Until now…possibly.

  “Lara, we need to talk.”

  The worry that made a deep breath near impossible had her searching his eyes, his face for some indication of just how concerned she should be. “What’s going on? I mean, I’m thrilled to have you sitting at my table like this.” She gestured to him and then the room at large mainly just to have something to do with her hands. “But having you show up like this is…perhaps not a social call. Not that I’m unhappy about seeing you—I mean, really seeing you—either way,” she threw in for good measure and then shut up because she was rambling.

  “Sorry about the way I just showed up. I didn’t want to have this conversation on the phone.” He settled his mug on the table and continued before she could decide how to respond to his words. “Next week, I think, is the upcoming DNA series you told me about.”

  “Yes.” She nodded. “In the Blood.” That was the title she’d given to next week’s two-part segment. Generally, she blogged on Mondays only. Occasionally, like this past week, she blogged on Mondays and Fridays. Next week’s segment had garnered a great deal of interest, prompting her to make it a two-parter as well.

  “It’s related to that—the DNA series—my visit, I mean.” He glanced at the table and then at the window.

  In all the conversations she’d had with this man, he’d never come off as unsure of himself. Steady, confident—she’d never thought of him any other way. Apparently, he was as unsettled as she was. Tension was thick in his tone. What the devil was going on?

  “Okay,” she prompted, needing to hear the rest.

  “You’re more aware than most,” he began, “that the Bureau, as well as other law enforcement agencies, has made a good number of connections to ongoing cases through the surge in people’s obsession with delving into their ancestries.”

  Lara didn’t quite understand why he felt the need to qualify whatever he was about to say with this. They had discussed the subject numerous times as she planned the upcoming segment. Before she could ask, he went on.

  “You’re familiar, of course, with the Butcher.”

  This wasn’t a question. He knew she was. Yet, she nodded as if it was necessary to confirm his statement. The conversation suddenly felt off kilter. Out of sync.

  “He has eluded the authorities for decades. We can’t be sure just how many murders are his but dozens match his MO. Only twice in all those cases, and only in the past couple of years, has he ever made a mistake and left behind DNA evidence.”

  “The first time you assumed it could be another victim’s,” she said, remembering what a coup it was to find any evidence, genetic or otherwise, not belonging to the victim left at the scene of the crime. The scene was actually the dump site. The Butcher’s victims were abducted, then taken to an unknown location for him to do his heinous work, afterwards the body was left at a staged scene.

  “Right. Then it happened again, back in August. The thinking was that he could be growing sloppy or that age or illness had begun to affect his work.”

  “Or maybe he’s testing you.” Lara shrugged. “Or playing with you. Showing that he is far superior by leaving evidence you can’t figure out how to use.”

  Nate nodded, his gaze dropping from hers.

  “Has there been another victim?” She hadn’t seen anything in the news and she tracked numerous media outlets. Notifications hit her feed twenty-four/seven.

  Having the Butcher strike again would have made national news. The moniker had been chosen back in the nineties. His victims were always impaled and tortured slowly over the time it took them to die as he effectively butchered them like an animal being prepared for market. He never took trophies from his victims, and there seemed to be no true pattern to the type he chose or his timing. Sometimes he took two or three victims per year, but the past two he’d only taken one per year. This, too, suggested a slowing down which could be related to aging or some health issue.

  There were lots of theories and rumors about why he worked so randomly but none that had been substantiated.

  Nate’s hesitation to respond made her uneasy.

  When he finally lifted his gaze to hers, the worry and regret there had her pulse fluttering. “Forty-eight hours ago, we got a hit on the Butcher’s DNA from one of the public ancestry sites.”

  Now he had her full attention. “Are you serious?” This could be huge for her segment. Not just huge but freaking phenomenal! The timing couldn’t be more perfect. “This is amazing. Please tell me you can share at least some of the details with me.”

  He nodded, his expression strangely somber now. “I can.”

  “Fantastic.” Anticipation rushed through her. “Has the person who submitted the test been notified?”

  “We’re working on that.”

  “So we’re talking about a close relative. A sibling or—”

  “Child,” Nate interjected.

  “Oh my God.” Excitement burst inside her like fireworks on the Fourth of July. This was the proverbial gold mine. “The Butcher has a child?”

  “He does. We can’t be sure he’s aware of this child’s existence. All we know at this time is that the test is conclusive. The child’s DNA and the DNA from those two homicide scenes are a perfect genetic match for father/daughter.”

  “I’m surprised I haven’t heard about this on the news.” Wait. He’d said they were working on contacting the match. She understood now. The FBI was keeping the news quiet until they notified the match. “How can I help?”

  The reality of exactly how amazing this news was hit her all over again.

  “You submitted a sample to Find Me.”

  She nodded. Find Me was, in Lara’s opinion, currently the best genealogy site out there. “They’re not sponsoring my segment,” she pointed out. “I felt that would be a conflict of interest.”

  “I know.” His gaze held hers, his face as clean of emotions as his tone suddenly sounded. “The match located was at Find Me.”

