“I know how hard this must be for you, Ramie. Or maybe I don’t. I’ll spare you any condescension by claiming I know what you’re going through. I’m not trying to say I’ve experienced anything on the scale that you have. But I can imagine how scared you must be and I can also imagine me not having the courage to see it through like you have.”

Ramie laughed, the sound jarring and abrasive, scratching like a steel wool scouring pad over her skin.

“Scared? Absolutely. Courageous? Not even close. If it weren’t for Caleb, I’d still be out there hiding, trying to cover my trail and praying that each day wouldn’t be my last. If I was brave—or whatever . . .” she said derisively.

She paused a moment and swallowed back the knot in her throat. Then she looked straight through Eliza.

“If I had courage, then all the women he killed in his efforts to get to me would still be alive. If I was brave, I would have taken a stand much sooner instead of acting like a frightened child and burying my head in the sand.”

She held up her hand when Eliza launched an immediate protest.

“Save your breath,” Ramie said, fatigue swamping her. “I didn’t say that to earn your pity or to get you to argue and tell me it wasn’t my fault. Nor do I expect or want validation. Rationally I know I can’t be held accountable for the actions of others. But at the same time, if I had only tried to confront him instead of spending the last year running and constantly looking over my shoulder then maybe he’d be in prison right now. Or dead. And all those women who died would still be alive, enjoying their families, children . . .”

“Or maybe you’d be dead and he would still be out there stalking his next victim, still taking innocent lives because there was no one to bring him down. There are a lot of maybes, Ramie. A lot of what-ifs and second guesses. You forget that you saved a hell of a lot of victims. You saved Tori from certain death. They got to her mere hours before he planned to kill her. And the others you helped. They’d all be dead if you hadn’t intervened. Focus on those lives you saved. Not the ones you didn’t.”

Dane returned just then, a bottle of water in one hand, his jaw tight. His eyes glinted with anger and Ramie saw Eliza’s eyebrow go up. Evidently she saw the same thing Ramie had. Ramie didn’t need to touch him to know he was pissed.

“What is it?” Ramie asked softly.

Dane ignored her and held out the medication. Ramie eyed it dubiously, knowing she likely wouldn’t be sensible in an hour’s time. She was sensitive to any medication that altered her level of consciousness in any way, no matter how weakly it might affect her.

She was at her most vulnerable when she took medication. She couldn’t school her thoughts as well and didn’t have protective barriers in place. From past experience she knew that memories and dreams of past victims would be unleashed, and she would be unable to control her thought patterns. She shuddered, her skin prickling, the hairs standing on end.

“Take it, Ramie,” Dane urged.

Though he wasn’t in the least bit threatening and he’d tempered his voice in deference to her sensitivity to sound, she could sense his steel resolve that she down the pill. With a sigh, she allowed him to drop it into her hand, but still she paused after he handed her the bottle of water.

Emotion swamped her. She jerked in surprise at the strength of the impressions from just a tiny pill. But Tori—and Dane—had touched it and so the remnants of their volatile encounter was transferred to Ramie.

Dane studied her, his eyes sharp as he took in her reaction. His lips thinned as if he realized what had happened and had little liking for it. She could barely hear the muttered curses under his breath.

“Before you get pissed, understand that it’s high time someone quit coddling her and pulled her back into the real world where everything doesn’t revolve around one individual,” Dane said.

It was obvious that Tori and Dane had faced off about something. Her? Giving her relief from the mental strain of a migraine and the psychic weight of so many souls, pulling her left and right, all demanding justice for what was done to them?

That heaviness gave her much-needed impetus to face the task ahead. If everyone thought Tori unreasonable and recalcitrant then what must they think about her? Tori had more reason to be angry than Ramie. After all, no matter that Ramie shared the same fate, it still wasn’t the same as being there, suffering it firsthand and being helpless to stop it. And there was the fact that Ramie had been so difficult to find. And unyielding, only giving Caleb the information he demanded after it was forced on her.

She swallowed the pill, grimacing as it went down. She’d never been able to swallow pills. Even as an adult, she often resorted to crushing tablets into a fine powder and mixing it with a tiny amount of liquid.

It took a few more sips to wash it completely down and then she leaned back, focusing her attention once more on the drawing. In an hour’s time she wouldn’t trust herself to remember details accurately so she needed to get this right. Every minute the killer walked free was another minute his victim had to endure the unimaginable.

Even the effort it took to get the pill down sent shards of pain through the base of her skull. Her stomach lurched and she inhaled sharply through her nose in an effort to stave off the nausea. She felt as though tiny little fractures formed a spiderweb over her skull, cracking and splintering as they raced, weaving a crisscross pattern through her hair.

She reeled precariously, her stomach revolting once more. She swallowed furiously, forcing herself to keep the pill down and not promptly throw it up.