The round might have been a blank, but that didn’t matter. It was pressed up against the back of Martinez’s skull, and when Stitts fired the gun, the room exploded.
As did the back of Martinez’s head.
Warm blood sprayed Chase’s face and she screamed.
She screamed even as Stitts tore her bindings away. She screamed as she fell to the ground.
She screamed when Stitts collapsed beside her.
Chase screamed until her entire world went black.
CHAPTER 56
Chase awoke to the sound of a bell.
The bells at heaven’s gate, she thought incoherently.
Something wet touched her face, and she grunted. Her entire body was sore, and she felt unable to move.
The wetness persisted, and Chase finally managed to open her eyes.
Stitts’s beagle had returned and its rough tongue was lapping the side of her cheek.
She groaned and blinked, trying to clear her vision. Her movements caused the dog to pull away from her, and she heard the bell again, which drew her gaze.
A small smile crossed her lips when she saw the tracking device attached to the dog’s collar.
Then reality struck, and the expression slid off her face.
Chase was lying on her side in a pool of blood, only about half of which appeared to be hers.
The rest was from the mess that was now the back of Martinez’s head.
“Stitts!”
He was lying on his back, only three feet from her. His face was a swollen mess, and Chase had to stare hard to see his chest rise and fall.
But breathe he did; Stitts was alive, but for how long, she couldn’t be certain.
Chase forced the pain from her mind and looked around.
There, not ten paces from where the three of them lay was Martinez’s cell phone. It was still open to whatever map program he was using, and the tracker glowed red directly in the center of the screen.
Chase closed her eyes and breathed deeply.
Then she started to crawl.
The beagle was by her side the entire time, silently urging her onward with encouraging licks.
When Chase finally opened her eyes, she realized that she had crawled past the cell phone.
It was beside her shoulder and she reached out and grabbed it.
With one final, deep breath, Chase dialed 9-1-1 and brought it to her ear.
EPILOGUE
SIX MONTHS LATER
A KNOCK AT THE DOOR drew Chase’s eyes from the file. She lifted her head and waited. When the knock came a second time, she shut the file and then with a wince, rose from the kitchen table.
As she made her way to the front door, her gait became more fluid and the pain in her side started to fade.
Chase looked through the peephole, then pressed her back against the door and shut her eyes.
“I see your shadow, Chase,” the man on the other side of the door told her. “I know you’re in there. Open up, I’ve got someone here who wants to speak to you.”
A smile touched Chase’s lips and she opened her eyes. Then she turned, unlocked the door and pulled it wide.
Jeremy Stitts stared back at her. His face was mostly healed, and aside from a dimple, more of a dent, really, beneath his right eye, there was no other evidence that he had been beaten nearly to death.
He surprised Chase by leaning in and giving her a hug.
Chase embraced Stitts, relishing the first human contact she’d had from a person not in a white lab coat. And then a dog barked, and she pulled away.
With a grunt, she squatted on her haunches and scratched the beagle behind his ears.
“Good boy,” she said. “Good boy.”
Jeremy helped her to her feet.
“You never even told me the dog’s name,” Chase said as she led Jeremy toward the kitchen. “Damn mutt saved our lives, and I don’t even know his name.”
Jeremy snickered.
“First of all, it’s a she, and she isn’t a mutt.”
Chase shook her head.
“Figures; if it had been a male dog, it probably would’ve messed up the plan.”
Stitts faced her.
“Her name is Mia,” Stitts said, suddenly growing serious.
Chase nodded and ran her fingers along the dog’s back.
“Well thank you, Mia. Thank you for saving our lives.”
Before emotions overwhelmed her, Chase turned away and moved toward the counter.
“You want a coffee?”
“Sure.”
Chase poured two cups, and then took a seat at the table across from Stitts.
Mia curled up at her feet.
Jeremy’s gaze was on the plain manila folder, but he stopped staring when Chase caught his eye.
