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Shadow Hunt, Shadow Point Security Romantic Suspense Series, Book 1
©2026 Misty Evans
Claire sat across from Dr. Montgomery in what the Shadow Point team called the ‘interview room.’ It looked more like a therapist’s office than an interrogation space—comfortable chairs, soft lighting, a box of tissues on the side table. A pair of bonded parakeets trilled every once in a while, lending a touch of beauty and lightness to the room.
But Claire knew that was exactly what this was—an interview. A psychological profile. An excavation of her worst memories.
Wolf stood behind the one-way mirror in the observation room. She couldn’t see him, but she felt him there. Watching. Listening. Learning things about her she’d spent fifteen years trying to forget.
“Take your time,” Vivi said gently. “I know this is difficult.”
Claire wrapped her hands around the mug of tea someone had given her. “What do you need to know?”
“Everything. Start from the beginning. The night Lily died.”
The night that divided Claire’s life into before and after. The night that made her who she was. The night she’d relived a thousand times in therapy, in nightmares, in the quiet moments when her guard was down.
Detach from the trauma. Report the facts. “We went to see a movie,” Claire began. “It was a Friday night in September. We were fourteen. Lily’s mom had dropped us off at the theater at seven. We were supposed to call when it was over for a ride home.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No. We decided to walk. It was only a mile. We’d done it before.” Claire stared into her mug, seeing a different time and place. “It was warm that night. We were laughing and talking about the movie. About boys. About nothing important.”
The doctor’s pen scratched on her notepad. “What happened next?”
“A car pulled up beside us. A man asked for directions.” Claire’s hands tightened on the mug. “We stopped. We were stupid, naive fourteen-year-old girls who didn’t think anything bad could happen to us.”
“You weren’t stupid,” Vivi said quietly. “You were children.”
Claire had heard that so many times it didn’t mean anything anymore. “He got out of the car. I remember thinking he was too close. Something felt wrong. I grabbed Lily’s arm, told her we should go.”
“Did she listen?”
“She started to, but he moved so fast. He grabbed me. I hit him, screamed, fought.” Claire’s voice cracked. “He twisted my arm and hit me in the head with a rock. Everything went gray and fuzzy. I vomited.”
“What’s the last thing you remember?”
“Lily screaming my name. And me on the ground. I tried to get up. Tried to help her. But everything was spinning. I couldn’t make my body work.” Tears burned behind Claire’s eyes. She blinked them away. “I heard the car drive away. Heard Lily still screaming. And then… nothing.”
“You lost consciousness.”
“When I woke up, I was in the hospital. My parents were there. The police.” Her voice hitched. “ And Lily was gone.”
Vivi leaned forward. “According to the hospital report, your skull was fractured.”
“I was in the hospital for a week.”
“And your memory of the attack?”
“Fragmented.” Claire finally looked up and met Vivi’s eyes. “I gave the police a description of the man. White male, thirties or forties, dark hair, average height. But it was dark, and after he hit me, all I wanted to do was get away. They showed me photo lineups. Sketches. I couldn’t identify him with certainty.”
“That must have been frustrating.”
“It was torture.” Claire’s voice was raw now. “They found Lily three days after I got out of the hospital in a field twenty miles from the abduction site. The medical examiner said she’d been alive for at least thirty-six hours after she was taken. Thirty-six hours that I could have saved her if I’d just remembered his face. If I’d been stronger. If I’d fought harder.”
“You have to quit blaming yourself.”
“I failed her.” The truth that lived in her chest like a stone. “I was supposed to protect her. We were best friends. And I let him take her.”
“Why do you think Brands didn’t take you?”
She’d been over that thousands of times in her mind. “Because I fought back? Because he didn’t want to deal with a damaged girl with a broken arm and a concussion?” She shrugged. “When they caught up to him, he committed suicide by cop, so they couldn’t get answers.”
“Tell me about Lily,” Vivi said. “Not the night she died, but who she was.”
Claire’s throat tightened. “She was smart and sarcastic. She wanted to be a marine biologist. She loved the ocean. We’d planned this trip to California the summer after we graduated high school. We were going to drive up the coast, see the redwoods, and visit Monterey Bay.”
“You loved her.”
“She was my sister in every way that mattered.” Claire’s voice broke, and a tear slipped out of her eye. She hurriedly wiped it away. “I didn’t have any siblings, and she had a brother, but he lived with their dad. I only met him once or twice when he came to visit.”
Claire paused, trying to pull up the memory. It was hazy, distant. “I saw him at the funeral. He looked…destroyed. Like part of him had died with her. I wanted to say something to him. Tell him I tried to save her, but all I could get out was, ‘I’m sorry.’ I was broken, and I didn’t know what to say to the brother of the girl I couldn’t save.”
