Artist Lisa Stewart fingered the plastic bags in her hoodie pockets, dutifully grabbed when she left the cottage with Buster and Brownie. Most people slept in on their vacations. But morning was the best time for the dogs, the only time Lisa could risk letting them run free on the beach.

  Buster raced up and down in joyous swoops and bursts of speed. Brownie sniffed along the water’s edge at whatever the tide had left behind. Rock weed. Mussels. Limpets.

  Gull droppings.

  A big white bird with a yellow head and a cruel, curved beak stood in the shallows, cocking a blue-ringed eye at the dogs. Lisa caught her breath. She’d never seen a gull that size.

  Buster bounded out of the mist, pink tongue dripping. The bird screeched and lifted off, its black-tipped wings beating the air. Barking, Buster charged down the beach after it.

  Lisa grinned. But as long minutes passed with no sign of the dog, her smile faded.

  She whistled and lengthened her stride, Brownie trotting at her heel. Her sneakers crunched and slid on shingle and shale. Her breath rasped. The smell of the ocean, life, death, and decay, hung heavy in the damp air.

  There. Relief washed over her.

  Wasn’t that—yes, there was Buster, inching toward the shallows on his belly, completely ignoring the big white bird perched only yards away. His big dark eyes fixed on a rounded lump that rose from the wet shore like a dark jewel on a belt of beaten silver, its reflection staining the gritty beach, bleeding into the retreating water.

  “Buster!”

  Brownie whined and pressed trembling against her leg. The bird squawked and launched heavily into the still air.

  Buster’s hips wriggled. His top knot quivered. A wave rushed in and faded away, stirring the rusty seaweed clumped along one side of the rock.

  Lisa frowned. Not a rock. A dolphin beached by the tide? She tightened her grip on the leash and took a step closer. A seal? Or…

  Her stomach plunged. She pressed her shaking fingers to her mouth.

  A body.

  * * *

  In her dreams, the heavens wept blood and the oceans blazed. Margred struggled to breathe.

  Pain sprang at her out of the dark—brutal, insulting, slamming her onto the rocks. Her palms burned. Fire exploded in her head. In her knees. She tried to cry out, but the fire stole her voice, eating the soft tissue of tongue and palette, searing her throat.

  Margred tossed, her breathing harsh, her heart racing. She was burning, drying, drying up…

  She moaned and opened her eyes.

  Gray dawn licked at the edges of the window shade, the paneled walls, the row of books by Bradford and Conan Doyle. On the shelf below sat a picture of the child Caleb with Lucy on his lap.

  Caleb. She was in Caleb’s room.

  And Lucy—all grown up now—hovered in the doorway, wearing an apologetic expression and a green T-shirt with the word CLIPPERS across her breasts. The shadow of Margred’s dream clouded the younger girl’s eyes.

  Margred struggled from the shrouds of sleep. Something about the veiled depths of those eyes…

  Lucy blinked. “Sorry to wake you.” She held out her cell phone. Her eyes were bright and shallow again as sunlight on the sea. Warm, green eyes. Caleb’s eyes. “It’s Caleb. He wants to talk with you.”

  Margred sat up, sticky with sweat, and fumbled with the phone. “Hello?”

  “Maggie.”

  Her heart gave a foolish skip. “Yes?”

  “You’re all right.”

  “Ye-es.”

  Why wouldn’t she be?

  But she was troubled by her dream, bothered by whatever she had seen or imagined in Lucy’s eyes. She looked again at Lucy.

  Lucy shrugged.

  “What is going on?” Margred asked.

  “I don’t know yet.” Caleb’s deep voice was hard. Flat. “I’m on my way to find out. Stay put, okay?”

  She appreciated his concern when he was so obviously preoccupied. But she resisted his assumption he could tell her what to do.

  “I have work at ten,” she said.

  “Tell Antonia you can’t make it. Somebody may be by later to talk to you.”

  “Then he can talk to me at Antonia’s.”

  She heard his indrawn breath. “When they get there—”

  They?

