Ken Wyatt couldn't believe his eyes.

Wyatt was at home in two worlds. Like a ghost floating between spheres. They called him The Spectre. Not only because of his pale skin and white-blond hair. Because, like a ghost, he wasn't really at home anywhere. He worked at the CIA, and yet he didn't work there. He was the head of the National Clandestine Service, or NCS for short, the intelligence coordination center. An intelligence agency within an intelligence agency.

That's why Wyatt had an office around CIA headquarters in Langley. The NSC was a special federal agency tasked with coordinating activities of the other intelligence agencies of the United States. This included the FBI, the Diplomatic Security Service, or DSS, and many other services that most citizens of the United States didn't know about and didn't need to know about. And the enemies of the West certainly didn't.

As head of the NCS, Ken Wyatt was responsible to the director of the CIA, no one else. At the same time, Wyatt coordinated activities with the Defense Intelligence Agency, or DIA. And thus knew some things that others didn't and shouldn't know, specifically about the military.

Wyatt The Spectre not only looked like a ghost, he could also make things disappear as if by magic. However, he also hoped that those things would stay gone and not reappear.

That was precisely why his breath was caught in his throat.

Because someone had somehow brought the things that had disappeared by magic back into the material world.

Someone had done what everyone was forbidden to do.

Someone had stolen the confidential file from the archives. The file that was supposed to stay there forever. The file only existed in paper form. The file that was never allowed to be digitized.

But what had happened now?

Someone had stolen this file.

Had studied it.

The same person who had sent data.

To Boston.

The person who had made long phone calls.

Also, to Boston.

The person who had passed on information to whomever.

The IP address of the recipient was a government agency in Boston.

From the data, it was the BPD.

And the sender of this information, which no one was ever supposed to see, was Lance Williams.

Why, Wyatt wondered. Why do the best people always have to make the worst mistakes?

He stormed out of his office and ran down the corridor.

xxx

Katherine sat at the conference table with a loud sigh and looked at the others. "The Draftsman felt abandoned by the army?"

"He was pretty freaked out at the time because he couldn't be there for the killing of a senior ISIS leader. But he was told he was too unpredictable for that assignment." Williams flipped through the file he had printed out during the break. "That's why the CIA shipped him far away from the field. Boston, for starters."

Katherine nodded slowly and gritted her teeth. "What was he doing before that?"

"He threatened to shoot his commander. He was given a choice: Either he leaves or gets shot himself."

Elizabeth furrowed her brows. "And now he's here in Boston?"

"Looks that way," Brooks growled, glancing alternately at Williams and the crime scene pictures.

"Maybe to some troop base?" drilled Elizabeth further.

"Possibly."

"We matched the outline on the camera footage to questionable biometric images," said Nick, who had been standing in the doorway all along. "Nothing. We can't find him. Either he doesn't officially exist, or a blocking device has been put in place. We couldn't get a face or a picture in the database." He looked strained in Elizabeth's direction. They both knew that Jane and Eric Weber, a bigwig at the FBI who had helped them once before, were already trying to get the killer's address through the camera footage using the FBI database. But they didn't want to make it too easy for Williams and keep the pressure on a little. If Williams had a perfect contact at the CIA, he should use it while he could.

"And your nephew still thinks it's him?" she asked.

Williams nodded slowly and frowned. "Yes. Because here's the thing: The DNA we found at the crime scene is also in the CIA's database in connection with a special unit, and he's our killer."

Everyone fell silent.

"Identical," Katherine finally murmured. "So he's the one fighting in such a unit."

Now it's finally clear, Elizabeth thought.

Williams continued, "Unfortunately, we still don't know who's behind that DNA. The info is, of course, subject to the highest level of secrecy. My nephew is trying to --" He squirmed because obviously what his nephew was doing was close to accusations of treason. "Well, he's trying to find out the identity of the person to whom the DNA belongs. If there's anything to it at the CIA at all."

"So that's why!" cried Brooks, getting up from his chair in a huff. "That's why we never found anything on the FBI and because there was never really anything there."

Williams nodded slowly. "I'm afraid that's the way it is."

"Whereas he was much more careful in Los Angeles and New York than here," Brooks replied. "He didn't leave as much of his DNA at the scene there, but he did in Boston."

Katherine looked at each one. "Maybe because only the CIA has his DNA, any access to him from investigative agencies is shielded."

"A bit like he's just passing through," Elizabeth said with furrowed brows. "And like he doesn't care what happens at transit sites."

At that moment, the landline in the conference room rang.

Elizabeth picked up the call. Then she handed the receiver to Williams. "It's for you."

Williams got up from his chair and activated the speaker on the landline.

"I've got it," said the voice on the other end of the line.

Williams looked at the other investigators with wide eyes and frowned deeply. "The file?"

"Yes. There's a file on him here," Lance Williams said. "The man's name is Cameron Wilkinson."

