CHAPTER ONE

      IT WASN’T A NOISE THAT awakened Fiona Gallagher, but a scent. A sultry, provocative fragrance that carried a subtle note of sandalwood.

      She tried to rouse herself to investigate, but the dream kept pulling her back under.

       “You always smell so good.”

       He tangled his hands in her hair. “How good?”

      She looked up with a smile and then showed him. Heart pounding, Fiona bolted upright in bed, her frantic gaze searching the far recesses of the room. It was dark, but enough light filtered in from the street that she could make out all the corners, all the nooks and crannies.

      Nothing stirred, not so much as a ghost. She was alone, safe and sound in her second-floor apartment protected from intruders by a series of locks and dead bolts her brother, Tony, had helped her install when she’d first moved in six years ago. No one could get in. She was fine.

      Except...she wasn’t fine. She’d been dreaming about David again, dreaming she was still in love with him. That only happened these days when she was under a lot of stress.

      The DeMarco case had brought back the nightmares, she thought wearily. As a prosecutor for the Cook County State’s Attorney’s office, Fiona had come face-to-face with evil before, more times than she cared to remember. But there was something about Vince DeMarco’s eyes... the way he looked at her...that sly smile...

      There was something about him that reminded her of David.

      Falling back against the pillows, she wiped a hand across her brow. Seven years since that night and David Mackenzie still had a hold on her, one so powerful that sometimes, during moments of weakness, she imagined his scent in her apartment. Heard his voice over her telephone. Saw his smile on every defendant.

      Even fully awake now, she could still smell his cologne, but she knew it wasn’t real. It couldn’t be real. She and her therapist had hashed out her hallucinations a long time ago. “The scent is symbolic, Fiona. Not of David, but of your guilt.”

      Her guilt smelled like sandalwood. Good to know.

      Realizing she would never fall back asleep now, Fiona got up and went into the bathroom to splash cold water on her face. Pressing the towel against her skin, she studied her reflection in the mirror. Outwardly she looked the same as she always had, but deep inside, where all her dark secrets lay hidden, she’d undergone a drastic metamorphosis.

      You can’t go through what you did and expect to walk away unchanged, Dr. Westfield had warned her.

      She couldn’t expect to ever