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“You’ll get there, Amber,” Simonsaid. He briefly reached out, his hand covering hers, and that moment of simplecontact felt electric to Amber. It was a reminder that he meant more to herthan just being a partner, that she wanted more than that with him. Didthis touch mean that he wanted it too?
Amber opened her mouth to ask thatquestion, only to find herself interrupted by the sound of Simon’s phone goingoff. Simon shot Amber an apologetic look, then picked up.
“It’s Palliser,” he said after amoment. “I’ll put her on speaker.”
He set the phone down in the middleof the table, next to the condiments and the menus. Their boss’s voice camethrough loud enough that Amber found herself worrying about the possibility ofthe other diners hearing too much about the case.
“Agents, I’m calling to update youon the Sinead Ballor case,” Agent Palliser said.
“Shouldn’t Mallory do that?” Simonasked.
Amber could hear the distaste intheir boss’ voice when she continued. “Agent Mallory doesn’t want any directcontact with the two of you. He’s agreed to put protection in place for AgentYoung’s family, but it’s pretty obvious that he resents your continuedinvolvement in this case. Especially since he now has the name of a suspect.”
“He does?” Amber said. It was hardto keep the surprise out of her voice. Maybe that was because she’d brieflybeen Mallory’s lead suspect in all of this. She had a hard time imagining thathe would suddenly come up with the answer now.
“He found a clear image on thesecurity footage for the front of the building.”
“If it’s the front of the building,how do we know that this is the person who went up to Sinead’s apartment?”Amber asked.
“Because it’s a face we allrecognized,” Palliser replied. She paused for a moment. “Phelps, there’s noeasy way to say this. It’s Colm O’Rafferty.”
Amber saw the look of horror that crossedSimon’s face in that moment, and just the strength of that reaction was enoughto tell her how serious this was.
“He’s behind this?” Simonsaid.
“It’s looking that way.”
Amber was a little confused. “Idon’t know who that is.”
Simon explained. “Colm is a killerI helped to put away. He likes puzzles, likes to toy with his victims. But… Ithought he was safely behind bars.”
“He escaped,” Palliser said. “Themarshals confirmed it. They’ve been hunting for him. And now it looks like he’stargeting Agent Young.”
Amber could see the fear on Simon’sface. It told her exactly how worried she should be about all of this. Terrorstarted to build inside her, even though she suspected it was something thatshould have been there already. After all, she’d already known that a killerwas going after people around her. This just let her put a name to the facelessimage of the man who had already killed three people she knew.
“We want to be in on the team thatgoes after him,” Simon said.
“We don’t have a location for him,”Palliser replied. “Like I said, the marshals have been hunting for him withoutsuccess. For now, I need you to keep working the case you’re on.”
“Ma’am,” Simon began. “That’s-”
“There’s nothing you can do here,Phelps,” Palliser said. “If we get anything more on O’Rafferty, you can helprun it down, but for now, you have your own killer to hunt.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Simon replied,although he didn’t sound happy about it as he hung up.
“Do you want to tell me more aboutthis O’Rafferty guy?” Amber asked.
Simon shrugged. “There’s not a lotto tell. He’s a killer. He likes puzzles. I should… here, let me show you apicture of him, so at least you’ll recognize him if we ever catch up to him.”
He pulled up an image on his phone.To Amber, Colm O’Rafferty looked surprisingly… normal. He was handsome andathletic, with blond hair and blue eyes. He was smiling in the photograph, andit took Amber a moment to realize that the smile didn’t quite reach his eyes,as if it were an expression that he’d practiced without really understandingit. The look in his eyes was predatory.
“He killed half a dozen peoplebefore we caught him last time,” Simon said. “Even then, we got lucky. He’sscarily clever, seemed to predict every move we would make.”
“So you don’t think the marshalswill catch him?” Amber asked.
Simon shook his head. “I doubt it.Even this… if he’s showing up on a camera, it’s because he wants us tosee him.”
“Because he doesn't think we’rekeeping up in his game,” Amber guessed. “Because he doesn’t think we’re playingagainst him well enough.”
