Between the Spirit and the Dust

Chapter Six

Max had fallen asleep while watching the news after we’d reached our new apartment in Washington, DC. Evie had switched off the television and fetched Max a blanket, in a surprisingly maternal move. Around 10 p.m., she’d headed into the room before reminding me not to stay up too late.

The agents were also staying in the apartment but had been talking softly in the kitchen the entire night, probably discussing what to make of Max and me. Around midnight, they’d gone to bed.

As far as I knew, everyone else in the apartment was now sound asleep. It was 3 a.m. in the morning after all. But I couldn’t fall asleep, my brain still working furiously to try and process everything that had happened earlier today.

While onboard the flight, Evie had given us a briefing on what we were to expect when we’d arrived. Because it was likely to be late afternoon when we’d reached, we were to go check into our new apartment first. Tomorrow morning we were to meet Assistant Director Derek Shepherd, who was extremely concerned with the renewed attention to the case and wanted to speak to us 

The agents had exchanged a look. Then Collins had said, “With all due respect, Evelyn, we still don’t know what Emily and Max are here to do.”

“I’m afraid that’s classified.”

The look of surprise that was on the agents’ faces was almost comical before Collins had spoken again, this time more aggressively, “I believe that I have clearance to know.”

There was a beat of silence before Evie had said, smoothly, “All that I can say is that they are here on my request. I’m sure you’ve heard rumors about the things that I can do, Collins. Both of them may look young but I assure you, they are capable and hold every bit as much power as I do. HQ has given me clearance to do this. If there’s anything else you want to know, you can take it up with Assistant Director Shepherd.”

Collins’ face had now turned bright red with anger but Jenna had paled. I wondered what they had heard about Evie’s abilities and whether it was because of Evie’s powers that she was the captain of our motley crew. If we were going by familiarity with the case, it seemed like Collins had the upper hand. 

Max had coughed, dissolving the tense atmosphere and asked, “This is unrelated but I was just reading on some of the files and I was wondering—is there some reason why all the victims are found naked?”

I shot Max a grateful smile for distracting them and he nodded slightly, acknowledging it. And besides, it was a really relevant question.

“At this point we are just speculating because there are a couple of theories for that,” Jenna had replied, the colour returning to her face. Her tone grew more passionate as she spoke, as though this was one of her favorite conversation topics. “The victims’ nudity makes it far more difficult for us to identify her and gives our perp more time to put distance between himself and the murder. The nudity also makes it more challenging to identify the killer because if there’s clothing involved, we can usually find some evidence—a strand of hair, a button, fingerprints.”

Jenna had stopped, checking to see that Max and I were following before adding, “This guy is incredibly meticulous, he even goes as far to clip his victim’s nails just in case they got some of his DNA by scratching him. In fact, the only evidence that we got so far was from victim number seven, we managed to find some pieces of his hair as well as semen in her body—”

She had cut herself abruptly, as if suddenly remembering the identity of victim number seven. And as she turned towards me with pity in her eyes, I knew for sure that she’d just recalled that victim number seven was Sylvia Wilkins.

I had clenched my fists and drew in a deep breath. “It’s okay, you don’t have to stop. Sooner or later, I’m going to have to hear about this. Keep going.”