  “Oh.” Lara frowned, lines of tension forming between her eyebrows. Was he trying to ask her to hold off on the segment until this situation was sorted out? “I don’t see how this discovery presents any problem with my moving forward with the segment I have planned. Unless the FBI feels otherwise.” She couldn’t imagine they would. The case had nothing to do with her segment. It was just further proof what an asset DNA could be.

  Nate’s attention remained steady on her, but he said nothing further. Another possibility nudged its way beyond her enthusiasm. Every part of her stilled; even her heart seemed to stumble, and she understood her line of thinking was off-base…wrong.

  Very, very wrong.

  This was not amazing by any definition of the word or stretch of the imagination. “What is it you’re trying to tell me?”

  “You are the match, Lara.”

  She made a sound, a sort of laugh that wasn’t a laugh at all. “That’s impossible. My father died before I was born.” He was in the Army and was killed in one of the conflicts in the Middle East. She knew the story by heart. Her mother had told her over and over how only weeks into her pregnancy—before she even knew she was pregnant—her father’s unit was called to duty, like so many others. Only he hadn’t made it through the operation. He’d come back in a box as so many other soldiers had.

  Her mother would never have lied to her.

  Was it possible Mary Franklin was somehow wrong?

  The bottom dropped out of Lara’s stomach. No matter how much she loved and trusted her mother, she understood that the man looking so downtrodden at having to relay this news was correct. He would not come bearing this awful revelation otherwise.

  She, Lara Franklin, true crime blogger, was the daughter of a heinous serial killer.

  All the depraved details, the ruthless scenarios and horrific theories she’d discussed at length in her years of blogging suddenly seemed wrong.

  So very wrong.

  Nate had a dozen years in the Bureau. He loved his job. He’d done his time in research, then as an agent in the field and the last six as a member of Public Affairs in one of the top positions in D.C. His loyalty and commitment to the Bureau had never been in question.

  Until now.

  This thing they wanted him to do was not right. Not in any sense of the word.

  The powers that be had come to him because of his relationship with Lara and dropped this bomb in his lap.

  What he and Lara had was a strong bond—a relationship. Those blue eyes staring at him in shock made his gut clench. They were friends. Had been for years. When he’d moved to Public Affairs after his divorce, she was his first interesting information request. Her prominent status as a public figure had landed her a little higher up the food chain. He’d been a research source for her since. Somewhere along the way they had become friends.

  Good friends.

  He felt a responsibility to protect her from what the Bureau he served and respected wanted.

  “Is there any possibility this is a mistake?”

  Her voice sounded strangely fragile, making his gut clench. Lara was one of the strongest people he knew. She was outgoing, straightforward and basically unstoppable. She took the bad with the good and produced a media forum about crime that was unsurpassed, in his opinion.

  That, too, was being considered in this hot mess.

  No matter that a part of him understood what the profilers in the Behavioral Analysis Unit were attempting to do, he didn’t agree with the tactic. Didn’t like it at all.

  He knew Lara. Didn’t matter that they hadn’t met face to face until a few minutes ago. He knew her as well as he knew any one of his friends.

  The idea that all the cases she had dissected were now viewed as suspect infuriated him. How could anyone but a killer—other than perhaps one genetically connected to said killer—create and post such eerily and frighteningly accurate scenarios? This was the Bureau’s question. Of course, they had framed it as a concern for Lara’s welfare, but he’d read between the lines.

  The Bureau had shifted its powerful scrutiny to Lara Franklin. She was now a person of interest, basically a suspect.

  His job was to keep an eye on her until the situation was resolved or, at the very least, clarified.

  He shook his head in answer to her question, desperately wished the solution to this unthinkable dilemma was so simple. “No. Unfortunately, there’s no mistake.”

  She drew in a deep breath, pulled herself upright and looked him straight in the eye. “What do they want me to do?”

  He should have known she would immediately grasp the magnitude of her new position in the eyes of the Bureau. She was far too smart and too perceptive to not fully comprehend the implications of her new quandary.

  “It doesn’t matter what they want,” he reminded her. If the Bureau had hoped he would come to her home and represent their interests only, they were sadly misguided. He wouldn’t do that. “What counts is what you want to do.”

  She appeared to digest this for a moment. “First, I need to come to terms with the possibility that my mother lied to me all those years. Assuming she knew he wasn’t dead.”

  Since her mother passed a few months ago, Lara couldn’t exactly ask her. Nate had wanted to come to the funeral. He’d been desperate to put his arms around Lara and give her a hug. But the worst flu he’d had in his life had left him no option except to call and send flowers. They’d made tentative plans to rendezvous for dinner when she returned to New York.

  But she hadn’t come back, and work had kept him too busy to form an alternate plan.

  “Completely understandable. You don’t need to do anything now or ever, for that matter. The Bureau has no grounds to compel you to assist in their plans or attempts to apprehend the Butcher.”

  Light flashed in her blue eyes as if she’d only just realized what they wanted. “They believe I can somehow lure him in?”