  “Tell them the truth. As much as you can.”

  Maggie bit her lip in vexation. What truth? He didn’t want her truth.

  As much as you can? Or as much as Caleb and his mysterious “they” could accept?

  “Caleb—”

  “I’ve got to go,” he said, still in that abrupt, official voice. “Maggie…”

  She waited, her heart racing, her fingers curled around the phone, willing him to dispel the darkness cast by her dream with the light of his reason, his warm, strong, steady heart.

  “Take care of yourself,” he said, and disconnected.

  * * *

  The beach boiled with activity.

  A temporary command post had been set up under the trees on the headland until the scene could be released and the whole police circus moved to the common room at the community center. Which would inconvenience a lot of islanders and piss off Antonia, but the mayor was the least of Caleb’s worries now.

  The medical examiner had come and gone, transporting the body to his office in Augusta. No bloated drowning victim this time. This woman had died recently. Violently.

  Even Caleb, hardened by war and accustomed to death, had been shaken by the condition of her torn and naked body. The nature of her wounds.

  The webbing between her toes.

  But he couldn’t dwell on the victim’s feet. He couldn’t think about Maggie. He’d reacted according to his training, calming the hysterical dog owner, notifying CID, securing the scene.

  And then he stood by while they took over.

  One of the state cops had accompanied the medical examiner to the mainland. By Caleb’s count, that still left five detectives from CID, three techs from the Evidence Response Team, ten members of the Maine warden service performing a meticulous search of the surrounding woods and slopes, and a dive team searching for evidence offshore.

  The mist had burned off. Caleb squinted against the glare, watching the sergeant in the shadows confer with his detectives.

  God, he wanted a cigarette. His hands fisted uselessly in his pockets.

  He needed something to do.

  This was his island. His responsibility. But this wasn’t his case. Outside of Portland, homicides in Maine belonged to the state. In the past, in the city, Caleb had worked Major Crimes. But here and now, all he could do was stand outside the crime scene tape with his thumb up his ass as the experts did their jobs.

  He paced, getting sweatier and more frustrated as the sun crawled overhead, cutting the hill in light and shadow. The flat blue ocean mocked the bustle on shore, the turmoil inside him.

  In his mind, he saw Maggie sticking out her pretty bare foot.

  “Explain this.”

  “What?”

  “My toes are webbed.” She’d wiggled them to prove it.

  “They’re still toes,” he’d told her. “Not fins or flippers. I need more from you than that.”

  His brain reeled. His gut twisted. How much more did he need?

  Two violent attacks. Both on the beach.

  Two women. Both with webbed feet.

  My God, Maggie…

  Sam Reynolds and one of the female detectives peeled away from the knot under the trees and strolled through ankle-deep weeds toward Caleb.

  Caleb stood at attention and watched them come.

  Reynolds massaged his mustache. “Got a minute?”

  “As many as you need.”

  The state guy nodded toward his companion. “You’ve met Detective Hall.”

  Unlike the female cops on TV, Evelyn Hall was gray and plain, weathered as a barn and thirty pounds overweight. She had a fisherman’s grip and a farmer’s tan.

  “Detective,” he acknowledged.

  “Evelyn.” Her smile was more polite than friendly. Maybe it was a turf thing. Or maybe it was a gender thing. The state bureau was almost half and half, male and female. But Caleb bet any female state detective was used to the boys in local law enforcement giving her a hard time. “Our sergeant was wondering if we could sit down and discuss the case.”

  Caleb lifted his brows. “This case?”

  Reynolds cleared his throat. “There’s a good chance the same person committed both attacks. At least until we have the identity of the murder victim, the key to the crime is probably the first assault.”

  “So you’re taking over my case.”

  Maggie’s case.

  “We’re incorporating the two investigations. The sergeant understands you have experience with this place and the people.”

  “I have experience in homicide, too.”

  “We’re not in Portland anymore, Toto,” Hall said. “We have a dead naked woman at a tourist resort. The lieutenant’s making this case a top priority.”

