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  It hurt her jaw to say something so simple but it was a slight pain in comparison to what she had endured five nights ago.

  “She’s right,” O’Malley said. “Sit back down, Rose. You went through hell, too. You’re part of this, so you deserve updates, too.”

  Rose bit back a smile as she returned to her seat. She set her phone down and gave O’Malley he undivided attention.

  “First,” O’Malley said, “Connelly is getting pretty damn tired of answering calls from the media, requesting interviews with you. We’re talking CNN and Fox News. The story about your fight with Biel went viral on Twitter. You’re a meme now. It’s getting out of hand.”

  She shook her head. The idea that what she had gone through was now of national interest was a little creepy to her. But she knew how news tended to spread…especially news involving a serial killer.

  “A few things before we get to the information I know you’re looking for. There are going to be small monuments created for Ramirez, Sawyer, and Dennison. We don’t know where they’ll go up yet, but we aren’t making any solid plans until you’re cleared to leave here. We want you involved in that. Cool?”

  “Cool.”

  “Okay. Now…Howard Randall. We know he was shot at least once. Four officers saw it and can confirm. Some of his blood was also found on the scene. But the question we’ve been dying to know is this: Why was he there? Was he working with Biel?”

  Avery shook her head. “He saved me.”

  “What?”

  She reached for the pad and pen on the desk by the bed, but O’Malley waved her hands away. “No. Tell me later, when you can go into detail. Anyway…it’s been five days, and we still can’t find him. If the shot killed him and he sank to the bottom, we’ll eventually find him with a scuba team. But you know how that works…if he was shot and killed and fell in, his body would have floated. But it didn’t. And we have no idea where he is.”

  Avery nodded, but she was still hung up on what she had just told O’Malley. Speaking it out loud had solidified it—now she just had to figure out what it meant.

  He saved me.

  “We do have confirmation that inmates saw the two of them talking on at least two occasions while in prison. One of those conversations seemed to have gotten heated. And really, that’s all the information we have.”

  She smiled and gave a weak nod.

  And with Howard, she thought, that’s probably all you’re going to get.

  CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR

  Within another month, the pains from that night were still prominent. Everything had healed as well as it could, but the stitching in her calf itched all the time and her ribs still ached almost casually even though they were healing as well as the doctors could hope.

  Still, she was able to live a somewhat normal life. She had been discharged from the hospital the day after her conversation with O’Malley. She and Rose had moved back into her apartment, grateful to find that a few guys in the A1 had paid to have her window replaced and the apartment cleaned.

  The memorial ceremony for Ramirez, Sawyer, and Dennison came and went. It was a touching ceremony and the first time Avery had shown her face since the night by the wharf. Rose had shown her a few posts from Facebook where people were appreciative of what she had done and the way she had fought. Still, Avery felt she deserved none of it. She had declined all offers for interviews and after two weeks of it, people stopped calling. The world moved on to other stories and Avery was glad to have been left behind.

  Through it all, as her wounds healed and her relationship with Rose continued to become something she could have only dreamed of in the past, she knew that in order to truly move on there were two things she needed to do. She wasn’t looking forward to either of them, but they were necessary.

  The first of those things occurred after the ceremony. She had gone into the A1 for the first time since coming home from the hospital. Everyone looked at her as if she were a celebrity or some sort of legend—which made what she was about to do so much easier.

  She’d walked into Connelly’s office slowly. She placed her gun and her badge on the corner of his desk. He only sighed at her and gave her a smile—a rarity for Connelly. He looked like he wanted to argue with her but shut it down before he could start.

  “You sure about this?” he asked.

  She nodded. She was afraid that if she tried to speak, she’d start crying. And she’d done more than enough of that over the last two or three weeks.

  “I figured you would,” he said. “But listen to me: if you change your mind, there’s no question on my end. You come back in, pick these up, and you’re back with the A1. I don’t care if you’re sixty and just going to ride a desk and answer calls. You’re always welcome back here.”

  “Thanks,” she said, leaving as quickly as she could without being rude.

  When she was back in her car and allowed herself to openly weep, she headed directly from the A1 headquarters to the second place she needed to go to put it all behind her. It was a place she knew she had to visit—a location that would end this harrowing chapter of her life.

