The onsite professionals appeared to know her and respect her. The two police detectives had treated her with the utmost courtesy. He wasn’t surprised. Victoria was one of those determined people who worked her butt off to achieve her goals. She didn’t believe in shortcuts. She’d always succeeded at what she put her mind to.

He turned his attention back to the dead girls.

A fucking waste.

The scene reminded him a bit of the Heaven’s Gate cult. In the late nineties nearly forty people had committed suicide together, hoping to catch a ride on a spaceship trailing the Hale-Bopp comet. He remembered photos of rows of neatly arranged bodies in beds, their faces covered with purple cloths and brand-new Nikes on their feet. There’d been a master planner at work who’d brainwashed the group.

Who would do this? Someone was involved. Someone who was still alive, because the girls’ shoes didn’t walk away by themselves. He had every intention of attending the examinations of these girls.

They were close to Eden’s age.

He fought the anger crawling up the back of his throat.

Working on the endless stream of autopsies at the coroner’s office in California felt different when the victim was from a crime scene he’d attended. Every body he worked on, he gave his best. But when he’d been present to see the setting of the atrocity, it sparked something inside of him, driving him harder to find justice for the dead.

He’d seen his share of bodies from crimes. It was a factor in what made his job so engrossing. Science meets crime. Science kicks crime’s butt. It was a thrill to know he’d helped to bring justice to the assholes of the world who’d believed they’d gotten away with murder. It wasn’t glamorous. It wasn’t fun. But it was damned interesting, and he saw and learned something fascinating every day.

These girls didn’t decide to lie down and die. There was a more powerful hand at work here; he could feel it. And that hand had cleaned up the scene.

“Dr. Rutledge?” Detective Lusco approached him. “Callahan and I are headed out. I just wanted to say good luck with the job selection process.” The detective was a big guy, clean cut. He looked like a pro football player turned cop, and Seth estimated the detective’s age to be a bit younger than his own. Even though it was the middle of the night, the detective looked as pressed and fresh as someone who’d just arrived at work. Seth looked he’d just rolled out of bed.

“Thanks. Maybe we’ll cross paths again.”

“You’ll have big shoes to fill. Dr. Campbell has an amazing reputation around here. Hate to see the guy go.”

“He’s done it longer than a lot of MEs. Wears away at your soul after a while. Probably like being a cop.”

“This is the kind of case that does it,” said Lusco, taking in the dead girls with a wave of his hand. “The young ones. Always pointless.”

“Still no reports of missing teens?”

Lusco shook his head and glanced at his watch. “Shouldn’t be much longer. Worried parents are gonna start calling.”

Victoria spoke from behind him. “Unless it was one of those organized ‘Tell your mom you’re sleeping at my house, and I’ll tell mine that I’m at your house’ type setups.” She stepped closer to join their conversation.

Seth studied her profile as she looked at Lusco. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail, her chin raised and stubborn. Victoria Peres was a woman to be reckoned with. Still.

“Christ. I didn’t think of that,” said Lusco.

Victoria nodded. “That’s because you were never a teen girl. They all did that.”

Seth noted she didn’t say “We all did that.” It was hard to imagine Tori as a teen girl. Even though she’d been nineteen when they first met, she’d always been an adult. Lying to her parents about sleeping at a friend’s house wasn’t something she’d do.

“You might not get any leads until tomorrow, when the parents start calling each other,” she added.

“Tomorrow is really gonna suck,” stated Lusco.

Seth silently agreed.

Mason Callahan watched Lacey move away from the bright lights, still bodies, and low conversations into the shadows of the forest. Someone needed a break after the scent of death, he figured. Dr. Campbell often wore her heart on her sleeve. Not like Victoria Peres. You never could tell what she was thinking.

He nearly fell over when Dr. Rutledge called her Tori.

Mason had heard the forensic anthropologist called a lot of things, usually along the lines of Ice Princess and Bone Woman. Hard, unforgiving names. Dr. Peres had a knack for reading bones. Watching her handle the dry bones, scanning them with her fingertips as she felt every bump and valley. The woman knew what she was doing.

Cold was what his fellow officers called the Bone Lady. Antisocial and rigid. Officers who’d stepped a wrong foot in a one of her scenes called her Bitch.

Private, was Mason’s assessment.

“Tori” sounded tender coming from Dr. Rutledge.

Holy crap. The Ice Princess had a past.

He shook his head. Victoria Peres was a tall and attractive woman, but there was something very off-putting about the way she interacted with people. Had she been different when she was younger? Dr. Rutledge seemed to know. Mason’d seen the way the doctor’s gaze followed Victoria. Yes, there was certainly a history there. Mason cringed. Thinking about getting close to the Ice Princess made him uncomfortable; they had a good working relationship.