It was time to find this guy. He rolled his neck and slid back into his role as a profiler of evil.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Nari tried to even out the sugar rush from the latte with a cheese-and-bacon protein roll baked by Pippa. It was shocking how many people wanted Angus and the rest of their team dead. She took a deep breath and opened her file folder to see what had been compiled on the serial killer. She whistled. “Wow. Brigid really hacked everybody this time, didn’t she?”
Wolfe nodded. “Yeah, we all called in any favor we could find. The newest victim is on the second page.”
Nari turned to see a brunette who looked defenseless in death, and tears pricked the backs of her eyes. The poor woman. Nari had never gone to the bakery, but she’d enjoyed the goodies Angus had brought to the office on more than one occasion.
Angus read the papers without saying a word, but tension radiated from his hard body. She wanted to reach out to him and offer some kind of comfort, but they weren’t exactly getting along just then.
Angus flipped the page and stared at the picture. “She didn’t stand a chance.”
Nari studied the heartbreaking picture. “He’s being more subtle, finding a baker. Pippa doesn’t work as a baker, and most folks outside our team don’t even know she exists. So, how does the killer?”
Angus nodded. “I was thinking the same thing. How does the killer know Pippa bakes?”
Nari shook her head. “Not many people are close enough to any of us to know that.” Pippa wasn’t even on the team, although she lived with Malcolm and was part of the little family they’d all formed. Nari looked up. Angus had been the best profiler in the FBI before he’d left the agency. “What’s this guy’s next move? I mean, who?”
Angus’s jaw was hard as he flipped through the records. “Let’s work through it with the notes we’ve found. Normally, if I had to guess right now, I’d say he’d want to go in opposite order from these kills, mainly because you and I are spending so much time together. He’d save you for last. Except that’s not what he’s done. He’s tried to take you already.”
Nari shivered. “Why?”
“I don’t know. There’s something we’re missing.” Angus looked at Wolfe. “When you report back, let Malcolm and Pippa know that, if this guy hadn’t tried for Nari, I’d think Pippa would be the first target.” He took a drink of his latte. “Although, the guy might take any opportunity, so everyone needs to be alert and guarded.”
“What about the men?” Nari asked quietly. “Maybe he’s going after the entire team.”
“It’s a possibility,” Angus said, his green eyes glimmering with intelligence. “But there’s a sexual component to all these killings, and I think this guy gets off on harming women.” He turned the page. “Let’s go through the notes and I’ll develop a profile.”
Wolfe looked at Jethro. “You helped catch Lassiter, right? What are your degrees in?” He munched on a cinnamon roll.
Jethro reached for another sheet in his file folder. “Philosophy, with emphases in rational choice, game, moral theory, ethics, and decision theories,” he said absently, reading along.
“As well as psychology and criminology,” Angus added.
“Huh.” Wolfe licked frosting from his fingers. “Somebody is trying to explain away evil.”
Jethro jolted and then returned to reading.
Nari eyed a blueberry muffin. Sometimes Wolfe was so insightful it was scary. Or impressive. Maybe both.
Jethro cleared his throat. “There weren’t notes with the first two victims, and we’ve tracked down the origin of the note with the third victim.” He turned toward Wolfe. “The passage was from a poem calledThe Fate of the Damnedby Giuseppe Legonito. The poet lost his family in a fire and went crazy all by himself.”
Wolfe sat back. “Well, that fits Angus.”
Angus winced. “Thanks, Wolfe.”
“Sure.” Wolfe set down his folder. “What was the saying you found on the bridge?”
Angus spoke instantly, not looking at the papers. “‘The forest watches, the darkness knows, the time is coming—can you feel the change?’”
Jethro tapped a Cross pen on his paper. “The passage is from an eighteenth-century poem by Aiden Donnelly, who studied under Robert Burns for a while and was also Scottish. He, too, went crazy. This poem, like the other, is about death.”
Angus sat back. “That doesn’t help me.”
“No, but this might.” Jethro pushed a picture of the graffiti beneath the bridge toward Angus.
Nari leaned closer. She’d seen the graffiti, but the photo made the symbols easier to discern. She squinted. “Wait a minute.”