  ***

  Ramirez’s grave was simple yet elegant in a refined way. It had also been adorned with several flowers and bouquets from friends, family, and members of the Boston Police Department. When Avery approached it, she did so with a respect and sadness that she had known would level her—but not quite this badly.

  Seeing his name engraved on the stone drove it home. He was gone and he was not coming back. She’d done her part to bring the man who had killed him to justice and for now, she could live with that. The inclusion of Howard Randall in that equation still confounded her, but not enough to distract her from why she was here.

  She took a seat in front of the grave, sitting with her left leg extended as not to overexert the wound in her calf.

  “I wish I could at least know if you were awake when he got there. Did you see him when he came in? Did you fight right away? Or were you sleeping?” She paused here and pounded the ground with her fist. “I’m so sorry…”

  The hell of it was that now, a month removed from it all, she knew that there was no real reason to blame herself. There was no way she could have predicted Biel’s path of destruction—or the level of his madness. But for the first two weeks or so, there had been plenty of blame and guilt rattling around in her head. Without Rose at her side to talk it out of her, there was no telling what state she might currently be in.

  She fell silent again, partly because she wasn’t sure what else to say, and partly because her jaw was starting to ache. Avery wasn’t sure if she believed in God, an afterlife, or anything like that—which, considering that she was over forty might be something she needed to iron out later on down the road. Still, despite her uncertainty of those things, she was surprised at how comforting it was to speak to Ramirez as if there was no doubt that he could hear her from some other place.

  “By the way, I handed in my gun and badge today. I have no idea what I’ll do with the rest of my life. Rose seems to think I could make a living writing books about my cases, or looking into some sort of reality show nonsense. It’s ridiculous how much attention I got over this. You would have gotten a kick out of it…”

  That’s when she started crying again. But it was a good sort of crying, a refreshing act that felt right while sitting at Ramirez’s final resting place.

  “I have the ring,” she said. “When you were first admitted, a nurse found it on you and gave it to me. It may seem like poor judgment on her part, but we weren’t sure you were going to make it.”

  She smiled and wiped away tears.

  “I wish I’d had a chance to see your face when you gave it to me,” she said. “I wish I’d had a chance to hear how you would propose.” She cried freely now. “I’m sure it would’ve been in some wise-ass way,” she added, and laughed through her tears.

  She cried for a long time, until finally she calmed.

  She stood, and
stared down at his grave for a long time.

  “And I wish you’d had a chance to hear my answer,” she finally said, her voice soft now. “My answer is Yes. For now and forever—yes.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE

  Three months later, Rose told Avery that she found an apartment she liked. They were still living together, Rose having still been traumatized by everything that had happened. But she was getting better about it all. The fact that Rose had found a place was a big step, and Avery was excited to see it with her tonight.

  As Avery straightened up the apartment while Rose was out, she started to really look forward to the night. She ran a few errands that afternoon, picking up some things for dinner and running a fresh batch of flowers to Ramirez’s grave.

  When she returned to her apartment building, she checked her mailbox on the first floor and headed upstairs. As she ascended the stairs, she rifled through the handful of mail she’d gotten: a flier for a sale, her utility bill, junk mail from a credit card company, and a postcard.

  The postcard made no sense. It was from Omaha, Nebraska. It had no message on the back and had been postmarked three days ago.

  Who do I know in Nebraska?

  The answer was easy: no one.

  Then the real answer came to her. And although there was no reason to believe she was right, every nerve in her body knew it was so.

  The postcard was from Howard. A postcard with no message from a random place in the country. It wasn’t quite a riddle, but it practically screamed Howard.

  She finally made it to her apartment, still eyeing the postcard. She had thought about him a lot lately. She was well aware that she’d likely be dead if Howard had not showed up that night. As to the why…well, she had theories but nothing certain. He had saved her, that was obvious, but had that been his plan all along?

  She knew that there was an active ongoing search for him. His name was on the FBI’s Most Wanted list, but it was buried on it, somewhere in the high teens. She knew they’d never catch him.

  And a small part of her was glad.

  NOW AVAILABLE!

  CAUSE TO DREAD

  (An Avery Black Mystery--Book #6)

  “A dynamic story line that grips from the first chapter and doesn't let go.”

