That genius served her well in her new life. Not a thing could happen within a quarter mile of this house without her computer surveillance system warning her.

"I was just about to make dinner."

He followed, feeling a slow smile tug at his mouth. "Getting any better at it?"

Casting a quick glance over her shoulder, she smirked. "You won't choke."

Considering he'd tasted her dubious kitchen creations before, he'd reserve judgment. On the weekends when he came up, he usually brought fish or steaks to grill. This trip had just been too impromptu for him to do it.

After all, forty-eight hours ago, he would not have imagined he'd be traveling to Maine to try to find out if the young woman whose life he had saved really had slaughtered three men.

It's crazy. But he needed to be sure.

"Salad and grilled chicken okay? I went to the market yesterday."

"Fine. And you were careful in town?"

She gave him a Duh look. "In case you haven't been there lately, Keating is a tourist town. Tons of people in and out. I make sure not to draw any attention."

Huh. She drew attention no matter where she went, though she didn't see it. "Well, now that it's Labor Day weekend, be prepared for all that to change. The town is small enough that it will start to pay attention to anybody who sticks around."

"They've paid attention," she admitted, sounding grudging. Rolling her eyes, she gestured around the bright, airy kitchen with the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the ocean. Her tone dripping sarcasm, she added, "Enough to drop hints about this creepy house of yours."

The muscles in his body stiffened reflexively, but he forced himself to remain where he was, leaning against the doorjamb, his arms crossed. Nonchalant. Normal. Nothing to reveal just how much he hated being here and how right the townies were to think of this place as tainted.

"Just be warned, they're likely to be more nosy when they don't have other tourists to focus on."

"Duly noted."

Lily finally dropped it, thank God, and began to prepare dinner, pulling fresh produce from the refrigerator. As she worked, she would occasionally move a certain way, or her bottom lip would push out in frustration as she tried to decide which spice to use, and he'd catch a glimpse of the old Lily. She even unconsciously lifted a hand to sweep her short hair away from her face, as if forgetting she no longer had the long, silky strands.

"Your hair's really grown out," he murmured, acknowledging that for the first time.

She lifted a brow. "You just saw me three weeks ago."

"I know. But I can't see the scars at all anymore." At least, not the external ones.

This time when she lifted her hand, it was to self-consciously pat and smooth the hair over the top of her mangled ear. She would eventually need to get plastic surgery to repair it, but seemed to have had enough of doctors and hospitals for this year.

Lovesprettyboys, the bastard she and members of another Cyber Action Team had been trying to catch last January in a sting in Virginia, had shot her point-blank, aiming for her face. The bullet had instead skimmed the side of her head, taking off a chunk of her ear.

She'd been lucky. Damned lucky. Especially because the killer's second shot, straight to the chest, had been stopped by her bulletproof vest. He regularly thanked God that she'd been wearing it. She'd ended up with some broken ribs and bruises, but nothing major.

No, the major wound had been the third shot. It hit her in her upper thigh, so close to her femoral artery that another millimeter to the right would have been the end of her.

It almost had been, anyway. He still sometimes found it hard to believe she'd lived, especially given the amount of her blood they'd found inside the surveillance van where she'd been attacked. So much blood, it had been impossible to believe she could have survived, and despite the lack of a body, the world had decided she hadn't. Him included.

The grief of those standing beside a grave that held no coffin, who watched as a small marker with her name and the dates of her brief thirty years on this earth had been erected, had been genuine and heartbreaking. Something none of them had expected to get over. So when he picked up his phone that very night after her memorial service, hers was the last voice he had expected to hear. Weak and agonized, but Lily's voice.

It had been one of the most shocking moments of his life.

They had all believed her corpse had been swept away after the van had crashed from a high bridge. Now, of course, he knew that was what her attacker had wanted them to think. But then, answering that call, he had wondered whether someone was playing a sick joke.

"So how are things in the Hoover Building?" she asked as she reached for an onion and began peeling away the skin, taking a few usable layers of white with it. Talented in the kitchen, she was not.

"Fine."

"Everybody at the office okay? Jackie?"

"The same. She and Lambert still go at each other, especially when they start arguing about who's going to drive."

Her smile was faint, but it did appear. "She's dangerous behind the wheel."

"He's managed to survive."

The smile widened the tiniest bit as her guard began to come down at the talk of normal things. Familiar things. "Lambert turned out okay, though?"

"Yes, he's worked out very well." Jackie's partner, Alec Lambert, had been a new member of the team, on board for only a week when Lily's attack had occurred. "His profiling background has been a remarkable asset. Meanwhile, Kyle still manages to get off one-liners that leave Dean ready to laugh or growl-I can't quite tell which."

That put a sparkle in her eyes. "Mulrooney's a big, crass teddy bear, but Dean wouldn't trade him for another partner for anything."

Wyatt lifted a surprised brow. Because, though Lily was right, he wondered how she could know that. It had been only a year since the team had come together, and Lily had been absent for seven months of that year. When she left, everyone was still just a bit unsure, cautious, not quite melding into the solid unit they had become.

Funny, in a completely unfunny way. Lily's death had been the unifying moment.

"What about Jackie's family? Her husband? Her kids?"

"Everybody seems fine. The kids are growing up too fast, she says." He couldn't help adding, "She talks about you often."

Jackie Stokes had been the only other woman on the team at the time of Lily's attack and had taken the loss very hard. They had formed a solid friendship, and Jackie, though only twelve or so years older than Lily, had a mother instinct that ran deep. Despite her caustic exterior, the striking, brilliant African-American woman had grown protective of all the younger members of the team.

Many times, Wyatt had wondered just how big a mistake he had made in bringing only Brandon in on the rescue, and in letting Lily swear them both to secrecy about her survival. Jackie could have been a big help. All of them could.

But he'd had his reasons. Valid ones. And he didn't know that he'd make a different decision now, even knowing Lily's recovery was going to take so many months.

Still, he couldn't help wondering whether any of them would understand that, how they would react when Lily decided to rejoin the land of the living. They would be furious, would feel betrayed. And he couldn't blame them. He only hoped they eventually understood the choices he, Lily, and Brandon had all made that bitter January night.

"What about the new ones?"

"Anna Delaney's good, very thorough, although she doesn't have quite the instincts that you do. And Christian Mendez, who came in from the Miami field office, is very direct and single-minded, but I think he'll work out all right."