by Blake Pierce
“I’m not going to go live in a hotel based on some wild assumption you have,” he said.
“It’s a little more than just an assumption,” she said.
“Whatever. I don’t jump when you say so anymore, Avery. That didn’t really work for us last time either, did it?”
“Don’t do it for me, then,” Avery said. “Do it for Rose.”
“Don’t you dare use her as some sort of lure to get me to bite into your little theories. Forget it, Avery. I appreciate the concern—I guess—but no, I’m not leaving.”
“You stubborn asshole,” she said in a shout. “This is not about me and you. This is about our daughter having a father. Biel is out there and he is killing. He’s taking out people in my orbit. He killed Jane less than five hours after I spoke with her this morning. The creep threw a dead cat through my window while Rose was with me. Do you get it?”
He slammed his fist down on the table that, less than ten minutes ago, had served as a support for afternoon sex.
“Fine. I’ll do it. I’ll talk to Tricia and see if I can stay at her place.”
“Thank you. And don’t use your car. Ride together, in her car. Just in case.”
He gave a sarcastic chuckle. “You and your damn orders. Anything else you think I should be doing in the next few days, Detective?”
She let the jab go as she turned for the doorway to make her exit. “Yes,” she said. “Fix your doorbell.” And then, as she made her way out of the room, she added: “And you might want to fix your door, too.”
CHAPTER TWENTY TWO
Seeing Jane Seymour’s freshly killed body and having to confront Jack all in the span of two hours had taken its toll on Avery. She left Jack’s house (not bothering to give Trisha even the slightest of glances on her way out) and headed back into the city. Before she was even off of Jack’s street, she realized that she had nowhere to go. Maybe O’Malley had been right: maybe she was temporarily homeless.
She called O’Malley and he answered right away. “How’s Jack?” he asked.
“Alive. And having a very fun afternoon, I might add. How are things on your end?”
“We’ve got a section of the city blocked off—a six-block radius, with Seymour and Fitch in the center. But it’s not looking good. This guy works fast. We did find some sort of fluid on the headrest of Jane’s car, though. Probably saliva. The working theory is that as Jane parked her car, Biel approached quickly from nearby, maybe behind the building, and got into the back as she started to get out. Maybe he drooled a bit when he was cutting her up from behind. We’re checking on it. Should have results in the next twelve hours or so.”
“Sounds good. Any news on where Rose and I are staying?”
“Yeah,” O’Malley said. “And I don’t think you’re going to like it.”
***
Avery pulled her car into one of the many vacant spots in the Weston Motel forty minutes later. It was 4:17 and the place was basically dead with the notable exception of three police cars and a few sad-looking cars scattered around the lot. The Weston Motel was not the type of place you went for a good night’s rest. Avery knew for a fact that it had once been a hot spot for heroin deals and prostitutes. In the last few years it had managed to drop that reputation but it also wasn’t anywhere near a five-star resort—or a four-star. It might scrape the bottom of a third-star rating, and that was being kind. It was a crummy little place tucked away like some forgotten blemish not too far away from Franklin Park.
As she got out of her car, she saw Finley coming out of one of the rooms. He gave her an apologetic grin and then shrugged his shoulders. She met him on the concrete walkway that connected all of the rooms to the main office, the drink machines, and the ice machine.
“If it helps, I argued for something a little nicer,” Finley said.
She sighed. “Thanks. But I know how this works. It makes sense. The place is only one level. It’s located in an area of town where if most people see a police car, they’re not going to cause any trouble. It’s a smart move. Where’s Rose?”
“Room twelve,” Finley said. “And man, is she pissed.”
“Thanks, Finley,” she said as she made her way farther down the concrete walkway toward room twelve.
When she knocked on the door, it was answered right away by Officer Dennison. He smiled at her out of obligation and then stepped aside to let her in. She saw Rose sitting on the bed, scrolling through her phone. The TV was also on but was being mostly ignored.
“You okay, Rose?” she asked.
“No. This sucks.”
Dennison chuckle and agreed. “It does suck. But we just ordered pizza.”
“Is it just you?” Avery asked.
“No. Sawyer’s out in the car. We’ll switch in about two or three hours. We’re on until midnight and then Dabney and Parks will come in to relieve us.”
“That’s not necessary,” Avery said. “I’m here now. You guys don’t need to stay here to protect us.”
“Yeah, I know that, and Sawyer knows that. But Connelly doesn’t. Or maybe he does, but just wants to be safe.”
“Wow, it does suck for you, too, huh?”
Dennison laughed at this and Avery was glad to see Rose smile at the sound of the man’s raucous laughter. She sat down by Rose on the edge of the bed. When Rose looked up at her, Avery did her best to look her in the eyes—something Rose had never been a fan of.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “But I am working as hard as I can to catch him. And when we do, this will all be over.”
“I know,” Rose said, clearly having to push her frustration aside to be civil. “You saw Dad, I hear? How is he?”
