“That helps,” she muttered to herself. “Why? Why that knife? Why slash the victims? What are you doing? Who are you seeing as they die in front of you, by your hand?”

The organization, the planning, the pattern—all suggested a specific motive, beyond convenience, for choosing his victims. This was her biggest obstacle now: how did the Triple Killer decide whom to kill? How did each, in his sick mind, satisfy his pattern? It wasn’t wholly unusual for a serial killer to mix victim races or ages, sometimes out of opportunity and impulsivity, but it was highly uncommon to mix races and ages and genders. That suggested a more random approach... Yet some of the victims did have things in common, even if none of them knew each other, as far as each investigation had been able to uncover. But two nurses? One Asian, one Caucasian. Two off-duty cops? The first Japanese, the second Caucasian. And, she supposed, the vice principal in Portland (Caucasian) and the college professor in Missoula (Black) could be considered working in the same field—they were both, in a sense, educators. But he deviated on race and gender and age. Rare. Very rare.

Maybe drawing any conclusions from the few similar elements was a stretch. Nursing and education and law enforcement are common professions. Could the killer have an issue with authority? She almost laughed out loud at the thought. Of course the majority of serial murderers had serious problems with authority—it was usually an authority figure who first identified the future killer’s psychopathic tendencies—a parent, a teacher, a cop. Or an authority figure who abused the killer in his youth.

Perhaps his parents were in one or more of those professions. Perhaps his mother was a nurse, his father a cop. His mother a teacher, his father a doctor. Maybe. Maybe...

There was something here, but she couldn’t quite grasp it.

She needed more background on all the victims. That had been a problem from the start—these victims all appeared to be average people leading average lives with no apparent connection to one another. But each had to hold a particular significance for the killer. The more Catherine thought about it, the more convinced she became that he specifically chose these victims.

Don’t judge a book by its cover.

Cliché, but it was cliché for a reason. The circumstances appeared random. Indoors, outdoors. Two in their own homes, but most in places they didn’t frequent. It was too early to know if Victoria Manners was connected to Liberty Lake—or if the killer purposely chose that location for another reason. She lived and worked in Spokane. Why kill her and leave the body in Liberty Lake?

Catherine flipped through her notes, thinking she might see something relevant, but she was wrong. One of the first victims lived in a Portland suburb, but was killed within the Portland city limits, on the banks of the Columbia River. Two of the Missoula victims lived outside of the city limits but worked within the city—and their bodies were found within the city.