The profiler was determined not to break eye contact. A million ways he could have known. A million ways. “So now you’re telling me you read minds.”

Dillon scoffed. “I don’t have to. It’s written in the patterns of everything you do. The way you breathe, the way you sit, the inflections of your voice. It’s a blood disease, isn’t it? AIDS? No . . . No, leukemia. How many months do they give you?”

“I can’t see how it’s your business.”

“How many?” Dillon demanded. Then when he didn’t get an answer, Dillon sniffed the air, and cocked his head slightly, as if listening for some resonant frequency beyond that intolerable pulsing of his heart. “Six months,” Dillon said. “You’ve been in remission before. Twice . . . maybe three times. This time you’re refusing treatment. You plan to die with dignity.”

The profiler pushed back from the table, infuriated by his own lack of restraint. “What is it you want?!”

Dillon was as composed as his counterpart was agitated, and calmly said, “I want someone to scratch my nose.”

The room suddenly seemed too small, and the table too meager a barrier between them. “This session is over.” The profiler tried to maintain a sense of professional control as he stood from the table, but his voice betrayed how shaken he was. “You will be locked away, and believe me, your friends will be caught!”

“Only if they want to be caught.”

“We caught you.”

“Exactly.”

The interrogator reached for his notepad on the table—forcing temper to his trembling hands—and as he did, Dillon jiggled his hands. All he did was jiggle them, and the cuffs snapped open, and clattered off. “Your old boss didn’t send you here to do a profile,” Dillon said, “he sent you here for this.” Then Dillon thrust an arm forward and grabbed him by the wrist, tightly.