Yes, elimination was the key.

Sam interrupted her reverie. “We’re ready to take off. Tabor will meet us there.”

Taylor turned to her best friend. “You look tired. You could hand it off to one of the other M.E.’s.”

Sam was almost eight weeks pregnant, dark circles riding under her eyes, her face drawn with exhaustion.

“I’m okay. Simon’s got the twins, and I’m feeling all right now. I’m on the late shift this week, so that works good. It’s the mornings that are getting to me. I’m much sicker with this one than the twins. Hell, I didn’t even know I was pregnant with them for a couple of months.”

“All the more reason to rest. But I understand. I saw a couple of the guys on their phones. I hope this hasn’t leaked out just yet. Keep an eye on that, will you?”

“Sure thing. I’ll see you later.”

“Wait, Sam. Mind if I join you?”

Surprise etched Sam’s face, but she shook her head. “Not at all. I could use the company. I’ll see you over there.”

Taylor watched Sam stride away and get into the plain white van that served Forensic Medical. She found Marcus, let him know she was leaving, then climbed in her own car. She picked up her cell to call Baldwin again, tell him she was heading to the morgue, and realized the battery was dead. Careless. She never let that happen. But with the quick trip to North Carolina, Fitz, the murders this morning, she’d just spaced out. Baldwin would be furious with her, she’d get a lecture. She didn’t blame him, it was a stupid mistake.

She got out of the car and went to borrow Marcus’s cell. She didn’t need her flashlight, not with the crime scene fully illuminated. She scooted around the edge of one of the light stands, turning her body to slip past the contraption. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw something orange. She halted, looked closer. The tree closest to her had a pentacle painted on the wood.

She shouted to the nearest crime scene tech. “Hey, Iles, come here for a second.”

Iles was capable, smart. Quiet and businesslike. She liked him. He came over to her, smiling, his teeth flashing white against his tanned face. She wondered if he went to a salon or spray tanned, or both. Really, a tan at the beginning of winter? Metrosexual men, she never knew what to think about them. She usually didn’t trust guys who spent more time in the bathroom getting ready than she did—with the exception of Lincoln, of course. His fascination with clothes was actually fascinating to her. That man had taste, and style. He wasn’t a poseur.

“What can I do for you, Lieutenant?”

She pointed to the tree. “Has anyone looked at this?”

Iles shined a Maglite on the bark, the fluorescent orange practically leaped out in 3-D. Eerie. It had been spray-painted, little drips of orange had run down the tree, puddling in the bark and on the ground below. She leaned in close and sniffed deeply, the acrid scent of acetone filled her nostrils. Not totally fresh, but not entirely dry either.

“No, I don’t think we have. You think this has something to do with the crime scene?”

“A teenager dead, and a pentacle at the scene? Either it does, or someone has a very sick sense of humor.”

She called to Marcus. He joined them, eyebrows tight.

“What’s up, LT? They just found a bag under the tree branch, looks like the kid’s backpack. I think we’re going to be at this for another couple of hours, at least.”

“Did you see this?”

Marcus stared at the tree.

“No, I didn’t.” He turned to Iles, voice tight. “Get pictures of this, now.”

“Why would someone paint a pentacle on the tree out here?” Iles asked. “I thought you shot the kid who ran the Halloween massacre, and locked the rest of them away.”

Taylor tried not to flinch in the face of Iles’s words.

“Let’s just pray it’s someone playing a very bad joke,” she said.

She drove in silence to Forensic Medical, planning to use the phone as soon as she arrived. It was after hours and the lobby was dark. She used her key card to enter. She was doing her damndest here. From the outside, it looked like another strike against her, running around alone in the dark. She was becoming more aware of her vulnerabilities. It wasn’t so hard to lay herself out in the open, ripe for the taking. She needed it to look like she wasn’t aware of her surroundings, that she was comfortable enough to let her guard down. And that meant walking a thin line, close to the ones she loved, to draw the bastard out.

She’d been alone for a couple of hours now. Why hadn’t he made a play? What in the name of God was he waiting for?

The door unlocked with a snap, and she entered the building. The reception desk was deserted, of course. Kris, the bubbly, vivacious girl who handled the day-to-day management of calls, requests, family visits, was home for the night.

Taylor pulled out Kris’s chair and sat at the desk. She reached for the phone, and a picture taped to the top of Kris’s computer caught her eye. Kris and Barclay Iles, in bathing suits, hugging, tan and happy. Ah. That explained Iles’s tan. She didn’t know they were dating. Kris had always seemed to like bad boys; Iles was, well, benign, if she were to be honest. Hmm.

She dialed home, but Baldwin didn’t answer, the phone went directly to voice mail. That only happened when he was on the other line, so she left a message detailing where she was, the random pentacle at the Peter Schechter scene and that she loved him. All told, a good message, she thought. At least it ended well.

After taking one last glance at the picture of Kris and Barclay Iles, she crossed the lobby and swiped her card again to enter Forensic Medical’s inner sanctum. A long hallway led to the autopsy suite, and she smiled as she passed Sam’s office. The door was ajar, a small red Chinese lamp filled the room with soft light. Everything was in its place. Sam was a neat freak, had more than a touch of obsessive-compulsive disorder. Just enough that details were always sewn up, her office never looked like a bomb had gone off in it. It was what made her such a good medical examiner—there weren’t too many things that she didn’t notice.

Taylor entered the women’s locker room, put her hair up in a bun and changed into a pair of scrubs. She didn’t want her street clothes anywhere near the autopsy suite tonight—floaters were the worst, and she’d stink for days if she miscalculated.

Sam was already at work, sipping a cup of green tea just inside the door, wearing a full-length lead apron. She wasn’t alone. Dr. Michael Tabor, the forensic odontologist for the state of Tennessee, was staring at the illuminated x-ray window box. Stuart Charisse, Sam’s perpetual lab assistant, was taking new radiographs of the body, which was still clothed.

Tabor greeted Taylor with a hug. She’d always enjoyed working with him. A regular dentist by trade, he was also one of the most experienced forensic odontologists in the country. His ties to Los Angeles and New York had garnered him nationwide respect, and enabled him to work cases outside of Tennessee. He’d been called to New York after 9/11 to work on identifications. He had spent weeks in New York naming the firefighters, police and other innocent men and women lost in the collapse. Taylor knew the experience had changed him, and she couldn’t help but respect how difficult a job that had been.

While Stuart prepped and x-rayed the floater’s teeth, Tabor went through the National Dental Image Repository worksheet on his laptop. Though he could look at the two sets of radiographs and tell almost immediately if they had a match, this was an official case, and the procedures must be followed.

On paper, the law enforcement dental identification process seemed simple. Match antemortem dental records to postmortem records through the use of the FBI’s huge nationwide NDIR computer database. In reality, the NDIR didn’t have much luck making matches. The dental database should have been basic protocol all over the country. But many of the rural police departments found it difficult to populate their databases simply because their victims weren’t commonly seen by dentists. The big-city guys were too busy with their caseloads to follow through. It just hadn’t gotten to the point that it worked smoothly.