Cause to Hide

The figure of the woman came closer, stepping through the fog. He saw that she had her own dog, taking it for its morning walk. It was one of those small pretentious dogs, the sort that looked more like a rat. Of course, he knew this about her. He knew just about everything about her morning schedule.

“Everything okay?” the woman asked.

He could see her face now. She was much younger than he was. Twenty years, at least.

He held up the empty leash and gave the woman a sad sort of smile. “My dog got loose. I’m pretty sure she came this way, but I don’t hear her.”

“Oh no,” the woman said.

“Sweet Pea!” he yelled again.

At the woman’s feet, her little dog lifted its leg and peed. The woman barely seemed to notice. She was looking at him now. Something very close to recognition filled her eyes. She tilted her head. An uncertain smile touched the corners of her mouth. She took a tiny step backward.

He reached into his other coat pocket and wrapped his hand around the handle of the hammer he had hidden there. He brought it out with a speed that surprised even him.

He struck her hard on top of the head with it. The sound it made in the quiet lot, in the blanket of fog, was almost nothing. Thunk.

Her eyes went glassy. When she collapsed to the ground, the traces of that small smile were still at the corners of her mouth.

Her little dog sniffed at her and then looked up to him. It gave a pathetic little bark. He stepped toward it and growled lightly. The dog peed a little more, backed away, and then went running out of the lot, its leash dragging behind it.

He pocketed the hammer and the useless leash. He then looked down at her body for a moment and slowly reached for it, the only sound left that of the dog’s barking, echoing endlessly in the rolling fog of morning.

CHAPTER ONE

Avery sat the last of the boxes down on the floor of her daughter’s new apartment and felt like crying. The moving truck had pulled away from the curb downstairs five minutes ago and there was no going back now: Rose had an apartment of her own. Avery felt the pit growing in her stomach; this was completely different than her living in a college dorm, where there were friends at every corner and the security of the campus police.

Rose would be living alone now. And Avery still hadn’t accepted it. A very short time ago, Rose had been endangered because of Avery’s last case – and that was something that Avery still harbored massive guilt over. To have Rose now out on her own after such an ordeal felt irresponsible on Avery’s part. It made her feel like a failure as a mother. It also made her very scared for her daughter. And that was saying something, coming from a decorated Homicide detective.

She’s eighteen, Avery thought. You can’t hold onto her forever, especially when your grip on her was loose, if not non-existent, during her formative years.

How had Rose grown up so fast? How had she become such a beautiful, independent, and driven woman? Avery certainly couldn’t take credit for it, as she had been absent for most of Rose’s life.

All that aside, it made her feel proud to watch her daughter as she unpacked her own dishes and placed them into her own cupboards. Despite the tumultuous childhood and teen years she had faced, Rose had made it. The future was hers for the taking, and it started with putting her Dollar Store dishes into the cupboards of her first apartment.

“I’m proud of you, kid,” Avery said. She made her way through the maze of boxes that occupied the floor of Rose’s living room.

“For what?” Rose said.

“Surviving,” Avery said with a laugh. “I know I didn’t necessarily make it easy on you.”

“You didn’t. But Dad did okay. And that’s not a dig against you.”

Avery felt a pang of sorrow.

“I know.”

Avery knew that such an admission was hard for Rose. Avery knew that her daughter was still trying to figure out the footing of their relationship. For a typical estranged mother and daughter, reconciliation was hard enough. But they had both been through hell lately. From Rose being stalked by a serial killer and moved to a safe house, to the post-traumatic stress disorder Avery was wrestling with from running to Rose’s rescue, there were mountain-sized obstacles to get over. And even something as simple as moving boxes into her daughter’s new apartment was a huge step along the way of repairing the relationship Avery so badly wanted with her.

Taking that step required some sort of normalcy – a normalcy that wasn’t always available in the world of a work-obsessed detective.

She joined Rose in the kitchen and helped her unpack the boxes labeled KITCHEN. As they worked together to unpack them, Avery felt herself close to tears again.

What the hell? When have I ever gotten this emotional?

“Do you think you’ll be okay?” Avery asked, doing what she could to keep conversation going. “This isn’t like a college dorm. You’re legitimately on your own. Are you ready for that after…well, after everything you’ve been through?”

“Yes, Mom. I’m not a little girl anymore.”

“Well, that’s very clear.”

“Besides,” she said, putting the last dish away and setting the empty box aside. “I’m not exactly alone anymore.”

And there it was. Rose had been a little distracted lately but also in a good mood, and a noticeable good mood was a rare occurrence for Rose Black. Avery had thought there might be a boy involved and that opened up a whole different can of worms that Avery wasn’t prepared to deal with. She’d missed the period talk with Rose, missed details of her first crush, first dance, and first kiss. Now that she was faced with the potential love life of her eighteen-year-old daughter, she understood just how much she had missed.

“What do you mean?” Avery asked.

Rose bit at her lip, as if she regretted having said anything.

“I…well, I might have met someone.”

She said it casually and a bit dismissively, making it clear that she had no interest in talking about it.

“Oh yeah?” Avery asked. “When was this?”

“About a month ago,” Rose said.

Exactly the amount of time I’ve been noticing her better moods, Avery thought. Sometimes it was eerie how her detective skills overlaid her personal life.

“But…he’s not living here, is he?” Rose asked.

“No, Mom. But he might be here a lot.”

“That’s not the sort of thing the mother of an eighteen-year-old wants to hear,” Avery said.

“God, Mom. It’ll be okay.”

Avery knew she should leave it alone. If Rose wanted to talk to her about this guy, she’d do it on her own time. Pressuring her would only make it worse.

But again, her work instinct took over and she couldn’t help herself from asking more questions.

“Can I meet him?”

“Um, absolutely not. Not yet, anyway.”

Avery sensed the opportunity to go deeper into the conversation – the awkward conversation about protected sex and the risk of diseases and teenage pregnancy. But she almost felt like she didn’t have that right, given their strained relationship.

Being a Homicide detective, though, it was impossible not to worry. She knew the caliber of men out there. She had seen not just murders but severe domestic abuse cases. And while this guy in Rose’s life might be a perfect gentleman, it was much easier for Rose to assume that he was a threat.