Page 30 of Twelve
That wasn’t me profiling the killer. That was me profiling the woman standing two steps above me—and that distinction was enough to send my heart pounding in my ears.
As if from a great distance, I heard Lia confirm that every word that the psychologist had just spoken was true. Her guilt was centered on Mackenzie.
You’re the reason she’s still in such a precarious position.A crack of thunder drowned out every other noise in the stairwell, but not the deafening roar of my own thoughts.But you’re not the only reason.
Mackenzie’s psychologist wasn’t the only one who’d spoken up and whose words had kept Mackenzie out on that ledge.You weren’t the only person in that room with a background in psychology, motivation, mental illness, and the human mind.
I had similar training—and I was willing to lay a lot of money on it that any crisis negotiator worth his salt had the same.
You’re the one in control here,Quentin Nichols had told Mackenzie.It’s your decision.
I’d assumed that he hadn’t realized how Mackenzie would take a man in a position of powergivingher control, like it was his to dole out. But in Quentin Nichols’s line of work, hehadto know what to say, how to manipulate a target, how to defuse a dangerous situation…
Or how to blow it up.
YOU
The boards are off the windows. It’s just you and Mackenzie now, separated by feet.
Soon to be inches.
Clearing the room before the FBI agent returned was the right call. You promised Mackenzie’s mother that this would be over shortly.
It will be.
You wouldn’t have chosen Mackenzie. She’s younger than Cara was—younger than you were when Cara died—but she’s hurting. You can see that. You feel it. This child is hurting. She will always hurt.
She needs you.
You didn’t arrange for Mackenzie to be standing on that ledge. You didn’t befriend her, didn’t mentor her, didn’t lead her to this place. She’s not like the others, but she needs you all the same.
Needs this.
And after Kelley? Your heart ticks up a beat. You need this, too.
Ipushed past the psychologist and bolted up the stairs, aware that Michael and Lia were following on my heels, but focused only on Mackenzie.The ledge. It’s slick now. You’re shivering. What’s he saying to you?
What is he nudging you to do?
I reached the ninth-story landing to find Mrs. McBride and the fireman standing to one side. Celine was on the other side of them, fighting with the door to the lightroom. It was jammed.
The ladder was up.
“Mackenzie let us take the boards off the window,” Mrs. McBride told me, breathless, glowing, and fighting tears. “Quentin said she needed space—but she’s coming down.”
They’d left her alone with him—and based on the trouble Celine was having with the door, he’d locked them out.
“Nichols isn’t talking herdown,” I told Celine, keeping my voice low. “We have to get in there.Now.”
It took time for the fireman to cut through the door, time for Celine to pull down what was left of the ladder.
Time we didn’t have.
Per protocol, Agent Delacroix pulled herself up first. I followed a heartbeat later—screw protocol. On the far side of the room, Mackenzie stood ramrod still on the ledge, the window open, the remains of the barricade scattered on the floor.
Quentin Nichols stood between her and us—close enough that he could have pulled Mackenzie in.
If he’d wanted to.
