Chapter 21
Twenty-One
Two weeks later…
Ava
The clinic is exactly as I found it. Axel’s notepad sits neatly beside his keyboard. The chairs are back where they belong, aligned with surgical precision. Nothing borrowed has been left behind, and nothing has been moved out of place.
Except that isn’t entirely true. I came here with considerably less than I’m leaving with, and none of it—none of the weight, the change, the perspective—fits in the bag sitting by the door.
"The visual disturbances concern me more than the EEG," I say, pressing the phone to my ear as I pace the limited floor space. "Has anyone done a thorough medication review? Post-blast patients self-medicate more than they report."
There’s a pause on David's end of the line, just the sound of his pen scribbling a quick note. "I'll have someone look at it."
"Don't have someone look at it. Look at it yourself." I soften the command slightly, leaning against the counter. "He's not going to tell a resident the truth about his symptoms."
"Noted." Another pause, and I can hear him smiling through the receiver. "You sound like yourself again, Ava. I’m not sure I would have managed it as quickly."
I hide a smile. “I had a lot of help healing.”
Before he can ask me the questions both the police and Silas have strictly cautioned me not to answer yet, I redirect him.
"I'll be back Thursday," I say. "I want to see him in person."
"I was hoping you'd say that." The relief in his voice is genuine. "I'll have his file ready when you arrive."
We wrap up the call and I set the phone down on the sterile surface.
From the examination chair she has comprehensively claimed as her own, Delilah looks up from her laptop. Shoes off. Coke in hand. She’s the picture of a woman entirely, unapologetically at home in someone else's space.
"Doctory," she says, looking over the rim of her can approvingly.
"That wasn’t a word three nights ago when you played it, Delilah."
"It absolutely is." She takes a long, satisfied pull of her Coke. "It might not be in the official Scrabble dictionary, but it’s in the Hightower lexicon. It’s filed right after Rangery and Bomby."
I snort a laugh. "Verity is never going to let you call her Bomby."
"She lets me call her lots of things." Delilah grins, her eyes bright. "She just doesn't know it yet."
From the corner of the room, Verity looks up from a device she assured us is just a "practice explosive device" she’s defusing. The look she gives Delilah is patient in the way that suggests it has been tested many times, survived, and reached a state of weary acceptance.
"I heard that," Verity says.
"I know," Delilah retorts without missing a beat.
I watch the two of them and feel something settle in my chest that I don't immediately have a clinical name for.
It isn't quite just "belonging." It’s something adjacent to it—the warmth of being inside a joke you didn't have to earn, a space where you’re simply allowed to exist. I’ve been inside churches that were less welcoming than these women have been.
I pick up the notepad, cap the pen, and set it back beside Axel's keyboard exactly where I found it.
"I can't believe it's been two weeks," I say.
Delilah looks up. Something crosses her face—a quick, unguarded flicker of emotion—before she pulls it back behind a mask of casual indifference. "I can't believe you actually made me eat that macaroni and cheese you made."
"You didn't have to eat it. I warned you I was a terrible cook."
"You looked so proud of it," she says, shuddering with her entire body. "I felt sorry for you."
"It wasn't that bad."
"Ava." She sets her Coke down, her tone turning serious. "It was that bad."
Verity makes a sound that is almost a laugh before she smiles. “We’ll miss your lousy cooking, and you thrashing us at Scrabble.”
Delilah chimes in, "I don’t think Axel appreciated you beating him at Donkey Kong, though."
I chuckle, mostly to hide how much the impending departure is starting to hurt. I knew it was coming. I have been entirely practical about it all morning—making sure my mother is well, preparing to return to work, packing the new clothes Verity had to go out and buy for me.
One task at a time. Function first.
It's only now, watching Verity's guarded expression, that the practicality starts to cost me something.
"How often do you think you'll come back?" Delilah asks. Her voice is casual in the specific way that means it’s anything but.
"As often as I can manage."
"That's not a number."
"It's not a number because I don't have one yet." I fold my arms, grounding myself. "I have a house to get back to. A patient who's been waiting two weeks. A division chief who is too polite to say he's desperate."
"And a mother to visit," Verity says quietly. It isn't a correction; it's a gentle acknowledgment of the truth.
"And a mother to visit," I agree.
Delilah chews her lip. She looks down at her laptop, then back at me, her bravado slipping. "I wish I could come to Baltimore."
