Blood Dreams

saw.

Dani and Paris preferred it that way, confiding the truth only to each other. They learned early to hide or disguise the easy mental and emotional link they shared, eventually discovering how to fashion the 'door' Paris spoke of.

It gave them the privacy of being alone in their own minds, something most people never learned to value. For the twins, it had finally enabled them to at least begin to experience life as unique individuals rather than two halves of a whole.

Dani missed that former closeness, though. It might now be only a door away-but that door did mostly stay closed these days, with the twins in their early thirties and having chosen very different life paths.

Nodding slowly, Dani said, 'Okay. The dream started a few months ago, back in the summer. When the senator's daughter was murdered by that serial killer in Boston.'

'The one they haven't caught yet?'

'Yeah.'

Paris was frowning. 'I'm missing the connection.'

'I didn't think there was one. Absolutely no connection between me and those murders, not with the victims and not with any of the investigators. And I never have visions about anything not involving me or the people in my life. Which is why I didn't think this dream was a premonition.'

Without pouncing on that admission, her sister said, 'Until something changed. What?'

'I saw a news report. The federal agent in charge of the investigation in Boston is the man in my dream. Bishop.'

'I still don't see-'

'His wife is Miranda Bishop.'

Paris sat up straighter. 'Jeez. She's the one who told us about Haven.'

'Yeah.' It had been in Atlanta nearly a year and a half before. Paris and her husband were one argument away from splitting up, and Dani was between jobs and at loose ends. Neither one of them was interested in becoming a fed, even to join the Special Crimes Unit Miranda Bishop had told them about.

They didn't want to carry guns, didn't want to be cops. But working for Haven, a privately run civilian organization of investigators with unique abilities-that had sounded interesting.

Absently, Paris said, 'That was the last straw for Danny, you know. When I wanted to use my abilities, when I got a job that actually required them. I saw how creeped-out he was. How could I stay with someone who felt that way about any part of me?'

'Yeah, I know. Been there. Most of the guys I've met couldn't get past the fact that I was an identical twin; having dreams that literally came true hasn't exactly been seen as a fun bonus.'

'Especially when you dreamed about them?'

'Well, anybody who gets close takes that risk. And since I never dream about sunshine and puppies, most of the guys in my life haven't stuck around long enough to hear about their own personal-doom scenario.'

'There was one who never ran.'

Dani frowned. 'Yeah, well. He would have. Sooner or later.'

'Do you know that, or are you only guessing?'

'Can we get back to the dream, please?'

Since a solemn pact made in girlhood, each of them had been scrupulous about staying out of the other's love life. And because her own very rocky marriage had recently left her hypersensitive to that, Paris could hardly push. 'Okay. Getting back to your dream-are you saying it has something to do with that serial killer?'

'I think so.'

'Why?'

'A feeling.'

Paris watched her steadily. 'What else?'

Dani didn't want to answer but finally did. 'Whatever was down in that basement was-is-evil. A kind of evil I've never felt before. A kind that scares the hell out of me. And one thing that has been the same in every single version of my dream is the fact that it has Miranda.'

'She's a hostage?'

'She's bait.'

* * * *

'She was my only child.'

'Yes. I know.'

Senator Abe LeMott looked up from the framed photograph he had been studying and directed his attention across the desk to a face that had become, these last months, almost as familiar to him as the one that had belonged to his daughter, Annie.

Special Agent Noah Bishop, Chief of the FBI's Special Crimes Unit, possessed an unforgettable face anyway LeMott thought. Because it was an unusually handsome face but, even more, because the pale silver-gray eyes missed nothing, and because the faint but wicked scar twisting down his left cheek was mute evidence of a violent past. Add to that a streak of pure white hair at his left temple, shocking against the jet-black all around it, and you had a man who was not likely to be overlooked, much less easily forgotten.

'You and your wife don't have children.' LeMott set the photograph aside carefully, in its accustomed place to the right of the blotter.

'No.'

The senator summoned a smile. 'And yet you do. Brothers and sisters, at least. Family. Your unit. Your team.'

Bishop nodded.

'Have you ever lost one of them?'

'No. A few close calls, but no.'

Not yet.

The unspoken hung in the air between them, and LeMott nodded somberly. 'Bound to happen. The work you people do, the evil you face. Sooner or later, there'll be a… an unbearable price demanded. There always is.'

Choosing not to respond to that, Bishop said instead, 'As I told you, we lost what faint trail we had near Atlanta. Whether he's in the city or somewhere nearby, that's the area. But until he makes a move…'

'Until he kills again, you mean.'

'He's gone to ground, and he isn't likely to surface again until he feels less threatened. Less hunted. Or until his needs drive him to act despite that.'

'It's gotten personal, hasn't it? Between you and him. The hunter and the hunted.'

'I'm a cop. It's my job to hunt scum like him.'

LeMott shook his head. 'No, it was always more than that for you. I could see it. Hell, anybody could see it. I'm betting he knew it, knew you were hunting him and knew you'd crawled inside his head.'

'Not far enough inside his head,' Bishop said, a tinge of bitterness creeping into his voice. 'He was still able to get Annie, he was still able to get at least eleven other young women, and all I know for certain is that he isn't finished yet.'

'It's been months. Is it likely that's why he's been waiting, for the heat to die down? Is that why he left Boston?'

'I believe that's at least part of it. It wasn't the spotlight he was after, the attention. He never wanted to engage the police, to test his skills and will against ours. That's not the kind of killer he is, not what it's about for him.'

'What is it about for him?'

'I wish I could answer that with any kind of certainty, but you know I can't. That's the hell of hunting serials: the facts come only after we've caught him. Until then, we have only speculation and guesswork. So all I know is bits and pieces, and precious few of those. Despite all the bodies, he hasn't left us much to work with.'

'But you know Annie was a mistake, wasn't she?'