  --Midwest Book Review, Diane Donovan (regarding Once Gone)

  From #1 bestselling author Blake Pierce comes a new masterpiece of psychological suspense—the AVERY BLACK SERIES—which continues here with CAUSE TO DREAD (Book #6), also a standalone novel. The series begins with CAUSE TO KILL (Book #1)—a free download with over 200 five star reviews!

  A woman turns up dead in her own apartment, locked in her closet, her body crawling with poisonous spiders, and the Boston police are stumped. As all of their leads collapse, they are dreading the killer will strike again. Desperate, the police have no choice but to turn to Boston’s most brilliant and controversial homicide detective—Avery Black. Now retired, Avery, in a low point in her own life, reluctantly agrees to help with the case. But when other bodies start turning up, murdered in grotesque and unusual ways, Avery can’t help but wonder: is there a serial killer on the loose?

  With the intense media pressure and the stress of having a new, inexperienced partner, Avery is pushed to her limit as she struggles to crack the bizarre cases—and to keep herself from falling into the abyss.

  Avery finds herself falling deeper and deeper into the twisted mind of the killer, who holds more secrets than Avery could imagine.

  The most riveting and shocking book of the series, a psychological thriller with heart-pounding suspense, CAUSE TO DREAD will leave you turning pages late into the night.

  “A masterpiece of thriller and mystery. Pierce did a magnificent job developing characters with a psychological side, so well described that we feel inside their minds, follow their fears and cheer for their success. The plot is very intelligent and will keep you entertained throughout the book. Full of twists, this book will keep you awake until the turn of the last page.”

  --Books and Movie Reviews, Roberto Mattos (re Once Gone)

  CAUSE TO DREAD

  (An Avery Black Mystery--Book #6)

  Did you know that I've written multiple novels in the mystery genre? If you haven't read all my series, click the image below to download a series starter!

  Blake Pierce

  Blake Pierce is author of the bestselling RILEY PAGE mystery series, which includes ten books (and counting). Blake Pierce is also the author of the MACKENZIE WHITE mystery series, comprising six books (and counting); of the AVERY BLACK mystery series, comprising six books; and of the new KERI LOCKE mystery series, comprising four books (and counting).

  ONCE GONE (a Riley Paige Mystery--Book #1), BEFORE HE KILLS (A Mackenzie White Mystery—Book 1), CAUSE TO KILL (An Avery Black Mystery—Book 1), and A TRACE OF DEATH (A Keri Locke Mystery—Book 1) are each available as a free download on Kobo!

  An avid reader and lifelong fan of the mystery and thriller genres, Blake loves to hear from you, so please feel free to visit www.blakepierceauthor.com to learn more and stay in touch.

  BOOKS BY BLAKE PIERCE

  RILEY PAIGE MYSTERY SERIES

  ONCE GONE (Book #1)

  ONCE TAKEN (Book #2)

  ONCE CRAVED (Book #3)

  ONCE LURED (Book #4)

  ONCE HUNTED (Book #5)

  ONCE PINED (Book #6)

  ONCE FORSAKEN (Book #7)

  ONCE COLD (Book #8)

  ONCE STALKED (Book #9)

  ONCE LOST (Book #10)

  ONCE BURIED (Book #11)

  ONCE BOUND (Book #12)

  MACKENZIE WHITE MYSTERY SERIES

  BEFORE HE KILLS (Book #1)

  BEFORE HE SEES (Book #2)

  BEFORE HE COVETS (Book #3)

  BEFORE HE TAKES (Book #4)

  BEFORE HE NEEDS (Book #5)

  BEFORE HE FEELS (Book #6)

  BEFORE HE SINS (Book #7)

  BEFORE HE HUNTS (Book #8)

  AVERY BLACK MYSTERY SERIES

  CAUSE TO KILL (Book #1)

  CAUSE TO RUN (Book #2)

  CAUSE TO HIDE (Book #3)

  CAUSE TO FEAR (Book #4)

  CAUSE TO SAVE (Book #5)

  CAUSE TO DREAD (Book #6)

  KERI LOCKE MYSTERY SERIES

  A TRACE OF DEATH (Book #1)

  A TRACE OF MUDER (Book #2)

  A TRACE OF VICE (Book #3)

  A TRACE OF CRIME (Book #4)

  A TRACE OF HOPE (Book #5)