Page 40 of Whispers in the Night

Harper felt her eyes growing heavy. The darkness, the gentle patter of rain outside, Silas’s presence—it all combined to make her feel, for the first time in months, safe enough to sleep.

“You can stay,” she murmured, already drifting off. “If you want. Just...stay.”

“I’ll stay,” Silas said quietly. “I’ll be right here. You’re safe, Harper. I promise.”

And for once, Harper believed it.

She fell asleep to the sound of rain on the sills and Silas’s steady breathing. And when the nightmares came—when she saw Nicole’s face morphing into her own—she heard Silas’s voice cutting through the darkness, calling her name, bringing her back.

She was safe.

For now.

But the killer was still out there. Still planning. Still preparing for his masterpiece.

And time was running out.

Chapter 8

Silas woke in the chair by Harper’s window, his neck screaming in protest. Gray morning light filtered through the curtains. Rain still pattered against the glass—the storm hadn’t let up overnight.

He checked his watch. Six-thirty a.m. He’d been in the chair for maybe three hours, watching Harper sleep. Making sure she was safe. Making sure no one came through that window or door.

Old habits from Afghanistan. Guard duty. Protect the base. Protect your team.

Protect her.

Silas stood carefully, working the kinks out of his spine, his knees protesting loudly. Harper was still asleep, curled on her side, one hand tucked under her pillow. She looked younger in sleep, the tension that normally lined her face smoothed away. Peaceful.

He shouldn’t be here. Shouldn’t have stayed in her room all night, watching her sleep like some kind of stalker. But she’d asked him to stay, and he hadn’t been able to refuse.

Just until we catch him,he reminded himself.That’s all this is. Protection detail. Nothing more.

But even as he thought it, he knew it was a lie.

Something had shifted last night. Some wall he’d built around himself had cracked, and Harper Sinclair had slippedthrough. He’d told her about Scout, about the last innocent thing in his life. He’d admitted he wanted to go back, be the person he was before Afghanistan broke him.

He’d let her see him.

And that was dangerous. Because people he let close got hurt. Got killed. That was the pattern, the curse he carried. Better to stay distant, stay professional, keep the walls up.

But God, it was hard. Especially when she looked at him with those dark eyes that understood, that carried their own weight of guilt and trauma. When she talked about Michael and survivor’s guilt and not knowing if she could still do the job. When she fell asleep trusting him to keep her safe.

Silas left the room quietly, closing the door behind him. In the kitchen, he started coffee—the good stuff Harper kept in the freezer, not the cheap instant he usually survived on. While it brewed, he did a perimeter check.

All windows locked. Doors secured. Alarm armed. The cabin was as safe as he could make it without turning it into a fortress.

But a determined killer could still get in. Could still reach Harper if Silas made one mistake, missed one detail, let his guard down for one second.

Not happening,he thought grimly.Not on my watch.

His phone buzzed with a text from Morris.DNA results back. No match in the system. Sorry boss.

Silas cursed under his breath. The skin under Amy Thorne’s fingernails had been their best lead, and it had gone nowhere. The killer wasn’t in CODIS, wasn’t in any criminal database. Which meant either he’d never been arrested, or he’d been very careful about not leaving DNA at previous scenes.

Another text, this one from the ME.Tox screen on victim 3 shows same sedative—midazolam. Also found fiber evidence, possibly from rope. Sending to lab for analysis.

Silas made notes. The killer was consistent—same drug, same method, same symbols. But he was also escalating, losing control. The symbols on Amy Thorne had been messier than Melissa Wagoner’s. And Nicole Merrin had been left with a note, a direct taunt.