“Oh, he’s fine. I convinced him to lay low somewhere else until it all blows over, too.”
“Good,” Rose said, then returning her attention back to her screen.
Avery decided to leave well enough alone and not push Rose any further. When she was ready to talk, she’d talk. So instead of pestering her daughter further, Avery figured she’d try to be productive. And she’d start by going over the files on Ronald Biel again. Maybe there was something she was missing, something she could closely link to today’s two murders.
She went out to her car to retrieve them. She spotted Sawyer in the patrol car parked to the left of room twelve and gave him a little wave. He returned with a shrug and the same apologetic look Finley had given her moments ago.
She unlocked her trunk and took out the small box of files she accumulated between the A1, the prison, Jane, and her own personal files. As she shuffled the box out, Finley was there to shut the trunk for her.
“Need help?” he asked.
“No, I got it,” she said. Finley nodded, but followed her all the same.
As she carried the files back to the room, she heard her phone ding from inside her coat pocket, indicating that she’d gotten a text.
O’Malley, she thought. Maybe they found something else to go by in Jane’s car.
She reached the room, set the files down on the second bed, and fished her phone out of her pocket. She saw right away that the text was not from O’Malley.
It was from a number she didn’t know. She was pretty sure she had never seen it before. It read: I figured I’d be polite and not jump you again. I have a clue for you, since it seems our man is working very quickly. Want the clue? Meet me at your apartment building. 6 p.m. Out back. Come alone. Ooh. Bad reception. Gotta Go.
Howard, she thought.
Oddly enough, it was the smiley face that sealed the deal. And, of course, he was offering a clue but had left something of a riddle in the message. Bad reception. That’s some sort of clue, too. I know that miserable bastard far too well.
“You okay?” Finley asked.
“Yeah, I’m good,” she said. But she angled herself away from Finley so he couldn’t see the message and read it again.
Maybe it’s not Howard, she thought. Maybe it’s Biel. Whichever it is, they’re probably messaging me fr
om a burner phone. I’d waste my time trying to track it down. And I don’t have time to waste with the speed Biel is working.
And with that thought, she made her decision.
She didn’t care if it was Howard or Biel. She’d be happy to meet with either one.
She looked at Rose, still scrolling listlessly on her phone. Making such a reckless decision while in the presence of her daughter felt wrong. But she didn’t see where she had any choice.
Six p.m. I’d have to leave in about an hour and twenty minutes. What to do until then?
She looked to the box of files but not for very long. She then looked again at Rose and, slowly, sat back down on the bed. She grabbed the remote from the bedside table and found a rerun of Friends. Hearing the laugh track broke Rose from her phone hypnosis and just like that, Avery was spending time with her daughter.
It felt lazy and forced, but it warmed Avery’s heart.
And it also made her more certain than ever that she’d be following up on the message she’d just received. Whatever it took to free Rose of this prison she had created, she was willing to do it—even if it meant carelessly risking her own life.
CHAPTER TWENTY THREE
When Avery left the Weston Motel, Rose didn’t seem to have any particular feelings about it. It was some of the moody elements of her teenage self, clinging on to a fast-approaching twenty, but that was fine with Avery. She’d rather Rose be detached and moody than clingy and panicked as her mother went speeding off to her next dangerous location.
The message had said to show up alone, so she had remained mum on her location when Sawyer and Dennison had asked her. “Just checking out a possible lead,” she had said.
And that had been that.
She pulled up behind her apartment building at 5:56, a little shocked by how alien the place felt to her now. It had been a hectic two weeks, filled with dark emotions she had still not yet dealt with. Just because Ramirez was back among the land of the living did not make those feelings go away.
Although she was a few minutes early, she was pretty sure she spotted Howard’s little clue within his text message right away.
Ooh, bad reception…
A white van was parked in the far corner of the rear lot of her apartment building. It looked a little worn with age. The lettering along the side was basic—white with simple block lettering. Like the rest of the van, the lettering was worse for wear, yet still readable: HUDSON ELECTRONICS REPAIR – Specializing in TVs.
She was hard pressed to remember the last time she’d seen any van—or any business for that matter—that boasted about specializing in television repair. Was that even a thing anymore?
Not wanting to tempt Howard, she waited until her phone read 6:00 before she stepped out of her car. She was very aware that he could be somewhere nearby, watching her. It was difficult not to call out to him. But if this was some game he was playing, she figured she needed to play by his rules. Every clue or riddle he had given her in the past had always led to something helpful. Why would this time be any different?
She walked to the van and the closer she got, the more she started to see it as some sort of relic out of time. She could easily imagine Howard having this van stored away somewhere, or maybe he purchased it recently for this very reason. Whatever the case, the van had clearly not seen any real road time in several years.
She tried the door on the back of the van and found it locked. She then tried the driver’s side door and it opened without any trouble. She slowly climbed in, taking a glance over her shoulder. There were two people walking down the street at the edge of the block, but they were paying her no attention. If Howard Randall was in the vicinity, he was not showing himself.
