Chapter 3 After ten years

Island's POV

The radio stayed off.

I couldn't stand the noise, not tonight, not with Rob's words looping in my head on repeat.

The victim has a mark. The same mark. I think we just found your ghost.

My hands were steady on the wheel. Good. That was something.

A star, I told myself. It's probably nothing. Copycats exist, coincidences exist. Kansas City is a big city and stars are a common enough shape to carve into someone's skin if you're some kind of sick…I didn't believe a single word of it.

The closer I got to Fifty-seventh and Eighth, the brighter the night became. Red, blue, red….blue. The flashing lights bounced off storefront windows and parked cars, painting the street in restless color.

I turned onto the block and immediately saw why Chief Rob had sounded the way he did.

Chaos.

News vans lined both sides of the street, satellite dishes pointed toward the sky. Reporters stood behind a wall of microphones, speaking urgently into cameras while producers barked instructions through headsets. Police cruisers crowded the driveway of a sprawling mansion hidden behind wrought-iron gates.

Even from the street, I recognized the house.

Everyone in Kansas City did.

Zane Chandler.

Hockey's golden boy.

The man whose face smiled from billboards, cereal boxes, sportswear ads, and every television in Missouri whenever hockey season rolled around.

Tonight, those same cameras weren't celebrating him…They were waiting to watch him fall apart.

I parked behind an unmarked sedan and climbed out. The October air bit through the thin fabric of my shirt, but I barely noticed. My badge hung from my belt, my weapon rested comfortably against my hip, my heartbeat...That was another story.

I pushed toward the crowd.

"Agent coming through."

A uniformed officer spotted me and immediately lifted the yellow tape.

"Evening, Agent Meyers."

I nodded once. No small talk. Not tonight.

The moment I ducked beneath the tape, the shouting faded behind me.

"Mr. Chandler!"

"Is it true your sister was murdered?"

"Did you see the killer?"

"Officer! Officer! Can you confirm rumors of ritual markings?"

The tape swallowed their voices.

Inside the house it was almost peaceful, but the wrong kind of peaceful. Camera shutters clicked in a steady rhythm. Technicians moved carefully in their gloves. Evidence markers dotted the floor like a strange yellow constellation. Somebody murmured measurements into a recorder in a flat, clinical voice.

The metallic smell reached me before I crossed the threshold. Blood…Fresh and too much of it.

I stepped inside and my eyes swept the room automatically.

Forced entry...None.

Furniture disturbed...Minimal.

One overturned chair, a shattered picture frame, drops of blood leading nowhere. Forensic markers dotted the hardwood floor like tiny yellow tombstones.

I've walked into more crime scenes than I can count. I knew how to keep my face still. I knew how to let the horror slide off me until I'm home, alone, and it's safe to feel it. But this one….this one didn't slide off. This one dug in.

I made myself walk closer and my gaze settled on the body.

Young female, early twenties, gray hoodie, jeans and bare feet. No defensive wounds on her hands. She hadn't fought. She hadn't even seen it coming.

Katie Chandler.

I walked closer.

Every instinct I possessed screamed at me to stop.

I didn't.

One step. Then another.

The medical examiner looked up as I approached.

"Agent..."

I barely heard him. My attention stayed on her face.

No… Not her face.

Her eyes.

Or rather...The empty spaces where they should have been.

My pulse stumbled and a cold weight settled in my chest.

Then I saw it…The star, five points, cut with impossible precision into the bridge of her nose and deep enough that whoever carved it hadn't hesitated.

My vision blurred.

No...

No, no...Not again.

For a heartbeat, the living room disappeared and a different hallway came into view. A different night.

My father's hand reaching toward me, blood spreading beneath him. The same star. The same impossible question echoing through frightened detectives.

What the hell could've done this?

My father's hand, open and empty. Shoes by the door that would never be worn again. Someone was screaming and it took me a full ten seconds to realize it was me. A star…the same star. Flashing lights outside a house that used to be home.

"Agent?"

The voice snapped me back and I blinked.

The room returned and Katie lay exactly where she'd been.

My hands were trembling.

Damn it.

I curled them into fists before anyone noticed.

"Excuse me,"

I said to no one, and walked out the back door into the yard. The night air was cold enough to hurt. Good. I needed something to hurt on the outside.

I clenched my fists until my nails bit into my palms. Breathed in. Breathed out and looked up at a sky with no stars in it, which felt like the only mercy I'd get tonight.

Ten years.

Get it together, Island. You're not seventeen anymore. You're the lead agent. Act like it.

"You okay?"

Chief Rob stood beside the porch railing, coffee in one hand.

"I'm good."

His eyes searched mine. He didn't push. Rob had known me long enough to know when a lie needed to stay a lie.

"You recognize it."

It wasn't a question. I looked back through the open front door.

"They're identical."

He exhaled slowly.

"I was afraid you'd say that."

"What do we know?"

"Victim's Katie Chandler. Twenty-two."

"Time of death?"

"ME's estimating somewhere between six and nine tonight. Zane Chandler found her when he got home from the game.”

"Witnesses?"

"None."

"Murder weapon?"

He shook his head.

"Nothing."

I frowned.

"No footprints?"

"Nothing useful."

"No cameras?"

"The security system was disabled."

Professional…Too professional. Whoever had done this hadn't panicked. They'd planned every second.

Rob rubbed the back of his neck.

"The brother found her."

"Is he here?"

He nodded toward the living room.

"Hasn't moved much."

Before I could answer, a young officer hurried onto the porch.

"Agent Meyers?"

"Yes?"

"The victim's brother wants to speak with whoever's leading the investigation."

Rob looked at me.

"You ready?"

No. I wasn't. I fucking wasn't ready.

"I am."

The officer led me back inside. The room seemed even quieter now. Everyone watched without appearing to watch.

Then I saw him.

Zane Chandler.

He stood near the staircase. Six-foot-three, maybe, broad shoulders, athletic build and expensive clothes stained with drying blood. His dark hair looked like he'd been dragging his hands through it for the last hour.

His eyes...Red, from crying. He looked nothing like the smiling superstar from television. He looked broken.

He noticed me approaching. For a second...Confusion crossed his face. His gaze traveled from my boots....to my badge....to my face.

Then he let out a short, bitter laugh.

"You've got to be kidding me."

The room went still.

He looked me up and down again, disbelief hardening into anger.

"This is who you sent?"

No one answered.

"My sister's dead..."

His voice cracked.

"And you brought a rookie?"

Silence settled over the room. Every detective suddenly became fascinated with their own paperwork.

I held his gaze. I didn't flinch or react.

"Are you finished?"

His jaw tightened. The anger in his eyes burned brighter.

Good…Angry people talked. Grieving people remembered things, and right now...I needed him talking. Not because he was Zane Chandler, not because the cameras outside cared. But because somewhere...Someone had carved a star into his sister's face.

And after ten years...I intended to find out why.