Cameron Wilkinson. Elizabeth frantically jotted down the name while her heart, for no apparent reason, began to speed up. She looked at the phone for a long moment. "So?"

"The file has a very high-security level, two below the highest, and is kept top secret."

"But you can get to it?" the detective asked.

"Actually, yes," Lance replied. "But the FBI file is only in hard copy as a paper file now, as the CIA has deleted everything else. There's nothing scanned in anymore, and what I have in my hands is everything that still exists on this case."

"What's it about?"

"Nothing that stands out at first," Lance said. You could hear him flipping through the file. "Anyway, no sex offenses, terrorism, or anything like that would be considered extreme or dangerous."

"Then the file isn't classified because of those offenses?" said Katherine with a furrowed brow.

"No," Lance said after a brief pause, "certainly not."

Elizabeth looked at the phone again. "And what did the killer do before he became the Draftsman?"

"First of all, the man's background is interesting. He was born and raised in Argentina before he came to the United States. Supposedly, his American father shot his mother when she was pregnant with Cameron."

Elizabeth's eyebrows drew together. "What, the man shot his wife who was expecting his child?"

"Yes," she heard Lance's voice through the speaker. "I guess he was probably a pretty big shot back in the U.S. and a psychopath. The shot went through the womb. The baby got shot in the foot, but everything healed. I guess there's still a little scar left. It's not known if the baby was traumatized by this. Anyway, after the incident, he had to be delivered immediately through an emergency C-section and was in an incubator for a couple of weeks." He was silent for a moment. "The mother didn't make it."

Elizabeth nodded slowly and licked her lips. For some reason, she already knew the answer. "And the father?"

"The Argentine authorities couldn't or wouldn't prove anything against him because he supposedly managed to make the gun disappear immediately. Maybe he didn't do it at all."

Elizabeth closed her eyes briefly, shaking her head. "And then, did the boy grow up with his father? Or did he go to a children's home?"

"No, he grew up with his father. I don't know how his lawyer managed that. His lawyer convinced the jury that it was better for the boy than a children's home. But it certainly wasn't better, quite the opposite. Little Cameron was constantly abused and beaten by his father. The man who had shot him in the foot when he was a baby continued to mistreat him blithely after he was born."

Elizabeth nodded slowly. This was indeed something new. That children, especially in precarious milieus, were sometimes tormented shortly after birth was something she knew all too well, even from Boston. But before birth ...?

Katherine looked closely at her sister. "What kind of man was the father?"

"Oscar Wilkinson was a lawyer himself in the United States. Beat his son constantly with a belt and made him stand outside for hours in the heat. He went on record as saying he wanted to make him strong."

Elizabeth's eyes grew wide when she heard the name she had hoped never to hear again in her life, looked at her sister and stopped breathing for a few seconds.

Katherine stiffened and clenched her hands so hard that her knuckles turned white. She closed her eyes to regain her self-control. She forced herself to take a deep breath and then said. "Then out of these vulnerable situations has come the desire to dominate others and thus, vicariously of course, to kill others, in place of his own father. That's Sigmund Freud at its purest."

Williams nodded slowly. "And by eating the heart of his victims, he believes he is absorbing the power of the other."

"What about the cuts?" asked Lance.

"The cuts," said Katherine slowly, "are military insignia of rank, though richly crude. They spring from the killer's desire to build an arm from the vanquished, much like the Norse god Odin in Valhalla, to become even stronger by killing the others."

"Crazy," Lance muttered.

You have no idea how crazy, Elizabeth thought, asking the question she wasn't sure she even wanted to know the answer. "What about the father? Where's Oscar Wilkinson now?"

"He's dead," Lance answered.

Elizabeth blinked a few times and frowned deeply. "Dead?"

"Yes. For several years now."

"A natural death?"

"No."

"Did Cameron --" A dark foreboding rose in the detective.

"Yes. Cameron himself killed him. He had traveled back to Argentina and was hiding in his father's tool shed, waiting for him. One day he snuck up on his father with a gun and executed him with a shot to the neck."

Elizabeth gritted her teeth and nodded a little. "Like a Navy SEAL?"

"That's exactly where he ended up later."

"So, what were the consequences? After the murder, I mean."

"Nobody found the father at first. Cameron wrapped the body in plastic so no smells would get out. At some point, the plastic sheeting burst under the pressure of the rotting gases, and they found the body. By then, though, the son was back on the road in the United States."

"And where was he?"

"In California."

"What was he doing there?"

"Among other things, beating up hippies because he didn't like them. When they'd tell him something about pacifism and ask if he was a pacifist, he'd told them to drop the paci."

"So just --"

"Right. Just Fist."

"But at some point, he ended up in jail?"

"Yes. But not for killing his father; he did that one in Argentina, after all."

Elizabeth's eyebrows drew together, and she looked at the phone intently. "What were the offenses he got caught with?"

"He once defended his cousin in a bar on the highway. She got grabbed by some biker guys, and he killed two of them. He broke one guy's neck, punched the other guy's nose bone into his brain."

