The Devil's Daughter (Hidden Sins #1)(52)
Damn it.
Eden set the report down carefully and took an equally careful drink of her coffee. She’d read worse reports in her years in the Bureau. Reports concerning children or torture or any number of things that gave her nightmares plenty of fodder—as if she didn’t have enough already. But none of those other victims had been connected quite as closely to Eden.
Steeling herself, she picked up the report and started reading again. She froze at the description of the newly inked tattoos. She’d known they existed—the ones in the picture were what had brought her back here in the first place—but she hadn’t realized there were four.
She flipped through the pictures beneath the written report, setting each of the tattoos out and tracing them with her gaze. The picture that had brought her back to Clear Springs in the first place had been at a distance—close enough to identify the newly inked tattoo, but the dirt and bruises had kept her from seeing it clearly.
Now that she could, she picked out differences between the tattoos on the dead girl and the ones Martha gave each cult member. They weren’t particularly clear to the untrained eye, but there were hesitation marks throughout the lines. Eden traced the bat with her finger. The differences could have been because the victim fought. That would make sense.
But Eden didn’t think so.
I fought every single tattoo my mother gave me, and there still weren’t hesitation marks like this.
She turned to the key. It had the same hesitation marks she’d seen on the others, but that didn’t change the fact that it existed at all. No one had that tattoo except Eden, Persephone to her mother’s Demeter. No one even knew about that tattoo.
She dropped the pictures and surged to her feet. Maybe I’m just being paranoid. Or maybe I’m not paranoid, but I’m so used to being paranoid that I’m ignoring evidence because I really, really don’t want this girl to have died to bring me back here. She walked to where she’d tossed her phone onto the middle of the bed and dialed numbly. It wasn’t until she heard her boss’s answer that the time registered. It’s one a.m. on the East Coast. Not that she could be certain Britton was in Quantico—he traveled nearly as often as his teams did.
“Eden.”
She took a deep breath. “I’m in trouble.”
“Tell me.” No recrimination, no telling her that coming to Clear Springs in the first place was a bad idea. Just a calm order for more information.
Some of the tension bled out of her shoulders. “You’re familiar with the case.”
It wasn’t quite a question, but he answered all the same. “I’m up-to-date.”
She didn’t ask how that was, since Britton made a habit of knowing things he couldn’t possibly know. It was just one of those things people started taking for granted after a while. When she’d first become an agent, she’d harbored half a dozen theories on how he knew the things he did, ranging from a complex network of informants to a crystal ball, but she’d stopped questioning it. He was just that good.
Eden’s gaze tracked back to the photos. “I’m more connected than I first thought. I share a tattoo with the dead girl—I’m the only one who shares that tattoo. Before you say coincidence—”
“Eden, I would point out that you sharing such a prominent trait with the victim—in addition to the superficial similarities and the connection with the Elysians—is unlikely to be a coincidence.”
“I know that. You trained me to know that.” She sank onto the sofa, her heart in her throat. “Someone left me a present today. I’m reasonably sure I left my car locked, but it’s possible I didn’t, because this place messed with my head.”
Britton was silent for a beat and then another. “You need to convince Sheriff Owens to officially ask for BAU assistance. Once he does, I’ll send in Vic.”
“Britton—” She stopped her instinctive denial that she needed help. If she was in his position, she’d do the same thing. “You’re right.”
“Bring me up-to-date.”
“We have one girl dead, and another who could be her sister in the looks department missing. Every point of the way, there is evidence linking up to me—to my past.” She went over the case one point at a time. “The cult is centered around the very idea of the prodigal daughter—I fit the bill. I had no intention of ever coming back, and everyone associated with Elysia during the time I was there knows that, so I have to assume the new recruits would know as well. Both the girl killed and the girl missing are petite with dark hair and dark eyes. I’m blondish now, but as a teenager my hair was the same color. The girl who was found has the same tattoos I do, and I think it’s safe to say she wasn’t any more consenting to them than I was.” She clamped her mouth shut. She hadn’t meant to say that last bit aloud. When Britton didn’t say anything, she straightened and continued, “Add to that the fact that someone has left me a present, and I’m reasonably sure there was someone in my room while I was gone, and it’s hard to think I’m not connected to this somehow.”
“You know as well as I do that psychology and profiling are vital components to what we do, and everything you’ve just told me leads me to believe it’s personal. If it’s personal, Eden, that means you’re somehow involved, whether you want to be or not.” He sighed. “Frankly, I wish it weren’t. You’re too close to this case because of your mother and your history, and if I could get you out of town right now, I would.”