The car was quiet as they sat staring back at the lake before them.

"I want to apologize for the way I acted and the things I said. It was very unprofessional and highly inappropriate."

"Want to forget what happened and just continue looking at the rest of the crime scenes?"

Turning his head around to face Zara, Nate nodded his head.. Truthfully, he wanted to talk about what had just happened between them, but decided to lay it to rest.

For now, that is.

One thing he was sure of was that eventually they would have to talk about it, because he wanted to know what it had meant to her. On his part, it meant so many things. Things, he admitted, that couldn't precisely be put into words right now.

It was intense, for sure. Something he hadn't felt in a long time — or ever, if he really thought about it.

What threw him off was how he had reacted to her. Never, in all of his professional career, had he acted in such a way, especially when he was on a case. It made matters worse that all of this had transpired right on top of a murder ground.

Something was happening; with them and with this case of which he was also suspicious.

Subtly, he fixed his coat and felt the stem from the rose, which he had plucked and secured in a plastic bag, jam at his ribs. Once he got back to his hotel room, he'd make some calls to see what the rose had to offer. Hopefully, there will be some prints.

The rumble of the motor as the SUV was turned on distracted the two from continuing any sort of conversation. Peeling away from the parking spot, they started to head north, the pine trees up ahead getting bigger as they drove straight towards them.

"The next body was found in the middle of the forest. In Cardinal Hall Falls Park to be exact. A couple were camping there for their honeymoon and the stench hit them while they were hiking to their spot."

"Hmmm," he replied, pulling up the notes he had written down on his phone and quickly scanning the files on the next victim. "They called you guys and then what?"

"They waited until we got there," keeping her eyes trained on the road, she turned on the wipers to the vehicle as fat raindrops began to fall. "When we reached where they were at, we could smell the decomposed body straight away."

"What did the M.E. say?"

"Gabi," she pointedly drew out her name to him, "suggests that the victim may have been dead for a few days. Three tops."

Guess someone is still ticked. Fine, I'll bite.

"And why does Gabi think it was before three days?" He quipped back.

"You mean other than the state of rigor mortis?" Zara bantered in return. "The butterfly inside her mouth was beginning to get saturated from the blood that had remained in the head. It was practically red when they pulled it out."

"As red as the petals on that rose?"

Hearing her let out a big sigh, he turned his head around to see her rub at the bridge of her nose in frustration.

"What? What's wrong?"

"Nothing," she replied, clearly lying judging by the scent that was filling the SUV and drifting directly to his nose.

"If something is wrong-"

"Nothing is wrong," she cut him off, taking her eyes from the road for a split second to level him with a glare, warning him to drop it. "I would appreciate it detective Sanders, if-"

"Nate, please. Sanders is too formal for my taste."

"If," she continued, purposely ignoring him in order to put her point across, "you kept your line of questioning only to be related to the case itself."

Nate felt a spark of annoyance thrumming along his body at that but remained quiet. He knew he was pressing on an area she had already established she didn't want him in.

To make matters worse, it had caused her to revert back to calling him by his last name rather than his first. It rubbed him the wrong way.

It was different when it came to his colleagues back at work who addressed him as Sanders. He never liked being too flexible with those he worked with.

His mother always said it was due to his Alpha dynamic. How, without even knowing it, he wanted to be considered as a leader, a person with power — not power hungry, but strong — in the face of so many Betas in the world.

Someone that can be looked up to.

But with her, it was the exact opposite. He wanted Zara to call him by his name because he wanted that closeness with her. As far as Nate could remember, he had never felt that way with any female, Beta or Omega.

Zara on the other hand was different.

She was strong.

She was fierce.

She was driven.

She was his.

"We're here."

Snapping his attention back to the present, he pushed his thoughts to the back of his mind. He'd dissect them later.

Much, much later.

Getting out of the car, he looked around and saw that they were at the entrance of the park.

"We will have to hike to the area since the forest is too dense and vehicles can't get through it."

With a nod of agreement, he followed behind her as they trekked their way to the next crime scene. The now pouring rain made the task hard, the ground beneath them growing slicker as they ascended the small hill before them.

Minutes went by as they continued climbing, the hill getting steeper the higher they went. Having almost arrived at the top, he paused to check his surroundings, trying to take note of everything around them. Seeing as Zara wasn't stopping, but was rather heading straight to where he could now see from his standing point the yellow tape, he quickly stored the information and followed.

Nearing the scene, he noticed that the whole area was taped down unlike the first one and that it was pretty huge.

"This crime scene was different from the first one. Well, kind of." Walking to the marked spot on the ground taped blue, she pointed to the area near the tape. "This one wasn't in a suitcase. The same amount of body parts that were in the other were outside for this one. At least, outside as much as they could be."

Dragging her pointer finger up, she pointed north of them. "Both the head and feet were found buried together, unlike the last one. Hands were buried near where we're at. Lower torso just south of here, across that tree.

"The upper torso was hanging from a tree by a rope over there," she finished, jerking her head sideways to the left where a huge oak tree stood not too far from them.

With measured steps, he walked to it and saw leftover threads from said rope buried in a branch. The bark was roughly nine feet above him, making the height from the ground to the branch a little under sixteen feet.

"Any marks on the ground in this area?" He motioned with his pointer finger around him, creating a wide circle. "Or here?" He finished, pointing to the tree.

"No. The place was undisturbed other than the body hanging from the rope."

Scanning the area, a sense of unease crawled its way up his body when he noticed that it was indeed untouched.

Even by wildlife.

"Do you have any pictures?"

"No," making her way to where he stood, she stopped once she was right in front of him. "You've seen all of the pictures that are on file, there -"

"You misunderstood my question," he stopped her, turning to fully face her. "I asked if you have any pictures."

He saw that she didn't try to deny what he was instigating, knowing full well she knew what he meant. In his years of being a detective, he'd known a few people — himself included — who took and stored additional information to review later.

It didn't make them a bad person, per se, it just meant that they were very detail oriented. Those people, he fully acknowledged, were the ones who he trusted completely with information.

Jerking her face away from his, he saw the beginnings of a blush paint her skin. An unadulterated sense of peace enveloped his being at the chagrin display. She gave him an almost nonexistent nod of her head, causing a Cheshire-like grin to spread on his lips.

"I have them stored in my personal computer. It's password protected — the file, that is."

Zara turned to look back at him, her once flushed face now back to its normal color. Spinning on her heel, she led the way back to their vehicle.

"Good," he answered, trailing behind her as she neared the first blue tape where the first portion of the body was found. "We should check those out once we are done with the other four places."

As they ducked under the barricade tape, something white caught the corner of his eye. Quickly turning to see what it was, he felt his body lock in both surprise and anger. A red haze began to film over his sight when he saw Zara turn to see what he was staring at.

He saw her body freeze. Heard her heart begin to beat faster, overtaking the sound of the pounding rain.

The earthy scent of the moist soil began to drift to the back of his mind as the stench of her fear took precedence over it.

"No," she whispered, his ears barely able to hear her with the pummeling rain still going on. "Not again."

His gaze zeroed in on that damn bloody rose, the same as the one from the lake, though this one was stapled to a tree.

A deep rumbling growl escaped from his lips.