The doctor’s pen did more scratching.
Claire closed her eyes. “Lily talked about him sometimes. Said he was in trouble a lot as a kid, but was getting his life together. He called her every Sunday night. She wouldn’t go anywhere, always waiting for that call, but that weekend he couldn’t. He told her he was going out with friends. She’d been devastated and I’d suggested the movie.” She blew out a deep breath, her lips vibrating from it. “If only he’d kept to the schedule, or I hadn’t convinced her to go out…” If onlys had tormented her all these years. “But my memories of him are vague. Just… a tall kid at a funeral who looked like his world had ended.”
She’d known exactly how he felt. Her own world felt the same way and—
Her vision tunneled. Her lungs froze. She tried to breathe. Couldn’t. Her chest was too tight. The air too thin. The walls too close.
“Claire?” Vivi’s voice came from far away. “Claire, look at me.”
But she couldn’t. She was back there. On the ground. Watching Lily being dragged away. Screaming her name. Failing. Failing. Failing.
Her vision narrowed even more, spots dancing at the edges, closing in. Her hands were numb. Her heart was racing so fast it hurt.
“I can’t—” she gasped. It was a panic attack. She hadn’t had one in years. The therapy had fixed this, taught her how to control her emotions. “I can’t…breathe. I can’t—”
The door burst open. Wolf dropped to his knees in front of her. “Claire. You’re okay. Look at me.”
She couldn’t. The room was spinning. Lily was screaming. Bobby was at the funeral. The man in the car. The bracelet. The countdown. Three days until the anniversary. She’d failed. She’d failed. She’d—
“Claire.” Wolf’s voice was firm, grounding. “Eyes on me. Right now.”
The command cut through her spinning thoughts. She forced herself to focus. His green eyes were so steady. Calm. Alive.
“Breathe with me,” he said. “In for four. Hold for four. Out for four. Can you do that?”
She tried. Failed. Gasped.
“You can do this.” His hands found hers, solid and warm. “In. Two. Three. Four. Hold.” She did it. Not as smoothly as his voice coaxed her to, but as best as she could. He squeezed her hands in encouragement. “Two. Three. Four. Good. Now, out. Two. Three. Four.”
Vivi’s voice joined his, softer. “You’re safe, Claire. You’re in Montana. You’re at Shadow Point. The man who took Lily is dead. You’re safe.”
“In. Two. Three. Four.”
Claire’s lungs found rhythm following Wolf’s voice. His hands warmed hers, his eyes anchored her.
“That’s it. Again.” He breathed with her, exaggerating his inhale. “In. Two. Three. Four.”
The room stopped spinning. The dots receded. Her heart slowed its frantic race.
Wolf was so steady. So calm. “Keep breathing. You’re doing great.”
Vivi stood. “I’m going to get you some coffee and sugar. Be right back.”
The door closed. It was just Claire and Wolf, her hands still in his. His eyes continued holding hers.
“I’m sorry,” Claire whispered. “I haven’t had a panic attack in years. I thought I was past them.”
“Trauma doesn’t work like that.” His voice was rough. “It waits. Hides. Sneaks up on you when you’re not looking.”
“It’s snuck up on you, too, hasn’t it?”
Something flickered in his eyes. “More times than I care to admit.”
Claire realized she was still gripping his hands. She should let go. Should pull back. Should re-establish professional distance.
She didn’t.
“Can you stand?” Wolf asked.
“I think so.”
He helped her up, his hand on her elbow. Steady. Strong. Safe. “I can take you back to your room.”
Claire’s hands fisted in his shirt. She couldn’t let go. Didn’t want to let go. She needed him close. Needed his strength because hers was gone.
“Claire?”
“Please.” Her voice broke. “Just… Stay with me right here for a minute. I need something to hold on to.”
Wolf tensed, his discomfort radiating through him, but he didn’t pull away. “I’ve got you. You’re okay.”
She believed it. Something deep inside her let go of the tension. “Thank you for understanding. For not…you know.”
Slowly, carefully, his arms came around her. One hand on her back. One on her head, cradling her against his chest. “I do know. You’re incredibly strong and brave, but it’s okay to acknowledge you’ve been through a trauma.”
Yes. It was nearly impossible for her to do, but she knew he was right. Her therapist had told her that same thing over and over again.
Until now, in this moment, she’d refused to go there. Refused to let herself show any weakness.
But in the safety of his arms, she knew he didn’t see her as weak. He saw her for who she was—strong and brave, even if she’d been through hell.
