Too soon, Sebastian screeched to a halt beside the warehouse. A white neon sign declared the space the home of the Bayou Ledger. He locked his bike and helped Erin to alight. Lights burned in every window, oblivious to the late hour.

Erin pressed the intercom for admission, and Kelly’s chipper voice asked for her identity.

“It’s Erin Abbott.”

“Hey, Erin! Gabe didn’t tell me to expect you. I guess things are too crazy for him to remember all the details. I swear, if we get this issue out, it’ll be a miracle.”

Erin grinned. “Kelly, can you let me in?”

“Sure thing!” The locks clicked open and Sebastian hauled the metal door aside.

Together, they entered chaos.

Chapter 24

News made itself in an instant, in a second’s thought or indecision. Lives altered course, spun in wild, untried directions. Information slithered in through whispered betrayals or bounded onto consciousness as shouted exaltations to the masses. Febrile and frozen by turns, the daily acts of randomly connected existences conspired to create human drama destined to unfold on oversize sheets creased with ink.

Newsworthy events made themselves over hours and days and years.

The Ledger had one night.

From the confines of his office on the main floor of the converted warehouse, Gabriel surveyed the commotion. He’d expected to be anxious or excited, probably both. He hadn’t expected to feel like a traitor. Even when the one he was about to betray asked him to do it.

The lead story on the twisted triangle of Analise Glover, Nathan Rhodes, and a serial killer was written. Right now, Peter was slashing through it with his green pen, punching up Gabriel’s prose. By morning, readers would know about a murder in California that had come to haunt New Orleans.

By tomorrow night, a killer would be behind bars. As would Erin.

FASCINATED, ERIN ABSORBED the flurry of activity. She and Sebastian halted at the edge of the main floor as a clerk hurried past, a page fisted in his hand. From her perch overhead, Kelly waved down to them. The friendly greeting motioned them inside and signaled that she’d join them soon. Erin intentionally refrained from glancing down the length of the floor to Gabriel’s office. But despite her best efforts, her gaze was drawn in that direction.

Sebastian impatiently observed the surreptitious glances. It didn’t take a genius to guess what she was trying so hard not to look at. Or who. Gabriel Moss had a great deal to answer for, beginning with the smudged shadows beneath Erin’s eyes. And the wounded catch in her voice when she said the man’s name. And agreeing to sign her death warrant by running her struggle for survival in his paper.