Simon’s gaze returns. “Yes. It was foolish of you to bring her.”

“Then you have extra incentive to win.” Emma takes a step closer. “If you tell me the answer, I can help you.”

“I thought you’d have figured it out yourself by now. I mean, you’re reasonably intelligent.… Yes, I’m sure you can manage.”

A prickle of awareness on her skin. “You think I can work it out from the information I already have?”

“Why not.” He smiles in anticipation.

“Simon, we’re running out of time. We’re not in a fairy tale now, this isn’t Rumpelstiltskin.…” She stops when she sees it’s no use. In Simon’s kingdom, he gets to make the rules.

Emma presses down hard on this strangling sense of urgency, tries to think. There’s something wrong here. Something is disturbing her, like hearing a familiar piece of music played slightly off-key. Simon’s presence obliterates her concentration, but she has to ignore that—she needs to narrow this down.

To find the right questions, she returns to basics.

“Simon, why is the Butcher focused on teenagers? You said the Butcher is trying to kindle a light inside himself, using young people’s blood.”

His head turns back. “I did, didn’t I.”

“So he doesn’t have that light already? Is he unwell, or impaired in some way?”

“In a manner of speaking.” Simon examines his nails.

“He’s trying to kindle youth, is he—” The natural trajectory of this makes her pause. “Simon, is he older?”

He cocks an eyebrow, and for a moment she can’t breathe. This whole time, they’ve been tracking a young man—eighteen to twenty-five. That’s what Cooper said; that’s what all the evidence pointed to.…

“Is the fog clearing, Emma?”

She realizes she’s been staring at Simon without seeing him. Now her eyes focus as she thinks of a new question. “Simon, how did the Butcher know to communicate with you through the Washington Post?”

“What an interesting question. Perhaps he assumed I read the papers.”

“But how would he know that?” She tracks the dark motes spinning in his eyes. “And how would he know which papers you receive? You and Kristin are from New Hampshire—you could’ve been reading your local paper for all anyone knew.”

“Perhaps it was mentioned in an article or something, around the time of my trial.”

She knows he’s lying. “I don’t think so.”

She squints, looks across to Bell. When she gestures for him to approach, he’s reluctant. She glares. He grimaces, starts walking over.

“Ahhh.” Amusement in Simon’s voice. “We couldn’t make sense of the numbers.… I knew you said ‘we.’ So Mr. Bell is part of the ‘we’? How interesting.”

Emma doesn’t respond to that. Bell finally arrives, standing a good three feet farther back from the barricade, pointedly ignoring Simon.

“What do you need?” he asks Emma.

“An answer to a question.”

“Now?”

“Now is all we have. During Simon’s trial, was there anything mentioned in the press coverage about how he reads the Washington Post? Do you remember anything?”