No, he was pretty sure the thoughts came from a part of him that understood how fleeting life could be. In a job where you carried a gun and were typically on the hunt for people breaking the law and ending lives, mortality often became a creature that stared you in the face with big, slobbering teeth on a daily basis. And now to have someone close to him staring that monster down every day, he couldn’t help but feel for Rachel.

  He left the bench and headed back inside. He hadn’t seen Rachel today and figured he might swing by her desk to check in on her. He’d done his best to keep his distance when they weren’t actively running cases together. She’d always seemed the type who preferred silence and isolation when facing something big.

  As he neared the elevators just off the lobby, his phone rang. He was surprised at first, wondering if Douglas Gift had undergone a change of heart. Maybe hearing his daughter’s name over the phone in such an unexpected way had simply shocked him and he’d responded by ending the call. But it wasn’t until he reached into his pocket that he realized the phone that was ringing was not the personal phone he’d used to make the call, but the bureau cellphone in his left pocket.

  Jesus, when did I become the pretentious a-hole that carries two phones on him? Jack wondered as he grabbed his work phone.

  The number and extension on the display were familiar. It was Anderson. And Anderson usually only called when there was an unscheduled meeting being set up or if there was a case. He took the call while standing in front of the elevators, letting it pass by.

  “This is Rivers.”

  “Agent Rivers, I need you to come to my office. I’ve got a case that just came in that I need you on. It’s local, here in the city, and I’d like to have you headed to the crime scene as soon as possible.”

  “Sure, sir. What’s the case?”

  “All I know right now is it’s a murder. And the victim seems to be connected to another body that was found a few days ago out near Brandermill. So come on up and I’ll fill you in.”

  “Sure, sir. Want me to grab Rachel on my way?”

  In an eerie resemblance to his conversation with Douglas, there was a brief silence on the other end of the line.

  “Agent Gift is on a temporary leave of absence,” Anderson said.

  “She’s…what?”

  “A leave of absence, for a period of at least two weeks.”

  Jack wondered what this might mean. Had she finally told Anderson about her diagnosis? A wave of despair washed over him simply because he wasn’t quite sure what was going on. But he figured he’d not say anything about Rachel unless Anderson brought it up first.

  “Rivers? Are you headed my way?” Anderson asked after a tense silence.

  “Yes, sir. Be there in a few minutes.”

  He ended the call, shocked and dumbfounded. A two-week leave of absence, and she hadn’t told him? It hurt a bit but beyond that, he found himself worried about her. Even as he pressed the button for the elevator, he wondered where she might be, and what she might be doing…and if he’d ever work with her again.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The following day, Thursday, Paige Gift went back to school. She’d made the request without any prompting, though Rachel had offered her to take the rest of the week off. It was all guesswork, really. After all, how was she supposed to be able to predict how such a young child would handle the news that her mother would be dead in about a year? She figured it might be good for Paige to try to keep a sense of normalcy, so if she wanted to go back to school, who was she to question it?

  So with Paige at school and Grandma Tate still occupying the guest bedroom, Rachel did her best to keep herself busy. She tidied up the living room. She dusted and vacuumed. The banal activities felt almost cathartic. Sure, there was a tumor in her brain but that didn’t mean the dust was going to stop settling in around the house or that Paige was going to stop leaving her homemade slime and little bottles of glitter all around the house.

  The act of cleaning was also something she’d often used in the past to focus her mind. As she swept and scrubbed, she thought of her two-week leave of absence and how it might affect the little bit of career time she had remaining. Was there really even any sense in going back? Beyond that, what about the Alex Lynch case? Was she supposed to be expected to just sit back and happily let someone else, some entire other arm of the government, track him down? She knew it seemed beyond conceited, but she felt that given her history with Lynch, she should have been the clear choice to lead the effort to hunt the man down.

  She was vacuuming the carpet on the stairs when Grandma Tate appeared at the top of the stairway. She peered down with a look of grave concern, causing Rachel to shut the vacuum off.

  “Something wrong?” Rachel asked.

  “I just want to make sure you’re not pushing yourself too hard.”

  Rachel bit back the sour reply that instantly came to her tongue—a reply about how Grandma Tate was being far too overbearing. Instead, she tried to keep things as pleasant but as firm as she could without causing a rift between them.

  “I was working an active case as an FBI agent two weeks ago,” she said. “I think vacuuming the stairs is going to be okay.”

  Grandma Tate furrowed her brow and sighed. “Don’t forget who you’re talking to, Rachel. I’ve been in your shoes. Hell, some days I feel like I still am. I know how it sneaks up on you. I’m just trying to watch out for you.”

  “I know you are.”

  And she did know how the wear and tear of her situation could sneak up on her. She’d experienced the blackouts, the thinning of her vision. She’d even crashed a car during the last case because of a moment of dizziness and confusion.

  Still, there was something about Grandma Tate’s watchful eye that was pissing her off. There was no sense in denying it. She did not regret having Grandma Tate come to stay with her and Paige, but it was starting to wear on her nerves.