  “Potentially.” The muscles tightened around his skull, increasing the throb already there. He’d barely slept since getting the call. Hypothetical scenario after scenario had played out in his head. None worked for him. She shouldn’t do this. It was far too risky.

  “Tell me what I need to do.”

  He kept his jaw locked for five seconds. Long enough to temper his response. “I’m not sure you’re grasping the full ramifications here.”

  “I get it.” She pushed away from the table, stood and walked to the sink. She deposited her coffee cup there then, buying time, ran water into it before turning back to face him. “I’m the bait they’ve hoped for all this time. A thirty-year reign as the most prolific serial killer in the country is a damned good motive for the Bureau’s desperation. The Butcher has killed dozens of people and those are just the ones they know about. I’m sure they would love to bring him down.”

  “This is assuming the man whose DNA proves he’s your father is, in fact, the killer. Maybe he’s involved in some other way. A partner of some sort.”

  “Now you’re reaching, Agent Decker. If his DNA had been found once, maybe. But twice? No way. It’s him.” She placed her hands on her hips, squared her shoulders. “I want to help bring him down.”

  “Certainly gives you a whole new twist for your book.”

  The wounded look that flashed on her face before the anger appeared made him wish for a do-over.

  “I’m sorry.” He shook his head. “That was uncalled for.” He pushed back his own chair and stood. “I just don’t want to see you get hurt in all this. Right now, I’m sure it feels at best like a great boost option for your blog and, unquestionably, new and twisted fodder for your book. But this is about you. Who you are, where you come from. When the shock wears off, you may realize you don’t want to share this with the world. You’ll go through all the stages of disbelief and regret. More than anything else you’ll want answers to all the questions whirling around in your head right now and in the days to come.”

  She shrugged, the flash of anger visibly draining out of her. “You’re right. I recognize I need to think this through. I need to look at all the possible ramifications before I leap.”

  Thank God. “You do.” He joined her at the sink, offered an understanding smile. “I’m really sorry to be the one to throw this at you, but I had to do it. I couldn’t be certain anyone else would properly take into consideration your feelings and your safety. I needed to be the one, to be sure you stay safe.”

  She smiled. “All these years of desk work have made you soft, Agent Decker.”

  “Maybe.” A beat of silence settled between them. “Besides, it was well past time we met in person. I should have called you on that promise for dinner months ago.”

  “This is true. How long can you stay?” She rolled her eyes. “I suppose the better question is how much time do you have to deliver my answer?”

  “They gave me until Monday.”

  When she didn’t react immediately, he added, “I can probably talk them out of another twenty-four hours. Or I can give them a ‘no’ right now.” He really wanted her to say no.

  “There were no other hits?” she asked. “No other relatives discovered?”

  “Only you.”

  “Not for the first time,” she said wistfully, “I wish my mother was still alive.”

  He’d heard those words from her several times the past few months. Lara had suffered through the guilt of not visiting her mother as much as she’d meant to. Of not calling as often as she felt she should have. Whatever she believed, she had been a good daughter. Far better than she gave herself credit for. “Did she talk about your father much?”

  “Always on Father’s Day and birthdays.” She hesitated, seeming to follow his line of thinking. “There is a photo, if you want to see.”

  “I would.”

  She led him back to the living room. He wondered how anyone could look so good in yoga pants and a baggy sweatshirt. The socks were adorable. She was exactly the way he had imagined her. Tough but soft.

  She settled onto the floor, legs crossed and grabbed a photo album from the bottom shelf of the bookcase beneath yet another window that looked out over the lake. He sat down beside her.

  When she’d found the page she sought, she passed the album to him. “This is the only photo of him she had—or, at least, that I’ve ever seen. He isn’t looking directly at the camera, but that’s him.” She tapped the photo. “Meet Patrick Franklin.”

  The man had the same red hair as Lara, for sure. “You never met any other members of your father’s family?” There had to have been parents. Grandparents.

  “All deceased.”

  Or that.

  “You’ve researched your father?” He couldn’t imagine she wouldn’t. Not Lara. She was far too curious not to have done her due diligence.

  “I did.” She flipped through a few more pages that showed her very young mother smiling and obviously pregnant. “His parents died when he was three. He was adopted. His adopted parents died when I was just a baby. I don’t remember them. But Mother spoke fondly of them. I think they were good to us. My impression was that they helped us out financially after…after he died.”

  It was difficult to argue with the story. Why would her mother have lied? Nate studied the youthful images of Lara’s mother. He couldn’t imagine her having that sort of devious mind. The woman Lara spoke of had been kind and giving. Quiet and thoughtful. Not the sort to deceive or betray.

  Lara turned to him. “I suppose they’re going to want to exhume his body.”

  “Under the circumstances I would say that’s a given.” Assuming Lara was willing. Even if she wasn’t, they would likely seek a warrant.

  “Tell them to do it. The sooner, the better. If my father is actually alive, I want to know why he left my mother and me the way he did.”