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“Mina! You’re not okay. Dammit, I know you. Tell me what it is. Have you been threatened again?”

“NO! It’s not that. It’s this!”

Something broke inside of me. I couldn’t hold it all in anymore. I thrust out my wrist and pulled on the red ribbon. Lock’s eyes widened in confusion.

“Piper told me,” I said.

“Told you what?”

“In the powder room tonight. She saw my ribbon. She told me you gave them out frequently. They called you Red Silk Romeo. And this is connected to the case I’m… I’m not supposed to be telling you about. Some maniac has been hurting women, and this is all we have to identify him.”

“What are you saying?”

“Lock, you have to admit this would be a pretty wild coincidence for another woman to have a ribbon like this.”

“Mina, you’re not making sense?” he said. “You think I’m a serial killer?”

“That’s not what I’m saying. I don’t know what I’m saying. I just know that it doesn’t make sense. And the Frères Célestes. It was at a crime scene we searched. How is that possible?”

He staggered backward as if he’d just been hit with a wrecking ball. “This is ridiculous. I think you’re seeing things that aren’t there? This has been too much for you. I shouldn’t have pushed you. Do you hear how crazy you sound?”

It felt like a punch to the gut.

“I know what I know,” I said. “I know what I saw.”

Lock closed his eyes, then opened them, as if he were resetting himself. “I’m sorry. I’m not doubting you. All these things. Mina, I don’t understand why you’re doing this to me. To us. Have I ever given you any reason to think I could be… It’s a ribbon, Mina,” he said more calmly.

“You’ve given away many,” I said. “How many?”

“I didn’t keep track,” he said, his voice flat. “I didn’t know I’d be cross-examined on it.”

“Five? Ten?” My wheels started to spin. If he’d given these ribbons to other women, one of them could have told someone and then…

“Mina,” he said. “Look at me.”

I did. His eyes were filled with despair. “Whatever you think this is. It’s not about me. You know me. You know us. Maybe you should take some time off. You’ve been under so much stress. You haven’t had a day off in what? Over a year? And with everything we’re going through. Dr. Wexler said that medication could add to your stress. Your moods.”

“Please don’t do that. Do not tell me you think this is my hormones.”

“I’m not. Baby, I’m sorry. I’m just… this is out of nowhere. You think I have something to do with whatever case your task force is investigating. Come on. You have to hear how bizarre that sounds. Please just come to bed. We can talk about all this later. You know I’m off to New York tomorrow. Please don’t make me have to leave you for a week when things are like this between us. It was a good night tonight. For you… but also for Bennett.”

My heart dropped to the floor. Bennett. I felt like a jerk. I stood there and watched as Lock was forced to confront a giant image of his dead brother. He had dedicated a statue in his honor. It was twenty-five years to the day from when Bennett Manning drowned. Whatever my fears, it was selfish of me to bring it up right now. Tonight.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “You’re right. We can talk about this later. I just want to go to bed.”

Lock’s face stayed hard. I’d hurt him with my insensitivity about his brother. But I just couldn’t bring myself to try and smooth it over. Maybe him leaving for a week was just the thing I needed to get my head straight. When I was with him, Lock sometimes eclipsed my own thoughts. I started toward the door. As Lock reluctantly followed me, the photograph I’d held of him, Piper, and Eli fluttered to the ground. Piper’s eyes seemed to follow me as we walked out of the room.

My sleep was restless, filled with more nightmares of suffocating, of falling through space and reaching for something I could never quite grasp. When I woke, drenched in sweat, the bed was empty beside me. Lock’s luggage was lined up next to the bedroom door. I got out of bed and found him standing in front of the full-length mirror, working on his tie.

It was one of my favorites. The blue one with a tiny, golden thread woven throughout.

“Here, let me.” Lock turned and moved his hands out of the way as I tightened his Windsor knot. I smoothed it down over his crisp white dress shirt. He pulled away.

“Can you help with these?” he said, holding up one of his sleeves. He dropped a gold cufflink into my palm. They were a gift from me. I had his jeweler design them using our initials, L and M, intertwined. He’d done it in such a way that they looked like an infinity symbol unless you knew the secret.

I fastened the first one. Lock reached into his pocket to pull out the other one. Instead, he frowned. He checked the other pocket.

“I put both of them in my pocket. I must have dropped one.”