candlelight stretching and blurring as she toppled toward the bed.
She landed face-first on the duvet, her cheek pressed against the cool fabric.Panic exploded through her mind, but her body remained still, unresponsive to her desperate internal commands to move, to fight, to flee.Her lungs struggled to expand, each breath becoming more laborious than the last.
Soft footsteps approached the bed.Rachel strained to move her eyes, the only part of her that still responded at all.A figure moved into her peripheral vision—just a shadow, a suggestion of presence rather than a clear form.Gentle hands rolled her onto her back, arranging her limbs carefully, as if positioning a mannequin.Or a corpse.
The crimson crane appeared in her narrowing field of vision, hovering for a moment before being placed deliberately on her chest, directly above her struggling heart.
“Beautiful,” a voice murmured from somewhere above her.“Just like the other one.”
Other one?Rachel’s mind grasped at the word, trying to make sense of it through the growing fog of oxygen deprivation.Her lungs burned with the effort of drawing air, each shallow breath more difficult than the last.
She wanted to beg, to plead for her life, but her lips remained frozen, her tongue a useless shape in her mouth.Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes, tracking silently down her temples and into her hair.
Rudy’s face appeared in her mind—his easy smile, the way his eyes crinkled at the corners when he laughed.Would he find her like this?How long before he came home from poker night, tipsy and affectionate as he always was after winning a few hands?Would he understand what had happened?That she hadn’t simply fallen asleep with a silly origami creation on her chest?
The room grew darker around the edges, her vision tunneling to a small circle of candlelight.Rachel could feel her heart laboring, its rhythm becoming increasingly erratic as her body fought for oxygen that her paralyzed respiratory muscles couldn’t deliver.
This wasn’t how it was supposed to end.Not when she was finally getting better, finally gaining control over the impulses that had nearly destroyed her career, strained her marriage.The irony wasn’t lost on her, even as consciousness began to slip away—she’d spent so much time fighting for control, only to die completely helpless, unable to move a single finger to save herself.
The last thing Rachel saw was the delicate edge of the crimson crane rising and falling almost imperceptibly with each weakening beat of her heart.Then darkness crept in from all sides, swallowing the candlelight, swallowing her consciousness, swallowing the future she’d been so carefully rebuilding, fold by meticulous fold.
CHAPTER ONE
The scent of coffee and cinnamon wafted through the house as Riley descended the stairs.She paused at the bottom, listening to the familiar morning sound of Gabriela humming a Guatemalan folk song while flipping pancakes.But there was a conspicuous absence of teenage footsteps from upstairs.
“Jilly!”Riley called up the staircase.“Get up now if you want breakfast before you need to leave!”
A muffled groan filtered down from the second floor, followed by the creaking of bedsprings.
“I mean it,” Riley added.“Gabriela made cinnamon pancakes.”
That earned a more enthusiastic response—a thump and then the sound of a drawer opening.Food worked where threats failed, especially when it was Gabriela’s cooking.
Riley moved toward the family room, drawn to the computer that was always left on.It was patched into their home security system—a setup that had begun as a standard package, but which she and Bill had modified and expanded until it rivaled the surveillance capabilities of a small police precinct.
She settled in front of the screen, opening the application that displayed feeds from the four exterior cameras mounted in the front and back of their townhouse.The view was peaceful: the small front porch and the empty street out front, the back door and back porch, the small backyard with its neat garden beds, and the lower-level entry into Gabriella’s big room.Nothing out of place.No one is watching.
Riley cycled through the recorded overnight footage at high speed, eyes sharp for any anomalies.She’d begun this ritual when Leo Dillard had gone silent after his last veiled threat.Bill had been doing the same thing even before she started, and she used to think it was excessive.Now she understood.
“Becoming just like Bill,” she murmured to herself as she continued her surveillance check.
Her FBI partner of many years, Bill Jeffreys, was now far more than just her colleague.Their relationship had deepened in ways neither had anticipated when they first began working together at the Behavioral Analysis Unit.Now he was as much a part of her household as her daughters or Gabriela.And, apparently, his security paranoia had rubbed off on her.
But it wasn’t paranoia if the threat was real.And Leo Dillard was very real.
That brilliant, charming psychopath had been one of her students at Quantico—a star pupil who had developed a dangerous obsession with her.By the time Riley realized the depths of his fixation, Leo had already begun his elaborate game of psychological manipulation.His intelligence made him far more dangerous than the average stalker.
Even now, with the FBI fully aware of the threat he posed, they couldn’t locate him.He’d vanished into thin air after their last confrontation, leaving only the promise that he would be watching, waiting for the right moment to claim what he believed was his.
Riley closed the security app, satisfied that the night had passed without incident.She turned her thoughts to April, her oldest daughter, now in her first semester at Jefferson Bell University right here in Fredericksburg.April had chafed under the security detail initially assigned to her by the university, but in the absence of any immediate threat, the protection had been scaled back to periodic checks and an emergency alert system.
Riley still wasn’t comfortable with the reduction, but she understood.Resources were finite, and April deserved some semblance of a normal college experience.Still, every morning brought a fresh wave of anxiety that wouldn’t fully recede until her customary text exchange with April around lunchtime.
Her phone vibrated against the coffee table.Bill’s name flashed on the screen, and Riley felt the immediate easing of tension that always accompanied his calls.
“Morning,” she answered, unable to keep the warmth from her voice.“How’s Maryland treating you?”
