“Even if lose the car,” Avery said, “we can at least narrow down the direction. We know he turned north out of the alley. That, matched with whatever Thompson finds at the park, and we can triangulate an area and go house by house if we have to.”
“What about forensics?” O’Malley asked.
“Nothing in the alley,” Avery said.
“Is that it?”
“We’ve got some suspects, too. Cindy was at a party on the night of her abduction. A guy named George Fine was there. He’s apparently been following Cindy around for years: takes classes she takes, seems to randomly bump into her at events. Kissed Cindy for the first time, danced with her all night.”
“Have you spoken to him?”
“Not yet,” she said and looked right at Dylan. “I wanted your approval before a potential shakedown at Harvard University.”
“It’s a good thing you have some sense of protocol,” Dylan grumbled.
“There’s also the boyfriend,” she added to O’Malley. “Winston Graves. Cindy was supposed to go to his house that night. Never showed up.”
“So we’ve got two potential suspects, footage of the event, and a car to track down. I’m impressed. What about motive? Have you given that any thought?”
Avery looked away.
The footage she’d seen, as well as the victim’s placement and handling, all pointed to a man that loved his work. He’d done it before, and he’d do it again. Some kind of power trip must have motivated him, because he had little care for the police. The alleyway bow to the camera told her as much. That took courage, or stupidity, and nothing about the body dump or the abduction pointed to a lack in judgment.
“He’s toying with us,” she said. “He likes what he does, and he wants to do it again. I’d say he’s got some kind of plan. This isn’t over yet.”
Dylan snorted and shook his head.
“Ridiculous,” he hissed.
“All right,” O’Malley said. “Avery, you’re clear to talk to your suspects tomorrow. Dylan, contact Harvard and give them the head’s-up. I’ll call the chief tonight and let him know what we’ve got. I can also see about getting you some blanket warrants for cameras. Let’s keep Thompson and Jones on their toes. Dan, I know you’ve been working all day. One more gig and you can call it a night. Get the addresses of those two Harvard boys if you don’t have them already. Roll by on your way home. Make sure they’re tucked in tight. I don’t want anyone bolting.”
“I can do that,” Ramirez said.
“OK.” O’Malley clapped. “Get going. Great job to both of you. You should be proud of yourselves. Avery and Dylan, hang out for a minute.”
Ramirez pointed at Avery.
“Want me to pick you up in the morning? Eight? We’ll head over together?”
“Sure.”
“I’ll keep on Sarah about that sketch. Maybe she’ll have something.”
The sudden eagerness of a partner to help – on his own and without prodding – was new for Avery. Everyone else she’d been paired up with since the moment she’d joined the force had wanted to leave her dead in a ditch somewhere.
“Sounds good,” she said.
Once Ramirez had gone, O’Malley made Dylan sit on one side of the conference table and he had Avery sit on the other.
“Listen up you two,” he said in a quiet yet firm voice. “The chief called me today and said he wanted to know what I was thinking, handing this case over to a well-known and disgraced former criminal defense attorney. Avery, I told him you were the right cop for the job and I stand by my decision. Your work today proves I was right. However, it’s almost seven thirty and I’m still here. I’ve got a wife and three kids waiting for me at home and I desperately want to go and see them and forget about this miserable place for a while. Obviously, neither one of you shares my concerns, so maybe you don’t understand what I’m saying.”
She stared back at him, wondering.
“Get along and stop bothering me with your bullshit!” he snapped.
A tense silence blanketed the room.
“Dylan, start acting like a supervisor! Don’t call me with every whiny detail. Learn how to handle your people on your own. And you,” he said to Avery, “you better cut out the wacky humor act and the I-don’t-give-a-shit attitude and start acting like you care for once, because I know you do.” He stared at her for a long time. “Dylan and I have been waiting on you for hours. You want to turn off your radio? Not answer phones? Maybe it helps you think? Good for you. You go right ahead. But when a superior calls, you call them back. The next time this happens, you’re off the case. Understood?”
Avery nodded, feeling humbled.
“Understood,” she said.
“Got it.” Dylan nodded.
“Good,” O’Malley said.
He stood taller and smiled.
“Now, I should have done this sooner but there’s no better time than the present. Avery Black, I’d like you to meet Dylan Connelly, divorced father of two. Wife left him two years ago because he never came home and he drank too much. Now they live in Maine and he never gets to see his kids, so he’s pissed off all the time.”
Dylan stiffened and was about to speak, but said nothing.
“And Dylan? Meet Avery Black, former criminal defense attorney that screwed up and released one of the world’s worst serial killer onto the streets of Boston, a man that killed again and destroyed her life. She leaves behind a multimillion-dollar gig, an ex-husband, and a kid that barely talks to her. And, like you, she’s usually drowning her sorrows in work and alcohol. You see? You two have more in common than you think.”