"You mean he risked his life for his cousin? That's almost chivalrous."

"That's who he is. It says in the file that he never assaulted anyone weaker in his entire life, and he only got the kick for his ego when he attacked physically strong opponents. As a weak person, there was nothing to fear from him."

"How did he know how to fight so well?"

"Probably, he trained like crazy. Karate. Street fights. Weapons training, the whole nine yards. He perfected that later on."

"And what prison did he serve time in?" wanted Brooks to know. "Falsom? Pelican Bay? St. Quentin?"

"None of the above. They shipped him off to one of those correction boot camps."

"The correctional boot camps that are kind of like jail?" asked Katherine with furrowed brows.

"Yes. The first facilities of this type came up in Georgia and Oklahoma in 1983, and they were specifically for first-time offenders and were supposed to go there first instead of ending up in prison."

"Well, he wasn't a first offender."

"No, but nobody knew that at the time. As I said, his father's murder wasn't discovered until later."

Elizabeth looked at the investigators for a long moment. "Aren't these boot camps a lot tougher than prison?"

"They sure are. Ninety to one hundred and eighty days in a boot camp or correction camp has canceled out up to ten years in jail. It's perfectly legal to send prisoners there instead of to jail, but the prisoner has to agree to the deal. Some even call it a quick and easy fix for troubled teens and young adults."

"And that helps?"

"Often, yes. That's why two-thirds of the states operate such boot camps. There have been thirty deaths in the eighties, but overall the track record is good. And there are more than enough non-natural deaths in a regular prison."

"And how did our killer like it there?"

"Incredible, but true," Lance replied, "our killer performed well there."

"So he did well there, you say? Did he perhaps even like it?"

"It seems so. The drill, the order. The tasks. He was one of the most exemplary prisoners, although I think he accidentally killed someone there."

Elizabeth blinked a few times, then drew her eyebrows together. "Excuse me? Even around boot camp, this Cameron guy killed someone?"

"Yes. But not in the way you'd think. One of the fellow prisoners was beaten up brutally by the supervisors during a drill, so that he passed out. The prisoners were supposed to do a team task, and the person involved was on Cameron's team. He wanted his team to be ready for action, so he gave the unconscious man ammonia to snort so he would wake up. The only problem was that the other guy choked on it when he inhaled it."

"And how did he defend himself?"

"He didn't. He said he wanted to win. And he wanted his comrade to keep fighting. That was the end of the matter for the instructors." Lance paused for a moment. "The instructors, all ex-military, liked Cameron. He was tough, disciplined, and ruthless and fit into that environment. It should have been obvious there by now that he would be best served in the Army. Preferably in a small Special Forces unit where everyone is like him, and no one has to deal with unmotivated, third-rate people who don't take their mission seriously."

"And when he got out of boot camp?"

"He immediately moved on and re-offended right away. He should have been put in an elite unit right away. But that didn't work because of his record and the numerous offenses. He was useless, although he was extremely well-suited for certain things. Well, and then the psychologists at the CIA had a brilliant idea."

Elizabeth took a deep breath and leaned back in her chair. "Unknown Warfare."

"Exactly. You knew the killer would kill again and again, and it was in his nature. Or is, more accurately. On top of that, he was very good at fitting into hierarchies, which made him a top organized killer."

Katherine looked at the others, frowning. "Normal psychopaths can't do that. Not the ones who get violent, anyway. They're lone wolves and usually don't think about the big picture. It seems to be different with Cameron."

"That means he's ruthless enough to kill indiscriminately but has enough discipline to obey orders?" asked Elizabeth, her eyebrows drawn together.

"That seems to be the case," Lance said. "He has everything a killing machine needs."

"And where is he in Boston? Is that in the file?"

Silence.

"Lance," Elizabeth said, "do you know where he lives in Boston?"

Still silence.

"Lance?" said Williams now, rising from his chair. "What's the matter? Are you still there?"

But there was no more sound.

xxx

Lance looked at his office door.

It had opened as if by magic.

He knew the man standing there well, for he was a ghost.

Lance knew what this man was doing.

And the man knew what Lance Williams had done.

And Lance, in turn, knew what was coming now.

The man was known within the Agency only as The Spectre. Everyone hoped he didn't know that nickname, but it was naive to think anything would escape him. Nothing escaped The Spectre. Neither what concerned himself nor what was going on in the Agency.

Lance saw the pale eyes that fixed him like the laser pointer of a sniper rifle. The man's thin, bony hand pointed alternately at Lance, the cell phone, and the computer screen. In his other hand, he held a packet of paper that looked familiar to Lance. That's because he had just scanned some of it with his smartphone and emailed to his uncle in Boston.

"Damn it, Lance," said Ken Wyatt, director of the NCS, the intelligence coordination center, in a pressed, therefore all the more menacing voice. "What the hell are you doing?"