She closed her eyes, and her breathing became easy. So easy. His heart beat steadily under her ear. His chest rose and fell in a rhythm her body matched. He smelled like soap, his tactical gear, and something else.
Safety.
“Tell me something,” Wolf said quietly. “Something good. A favorite memory.”
“What?”
“Anything. Your favorite food. A place you’ve traveled. Just…something that isn’t this.”
Claire chuckled. “Ice cream. Cookie dough ice cream from this place in Georgetown. Lily and I would beg her mom to take us there every Saturday in the summer.”
“What else?”
“Books. I read everything. Thrillers, mysteries, sci-fi. Anything that takes me out of my head for a while.”
“Do you have a favorite?”
“The Martian. I’ve read it five times.”
She felt rather than heard his almost-laugh. “Stranded on Mars. Sounds relaxing.”
“It’s about survival. Problem-solving. Not giving up even when everything’s against you.”
“No wonder you like it.”
Claire pulled back slightly, just enough to look up at him. His face was inches from hers. This close, she could see those gold flecks in his green eyes again. The small scar above his left eyebrow. The way his lips quirked with what seemed like genuine pleasure that he’d made her forget the bad memories. That she was clutching him like a lifeline.
“This is your brand of therapy, isn’t it?” she asked. “I like it.”
“It’s nothing.”
“It’s not nothing.” She should step back. Should let him go. “You talked me out of a panic attack and got me back on an even keel.”
“Yes, I did,” he said a little cheekily.
She pinched his side. “Don’t get arrogant, Commander.”
The term seemed to remind him of where they were. Who they were. He gently but firmly stepped back, disengaging her hands from his shirt.
“Sit,” he said, easing her back into the chair. His voice was still light as he added, “Doctor’s orders.”
Her legs were still shaky, but she was steady now. Her heart rate was normal.
“Have you had therapy?” she asked.
Wolf’s expression shuttered. “Some.”
“Did it help?”
“I’m still here.”
She smiled. “I’m glad.”
He smiled back. “At the moment, I am, too.”
Heat spread through her body. She tried to think of something to say, but her brain seemed to short-circuit.
He came to the rescue. “What about your family? Your parents. They must be proud of you. FBI agent, catching killers.”
“They are.” Claire wrapped her arms around herself, suddenly cold without his warmth. “But they moved to France five years ago. My dad’s company transferred him to Paris. They wanted me to come with them, but I stayed.”
“For the job.”
“For Lily.” The truth she’d never said out loud. It startled her in some ways, but in others, it seemed exactly right. “I couldn’t leave. Couldn’t stop hunting men like the one who took her. It felt like… if I left, if I gave up, she’d die all over again.”
Wolf was quiet for a long moment. “She wouldn’t want you to sacrifice your life for hers.”
“No, she wouldn’t, but that doesn’t bring her back.”
“You’re too hard on yourself. No one who loves someone wants them to stop living because they’re gone.”
The weight in his voice. The certainty. Claire studied his face, this man who understood grief in a way most people didn’t. “Are you insinuating I stopped living because of what happened?”
“Have you? Is everything you do for her?”
Her hands found a thread on her sleeve. “Now you do sound like a therapist.”
He must have heard the annoyance in her tone. He raised his hands in surrender. “Sorry. I was out of line.”
He was, and yet, she realized she was bristling because he’d hit the nail on the head. Who would she be right now if she hadn’t been living for Lily?
Rubbing her forehead, she sagged back in the chair. She’d think about that later. “What about your family?” she asked. “Your parents. Do you see them?”
Wolf’s jaw tightened. “No.”
“Why not?”
“We don’t have that kind of relationship.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” He faced the two-way mirror, his attention landing on her reflection. “Doctor Montgomery should be back soon with that coffee.”
Deflecting. Again. Every time Claire got close to something real, he pulled back.
“Wolf—”
“Tell me how you track killers,” he said, turning to face her. “Your process. step by step.”
Claire sighed but accepted that he was a closed book. For now. She was a profiler, and soon, she’d figure him out. “I look at victimology—who they target, why—and apply pattern analysis. Then I look at geographic profiling—where they hunt. Behavioral markers—escalation patterns, cooling-off periods. I put it all together and build a psychological profile. It includes what drives them, what triggers them, and what they need.”
“And once you have that?”
“It’s more science than art, but once I have all of that, I’m more accurate at predicting their next move. If the team agrees, we set up surveillance on likely targets or locations and wait for them to make a mistake.”
Wolf crossed his arms over his impressive chest and leaned back on the wall. “What if we don’t wait?”
“What do you mean?”
“The Countdown Killer wants you. He’s obsessed with you. What if we use that?”
Claire’s pulse sped up. “You mean as bait?”
