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Only I can’t silence that tiny voice inside me.
I lean over the table toward the agent recording the session. “Tell Agent Rana to have Tabitha remove her headband.”
The agent says, and somewhat annoyed, “Agent Rana can hear you.”
Rana directs an incensed glare at the mirror before she says to Tabitha, “Miss Yarrow, can you please remove your hair piece.”
From the fringe of my vision, I see Kallum’s features darken. His bruised knuckles bleach as his hand fists atop the table.
Tabitha pulls her lip between her teeth as worry creases her forehead. She speaks to Detective Riddick. “Do I have to?”
“No one can force you,” he says to her, “but it would work in your favor to cooperate.”
Tabitha fidgets with the hem of her shirt. She’s truly upset. She wasn’t instructed on how to handle this situation.
My conviction winning out, I stand and exit the viewing room. The officer guarding the door rolls his shoulders and reinforces his stance, and a shot of anger injects my bloodstream.
Before I realize I’ve done so, I’ve stepped up to him. “Move.”
He stands his place, but an unsure flinch in his features reveals enough hesitancy for me to shoulder past him and push through the door.
I’m greeted with a rigid scowl from Agent Rana. “You’re not allowed to be here?—”
“Tabitha,” I address her directly. “I know Devyn has told you not to help us. She really, really dislikes the feds.” At this, a small smile twitches at her lips. “I know how worried you are for Devyn. Honestly, I’m worried for her, too. We both want to help her. She’s out there alone, right? I know you don’t want her to be alone. I promise, I’ll make sure she gets help. That’s what she needs, Tabitha.”
After she considers my words for a moment, she reluctantly removes the headband.
And my heart crashes against my chest.
As I stare at the crown of Tabitha’s head, Rana follows my line of sight.
It’s Riddick who declares what we’re all seeing. “Christ,” he says, standing so he can lean over the table for better inspection. “What the hell are those?”
I swallow, my throat suddenly dry. Because I know.
I saw them on the victim at the hunting grounds. I saw them on the vanished locals as they danced around a circle of fire, and then on Devyn as she rocked me to the rhythmic drumbeat amid her ritual.
“They’re implants,” I say, tasting the bitter tension in the air.
Only where the victim’s flayed scalp merely held the stainless-steel implants, Tabitha’s harbor the finely shaped bone of antler nubs.
Realization washes over me with a cold prickling sensation. What Kallum said during our ritual comes back, about how antlers are adorned by an initiate of the mysteries, making them more godlike the closer they are to the sky.
The size is status. Maybe even a rank.
Devyn has a hierarchy, and it reaches outside of her inner circle of higher men.
I look to the mirror, as if I can find Kallum’s eyes through the glass, but only my reflection stares back.
“Tabitha, I need you to explain what this is,” Agent Rana says to her in a more subdued tone.
Bolstering her resolve, Tabitha says, “I want a lawyer.”
Detective Riddick frowns with a severe draw to his dark eyebrows as he nods with finality. “All right, then. I’ll see who I can find.”
Agent Rana sends him an incensed look. “We’re pressed for time, detective. We need answers now.”
“She asked for a lawyer. I don’t know how the feds do things, but we look after our own.” He plants his hands on the surface of the table, then pushes to his full height.