  “Tell you what,” Rachel said. “I’m going to finish the stairs, make a little lunch, and maybe try to take a nap. Sound good?”

  Her grandmother seemed to be confused on whether or not she was being made fun of but ended up nodding her head. She came down the stairs, sidestepping the vacuum cleaner. “I’ll throw some lunch together. What do you want?”

  Rachel waited to roll her eyes until Grandma Tate was behind her. And knowing that it was useless to argue, she said: “Just a ham and cheese sandwich, please.”

  She then turned the vacuum cleaner back on and finished the stairs. When she was done, she put the vacuum away and found her sandwich on the kitchen table, with a Granny Smith apple beside the plate. As for Grandma Tate, it seemed that she had walked out onto the back porch with her book of crossword puzzles. Rachel considered joining her just to catch a bit of sun, but decided against it. The nap she’d mentioned just to get her grandmother off of her back was starting to sound good. She didn’t feel tired but she also knew she’d probably be able to doze off for a quick hour-long nap if she closed the door and turned the noisemaker on.

  She sat down at the table with her sandwich and began to wonder if she’d made a mistake by being so unflinching with Anderson. What if she changed her mind next week and went back to him only to find that he’d taken offense to the way she’d reacted?

  Really, in the grand scheme of things, she wasn’t sure if it mattered. She had a very brief amount of time where she’d actually have to be concerned about what Anderson thought of her. It also made her wonder if she should just come clean with him, too. Everyone else close to her knew about her diagnosis so it was only a matter of time before he heard it, too.

  She was roughly halfway through her sandwich when the doorbell rang. It was an odd sound to her, as it was rarely ever used. She wondered if it might be Peter, but could not think of a reason why he might come by in the middle of the day. Her thoughts then turned to Alex Lynch but she found it highly illogical that he’d be so bold as to come to her house—much less use the doorbell.

  Still, she simply looked in the direction of the living room for several moments before getting up from the table. She decided to go ahead and answer the doorbell because if she didn’t, another ring or two and there was a chance Grandma Tate would hear it and come rushing in to make sure she wasn’t over-extending herself by answering the door. She left the remainder of her sandwich on the table, walked across the living room, and answered the door.

  The person on the other side was not Peter or Lynch, but someone just as familiar as both. It was Jack, offering her a vague smile.

  “Jack, how are you?” she said. At first, she was pleased to see him but then she remembered that she’d purposefully not told him about her decision to take a leave of absence if she could not get on the Lynch case. For all she knew, Jack might very well be pissed at her.

  “I’m good, I suppose,” he said.

  “You mad at me?”

  “Mad? No. But I’m a little concerned, and…well, can I just come in?”

  “Of course.” She opened the door and waved him in, closing the door behind him. She led him into the kitchen and sat back down to her sandwich. “Have you had lunch?”

  “No, actually.”

  “There’s leftover lasagna in the fridge if you’d like some. There’s some tuna salad my grandmother made, too.”

  “I’ll take you up on the tuna,” he said.

  “Help yourself.” She waved absently at the fridge, trying to decide why Jack had made a surprise visit if it wasn’t because he was angry at her for leaving work without telling him.

  “So, a two-week leave of absence?” he said as he opened the fridge and found the right Tupperware.

  “Well, the ‘two weeks’ part was Anderson’s decision. I didn’t put a cap on it.”

  “I know you didn’t tell him about your tumor, so how did you explain it?”

  “How do you know I didn’t tell him?”

  “Hey, I asked the question first.” He popped the lid off of the tuna salad and then looked around, finding the loaf of bread on the end of the counter. He helped himself, plucking a spoon out of the silverware drawer (he found it without her help on the second guess) and layering the salad on a slice of bread.

  “I asked him if I could be placed on the Alex Lynch case, and he said no. So I told him I wanted a leave of absence on the grounds that there was no way in hell I’d be able to focus on any other case if I knew Lynch was out there.”

  “Makes sense,” Jack said, finishing the construction of his meager sandwich. “I guess he refused it because he thought the connection was just too personal?”

  “Exactly. Now…answer my question. How can you know for sure I didn’t tell him about the tumor?”

  “Because he assigned me to a case and when I asked him if I could ping you on it, he told me about your leave of absence. And he asked me if I had any idea why you might have made such a decision other than Lynch. I, of course, said I couldn’t think of anything. I think he needs to be told about your situation, but I’m not going to be the one to do it.”

  “I’m going to tell him. Maybe in two weeks.”

  “Hey, that’s your decision,” Jack said. He took a bite of his sandwich and sat down at the table with her. “But listen…that’s not why I came here today. I came here to tell you about the case he assigned me to. It’s got me worried…about you.”

  “How’s that? What’s the case?”

  “Two people have been killed outside of medical facilities…cancer treatment centers. One was just off of Broad Street at the Colton Clinic. That one occurred late yesterday afternoon. The other happened in Brandermill three days ago, a fifty-seven-year-old male. Both victims had cancer, and they were terminal cases.”

  “You’re certain that’s the only thing linking the victims?”