“How you holding up?” he asked.
Chase shrugged.
“Getting better. The wounds are mostly healed. The docs say it’ll take a few more months for the muscles to be right again, but I should make a full recovery. And you?”
Chase stared at Jeremy Stitts’s face as she spoke. The man was handsome, and he offered her a perfect smile as a response. He looked exactly as Chase remembered him from the first time they had met over a year ago in New York City.
Aside from the new dimple, of course.
“I’ll be fine,” he said. “But you… I don’t only mean your physical wounds, Chase.”
Chase couldn’t hold his stare any longer.
“I’ll be fine—been through worse.”
“Yeah, that’s what I’m worried about.”
Silence fell over the three of them then, and Chase just let it play out as she sipped her coffee. She was aware that Jeremy was inspecting her the entire time, but didn’t take offense.
That was just how he was.
And if Chase was good at anything, it was keeping a poker face.
She finished her coffee and then said, “Are you done deposing me, Agent Stitts? Because, you know, I’m reeeeaaaaaaaally busy here.”
Stitts finished his own cup and stood.
“You ready to get back to work, Chase? I mean, for real this time?”
Chase nodded.
“I’m ready.”
“Give me a month, and then we’ll get you down to Quantico for some orientation.”
Chase made a mock salute.
“Aye, aye, captain. But I have one condition.”
Stitts grew serious again.
“Sure, what is it?”
“No psycho partners this time around, okay?”
Jeremy chuckled.
“Sorry, you’re stuck with me. I’ll see myself out.” He clapped his hands and Mia jumped to her feet. “Come on girl, Chase needs her rest.”
He was nearly at the door when something that Martinez said occurred to her.
“Hey Stitts?”
He stopped and turned.
“Yeah?”
“Did you really say that I was naive, that I try to see the good in everyone?”
Stitts hesitated before answering.
“I’m not sure… do you?”
He didn’t wait for a response.
Chase watched the two of them go, a smile on her face. When Stitts closed the door behind them, however, the smile vanished.
She reached into the pocket of her sweatshirt and pulled out an orange medicine container. Inside, she found one, solitary pill. Chase swallowed it dryly, and then turned her attention back to the folder she had been reading before Stitts had interrupted her.
Ernest & Ernest Law Offices, the header read.
Her scowl deepened as she read the first few lines of text over and over again.
Brad was filing for divorce, and he was seeking full custody of Felix.
He had visited her in the hospital during her recovery, of course, and Felix had come along. And not once had he mentioned this. Now, when she was almost fully recovered, a bombshell was delivered by a court-appointed sleaze ball.
Chase threw the emp
ty medicine container across the room, and then immediately cried out and clutched her left side protectively.
“Fuck!”
She collapsed on the ground and held her face in her hands as the tears started to flow.
Images flashed through her mind in rapid succession, first the man in the van with the aviator sunglasses, then Georgina’s tearing eyes, then her first hit, Stitts, and finally Martinez’s face just as the blank exploded against the back of his skull.
And, behind all of this, there was a voice.
Chase managed to stand, and staggered down the hallway toward her bedroom. She threw the door open so hard that it dented the drywall.
With determined steps, fighting the pain from the sudden act of throwing the medicine bottle, Chase strode to her nightside table. She pulled the drawer out hard, yanking it entirely free and tossing it on the floor behind her. Then she snaked her hand in and ran it along the underside of the wooden top.
For a moment, panic set in when her searching fingers failed to find it.
“Where the—”
But her index finger brushed against something hard, and she carefully peeled the tape away.
Two items fell into her palm and she squeezed them tightly as she withdrew her hand.
For nearly a full minute, she just stared at her knuckles, which had begun to turn white.
With a deep breath, Chase unfurled her fingers, revealing a syringe with an orange cap and a small bag of off-white powder emblazoned with an icon of a snake devouring an eyeball.
