“A bloodbath. Like the case you had in Florida. I don’t know much yet. We’ve just arrived. A family, Dan. An old man and an old woman and their health-care worker. All slashed up, hard to tell where one body leaves off and... We’re still waiting on the medical examiner, can’t touch them until he’s here, but when I saw this... Well, I thought of you.”

A stab of lightninglike pain streaked through Dan.

He’d left Florida six years ago over just such a case. They’d had the killer, he’d been certain. But in court, everything had gone to hell. They just hadn’t had enough tangible evidence.

The man had walked free despite Dan believing he’d killed more than once. The guy maintained he’d been a survivor of a brutal attack on a boat—one that killed his wife and best friends, six years earlier.

But then he just happened to be around when very similar murders were committed a mere two hundred miles north of where the first murders had taken place.

He’d claimed he’d moved to Orlando to get away from the horrible memories and therefore couldn’t help but be in the city where the next group of people had been heinously hacked up with an axe and a blade. But it was too much of a coincidence for Dan to ignore.

Calabria. George Calabria. The man said they’d been attacked, and he’d fallen overboard while his wife and others were murdered. He hadn’t known who had attacked him—“a large, dark, shadowy figure from behind.” He’d barely escaped with his own life, falling into the water when he’d been slammed in the head, and then somehow surfacing, maybe semiconscious, and he eventually made it to shore.

There had supposedly been another couple on the boat.

Where was this couple, and who were they?

Some new friends. Out-of-towners they’d recently met. Killed and thrown into the water, according to his story. Or maybe one of them was the killer.

But it was all so far-fetched and suspicious.

Dan was already standing, ready to rush out the door.

“I’m coming.”

“Slow down, Dan. I know this has happened similarly twice before, in Florida. But you need to understand, this is New Orleans. I’m not sure what you know about history here, but we had the infamous Axeman of New Orleans in 1919. And you know media today. They are going to start saying the Axeman is back. The guy that killed everyone back in—”

“1918 to 1919.”

“Uh, right, I think. The point is the city will be in a panic. If you know anything on this, which I’m guessing you do—”

“I know what we can look for... Who we can look for.”

“Okay, maybe. So I need you here. Now.”