“Did this Walter Givens really not remember? You’re sure about that?”

“Yes, I’m positive. Frankly, he isn’t smart enough to fool anyone. Dr. Hicks agreed. He believes someone was strong enough to hypnotize him into committing murder, something Dr. Hicks had a difficult time believing. He wanted to hypnotize Walter, but Walter refused, he was too scared to let someone else fool with his brain.” He paused for a moment. “Actually, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone as scared as Walter Givens was.”

“Can’t say I blame Walter, not after what happened to him.”

“But we have to know how it all came about. Maybe we can talk Walter into the hypnotism tomorrow. Do you know Dr. Hicks patted my hand, told me to figure out how to convince him?”

“Both the victim and the murderer are from the same town? Plackett, Virginia?”

“Yes. Plackett’s a small town about thirty minutes northeast of Richmond, two thousand souls or thereabouts.” He paused for a moment. “Both the murdered man, Sparky Carroll, and Walter Givens, his murderer, from the same town—it’s got to all tie in with this ritual witch’s knife, this Athame.”

“So we have a pissed-off witch on our hands and Sparky Carroll somehow got on his bad side?”

“Sounds like it.”

“I saw an Athame once,” Sherlock said, her voice slurring, she was so tired. “I think it was medieval. It was pretty.”

Pretty? That brutal knife with its ruby dragon eyes staring out had looked alien to him, and malevolent.

Savich pulled the Porsche into the garage, turned in his seat, cupped her beloved face between his hands, leaned forward, and touched his nose to hers. “You scared the crap out of me. I love you.” He kissed her, and took her whispered “I love you, too, and I’m so happy to be here saying that to you,” and when her eyes closed, her mouth still smiling, he finally let go of his fear.

•   •   •

SAVICH LAY ON his back, staring at the dark ceiling, Sherlock’s head on his shoulder. She was boneless, and slightly drunk, with half a bottle of champagne in her bloodstream. Savich wished he’d drunk more champagne, maybe he’d be snoozing, too, but no, his brain was stone-cold sober.

Bless her heart, she hadn’t had time to think about consequences, but Director Comey had. He’d assigned an assistant to handle all the media requests that would be flooding in to the Bureau. He’d also sent two agents to keep the media vans away from the Savich front yard and driveway. He’d laughed, suggested Savich and Sherlock might consider visiting Canada for a while, maybe take Romeo Rodriguez and Father Joseph with them.

Maybe Banff, Savich thought, his exhausted brain finally beginning to fuzz over; he’d like to visit Banff in western Canada. Maybe swim with Sean in Lake Louise. Need a wet suit for that. Did they make wet suits small enough for Sean? Sure, they did.

Savich’s last thought before he fell asleep was how it had been possible for someone to invade Walter Givens’s mind, convince him to murder Sparky Carroll, and then make him forget all of it. And why murder him in the middle of the hallway of the third floor of the Rayburn House Office Building with a witch’s ceremonial knife?

REINEKE POST OFFICE

REINEKE, VIRGINIA

Thursday, 5:15 a.m.

Ellie Moran was a twenty-five-year veteran of the Reineke post office, a woman as stalwart and plain as the boxy red-brick building she worked in. It sat proudly in the middle of High Street, sandwiched between the sheriff’s office and Donut Heaven.

Ellie knew everyone in town, and most of their secrets. She liked to think of herself as the hub of the Reineke gossip wheel. She might not be the postmaster, but she made the place run, and when the new postmaster showed in town the year before, he figured out what was good for him fast enough and fell into line.

She’d learned nearly every job and did each well, but her favorite was greeting the first early truck from the distribution center in Richmond that delivered the big rolling metal OTR package containers. She liked the predawn, enjoyed watching the sky get lighter and lighter as she wheeled the OTRs in from the dock inside the post office and unloaded them into the route hampers. She knew all the contract drivers from the private service the post office used, knew the sound each of their big trucks made as they backed up to the dock to unload the five to ten big OTRs that held up to fifty parcels each. Brakey Alcott was driving the truck this morning. He was young enough to be her son, always sucking down coffee like young people did to stay awake so early in the morning. Usually they joked back and forth as he pushed off the OTRs onto the loading dock, and he usually gave her a wave and called her beautiful as he headed back out again. But there were no jokes today. He was quiet, sort of nervous, and couldn’t wait to wheel the OTRs onto the loading dock and get away. She tried a joke, one of her best ones about the foul-mouthed parrot and the freezer, but Brakey didn’t even seem to hear her. Girl trouble, she thought; she’d bet her new Skechers it was girl trouble.