“How enlightening,” Zoe saiddrily. She didn’t believe a word of it. The marking of a symbol onto the fleshwas a deliberate action—it showed reasoning, if not forethought. It wasn’t justa random lunatic. At least, in the sense that any killer could be described asmore than a random lunatic. This was done with purpose, and there was some kindof message being created here.
It wasn’t as though Zoe hadn’tseen cases like this before. Like Maitland said, it was the reason why she hadbeen chosen for this task.
“I would like to see the bodies,”she continued. “Particularly the symbols carved into them. I think there issomething worth pursuing there.”
Beside her, she sensed more thansaw Flynn stiffening, the lines of his back and shoulders going straighter. He didn’tlike her decision. That was fine. Because she wasn’t there to make friends—shewas there to catch a killer.
“Now?” Sheriff Petrovski asked,with a tinge of disappointment in her voice.
Zoe nodded sharply. “That would bepreferable.”
She wasn’t going to wait around—notwhen there was a killer out there, potentially getting ready to attack again.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The coroner’s office was nevernormally the warmest building you could enter in pursuit of justice, but onthis cold November night, it was even colder. Zoe shivered slightly and pulledher FBI-branded windbreaker a little closer around her. Tomorrow, after she’dhad time to unpack her flight case, she’d be wearing a thicker coat.
The two bodies lay on metal slabsin the middle of the room, alongside a third slab that remained empty. It was astark reminder of the stakes that were in play here, and that two bodies couldeasily become three if they didn’t work fast.
Zoe closed out the sound of Flynntalking to the coroner, a small Asian man with a balding head. She didn’texpect he could tell her anything that the numbers couldn’t; she’d already seenthe tox screens, analysis, and other results for the first body and knew thatthey had turned up clean. The same would be true for the second. There was noevidence in the medical report that would point them to their killer—nothingexcept his calling card.
Zoe approached the first body andlifted the sheet covering it, examining the symbol carved into her flesh. Sheleaned close, seeing everything: the three-inch length of the straight upperline, with two-and-a-half- and two-and-three-quarter-inch lines coming down offit. They were both straight as well, though they did not hit the upper line atperpendicular angles, nor run parallel. There was a slight off-kilter angle tothem, coming in more like a hundred degrees rather than ninety. Maybe it wasthe work of a sloppy hand, unable to carve the lines precisely.
Zoe moved onto the second, theastronomer. Here, the symbol was the same. She let the numbers tell hereverything: a three-inch cap, two legs coming off at hundred-degree angles inopposite directions, each between two and a half and three inches long.
It was the same hand. She couldsee everything: the direction of the slash as it was made across the skin, theforce applied to create it, even the telltale marks of the kind of tool used.It all matched up. Both of the marks had been made by the same hand. This wasno coincidence, or copycat, or even a cult. It was done by one man—one man who wastrying to make a literal mark for himself.
Zoe straightened her back, feelingit complain at the lateness of the hour and the length of her day. After thepast few weeks she’d had, she needed rest—but that would have to wait. The casewas far more important.
“These marks were made by the samehand,” she said, realizing that Flynn and the coroner were no longer talking. “Thatmeans we can rule out a group of killers, or some kind of cult. The mark maystill hold ritualistic significance for the killer, but it is the same personmaking them.”
Flynn shrugged. “Makes sense. Itstill doesn’t leave us with a lot to go on. Especially if the perpetrator isusing the symbol to mislead us.”
Zoe shook her head. “I do notbelieve that. This is a deliberate act. The killer is being led by some kind ofprinciple—logical to him, even if not to us. I believe that he is marking themwith the symbol for pi.”
If she expected a grand dawning ofunderstanding and applause after her statement, it could not have been furtherfrom what she actually got. “Pi?” Flynn snorted. “That’s a bit of a leap, isn’tit?”
Zoe blinked. She hadn’t expectedhim to disagree with her quite so strongly—especially not in front of anotherprofessional. “An upper bar with two equal legs coming down from it at angles—thatlooks like pi to me.”
Flynn leaned over the body closestto him, shaking his head at the carving. “I mean, it could be pi. But itcould be anything. I mean, look how hasty and choppy the cuts are. The anglesmight not even be deliberate.”
Zoe’s mouth twitched withannoyance. This rookie—who did he think he was? She determinedly did not lookover at the coroner, because she knew the flat anger in her eyes would give heraway. She had never been good at hiding it. “What else could it signify?” shesnapped.
Flynn gestured to the symbol, hisfingers tracing invisible lines in the air above it. “It could be a set ofinitials. Two uppercase Ts, next to each other. The killer’s name, maybe—aliteral signature. Or the name of something else. Or the legal shorthand for aplaintiff—maybe it’s someone who isn’t happy with the justice system and wantsto make a point.”
Zoe felt her resolve beginning tocrumble. If she was just seeing the mathematical connection because she wantedit to be there, then it wouldn’t be the first time. She had interpreted thingsincorrectly before. Wasted time and resources, allowed more deaths to slipthrough before they got on the right track and caught the killer.
But she had always been somewherenear to the truth. Her instincts were good,
