Abby couldn’t help but smile at the description. “I like that. Captain America. His nickname around here used to be Boy Scout.” She didn’t mention she was the one who gave it to him all those years ago.
Zooey smiled, clearly delighted with this piece of information.
“So, Head Forensic Expert,” Abby said. “That’s impressive.”
“For someone so young?” Zooey asked, her eyes dancing.
Something told Abby she got this kind of comment a lot. “Sorry,” she said. “I just . . . how old are you?”
“Twenty-two,” the girl replied.
Abby frowned. “I thought the FBI had age requirements.”
“They do,” Zooey nodded. “Not so much for me, though.”
So Paul had called in a girl genius who looked like she’d stepped out of a punky Doris Day world?
“I’m very good at my job,” Zooey assured her.
“I’m sure you are,” Abby said. “I really don’t mean to question your skill. I’m . . . this whole thing . . . it’s been a long week,” she finally managed to say.
Zooey shot her a sympathetic look, reaching out and patting her hand. “I understand,” she said. “You did something pretty incredible, Abby. You saw something no one else did. All the experts, all the lawyers, and none of them saw what you did.”
There was knocking at the front door, followed by Roscoe barking and dashing out of the kitchen to confront the new person in his territory.
“Hey, buddy, it’s just me,” Abby heard Paul’s voice say. Then footsteps, and he was in the doorway of the study, wearing a plaid flannel shirt and jeans that had holes in the knee and he looked so much like himself, so much like the boy she remembered, her heart stuttered in her chest for a moment.
“Whoa, boss, you’ve gone all country,” Zooey said. “Are those cowboy boots?” She whipped her phone out, taking a picture, cackling, when Paul shot her a disapproving look.
“Did you bring everything?” he asked.
Zooey nodded. “Can I set up in here?”
“Let’s do it,” he said.
The girl pulled a laptop and a digital projector out of her bag, setting them on Abby’s father’s old cherrywood desk and sitting down at it. “This is gonna take a few minutes,” she said.
“Do you want something to drink or eat?” Abby asked, finally remembering her manners. She realized once again she was still in her pajamas.
“I’m fine,” Zooey replied.
“I’m going to get dressed,” Abby said.
She had almost escaped down the hall when Paul’s voice stopped her at the foot of the stairs. She sighed, closing her eyes and steeling herself before she turned around.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
Of all the things she was expecting, that was the last thing she could’ve imagined.
“I shouldn’t have been so derisive about your theory at first,” he said. “You were right.”
“Thank you,” she said.
“This is going to be difficult,” he said. “I spent last night going through the FBI file on Cass. There are crime scene photos. I wanted to warn you before Zooey let you look at it.”
There he went again, trying to protect her like she was still a little girl. A part of her prickled at the idea that she needed a warning. Another part felt the warm glow of safety. And yet another part was grateful, because there are some things you cannot unsee. And your best friend’s body is one of them.
“I’ll be right down,” she said as her answer, and he didn’t try to stop her again as she went up the stairs.
By the time Abby got back downstairs, Zooey had everything ready, her projector set up to beam against the wall behind the desk.
“I took down the painting,” Zooey said, gesturing to the oil painting Abby’s great-grandfather had done of his hunting dogs back in the day. “I hope that’s okay.”
“It’s fine,” Abby said, taking the painting and setting it out of the way. “So, how does this start?”
“I had Zooey pull up all the FBI files on Dr. X. Not just Cass’s case, but the other twelve girls.”
“I read them on the plane,” Zooey said.
“All of them?” Abby asked, shocked.
“I read fast,” Zooey replied. “So here’s the thing.” She tapped on the portable keyboard in her hand, and photos of thirteen girls suddenly appeared on the wall. All of them had long, dark hair, and Cass’s photo was at the bottom of the row, with a red circle around it. “Cass was definitely X’s type. He likes sweet-faced brunettes. But there are a few things that stand out about Cass.”
“Like what?”
“All the others have girls who have dark eyes,” Zooey explained.
“When there’s no variety like that, in such a large victim pool, that tells us that he has a very specific type. Deviating from that even a little is unusual,” Paul added.
“That makes sense,” Abby said. “But we already know that X didn’t kill Cass.”
“This is about the other guy,” Zooey said. “See, if we can narrow down the differences between Cass and X’s victims, then we can start to form a victim profile for our unsub.”
“Normally, our profiler does this,” Paul told Abby. “But she’s on another case.”
“And I’ve been working with Grace, learning profiling and experimenting with some algorithms,” Zooey said. “I’ve got five variables where Cass doesn’t match X’s other victims.” She punched a few keys, and the girls’ photos disappeared, and a list appeared.
Eye Color
Athleticism
Only Child
Two Parent Household
Family Economic Status
“So, you’re saying these things are why the unsub took Cass?” Abby asked. How could she be sure? It seemed like such an arbitrary list.
“Maybe,” Paul said. “He may not recognize that he has preferences. Or he may be aware of them. It depends on how sophisticated he is.”
“Oh, he’s sophisticated,” Zooey said.
Paul frowned at her. “What do you mean?” he asked.
“I didn’t want to tell you until my program finished running,” Zooey explained. “But I put Code Sibyl on it.”
“Zooey,” Paul broke in, and there was warning in his voice. “That’s not approved yet.”
“Only because the government is slow,” Zooey said. “Do you want to know what I found?”
“What’s Code Sibyl?” Abby hated this feeling of being in the dark.
“It’s a computer program I designed,” Zooey said. “To catch serial killers.”
“You’re kidding me.” Abby looked at Paul, like, who the hell is this person?
He sighed. “It analyzes a killer’s victimology and preferences, and identifies potential victims by working through all the records on John and Jane Does, current cases, cold cases, missing persons reports, etc. It hasn’t been field-tested yet.”
“Well, I kind of did a field test. On the plane,” Zooey broke in.
“What did you find?” Paul asked.