Page 55 of The Girl He Crowned

“That’s easiersaid than done,” Sheriff May said, with a shrug. Paige guessed that it was toomuch to hope for that everything would change in the town just because they’dcaught the serial killer stalking through it.

The sheriff leftto go to whatever press conference the councilor had called. Paige wasn’t goingto attend it, but shedidpull out her laptop and look for the localnews channels. She saw Yolanda Vert standing there beside Sheriff May, managingto look both grave and hopeful at the same time. A reporter thrust a microphonetowards them.

“Lucille Bale,EddisGazette. Is it true that earlier today you were attacked by the PendulumKiller, Councilor Vert?”

Yolanda Vert lookedhaunted for a moment before she started to speak. To Paige, the expressiondidn’t look quite real, and she found herself wondering just how much politicalcapital the councilor was planning to make from being attacked like that. Paigedidn’t agree with Edward Hales on anything else, but she found herselfwondering then if the world might not be better with fewer lies andmanipulations in it.

“I was attacked,”Councilor Vert agreed. “Edward Hales the clockmaker lured me to his family’sbusiness, and tried to strangle me there. I survived only because of thesterling efforts of our sheriff’s department, assisted ably by the FBI.”

Apparently, she’ddecided to make sure that Sheriff May got more of the credit. Paige didn’t careabout that, so long as Edward Hales ended up behind bars. It seemed, though,that the reporter wasn’t going to let it go at that.

“But weren’t theFBI the ones leading the investigation? I have reports that the sheriff hadsettled on another suspect as the potential killer, and that it was the FBI whocontinued to investigate.”

Paige smiledslightly at the question, but turned the channel off. The last thing she neededright then was to listen to arguments over who got the credit for the case.

Even as Paigethought that, though, she heard her phone ring. It was Agent Sauer. Paigepicked up, dreading what he was going to say next. Would he chide her foralmost dying up there on the roof? Would he talk about all the false leadsthey’d had to run down before they’d finally gotten to the truth? Would hesuggest that Melody Smythe’s death had been avoidable, knowing what they nowdid?

If so, it wasnothing Paige hadn’t thought about already, trying to work out if she andChristopher could have gotten answers faster, if there had been a way for themto bring Edward in before he could kill his third victim. She was pleased thatshe and Christopher had closed the case, but the questions remained.

“Sir?” Paige said.

“Agent King,congratulations on closing the case,” Agent Sauer said. “And you did it withoutcausing any additional damage. You even brought the killer in unscathed.”

That hadn’t beeneasy, not when Adam Riker’s words had still been ringing in Paige’s ears, hisoffer to reveal the identity of the Exsanguination Killer if only she killedsomeone, a dark temptation at the back of her mind. Yet ithadn’tbeen atemptation, not really. Adam might want to prove to Paige that she was exactlylike him, yet his efforts only succeeded in proving that Paige didn’t have togive in and be like him, in spite of any similarities in their pasts.

“Agent Marriottand I are just glad that we could stop him,” Paige said.

“It was anacceptable outcome,” Agent Sauer said. “You should be proud.”

Paige had to askwhat she felt was the obvious question. “Sir, does this affect my performancereview?”

Agent Sauer wassilent for a few seconds. “It has shown that you and Agent Marriott are capableof working well together and getting results, but I still have somereservations about the chaos that you cause while doing it. I understand that youdisrupted an opera in a way that posed a danger to yourself and the public,while chasing a man who turned outnotto be the killer?”

Paige was about toask where her boss got his information from, but then realized that an eventlike the chase through the opera house had probably been all over the news.

“At the time, hewas our strongest suspect,” Paige said. “We tried to locate him quietly, but heran because he was involved in other criminal activity. We had every reason tochase him.”

“And if he’scharged with other crimes, that helps,” Sauer said. “But the performance reviewstill has to go ahead. We have to make sure that everything is happening as itshould, by the book.”

“Yes sir,” Paigesaid, even though a frustrated part of her wanted to argue. She hated thatsimply doing her job and catching killers had left her and Christopher facingquestions.

“You did well thistime, though, Paige,” Agent Sauer said. “I look forward to seeing you back inQuantico.”

He hung up,leaving Paige unsure about whether she should be proud of what she’d done here,or worried about maybe getting reassigned. Of course, if she were reassigned,maybe it would be somewhere she could live close to her mother out in Virginia.That would at least make things easier inthatsense.

Only Paige didn’twant to give up her job. She was good at catching serial killers. She’d helpedto take a number of dangerous men off the streets, and it was also the onlyplace she could be to keep going with her attempts to catch the ExsanguinationKiller.

Or was it? Paigehad already been given a chance to see the files on the case, so she knew whatwas in them, but she wasn’t allowed to be a part of the team working the case. Theprogress she’d made since had been because of Adam giving her hints of what heknew in an attempt to manipulate her. Paige could continue to work the casefrom anywhere.

She still didn’twant to change, though. She certainly didn’t want to move out to Virginia withher mother, but Paigecouldthink of an alternative solution, one thatsuited both of them.

She called hermother, waiting for her to pick up while hoping that she was making the rightcall on all of this.

“Paige, sweetie,”her mom said. “Is everything all right?”

“Everything’sfine, Mom,” Paige said. “I just finished a case, so I have a little time beforeI head back to D.C.”

“To Washington?”her mother asked. “Not to Virginia?”

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