The first victim found, Jerrold King, had been dead for at least a couple of hours. Taylor was working on the premise that the murders had taken place sometime between 12:30 p.m. and 3:00 p.m. School had let out at noon, the first body was found at 3:00 p.m. Assuming the victims had attended the half day of school this morning, she had an initial framework to follow.

She shuddered, thinking about the methodical staging, and wished she could fast-forward a day so she had an idea of what killed them. Drugs of some kind-the cyanosis and pinpoint pupils pointed to an overdose-something they had all ingested or injected. She was having dark thoughts about mass suicides. But that couldn’t explain the pentacles, could it? Could seven teenagers all coordinate a mass suicide and carve pentacles into their flesh as they were dying?

No. These crimes were committed by an outside hand. One who’d struck quickly, mercilessly and efficiently.

Taylor saw McKenzie putting Letha King into a patrol car. It pulled away, the child’s blank stare fixed forward. McKenzie stood next to Taylor, watching her go.

“What’s up?” Taylor asked. “She give you anything?”

“She hasn’t said much of anything. I thought it best to hold on to her until her aunt comes to get her, out of the house, at least. She called a few minutes ago, she’s on her way.”

“Good. We’ll want to talk to her again, once things settle down.”

They walked back to the Kings’ house. Despite the crowd, the kitchen was strangely quiet.

Baldwin handed her a stack of photos. “Are you ready? Simari gave me her extra Polaroids so we can start recreating the scenes. Though I’ll be able to pull this from memory for a while.”

“No kidding. Have all the victims been identified?”

Lincoln nodded. ‘Tor the most part, yes. There’s going to be formal IDs done for a few of them tomorrow, once next of kin are notified. Two of the families are traveling.”

“We can’t release names to the media until we have all the notifications done. I think it would be best to wait, make all the names public at once.”

“We can try, but you know some of the names will leak. Nature of the beast.”

“I know. Do your best, okay? Run me through the scenes, give me some names to put with the faces. After Jerrold King and Ashley Norton, who was found next?”

She laid the pictures on the granite countertop, Lincoln shuffled them around until he had them in order, “We have Jerrold, then Ashley Norton. The two doubles after that, Xander Norwood and Amanda Vanderwood, then Chelsea Mott and Rachel Welch. Then we go back to a single we just found, Brandon Scott.” He tapped the last photograph. The picture showed the rictus-gripped face of a young man who’d not seen enough sunrises. Beautiful features ruined by death. Taylor wondered what they looked like alive, then pushed that thought away. No sense in it- she’d be haunted by their death masks forever.

“Are you hearing of any links between the victims? Any enemies?”

“No. No one knows a damn thing.”

“Where was the first couple found?”

“At the Vanderwood girl’s house.”

“Then let’s go there”

The trek didn’t take them long-the Vanderwoods’ house was only a quarter mile up Estes. It was less showy than the previous two homes, smaller, with whitewashed clapboard and a red front door. All the lights were on, and crime-scene techs darted in and out. A small group of neighbors watched silently from the lawn, sadness etched on their faces.

The stairs seemed endless, the now-familiar scent of jasmine clinging to the air in the hallway. Amanda’s room was the first at the top of the stairs. A death investigator took pictures, the shutter’s snap rang in Taylor’s ears. It was one of the most common sounds she heard at a crime scene, but it felt invasive and new tonight.

Xander Norwood was on the floor, on his back, naked. Amanda Vanderwood was also nude, her body faceup and partially on the bed, arms trailing onto the floor. Taylor noticed that Amanda’s forefinger was touching Xander’s palm. It looked like she’d managed to use the last of her strength to partially shift her body off the bed, and Xander had reached out to her, struggling to get their flesh together in the waning moments of their young lives. Love everlasting.

For the first time in many years of crime scenes, Taylor felt sick to her stomach.

Wouldn’t Baldwin’s caress be the last she’d ever want to feel? Wouldn’t his face be the last image she’d want to see, his lips the last to touch hers, his words to fill her ears? To die with the one you loved at hand, that was grace.

Taylor forced the romanticism away, became clinical and cool. Rigor was setting in. Their lips were tinged with blue, the bodies carved with the same pentacles as the others. Xander was partially wearing a condom, the wrapper was on the floor next to the night table. Were they in the act, getting ready to have sex or finishing when the killer struck? She supposed it didn’t matter, there were no defensive wounds, no real disturbance in the room. It was like they’d simply gone to sleep in permanently awkward positions, with a large, glowing star cut into their flesh.

Baldwin circled the bodies, then stepped to the girl’s messy desk.

“Have you photographed all of this?” he asked. The ‘gator nodded. Baldwin poked through the girl’s gym bag, then moved to her purse. He withdrew a plastic bag from the inside pocket of the Coach hobo, four small pills riding in the bottom.

‘Taylor,” he said.

“Yeah?”

“Look at this.”

The pills were blue, tiny as baby aspirin, with a heart stamped on one side.

“X,” Taylor said.

“Yep.” He handed them to the death investigator who was attending the body.

“Don’t lose these,” Baldwin admonished.

“Like that would happen,” the kid replied. He was new- Taylor didn’t recognize him. She felt like she’d seen him somewhere before, but couldn’t place him. Not surprising-with Metro’s influx of new people, there were plenty of faces she couldn’t put to names. His ID card was strung on a yellow-and-black lanyard around his neck, she saw his picture and the name B. lies. He took the Baggie from Baldwin reverently, photographed it and labeled it into evidence.

‘They were found like this?” Taylor asked the young man.

“Yes, ma’am. Nothing’s been moved. We’re waiting for the medical examiner to declare.”

“Can’t you do it?” She was surprised. Death investigators, fondly referred to as ‘gators, had the power to run a scene without the presence of a medical examiner.

“I can, but word came down that each scene had to be cleared by one of the ME’s.”

“Who gave that word?”

“Commander Huston.”

Ah. Her new boss was by the book, too. Taylor had no problem with that, though she knew Sam would be frustrated as hell. They’d have to roust the entire staff of Forensic Medical, all six of the medical examiners, to handle this mess.

‘That’s good enough for me. Anything else you saw that I should know about?”

“No, ma’am. I’ve documented everything, stills and video. Crime Scene’s been looking for the weapon, the knife that was used, but as far as I know, none have been found at any of the scenes. We’ve lifted fibers galore, trace, fin= gerprints. If the killer left anything of himself behind, we’ll find it.”

“Why do you say ‘himself’?” Taylor asked, lies blushed. “Well, I shouldn’t jump to conclusions, but we found a couple of black hairs that obviously didn’t belong to either of these two. One was lying right on top of the male decedent’s chest. It was short, I just assumed it was male.”

“That’s interesting. Does it have a tag?” They’d be able to get DNA off the hair if a follicle was attached.

“No. It was broken off.”

“Too bad. Keep looking, there might be more. If you see something that matches what he used to carve them up, let me know immediately. We need to make sure that every kid’s effects are accounted for, that their gym bags, backpacks and purses are all searched. Find their cell phones and planners, too. Okay? Pass that down the line to your other investigators for me, tell the crime-scene techs, too. And ask them to keep an eye out for more drugs.”