Dr. Gillian Foster was standing in the video analysis room with a half dozen Lightman Group associates when the door behind them banged open with a thump. Cal Lightman, founder and head of the deception detection agency that bore his name, strode in like a man on a mission.

Work halted as all eyes turned expectantly towards their leader.

He stopped abruptly in the center of the room and stared around at the scattered banks of monitors, each of which showed video footage from one of the cases on which the Group was working.

Then he gestured towards the image on one of the larger monitors that was being analyzed by a fair-haired young woman and an older Indian man.

"What the hell is this?" he demanded peremptorily. "Why're you looking at him? She's the one you want." He pointed at a figure near the periphery of the screen, and then turned on the young woman sitting at the workstation. "How can you be so bloody stupid?"

The girl, whom Gillian recognized as one of the summer interns from Georgetown University, turned red and looked as though she was about to burst into tears.

"And you!" Lightman shouted at the man standing beside her. "You call yourself a detection expert. What the hell do you think you're teaching her? Torres could do a better job than you, and she's only been here six months!"

Gillian stared at Cal in astonishment. She'd just gotten back from a three week assignment in London, and while she was there Loker had emailed her that his boss had been acting strangely –more strangely than usual – but this was the first time she'd seen it for herself.

His hard gaze swept across the speechless group. "I don't know what the hell I'm paying you all for. I really don't."

Then he suddenly cocked his head and sniffed the air. "Anybody smell violets?"

He waited a few seconds for a reply and then, when no one shook themselves out of their stunned silence, abruptly turned and stalked out the door.

----

Gillian stared across at Torres, shocked. "What was that about?"

Ria gave a sharp shrug. "Search me," she replied, almost bristling with irritation. "He's been like that all month. Bursting in, berating everyone, and then just walking out. It's…weird."

Loker nodded. "Definitely weird. And that thing with the violets. He's mentioned that a couple of times."

Torres went on, "At first we thought he was just testing us. You know, some kind of a memory retention exercise of events that take place during a trauma. But not like this, not day after day. It's gone way beyond that now."

Foster frowned. Cal had a certain volatility about him, and a casual arrogance that could be breathtaking at times, but this aggressive, attacking behavior was something she'd never seen before. Something was definitely off. "Has anyone talked to him about it?"

They shook their heads in unison. "We were hoping you'd do it," Loker told her with his customary honesty. "You're the only one of us who's likely to come back alive."

----

TBC