  “Too bad he didn’t feel that way when I was asking for Maggie’s lab results five days ago.”

  Or this murder might have been avoided. The unspoken implication echoed between them.

  “Look, you’ll still have a role in the investigation,” Reynolds said.

  Caleb narrowed his eyes. “A role.”

  Reynolds shrugged. “Take it or leave it.”

  “I can show you the report,” Caleb said. “Back at my office.”

  His turf.

  Reynolds nodded, conceding home field advantage. “We’ll need copies,” the detective said. “Notes, sketches, interviews—”

  “There’s a machine in the office,” Caleb replied evenly. “You can copy whatever you want.”

  “We appreciate that,” Hall said. “Right now, all we have to go on is the body.”

  Caleb’s mind flashed back to purpling flesh and white-edged wounds and naked toes…

  He controlled his face. His voice. “How soon can the ME conduct the autopsy?”

  “Usually? Tomorrow morning,” Reynolds said. “But the lieutenant is pushing for this afternoon. We need ID.”

  “Get me a photo,” Caleb said.

  “You want to put it out in the media?” Hall asked.

  “If we have to. First I want to show it to Maggie—the first victim,” Caleb said. “See if she recognizes her.”

  “We can do that,” Reynolds said.

  Caleb’s jaw tightened. Not his case, he reminded himself. But—

  “I can go with you,” he said. “She knows me.”

  “We don’t want to take up your time,” Reynolds said.

  “You have an objection to our talking to her alone?” Hall asked.

  “No objection,” Caleb said while frustration ate a hole in his gut.

  It wasn’t his job to object. And what the hell else could he say?

  He could tell them Maggie thought she was a mermaid and completely destroy her credibility.

  Or he could tell them he was beginning to believe her and completely destroy his.

  “Does she remember anything yet?” Reynolds asked. “Did she see anything?”

  “I did not see him at all,” Maggie had said, her cheeks flushed, her eyes dark and earnest. “But it was not Dylan.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  “It was a demon.”

  Fuck. That would go over about as well as her mermaid theory.

  Caleb forced his jaw to unlock. “She doesn’t remember. I think she doesn’t want to remember. Sometimes she…imagines things.”

  “She lies.”

  The memory of Maggie’s wide dark eyes and earnest voice rose like a ghost to accuse him.

  “No,” Caleb said firmly. “She believes what she’s saying. She just—”

  “I am not sick. Or stupid.”

  She had webbed toes.

  “She’s confused,” he said.

  Reynolds and Hall exchanged a look.

  “Maybe seeing what this guy did to somebody else will help clear her mind,” Reynolds said.

  Maybe, Caleb thought. Or maybe it would convince her she shouldn’t trust anybody.

  Including him.

  * * *

  The two detectives flanked Margred, one on the ugly brown couch and one by the Hunters’ living room fireplace.

  Tell them the truth?

  They would never believe her. Caleb had not believed her.

  So Margred lied. Charmingly, easily, over cups of coffee.

  Sitting between them, she told the same lies she had once told Caleb: She did not know. She did not remember. The male detective wrote everything down as if he believed her. The female had doubts—Margred could see the skepticism in her eyes—but she could not argue with Margred’s pretty distress over her memory loss.

  Margred felt no guilt. No betraying blushes, no awkward hesitations, no dropped glances gave her away.

  She lied and smiled and sipped her coffee and wanted to wring Caleb’s neck. Where was he? Why had he left her to deal with these people alone?

  “Is Caleb coming soon?” she asked as she refilled the male detective’s cup.

  He smoothed his mustache, shooting a glance over his hand at the woman. With the careful instincts of the hunted, Margred noticed the look. Her pulse kicked up.

  “We believe so,” the woman said.

  “Tell us about your relationship with Chief Hunter,” the man—Reynolds was his name—said.

  Relationship. Is that what they called it? Margred sat back down on the edge of her chair, folding her hands in her lap. “We are friends.”

  The man turned a page in his notebook. “Close friends.”

  She smiled at him. “Yes.”

