They were gathering in the war room with the first coffee of the day to go over what they had, what they needed, who would do what. Someone had turned on the TV they mostly used to look at video of crime scenes and interviews with suspects.

Mendez looked at Vince, who was shaking his head and pinching the bridge of his nose, pained literally and figuratively.

Bordain looked like she was about to get on a horse and go foxhunting in her brown tweed riding jacket and dark brown gloves. She was making an appeal for any information that might lead to the arrest of Marissa Fordham’s killer. She was personally offering a reward of $25,000.

“Who told her she could do that?” Mendez asked, looking at Dixon.

“Don’t look at me,” the sheriff said. “I specifically told her we would handle everything.”

“Did she say anything about a reward last night?” Vince asked.

“She offered to do it,” Dixon said. “I told her we’d discuss it and get back to her.”

“I guess that shows how much she values your opinion,” Hicks said.

“It would never occur to her that she needed permission to do anything,” Vince said. “She thinks she’s being helpful.”

A reward was a tool. If they offered one, when they offered one, what amount was offered, were all decisions that had to be made carefully with many different factors taken into consideration. Too large a reward offered too soon invited the greedy, vindictive people in the county to give up whoever they hated most in their life on the off chance that they might end up collecting some cash. With $25,000 at stake, the phones would be ringing off the hook with leads that would lead nowhere.

“What do you think, Vince?” Dixon asked.

Leone dragged a hand back through his salt-and-pepper mane and heaved a big sigh. He looked like shit—pasty and haggard. It had been a long night. Anne had refused to leave Haley Fordham. Vince had refused to leave Anne. He had spent the night on a chair in the corner of the little girl’s room.

Feeling like a heel, Mendez sank down into a chair at the other end of the table from Vince, who spread his hands and shrugged.

“There’s nothing you can do about it now,” he said. “Put some extra personnel on the phones and be prepared to chase your tails.”

“How will this sit with our perp?” Hamilton asked.

“Hard to say. As far as we know, we’re not dealing with a habitual predator,” Vince said. “A serial killer might take it as a challenge or a chance to gloat. We must be desperate, throwing all that money around. Maybe he should taunt us, play with us, toss us another victim.