“I mean, we set a trap. Make him come to us on our terms.”
“I’ve been thinking the same thing.” Claire leaned forward. “What if I reach out to him? Post something online where he’d see it. Something that makes him think I want to meet. To end this. To finish what started fifteen years ago.”
“No.” Wolf’s voice was steel.
“Why not? It makes tactical sense. He’s looking for me anyway. This way we control—”
“No.” He pushed off the wall. “You’re not dangling yourself in front of a serial killer.”
“I’m an FBI agent. I’ve done undercover work before.”
“Not with someone who’s obsessed with killing you specifically.”
“That’s exactly why it would work.”
“That’s exactly why it’s too dangerous.” His eyes were hard. “We’ll set a trap, but not with you as bait.”
“Then how?”
“We use the spyware against him. He had access to your phone. He thinks he knows you. Knows how you communicate. We use the phone to send messages he believes come from you.”
“You pretend to be me.”
A nod. “I respond to his next message. Tell him I’m tired of running. He’s outsmarted me and the entire FBI. I want to meet face-to-face.”
“He’ll know it’s not me.”
“Will he? He’s been watching you from a distance. Reading your texts. Your emails. Does he know how you think when you’re cornered? Even if he’s one of your coworkers, he can’t predict how you’ll react. Taking the doctor’s theory into account, he’s only ever seen you as a fourteen-year-old victim or a competent FBI profiler. I can pretend to be you.”
“This is insane.”
“This is tactical.”
Vivi entered with a tray—three cups of coffee, sandwiches, and a concerned expression.
“How are you feeling?” she asked Claire.
“Better. Thank you.”
She set down the tray, handed Claire a coffee loaded with cream and sugar. “Drink. You need the calories, and the sugar will help stabilize you.”
Claire sipped. It was too sweet, but warm. Grounding. “Wolf was just explaining his plan to trap the Countdown Killer, using my phone to lure him in.”
Vivi glanced at Wolf with a quirked brow. “How?”
Wolf shrugged. “If he sends another message, I respond as Claire. I can set up a meeting. Somewhere we control. Somewhere we can take him alive.”
“You want to take him alive?” Claire asked.
Wolf snagged a cup of coffee and smiled. “Dead men can’t tell us if they were at Lily’s murder or if there are more victims we don’t know about. You need closure. You need to bring him to justice.”
Vivi considered this. “It has merit. The Countdown Killer is arrogant. He’s been playing games with you for months. If you offer to meet on his terms, he might take the bait.”
“I hate this plan,” Claire said. “But it might work.”
“We’d need the right trigger,” Vivi said. “Something that would make Claire reaching out believable.”
“The anniversary,” Claire said quietly. “I could say I want to end it on the anniversary. Poetic justice. He’ll eat that up.”
Wolf’s eyes were dark. “Exactly.”
They sat in silence for a moment, drinking and eating while they all stewed over the plan.
A phone buzzed. All three of them froze.
“Is that yours?” Wolf asked her.
Claire pulled out her Bureau-issued phone. Looked at the screen.
Unknown Number.
Her hands shook as she unlocked it and read the text message.
The world fell silent, a roaring in her ears blocking it out.
Bobby couldn’t save her either.
The phone slipped from Claire’s fingers.
Wolf caught it. Read the message. His face went gray. Something terrible flickered behind his eyes.
“Why would he say that?” she asked. “Bobby wasn’t even in town that weekend.”
Wolf said nothing. Just stared at the message as if it had physically wounded him.
Vivi took the phone. Read it. Looked at Wolf with an expression Claire couldn’t read.
“He knows about Lily’s brother,” Vivi said. “That’s not a surprise, but it is interesting that our killer would mention him.”
Claire bolted upright. “Oh god. What if he’s gone after Bobby? What if—”
“I’m sure he’s fine,” Wolf said. “We need to stay focused on you.”
Claire’s mind raced, ignoring him. “I don’t know where he is. I haven’t seen him since the funeral. He’d be… what, thirty-three now? He could be anywhere.”
“We’ll look into it,” Wolf said. “Don’t worry about him.”
“He could be in danger. Why else would the Countdown Killer mention him?” Claire asked.
Wolf’s eyes met hers. They were shuttered, but she saw anger and something that reminded her of resolve behind them. “Because he wants you to think that no one can save you,” he said. “Not the FBI. Not Shadow Point.” His voice dropped. “Not Bobby.”
The coffee turned sour in her stomach. “Well, he’s wrong. First of all, I don’t need saving, and secondly…” Her gaze stayed locked on Wolf. “I’ve got you.”
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Don’t miss the next chapter!
Misty
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