He turned deadly serious.
“Don’t embarrass me again, or you’re both off the case.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Left alone in the conference room together, Avery and Dylan sat across from each other for a few moments in absolute silence. Neither one of them moved. His head was low. A grimace lined his face and he seemed to be mulling something over. For the first time, Avery felt some sympathy for him.
“I know what it’s like – ” she began.
Dylan stood up so fast and stiffly that his chair slid back and hit the wall.
“Don’t think this changes anything,” he said. “You and I are nothing alike.”
Although his menacing body language emanated anger and distance, his eyes said something different. Avery was sure he was on the verge of a breakdown. Something the captain had said affected him, just like it had affected her. They were both damaged, lonely. Alone.
“Look,” she offered, “I just thought.”
Dylan turned away and opened the door. His profile on the way out confirmed her fears: there were tears in his bloodshot eyes.
“Dammit,” she whispered.
Nights were the worst for Avery. She had no steady group of friends anymore, no real hobbies other than the job, and she was so tired that she couldn’t imagine doing more legwork. By herself at the large, blond table, she hung her head low and dreaded what came next.
The way out of the office was like every other day, only there was a charged feeling in the air, and many on the force were even more emboldened by her front page story.
“Hey, Black,” someone called and pointed to her cover photo. “Nice face.”
Another officer tapped on the image of Howard Randall.
“This story says you two were very close, Black. You into gerontophilia? You know what that means? It means you like to fuck old people.”
“You guys are hilarious.” She smiled and shot her fingers out like guns.
“Fuck you, Black.”
* * *
A white BMW was parked in the garage; five years old, dirty and worn. Avery had bought it at the height of her success as a defense attorney.
What were you thinking? she mused. Why would anyone buy a white car?
Success, she remembered. The white BMW had been bright and flashy, and she wanted everyone to know she was a boss. Now, it was a reminder of her failed life.
Avery’s apartment was on Bolton Street in South Boston. She owned a small two-bedroom on the second floor of a two-story building. The place was a downgrade from her former penthouse high-rise, but it was spacious and neat, with a nice terrace where she could sit and relax after a hard day’s work.
The living room was an open space with shaggy brown carpeting. The kitchen was to the right of the front door, and separated from the rest of the room by two large islands. There were no plants or animals. A northern exposure ensured the apartment was usually dark. Avery threw her keys on the table and shed the rest of her belongings: gun, shoulder harness, walkie-talkie, badge, belt, phone, and wallet. She undressed on the way to the shower.
After a long soak to process the events of the day, she put on a robe, grabbed a beer from the fridge, then her phone, and headed out to the terrace.
Nearly twenty missed calls flashed on her cell, along with ten new messages. Most of them were from Connelly and O’Malley. There was a lot of screaming.
Sometimes Avery was so single-minded and driven she refused to pick up for anyone that wasn’t essential to her task, especially when all of the pieces hadn’t been put together; today was one of those days.
She scrolled down through last numbers dialed – and all the people that had called her in the past month. Not a single one was her daughter, or her ex-husband.
Suddenly, she missed them both.
Numbers were dialed.
The phone rang.
A message answered: “Hi, this is Rose. I’m not here right now to take your call, but if you leave a brief message, and your name and number, I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. Thanks so much.” Beep.
Avery hung up.
She toyed with the idea of calling Jack, her ex. He was a good man, her college sweetheart with a heart of gold: a truly decent person. They’d had a torrid affair when she was eighteen, and she, with a sickening ego after her dream job, had ruined everything.
For years, she blamed other people about the split, and for the rift with her daughter: Howard Randall for his lies, her old boss, the money, the power, and all those people she had to constantly entertain and beguile to stay one step ahead of the truth: Little by little, her clients had become less reliable, and still she wanted to keep going, to ignore the truth, to bend justice one way or the other – simply to win. Only one more case, she often told herself. Next time, I’ll defend someone truly innocent and set the record straight.
Howard Randall had been that case.
I’m innocent, he’d cried at their first meeting. These students are my life. Why would I hurt one of them?
Avery had believed him, and for the first time in a long time, she had begun to believe in herself. Randall was a world-renowned psychology professor at Harvard, in his sixties, with no motive and no known history of his unhinged personal beliefs. More than that, he appeared weak and broken, and Avery had always wanted to defend the weak.
When she got him off, it was the highlight of her career, the highest of heights – that is, until he purposely killed again to expose her as a fraud.
All Avery had wanted to know was: why?
