"You look awful."

"Thanks, Dave. It's always lovely to see you too," Killian deadpanned, as his friend sat a mug of coffee down in front of him. He reached out for it and took a long sip, savoring the bitter taste that exploded over his tongue before he raised his eyes to ask, "How did it go yesterday, with the team sorting the fanmail?"

"They're not even halfway through it yet," David sighed. "There are thousands of pieces there, and what they're doing isn't a quick and simple search. But what they have sorted through so far hasn't thrown up any connections to our guy. What about you? Did you have any luck with Emma Swan yesterday?"

"Plenty. Which is why I've been here for three hours already," he groaned, running both of his hands through his hair. Killian picked up the file that had been sat on one side of his desk and tossed it over the table for his friend to flick through.

"Emma helped us to identify another of our victims, and she's given us a connection between them all too."

"Critics?"

"Isn't everyone these days?" Killian challenged. "From what we've been able to dig up so far, the girls we have identified are actually legitimate journalists." It had come as something of a surprise to him. He hadn't realized that websites actually paid people to attack celebrities the way these women had, and for such trivial things too. One of their articles about Emma that he'd read was simply a list of all the worst outfits she'd ever worn – and most of the pictures they'd used to illustrate said outfits were years old. "They've all written some pretty high-traffic hit pieces on Emma, which is what we think is the killer's motive behind the attacks. I've got some of the guys from tech running down other pieces that female journalists have written about her. Maybe we'll be able to connect a name to a missing person's report and ID our last victim."

David nodded his head in understanding but didn't lift it from the file he was still flicking through. "The note changed this time," he murmured.

"Yeah. Our killer seems to be spiraling. But hopefully the new information we have will let us catch him before his mental stability can decline any further."

"What do you need me to do?" David asked, finally snapping the file closed.

"I need a list of everyone who's purchased tickets for Emma's tour dates. Cross-check the names on each one. See if any of them appear more than a couple of times. If this guy is as obsessed as his actions suggest, then we might get a hit that way," Killian explained. "I also wanna send someone out to Emma's neighborhood to ask the people in her community if they've seen anything suspicious recently. Do you think you could coordinate that for me?"

"Of course," David assured him. His friend looked like he needed a good night of sleep, but he assumed that Killian had leads of his own to chase down, given that he was delegating to others. "What about you? What are your plans for the day?"

"I have to go and tell a woman that her daughter's never coming home," he sighed, pushing his chair away from the desk to stand up and stretch out his aching muscles. "After that, I'm gonna call in and see Liam and Ellie. I canceled on them again last night, so I have some groveling to do."

"Do you want me to come with you to tell the mother?" David asked, as he watched his friend gather a few files from his desk before reaching into a drawer for his badge and gun.

"Nah. Someone needs to chase down these leads, and I'd rather it be someone I trust. You don't mind, do ya?"

"Not at all," David replied. "I'll call you if I find anything promising."

"Thanks, mate."

The worst part of Killian's job was always delivering bad news. He could still remember the first time he'd gone with a supervisor to do just that. The guy had pulled him aside to warn Killian not to let his emotions show until they were away from the victim's family. It had been much easier said than done. He could still see the exact moment the woman's heart had broken when she'd found out that her husband wouldn't ever be coming home, and that look had haunted his dreams for months after that day.

Over the years he'd gotten better at dealing those blows. He'd learned to switch off the side of his brain that wanted nothing more than to hold those poor people as they cried for their loss while making promises that he wasn't sure he'd ever be able to keep. He'd learned to push those experiences down, to bury them under months of happy memories with his brother and his niece, so that he could sleep relatively peacefully every night. But it hadn't been easy.

As the navigation system in his car told him that he'd arrived at his final destination, Killian took a moment to switch off that compassionate side of his brain before he finally climbed out. The neighborhood he was in looked like a nice one, the kind where people living in it would never have expected the sort of news he was about to deliver. Which didn't make the task ahead of him any easier to face.

After rapping his knuckles sharply on the white wooden door, he reached into his back pocket for his badge and waited for someone to answer it.

"Yes?"

"Mrs. Bell? My name's Special Agent Jones and I work for the FBI. Would you mind if I came in?" he asked, holding out his credentials for the older woman to check over.

When she was satisfied that he was who he claimed to be, Mrs. Bell pulled the door open wider and ushered him through to the living room before closing it softly behind him.

"Can I get you anything to eat or drink, Special Agent Jones?"

"No, I'm fine, thank you," he assured her, as he took a careful seat on the edge of her sofa. The woman seemed to know that something bad was coming, as she hesitated before taking her own. But she didn't voice her concerns.

Killian let his gaze wander around the space for just a moment, taking in the pictures that decorated the walls and the mantlepiece. Even from a distance, he could tell he was in the right house, and for just a second, he hated himself for what he was about to do.

"I apologize for disturbing you this morning, Mrs. Bell, but I'm afraid I have some bad news," he began carefully.

The woman's eyes were already watering but she nodded her head for him to continue anyway.

"It's about your daughter, Isobel."

"Oh God, no!"

"I'm so very sorry to have to tell you this, but I'm afraid we found Isobel's body a few weeks ago."

The chilling cry of agony that left the older woman's throat was one that Killian knew he would never be able to forget.

Sorry for being MIA for a while. I had to take a step back to work on improving my health and then catch up at work.

Thanks for reading and reviewing.