  “Right now, that’s all we’ve got, yeah. And quite frankly, it’s enough for me. You can call me overbearing and worrisome if you want, but I’m afraid you might end up being targeted.”

  She thought this over for a while and understood his concern. Two victims, both with terminal cancer…it was a pretty undeniable link. Still, to think she might be affected seemed like a bit of a stretch to her.

  “You said both victims were attacked in parking lots, right?” she asked.

  “Right.”

  “Well, I should be safe for at least another ten days. I don’t have another appointment until then. And hopefully you’ll have caught this guy by then. But…Jesus. Someone targeting people who already have a death sentence seems pretty grim. Who else is working it?”

  “It just me for now, working with the police. I’ve got two interviews with family and friends lined up this afternoon, so that’ll be fun.”

  “Is there a potential link to the doctors they’re seeing, too?” Rachel asked.

  “I checked into that. Nothing lines up. I’ve also looked at the specialists they were seeing beforehand as well. Nothing there, either.”

  “Well, how about—”

  “Nope,” Jack said, cutting her off. “Two weeks’ leave. Remember?”

  She scowled at him and shook her head. “Why did you come by here if it wasn’t to pick my brain about it?”

  “I came by to tell you about the specifics of the case and to ask you to please be careful. To watch your back, as it were.”

  “Well, I appreciate that. Thank you.”

  “You feeling okay?”

  “I am. Maybe a tiny bit more tired than usual, but nothing bad.”

  “How’s Paige handling it?”

  “That’s a tricky question. She understands what’s going on but she’s also trying to sort of pretend nothing is different for the most part. We may have to have a bigger conversation with her about it in the future.”

  “We?”

  “Me and my grandmother.” She hitched a thumb toward the back porch and said, “She’s back there on the porch doing crosswords. Want to meet her?”

  “I do love a good crossword,” Jack said, getting to his feet. “But I have these interviews to get off to.”

  Rachel walked him to the door as he wolfed down the remainder of his sandwich. When he opened the door and stepped out, he remained there for a moment. It was clear that he wanted to say something else but couldn’t find the words. There was something like sadness in his eyes when he finally spoke.

  “You know, when this leave of absence is up and you’re not…better…what does that mean? You and I won’t be working together anymore, right?”

  Rachel knew the answer was an almost definite yes but could not bring herself to admit it. So she tried to lighten the moment with a joke. “That depends on if you continue to come by my house to pick my brain during lunch.”

  He smiled and shook his head. “There’s a tumor in your head, Gift. You keep making pick my brain comments and I’m not going to be able to take those freely offered puns.”

  “Understood. You be careful out there, Jack.”

  “Same to you.”

  He slowly walked away, but Rachel did not close the door right away. She watched Jack make his way to his car and, like him, wondered if their working relationship had come to an end and she hadn’t even realized it until now. And if their working relationship was seeing its last days, what did that mean for them? What did that mean in regards to the efforts to bring in Lynch and any last hoorah she might be able to manage with her FBI career?

  And if she let him go, what was she supposed to do? More chores? Sit around idly until Paige got home? Jesus…was that the life that was waiting for her if she let this damn tumor control her life from here on out?

  Not me, she thought. Nope, that’s just not me.

  It all rushed by like wind strewn with debris, rushing across her brain and swirling her up in it like a miniature tornado. She made a decision in that moment that she knew was based on emotion rather than logic but was acting on it before she could take it back.

  When she did close the door, a tear trickled down her cheek and she didn’t bother wiping it away. What she did do, though, was turn back around and rush to the door. She did it without thinking, following her heart and her stronger impulses.

  “Jack!” she yelled.

  He was already at the car but when she called him, he wheeled around with a startled look on his face. “Yeah?”

  “Give me a second, would you?”

  “A second for what?”

  “To speak with my grandmother,” she said. “I’m coming with you.”

  “You’re what?”

  But she didn’t bother answering. Instead, she ran to the back porch to tell Grandma Tate that she was leaving with her partner and might not be back for several hours.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “You’re absolutely crazy, you know that?” Jack said from behind the steering wheel. “Or maybe I am. Maybe I’m the crazy one for letting you come along.”

  “Would you have tried to stop me, Jack?” she asked. “Really?”

  “Maybe. I mean, Anderson is pretty upset about what you pulled yesterday.”

  “Am I being completely irresponsible if I suggest we just don’t tell him I came along?”

  The look of shock on his face surprised her. It was no longer a gentle back-and-forth ribbing of one another, but now treading on insubordination that could get them both in a bit of trouble.

  “Yeah, maybe you are, a little. I just…I don’t get it. Why would you request a leave of absence when you’re clearly not ready for it? Was it just a powerplay against Anderson?”

  “Maybe a little,” she replied. She didn’t see the point in lying about it. “I have limited time. I want to spend it in a way that’s meaningful. And I had convinced myself that if I couldn’t help bring Alex Lynch in, there was no point. But these terminal cancer patients…that hits a little close to home. I can’t just sit idly by, you know?”

  “So why not go directly to Anderson?”