Why would you it? she’d asked him once in his cell. Why would you lie and set me up, just to go to prison for the rest of your life?
Because I knew you could be saved, Howard had replied.
Saved, Avery thought.
Is this salvation? she wondered and viewed her surroundings. Here? Now? No friends? No family? A beer in hand and a new life hunting down killers to make amends for my past? She took a swig of her drink and shook her head. No, this isn’t salvation. At least not yet.
Her thoughts turned to the killer.
A picture of him had begun to form in her mind: quiet, lonely, desperate for attention, a specialist with herbs and corpses. She ruled out an alcoholic or drug addict. He was too careful. The minivan harked to a family, but his actions seemed to indicate a family was what he wanted, not what he had.
Her mind swirling with thoughts and images, Avery downed two more beers before she suddenly fell asleep in her cozy outdoor chair.
CHAPTER NINE
In her dreams, Avery was with her family again.
Her ex was an athletic man with cropped brown hair and dazzling green eyes. Avid climbers, they were on a hike together with their daughter, Rose; she was only sixteen and had already received an early admission to Brandeis College, even though she was only a junior in high school, but in the dream she was six. They were all singing and walking along a path surrounded by dense trees. Dark birds fluttered and cried out before the trees morphed into a shadowy monster and a knife-like hand stabbed Rose in the chest.
“No!” Avery screamed.
Another hand stabbed Jack and both he and her daughter were hoisted away.
“No! No! No!” Avery cried.
The monster lowered.
Dark lips whispered in her ear.
There is no justice.
Avery jolted awake to the sound of incessant ringing. She was still on the terrace in her robe. The sun had already come up. Her phone continued to blare.
She picked up.
“Black.”
“Yo Black!” Ramirez answered. “Don’t you ever pick up? I’m downstairs. Get your shit together and get out here. I’ve got coffee and sketch samples.”
“What time is it?”
“Eight-thirty.”
“Give me five minutes,” she said and hung up.
The dream continued to permeate her thoughts. Sluggishly, Avery rose and headed into the apartment. Her head pounded. Faded blue jeans were tugged on. A white T-shirt was made respectable by a black blazer. Three chugs of orange juice and a downed granola bar was breakfast. On the way out, Avery glanced at herself in the mirror. Her attire, and her morning meal, were a far cry from thousand-dollar suits and daily breakfast at the finest restaurants. Get over it, she thought. You’re not here to look pretty. You’re here to bring in the bad guys.
Ramirez handed her a cup of coffee in the car.
“Looking good, Black,” he joked.
As always, he appeared to be the model of perfection: dark blue jeans, a light-blue button-down shirt, and a dark-blue jacket with light-brown belt and shoes.
“You should be a model,” Avery grumbled, “not a cop.”
A smile displayed his perfect teeth.
“Actually, I did do a little modeling once.”
He pulled out of the breezeway and headed north.
“You get any sleep last night?” he asked.
“Not much. How about you?”
‘“I slept like a baby,” he said proudly. “I always sleep well. None of this gets to me, you know? I like to let it ride,” he said and waved his hand through the air.
“Any updates?”
“Both boys were home last night. Connelly put a watch on them just to make sure they didn’t bolt. He also talked to the dean to get some information and make sure no one freaks out about a bunch of plainclothes cops hanging around campus. Neither kid has a file. Dean said they’re both good boys from good families. We’ll see today. Nothing yet from Sarah on the facial recognition. We should hear something this afternoon. A few dealerships called me back with names and numbers. I’m just going to keep a list for a while and see what happens. You see the morning paper?”
“No.”
He pulled it out and threw it on her lap. In big, bold letters, the headline read “Murder at Harvard.” There was another picture from Lederman Park, along with a smaller photo of the Harvard campus. The article inside rehashed the editorial from the previous day and included a smaller picture of Avery and Howard Randall from their days in court together. Cindy Jenkins was mentioned by name but there was no photo given.
“Slow day in the news?” Avery said.
“She’s a white girl from Harvard,” Ramirez replied, “of course it’s big news. We gotta keep those white kids safe.”
Avery raised a brow.
“That sounds vaguely racist.”
Ramirez vigorously nodded.
“Yeah,” he agreed, “I’m probably a little racist.”
They wove through the streets of South Boston and headed over the Longfellow Bridge and into Cambridge.
“Why’d you become a cop?” she asked.
“I love being a cop,” he said. “Father was a cop, grandfather was a cop, and now I’m a cop. Went to college and got bumped up quick. What’s not to love? I get to carry a gun and wear a badge. I just bought myself a boat. I go out on the bay, chill out, catch some fish, and then catch some killers. Doing God’s work.”