I cross the room and sit on the edge of the examination chair beside her. "I know."
She bumps her shoulder against mine, a small, silent tether. "You'll come back though. Right? Not just for Silas. For us."
Verity looks up from the bag, her dark eyes searching mine. She doesn't say anything, but she doesn't need to.
"Yes," I say. "For you."
Verity ties off the bag and meets my eyes, calm, like she’s already walked this road and knows I won’t turn back now.
"It's time," she says, her voice steady. "Are you ready?
I swallow the lump in my throat.
"I am," I say.
Silas
The shoulder is manageable.
That’s the lie I have been repeating to myself since six this morning, when I moved the wrong way reaching for the coffee and the resulting spike of pain clarified my thinking considerably.
Manageable means functional. It doesn’t mean comfortable, and it certainly doesn’t mean that Ava won’t notice.
She’s a physician; she possesses the honed attention of someone trained to read what the body refuses to say out loud.
She’s already noticed. She hasn’t said anything yet, which means she’s waiting for the right moment to force the issue.
I know, because I have been doing the exact same thing to her.
I pull the Hydrocodone out of the top drawer. I hold the bottle for a moment, weighing it in my palm. Then toss it back and slam the drawer shut again.
The medication will take the edge off the shoulder, but it also takes the edge off everything else.
It will blunt my focus, my awareness, and the precise quality of vigilance I have been running on for years.
I can’t afford that today. Not with the board arriving in an hour, and not with three loose threads that still need pulling tight before they dare walk through my door.
The police report on Reagan Mitchell sits at the top of the stack. Thanks to Zack’s insistence, Vance was bumped, and an internal investigation is pending.
I flip it open, already knowing the contents by heart, yet needing the finality of the paper trail for closure.
Baltimore Police Department
Criminal Investigations Division
Case No.: 26-02187-BUR
Reporting Detective: Det. Jonathan Mercer #3921
Date: February 18, 2026
SUPPLEMENTAL REPORT – CASE DISPOSITION
On 02/03/2026 at approximately 2248 hours, officers responded to a reported attempted burglary at the residence of Ava Morrison, Baltimore, MD.
Damage to a rear basement window indicated forced entry.
Latent fingerprints recovered from the window frame and interior sill were processed through AFIS and matched to Thomas Grady (DOB 03/11/1976), a transient with prior misdemeanor arrests.
Grady was arrested on 02/08/2026 and charged with Attempted Burglary – 1st Degree and Malicious Destruction of Property.
During interview, Grady stated he had been paid $300 by an unknown male to “leave prints and make it look like a break-in.” This claim could not initially be corroborated.
Subsequent investigation into an ongoing stalking complaint involving Ava Morrison identified a suspect operating under the alias Reagan O’Connell.
Digital forensic analysis later confirmed the individual as Reagan Mitchell (DOB 07/19/1980).
Financial and cellular records placed Mitchell in contact with Grady prior to the staged burglary and near Morrison’s residence at the time of the offense.
On 02/16/2026 Mitchell was located at a remote cabin in the Gambrill Mountain area by Silas Hightower, acting as a licensed private security contractor and personal protection agent for Morrison.
Mitchell initiated gunfire, striking Hightower in the upper arm. The structure and adjacent outbuilding had been intentionally sabotaged and rigged with an explosive device. A pursuit and physical altercation followed, during which Mitchell deployed an explosive device.
Mitchell sustained fatal injuries during the confrontation and was pronounced deceased at the scene by responding EMS personnel.
The Frederick County State’s Attorney’s Office reviewed the incident and ruled Hightower’s use of force justified self-defense.
As a result of these findings:
· Charges against Thomas Grady were dismissed on 02/17/2026.
· Evidence confirms Grady was paid to stage forensic evidence.
· Reagan Mitchell is identified as the primary offender responsible for the stalking and related crimes.
Case Status: Closed – Offender Deceased
Report submitted,
Det. Jonathan Mercer #3921
Baltimore Police Department
I close the file.
The report says what it says. It doesn’t say what it was like on that mountain, what Ava looked like gripping a rifle she never should have had to pick up, or what days in a cell cost a man who had nothing to begin with.
Thomas Grady has been out since yesterday.
She delivers donuts to that community every Saturday morning. She will find out, and when she does, there won’t be a force on earth capable of stopping her from looking for him.
I don’t intend to try.