The van smelled of dust and mildew yet looked to have recently been tidied up. There was nothing of note in the front seats or on the dashboard. However, when she checked the glove compartment, she found a plastic bag. She slowly pulled it out and inside found something she had not been expecting—something that made her pause and actually laugh out loud.
There were several magnetized letters in the bag, the kind that preschoolers used on refrigerators while learning their ABCs. She looked through them and saw that it was not the entire alphabet, though. Also, there were some letters that were represented two and three times.
At the bottom of the bag was a handwritten note. In stylish cursive, written in pencil, was a question: What’s in a name?
She observed the handwriting and was quite certain it was not Biel’s. Biel’s had an almost childlike flare to it. This handwriting was rather elegant and beautiful.
Avery looked to the back of the van. It had been completely cleared out. Aside from some dust and grime, the back of the van was empty. On the left-hand wall, she saw an area that seemed to be much cleaner than the rest of the interior. She hunched over and crawled into the back of the van with the bag in hand. She placed her nose against the cleaner area and smelled something like window cleaner. It had been cleaned recently, while the rest of the van hadn’t.
She saw right away what Howard was doing and it made her feel as if he were talking down to her in a way. He was not only providing a clue, but also revealing the steps she needed to take in order to get to it. He was making everything abundantly clear to her, like a parent leaving a kid home alone for the first time.
The magnet letters. The square-shaped clean area in the back of the van. The note, asking what’s in a name?
Feeling a little foolish, she dumped the magnetized letters out into the floor. Then, on her hands and knees, she started sorting through them. She sorted the vowels out and set them to their own pile and then placed the every R, S, T, and N that she could find in another pile, as they were traditionally the most used letters in the English language.
She started placing the letters on the wall of the van, starting with consonants and trying to come up with a name that she might recognize. As she worked, she found an odd sort of appreciation for what Howard was having her do. In this silly little way, he was making her work for information rather than just leaving the name in a note…or even just sending it directly to her in the text message. While it was wasting her time, it was also keeping her sharp and driven.
She scrambled the letters here and there and kept finding herself drawn to the K. It was a letter that was typically either at the front or the very end of a first name. She tried the K with several vowel formations but had trouble with the consonants that followed. She worked fast, using her love of crosswords and other word puzzles to her advantage.
It took her a little less than two minutes before she figured out the first name, tied into place by the V—which was an oddball letter among the remaining magnets. She looked at it for a moment as she had it unscrambled.
Kevin.
She then looked to the remaining letters and tried sorting them out in a way that made some kind of sense. There were only two vowels remaining out of seven letters, which made it a little easier, but still complicated. After another few minutes, though, it was the inclusion of the S and H magnets that keyed her into it. She’d been trying to cram them into the middle of the last name but then realized that they needed to go at the end…before the two Rs, which were doubled, one behind the other.
With the name spelled out, she stared at it for a moment. She knew who it was but had never even thought about him ever since she’d discovered that Biel had been released. This guy had not even popped up on her radar—mainly because he had no reason to.
Kevin Parrish.
It was a name that had come up a few times during Biel’s trial—some former mob flunky who had taken the stand and yielded no results. But he had been the one person Biel had identified as a true friend—which was ironic, as he had tried to kill him during his little nine-victim rampage. If Avery was remembering correctly, she was pretty sure Kevin Parrish had been left without two fingers on his right hand and only one eye.
Given the six years or more than had passed since
Biel went to prison, and the mob’s tendency not to rat out their own in any way, she didn’t know if going to speak with Parrish would be worth her time. If it was a long way to travel, she’d rule him out.
But Howard seems to think he’s important, Avery thought. And really, that was good enough for her.
That’s when it occurred to her. She’d been thinking this entire time that it seemed strange that Howard would escape from prison. But maybe—juts maybe—he had not escaped out of his own selfish ambitions. Maybe he knew about Biel’s release and had escaped in an effort to save her.
The thought was jarring to say the least. Not allowing herself to get sidetracked by it, she pulled out her phone and called up O’Malley. As usual, he answered right away.
“How quickly can you get me an address?” she asked.
“If it concerns the Biel case, then I’ll have it for you in five minutes.”
“Good. I need the address for Kevin Parrish. Two r’s.”
“Got it. I’ll get right back to you.”
They ended the call and Avery let herself out of the van. She looked back at it before heading back for her car. She wondered how long Howard had hidden it away or, more realistically, how recently he had stolen it. The man’s mind worked like a computer, thinking quickly and often very far ahead of those he was around.
As she opened her car door, her cell phone buzzed. She saw that O’Malley had already gotten her the address, only three minutes after she’d made the request. If only they worked this quickly all the time, she thought.
She read the address and smiled in spite of herself. She wondered if Howard had already known what she was reading.
Kevin Parrish still lived in Boston. More than that, his address was only about fifteen minutes away. It seemed flimsy, but Avery was comfortable feeling that this was a break…finally.