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asked. “I mean, I’m not an expert, but I always thought that a killer like that escalated until he was killed or caught and locked away. Would a serial killer take a break that long?” She felt vaguely uneasy. She knew that the so-called Interstate Killer had plagued the central part of the state a dozen years ago. She also knew that he had supposedly been killed.
    And buried.
    â€œMaybe he didn’t take a break,” Dan theorized aloud. “Maybe he was gone…traveling from state to state.”
    â€œPossibly. They say that killers often keep on the move. Thank God for computers. They’ve made a big difference,” Mike said.
    â€œJed will know more about it,” Ana said confidently.
    â€œThat’s right. He wrote a book about the killings,” Dan said.
    â€œJed wrote a novel,” Ana said. “Based loosely on real events.”
    Michael was quiet, frowning at Christina.
    â€œWhat?” she demanded.
    He shook his head, then pointed a finger at her. “Sherri Mason, the woman who was killed, was five feet eight inches tall, about one hundred and thirty pounds. She had blue eyes—and long red hair.”
    They all stood in silence for a long moment.
    â€œWow. Thanks a lot for that,” Christina said at last.
    Ana slipped a supportive arm around her friend’s waist. “We can handle ourselves. It’s the unwary who usually wind up in trouble.”
    â€œThat’s not the point,” Michael said, and took a deep breath. “Christie, you have to be careful. The last victims, twelve years ago…they were all tall. And all had light eyes and—”
    â€œAnd long red hair,” Dan breathed softly.
    â€œJust like Sherri Mason,” Mike said. “Who was killed just the same way. As if she’d been killed by…a ghost.”

2
    J ed should have headed straight over to Christina’s house, and in fact he had meant to.
    But he didn’t.
    For some reason he found himself traveling down the road that led to one of the largest local cemeteries.
    Beau Kidd had been laid to rest there. His parents and his sister, furious that Beau had been labeled a killer without a trial, grieving his death, had ordered a fine tombstone for him. A glorious angel in marble rested atop it, kneeling down in prayer.
    It was dusk when he arrived, and the gates were closed, but the cemetery was one of the oldest in the area. Broken tombstones belonging to those who had served in the United States military as far back as the Seminole Wars could be found there. No one had ever spent the money for a high fence, so he was easily able to hop the low wall and enter. He knew this cemetery well. Too well, he thought.
    Margaritte was buried here.
    But he hadn’t come to mourn at her grave or feel sorry for himself. Not tonight.
    He was losing it, he thought. Visiting a cemetery, as if Beau Kidd could talk to him from the grave and offer him help.
    No, he told himself. He had simply decided to check on the monument, that was all. In the years after the killings and Kidd’s own death, the tombstone had been vandalized several times. Then Beau Kidd’s mother had appeared on television and made such a tearful plea to be let alone that the vandalism had stopped. No requests by law enforcement or even arrests could have put an end to the graffiti and damage the way her softly sobbed plea had done.
    He could see the angel as he headed down the path. What surprised him was that he wasn’t the only one who had come to check on Beau Kidd’s grave tonight.
    There was a young woman standing there. He frowned, for a moment thinking it might be Christina Hardy. This woman, too, had long red hair, and she was tall, slim and shapely, with elegantly straight posture.
    But when she turned as Jed approached, he saw that though she was attractive, her features were quite different from Christina’s. For one thing, her eyes were a pale yellow-green