  “How long have you known the chief?” the woman asked.

  Margred tried to remember what Caleb told the doctor. “About a month.”

  She felt their sudden attention, like sharks scenting blood in the water.

  “Since before the attack,” Reynolds said.

  Margred frowned. “Yes.”

  “You remember,” the woman said.

  Ah.

  “I remember Caleb,” Margred said. “Nothing else.”

  “So you really only have his word for it that you two were…close,” Reynolds said.

  Margred stopped herself from reaching for Caleb’s necklace around her throat. “I do not understand.”

  “Were you two getting along? Before all this happened, I mean?”

  Treacherous undercurrents swirled below the surface of the conversation. What did these people want? “Of course. I still don’t understand—”

  “We’re trying to help you,” the female detective said.

  “Another woman was attacked on the beach last night,” Reynolds explained. “If you know anything that could help us…anything at all…”

  Understanding struck Margred. Caleb had once accused her of protecting someone. Did these two actually imagine she—

  They could not possibly suspect he—

  She straightened her spine. “Caleb is a good man.”

  Reynolds nodded. “I guess you feel you owe him a lot.”

  “Especially since your…accident,” the woman put in.

  Margred bared her teeth. “I do not owe him anything. I have money. A job.”

  Reynolds looked down at his notebook. “You work for a friend of his, don’t you? Regina Barone?”

  A bloodred haze rose in Margred’s brain. For some reason, these humans were targeting Caleb. Threatening him. She bristled like a seal defending her pup. But she did not know how to protect him.

  “He got me my job, yes.”

  “Was he with you last night?” Reynolds asked.

  “He came by.”

  “What time was that?”

  “I was watching television with his sister. You could ask her. Perhaps…nine o’clock? A little after.”

  “Tell me what happened then,” Reynolds said.

  Margred clasped her hands loosely in her lap, holding on to her temper. Tell the truth, Caleb had advised. Well, if it would help him, she would try. “Caleb gave his father a ride home from Antonia’s. His father had had too much to drink. Caleb was very considerate, very calm. He helped his father to bed. Then he came downstairs and we talked for a while before he went home.”

  “How long?”

  Margred shrugged. “Perhaps…an hour?”

  Reynolds looked up. “So he didn’t spend the night?”

  If Margred could have lied, she would have. “No.”

  “Why was that?” the woman asked.

  Margred’s heart lurched. She could not possibly explain why they had quarreled.

  “I was angry. Jealous, I guess. And I took it out on you.” Caleb’s gaze had met hers, all nerves and need, and she felt the jolt in the pit of her stomach. “Come home with me, Maggie.”

  She wished she had.

  Too late.

  “I was tired,” she said. “A long shift at the restaurant.”

  “So you didn’t have words?” the female detective asked. “A disagreement?”

  “What are you suggesting? That Caleb was so upset by a lovers’ quarrel that he went out and attacked some woman on the beach?” Sarcasm dripped from her voice. “You insult him. Caleb is one of the kindest, most honorable men I know.”

  “You haven’t known him very long.”

  “Long enough to understand your suspicions are ridiculous.”

  “We don’t suspect anybody yet. We’re just trying to get a picture here.”

  The female detective leaned forward. “Chief Hunter just got back from Iraq, didn’t he? How’s he handling that?”

  Margred arched her eyebrows. “I imagine he is happy to be home.”

  “That doesn’t mean he wasn’t affected by the experience.”

  “Yes.” Margred met her eyes coolly. “He limps.”

  The woman pressed her lips together. “Any signs of stress? Mood swings. Nightmares. Depression, maybe.”

  Nightmares, Margred thought, with a catch at her heart. He had nightmares.

  “No.” She rose. “Now, if that is all—”

  “Not quite all.” Detective Reynolds slid a manila envelope from his notebook. “We’d like you to take a look at last night’s victim.”

  “Why?”

  “You might have seen her before.”

  “If I did, it is unlikely I would remember. But of course I will look if you like,” Margred added politely, and sat back down.