Page 1 of Forsaken

PROLOGUE

The trunk of Laura Benson's car was still warm against her back, radiating the heat of an unseasonably warm October day in Dallas. Her short blonde hair, usually neat and practical for long hours at the library desk, was matted with blood where she'd hit her head struggling. Her wrists burned where the rope cut into them, the fibers rough and unforgiving. Each time she moved, they dug deeper into her flesh.

The wind carried a cocktail of scents: motor oil from the library parking lot where he'd taken her, decaying leaves, the chemical sweetness that still burned her nostrils and made her thoughts blur at the edges. Chloroform. She remembered the sickly smell as he'd pressed the cloth to her face, remembered dropping her ring of keys with their little brass library card scanner, remembered the sound they made hitting the asphalt. Such a small, ordinary sound for the moment her world ended.

Her abductor moved with the efficiency of someone who had done this before. He hadn't bothered with a blindfold—a detail that made her stomach clench. In the beam of his flashlight, she could see the hunter's mask that covered the lower half of his face, dark material that might have been canvas or leather. But his eyes caught the light and held it. Those eyes. There was something familiar about them, something that nagged at the edges of her chloroform-addled mind.

The second length of rope hung from his latex-gloved hand, swaying slightly in the breeze. Laura tried to scream through the cloth wadded in her mouth, but only managed a sound like a wounded animal. The gag tasted of cotton and copper and fear.

"Shhhhh," he whispered, kneeling beside her. His breath fogged in the cooling night air. "Everything dies in its season. Everything must be renewed."

He looped the rope around her neck with terrible gentleness, his fingers brushing against her throat as he worked. The touch made her skin crawl, made her wish he would just hurt her instead of this horrible tenderness. He left it loose for now, the other end trailing down her back.

Somewhere in the darkness, water lapped against wood. The Trinity River. Laura knew these banks—she'd walked here with her sister just last weekend, discussing bridesmaid dresses and flower arrangements for the November wedding. The wedding she would never see now. The tears that slid down her cheeks were hot compared to the cooling night air.

Her captor hummed as he worked—something that might have been a hymn but wasn't quite right, the notes twisting into something darker. He reached into a canvas bag and began pulling out flowers. Not the hardy mums and asters of autumn, but spring flowers: daffodils, tulips, tender blossoms that had no business blooming in October. Their sweetness seemed obscene in the darkness, their presence as wrong as everything else about this night.

With practiced precision, he began weaving the flowers into her hair, ignoring how she trembled at his touch. Some part of her mind, the part still capable of rational thought, noted the ritual-like quality of his movements. This wasn't random. This was ceremony.

He gripped her arm and forced her to her feet, dragging her down the wooden dock. Her feet scraped against the rough planks, leaving trails of blood from her library's sensible shoes. Her nude pantyhose tore at the knees. Such a stupid detail to notice, but her mind latched onto it. She'd bought them at Target last week, a three-pack on sale.

The Trinity River stretched before them like spilled ink, swallowing the beam of his flashlight. The city lights of Dallas reflected off its surface in distorted streaks, so close yetimpossibly far away. Somewhere out there, life went on. People were drinking in bars, watching TV, sleeping in warm beds. Her mother was probably wondering why she hadn't answered her good-night text, a ritual they'd kept since Laura's college days.

"Your death will herald the change," he murmured, his voice almost lost in the sound of moving water. "Like the first frost that kills the summer crop, making way for new growth. You should be honored. You're part of something greater now."

He forced her to her knees at the edge of the dock. The wood was damp beneath her skin, warped from years of river moisture. With methodical movements, he took the free end of the rope around her neck and began securing it to one of the dock's metal cleats.

Laura thrashed wildly, but his knee in her back held her down. The rope grew taut as he worked. Not enough to strangle her—not yet—but enough that each panicked breath was a battle.

She felt his hands on her shoulders, gentle again, almost reverent. "The water will take you," he whispered. "And from your death, new life will bloom."

Then he pushed.

The rope snapped tight around her throat as she fell. Water closed over her head, shockingly cold after the warm October day. Laura kicked desperately, but the rope held her just beneath the surface. Close enough to see the distorted lights of Dallas through the dark water. Close enough to watch spring flowers drift past her face as consciousness began to fade.

The last thing she saw was his silhouette above her, backlit by the city's glow, scattering more flowers onto the water's surface as the Trinity River claimed her for its own.

CHAPTER ONE

Special Agent Morgan Cross felt as if the ground of the graveyard beneath her feet had suddenly given way.

Here, standing in front of the grave of Thomas Grady, she had heard a voice through the sound of raindrops.

She turned to see the man. He took another step closer, his umbrella lifting enough for her to see beneath the veil. She stared at the face she'd been hunting for months—Richard Cordell, in the flesh. The steady patter of rain against his black umbrella filled the silence between them, each drop another heartbeat of tension.

"Very good, Agent Cross." Cordell's smile never reached his eyes, cold and calculating beneath a shock of silver hair. "I was wondering how long it would take you to piece it together."

Morgan's fingers twitched toward where her weapon should be, finding nothing but empty air. She didn’t think to arm up for a funeral, but maybe she should’ve known better.Stupid.The weight of that missing weapon felt like another betrayal, another moment of weakness she couldn't afford.

And here he was—Richard Cordell. The aging man who once worked for the FBI, who once was her father’s superior. The man who she was certain framed her for murder—and got Thomas Grady killed.

Her hand dropped to her side, fingertips brushing against the rough denim of her jeans. Even after returning to the Bureau, she couldn't bring herself to wear the pantsuits that had once been her uniform. Too many memories of court appearances, of being led away in handcuffs while wearing professional attire. The tattoos that snaked up her arms—accumulated during those long years inside—were partiallyvisible beneath her rolled sleeves, a permanent reminder of how much she'd changed.

Three days ago, she'd watched Thomas die on that pier, his blood mixing with the rain as he tried to tell her something about Cordell, about her father. Now here was the puppet master himself, standing at his victim's grave, calm as could be beneath his black umbrella. The manicured cemetery grounds stretched out around them, a sea of granite markers and carefully tended grass. Too peaceful for the violence that had brought them here.

Cordell noticed her aborted reach for a weapon and chuckled, the sound carrying easily over the rain. "The fun and games are over now, Agent Cross. A man is dead." He gestured to Thomas's grave with his free hand, the movement almost graceful. "And now all that's left of John Christopher is you."

Morgan flinched at her father's true name. Even now, weeks after learning it, the sound of it felt wrong. The man she'd known as Christopher Cross had been a different person entirely—or perhaps just a carefully constructed lie. "I only knew him as Christopher Cross," she said, the words bitter on her tongue. Every memory of her father was now tainted with lies—the cabin in the woods where she'd grown up, his stories about working construction, the way he'd tried to talk her out of joining the FBI. She hadn't even been able to attend his funeral, locked in a cell while he was lowered into the ground.

---