Page 52 of Whispers in the Night

“Your fault. Whatever you’re thinking right now, whatever guilt spiral you’re starting—it’s not your fault.”

“You don’t know what I’m thinking.” How many times was she going to tell him that? At this point, he seemed to know her better than most.

“Yeah, I do.” Silas kept his eyes on the road, hands steady on the wheel. “Because I’ve been there. Because I know what it feels like to carry responsibility for deaths that aren’t yours to carry.”

Harper didn’t respond. Couldn’t. Because he was right and she hated it.

The parking garage was lit up like a crime scene—which it was, but the sheer number of emergency vehicles made it look like a disaster zone. Red and blue lights strobed across concrete pillars and painted lines. Harper counted four squad cars, two ambulances, the medical examiner’s van, Holloway’s unmarked sedan, and what looked like half of Blackridge PD’s night shift.

They parked at the perimeter and headed toward the center of activity—third floor, northwest corner, as far from the elevators and stairwells as possible. Harper could see the crime scene tape from two floors down, could see Morris standing guard at the outer perimeter, his young face pale and drawn even in the harsh fluorescent light.

“Harper,” Morris said quietly as they approached. His voice was tight, his expression haunted. “It’s bad.”

“How bad?”

“Worse than the others. A lot worse.” Morris swallowed hard. “Captain said to warn you before you went in.”

Harper ducked under the tape, Silas right behind her. Her boots echoed on the concrete floor. The smell hit her first—blood and something else, something chemical. Bleach, maybe. The killer cleaning up after himself.

And then she saw.

Jennifer Cross—though Harper didn’t know her name yet, wouldn’t know it until the ME ran prints and dental records—was positioned against a concrete support pillar in the corner. Twenty-six years old, paralegal, brunette, petite, pretty. She looked so much like Harper that for one disorienting second, Harper felt like she was looking at herself.

But it was the brutality that made Harper’s breath catch in her throat.

The previous victims had been killed with clinical precision. The symbols carved carefully post-mortem, the positioning deliberate but not violent. The killer had treated them almost reverently, like they were art projects rather than human beings.

This was different. This was rage.

Jennifer’s body was covered in symbols—the same interlocking circles and geometric patterns from the Nevada case, but deeper. Angrier. Cut with such force that the blade had scored the concrete pillar behind her in places. Her face wasturned toward the parking garage entrance, positioned so she’d be the first thing anyone saw when they came up the stairs. And carved into her torso in letters two inches high, deep enough that Harper could see bone: YOUR FAULT HARPER.

No punctuation. No apology. Just three words cut into dead flesh.

Harper’s vision swam. The garage tilted sideways. She felt Silas’s hand on her elbow, grounding her, keeping her upright.

“Breathe,” he said quietly, his voice steady in her ear.

Harper forced air into her lungs. Made herself step back from the edge, from the panic threatening to swallow her whole. She could fall apart later. Right now, she had a job to do.

She took a few deep breaths, then made herself look at the scene with professional detachment, cataloguing details the way she’d been trained at Quantico.

Victim positioned against pillar, arms at sides, legs extended. No defensive wounds visible on hands or forearms. Clothing mostly intact—blouse, slacks, one shoe missing. No obvious signs of sexual assault, though the ME would confirm. Symbols carved post-mortem based on the limited bleeding—the heart had already stopped pumping when he started cutting—thank God. Time of death approximately midnight based on liver temperature and the progression of rigor mortis in the smaller muscle groups.

And the message. Always the message now.

Dr. Reynolds, the medical examiner, looked up from where she was carefully documenting the wounds with her camera. Always thorough, professional, and unflappable.

Until now. Even she looked shaken.

“Agent Sinclair. Detective Kane.” Dr. Reynolds stood, pulling off her latex gloves with a sharp snap. “I need to be honest with you. In twenty years of doing this job, I’ve never seen this level of post-mortem mutilation.”

“What can you tell us?” Harper’s voice sounded strange to her own ears—too calm, too professional, when inside she was screaming.

“Female, mid-twenties, cause of death appears to be exsanguination from a single deep incision to the carotid artery. Same mechanism as the previous three victims.” Dr. Reynolds gestured to the body without looking at it directly. “But the post-mortem work is significantly more extensive. He spent considerably longer with this victim. Much longer.”

“How long?” Silas asked.

Dr. Reynolds consulted her notes. “Based on the depth and precision of the carving, the number of symbols, the complexity of the message—even working post-mortem when he didn’t have to worry about the victim’s pain or screaming—I’d estimate two to three hours minimum. Possibly longer.”