Her brow furrowed for a moment and she tilted her head, examining the eye first, then the snake, then the image as a whole.
What did it mean? She wondered, but then the voice returned.
Tyler Tisdale’s voice.
I can make you forget, Chase. I can make you forget everything.
END
~
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Although I wrote FROZEN STIFF to be enjoyed as a standalone novel, if you want to learn more about Chase Adams and her past before getting that fateful telephone call, check out the Damien Drake series. If you just want more Agent Adams (how dare you play favorites with my children), the second book in this series—SHADOW SUSPECT—is now available for pre-order and will be released sometime in January. I also wanted to take a moment to offer an apology to everyone who pre-ordered this book: the original release date got pushed back by about a month. I try my best to honor the pre-order dates that I set, and when I put my books up for pre-order, I do so with the intention of getting them out on time. Sometimes, though… sometimes things just pop up. And what are these things you ask? Some are under my control—mainly, writing the book—while others—cover design, editing, proof reading, publishing—are not. Thank you guys for sticking around.
2018 is going to be a great year, full of many books, including several more Chase Adams FBI Thrillers, the continuation of Damien Drake’s saga, as well as the introduction to Dr. Becket Campbell’s medical thriller series. I’m also toying with the idea of one more series set in this universe, but I’m not ready to reveal the star just yet…
And now we’ve arrived at the inevitable call-to-action: if you enjoyed this Chase Adams thriller, then please leave a review for FROZEN STIFF wherever you bought it from. Not only do reviews help other readers find books that they might like, but it also helps me decide what books to write next. So, please, log on to your favorite retailer, type a quick review, and get back to what you like doing best: reading. rearranging your sock drawer, or whatever else tickles your… ear.
As always, if you have any comments, suggestions, or if a dastardly typo somehow managed to slip through the cracks, or if you just want to say hi, stop on by my Facebook page @authorpatricklogan or drop me an email at [email protected].
As always, you keep reading, and I’ll keep writing.
Best,
Patrick
Montreal, 2017
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents in this book are either entirely imaginary or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or of places, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © Patrick Logan 2017
Interior design: © Patrick Logan 2017
All rights reserved.
This book, or parts thereof, cannot be reproduced, scanned, or disseminated in any print or electronic form.
Third Edition: December 2017
MORE BY PATRICK LOGAN
DETECTIVE DAMIEN DRAKE
Butterfly Kisses: A Thrilling Serial Killer Novel
Cause of Death: A Gripping Medical Murder Thriller
Download Murder: A Terrifying Psychological Murder Mystery
Skeleton King
CHASE ADAMS FBI THRILLERS
Shadow Suspect
DR. BECKETT CAMPBELL, MEDICAL EXAMINER MYSTERIES
Organ Donor: A Medical Thriller
THE INSATIABLE SERIES
Skin (Insatiable Series Book 1)
Crackers (Insatiable Series Book 2)
Flesh (Insatiable Series Book 3)
Parasite (Insatiable Series Book 4)
Knuckles (Insatiable Series Book 4.5)
Stitches (Insatiable Series Book 5)
THE HAUNTED SERIES
Shallow Graves (The Haunted Book 1)
The Seventh Ward (The Haunted Book 2)
Seaforth Prison (The Haunted Book 3)
Scarsdale Crematorium (The Haunted Book 4)
Sacred Heart Orphanage (The Haunted Book 5)
Shores of the Marrow (The Haunted Book 6)
FAMILY VALUES TRILOGY
Witch (Family Values Trilogy Book 0)
Mother (Family Values Trilogy Book 1)
Father (Family Values Trilogy Book 2)
COLLECTIONS
Descent Into Darkness
SEE MORE AT PATRICK LOGAN’S AUTHOR PAGE
Table of Contents
PART I - Trying to Walk
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
PART II - Trying to Swim
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Part III - Trying to Shoot
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Epilogue
END
Author’s Note
More by Patrick Logan
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