"You say you felt that."

Lucas remained silent.

"Well, didn't you?"

"Let it go, Wyatt."

The sheriff moved restlessly in his chair. "I just… I need to know. What she went through."

"No. You don't."

"I have to, don't you understand that?"

"You shouldn't even be here today. Go home. Take time to grieve."

"I can't go home. What am I going to do at home? Stare at the walls? Finish the half-eaten bag of popcorn she left at my place nearly a week ago? Go to bed so I can smell her on my sheets?"

Lucas wasn't surprised by the other man's raw emotion, nor Jiat the sheriff would allow that to escape in here, behind the:losed door of the conference room and before a relative stranger, jrief would find its outlet, one way or another, and many men:ould tell strangers what they couldn't tell those closest to them. It vas something Lucas had seen before.

But that didn't make it one bit easier to hear.

"I slept on the couch last night, or tried to," Metcalf went on oughly. "Like every night since we found her. The bed… I could wash the sheets, but I don't want to do that. Don't want to… lose that. We weren't public, she didn't think that would be a good idea, so whatever I have of her is like that, like the sheets. Private." He shook his head, then blinked at Lucas as if seeing him for the first time. "But you knew that, didn't you? That we were lovers?"

"Yeah, I knew."

"Because you're psychic."

Lucas smiled wryly. "No. Because you're a lousy actor, Wyatt. I think most people knew, if the truth were told."

"Think Caitlin knows?"

"Since she doesn't live here, perhaps not."

With a grimace, the sheriff said, "She'll know once she's cleared out Lindsay's apartment. I left stuff there."

"I doubt she'll say anything."

"I don't care about that. I just don't want her to think it was… was something casual. Because it wasn't."

Lucas hesitated, then leaned back in his chair and said, "If it helps you to tell her that, then tell her. But I'd give it some time, Wyatt. Let some of the numbness wear off first."

"Mine or hers?"

"Either. Both. Just give it some time."

"From what she said today, I got the impression she isn't planning to stick around for long."

"That was the numbness talking. Once it starts to wear off, she'll most likely want to find out who killed her sister. Some just stay and wait; some try to get involved in the investigation; but virtually all of them want that closure. They need it. Before they can move on."

Wyatt frowned briefly. "I forgot. You've seen a lot of this sort of thing, haven't you? Death. Grief."

"Yeah."

"How do you get through it? How do you keep doing it?"

Lucas had heard the questions before, and answered Wyatt as he had answered others.

"I get through it by focusing on what I can affect, what I can possibly control. Finding someone who's lost or taken, if that's at all possible. If it isn't, if I'm too late, then I try to find what's left, the body. And if I can, I try to find the killer. Put him behind bars, in a cage where he belongs. That's what I can do. That's all I can do, to help the living and the dead."

The sheriff's face seemed to quiver for an instant, and he said, "Just tell me one thing. Why Lindsay? Why did the bastard take her?"

"You know why. To make it personal. To give the victim a very familiar face. And as a taunt, a challenge. She was taken virtually from beneath our noses while we were watching someone else."

"Someone your Madam Zarina told us to watch."

Lucas shook his head. "Wyatt, don't go there. I know you want to blame someone, but don't blame Sam. She may have her faults, but when it comes to her visions she's the most truthful person I've ever known. I'm absolutely positive that she saw what she told us she saw."

"And even gifted psychics make mistakes, huh?"

"Yes, they do." Lucas frowned and, almost to himself, said, Though Sam's visions were always highly reliable. So maybe the question is-why did she see a different victim?"

Unwillingly, Wyatt said, "Maybe Carrie Vaughn is next on this bastard's hit parade. Maybe Zarina just skipped one."

"She saw Thursday's newspaper, said it was exactly the same is in the photograph you were sent."

"Then she lied."

"No. She'd never lie about something like that."

"Are you sure? Can you be?"

"Wyatt-"

"You're a cop and can't smell a setup? She comes in voluntarily for questioning. Warns us there's going to be another kidnapping and says she'll stay here to prove her innocence. But the supposed victim we're so busy watching is safe and sound while one of our own is snatched, all because little miss innocent made a mistake."

"She didn't kidnap or kill Lindsay, Wyatt. You know she didn't."

"Maybe not with her own hands, but who's to say we're only dealing with one kidnapper here? If your so-called profile was more accurate, you would have found him by now. So? What if you guys got it wrong all the way around? Suppose, just suppose, that Samantha Burke had help, Luke. A partner. Or, at the very least, a friend she's covering for. Suppose one of her carnie pals is behind all this?"

"You've checked them out," Lucas reminded him.

"For past criminal records, sure. But you and I both know there are criminals who never get caught. And it'd be a nice little racket, wouldn't it? A traveling carnival, never in one place for very long. Kidnap a local and make a few bucks, then move on to the next little town."

Lucas shook his head. "No. We've tracked this bastard for eighteen months, and the carnival was never in the towns where victims disappeared. I would have known."

Wyatt got to his feet and leaned over the table, hands braced, as he stared at Lucas. "You sat right here in this room and heard her say that all along their route they had heard about the kidnappings."

"Kidnappings make the news. So what?"

"So maybe the carnival was a lot closer to those kidnapped victims than you knew. Not in the same towns, but maybe nearby. Within driving distance. Near their regular yearly route, a path they know very well. Maybe even well enough to target victims along the way. Victims whose habits and haunts they had ample time to observe."

Lucas returned the sheriff's stare, saying merely, "You're wrong."

"Am I?" Wyatt straightened. "Let's find out. I'm going to go put my people on checking out the yearly schedule of the Carnival After Dark. I want to know about every town they visited, every fairground and parking lot where they set up shop. I want to know where they were in relation to every kidnapping you've been tracking. I'm going to find out exactly where they've been every day of the last eighteen months."

Lucas didn't try to stop him.

He was, after all, a man who understood obsession.

"Do you like having your abilities?" Caitlin Graham asked as she sipped her coffee.

Samantha wrapped both cold hands around her own mug of hot tea and smiled wryly. "That's a loaded question. Sometimes. Sometimes not."

"Not when you see bad things?"

"Bad, unsettling, frightening. It can feel like I'm trapped in a horror movie, only without the popcorn-or the ability to get up and leave the theater."

"You don't have any control?"

With a shrug, Samantha said, "Again, it depends. At a time like this, with emotions running so high, the visions tend to be very… intense."

"As in, so cold they burn your hands?"

"That was a first. I usually just come out of them so tired I want:o sleep for a few days."

"But you saw Lindsay. When she was being held."

Samantha nodded. She knew Caitlin needed to talk about this, so she did, matter-of-factly. "Like most good cops, she was working the problem. Trying to find an angle, a weakness she could use to her advantage."