Rizzoli & Isles 8-Book Set

with a desperate grunt heaved it aside, scattering ashes.
    She looked at the ground, which was now down to bare mud after the heat of the fire had melted the snow cover. The pendant might have been lying here for days, she thought. What else had the snow hidden from them? As the boy continued to attack the ruins of his family’s house, tearing at charred boards, searching for scraps of his lost mother and sister, Maura stared at Carrie’s pendant, trying to understand how something that was cherished could end up abandoned under the snow. She remembered what they’d found inside these houses. The untouched meals, the dead canary.
    And the blood. The pool of it at the bottom of the stairs, left to congeal and freeze on the floorboards after the body had been removed. These families didn’t just walk away, she thought. They were forced from their homes with such haste that meals were left behind and a child could not pause to retrieve a treasured necklace. This is why the fires were set, she thought. To hide what happened to the families of Kingdom Come.
    Bear gave a soft growl. She looked down at him and saw that he was crouched with teeth bared, his ears laid back. He was looking up toward the valley road.
    “Rat,” she said.
    The boy wasn’t listening. His attention was focused on digging into the remains of the house where his mother and Carrie had lived.
    The dog gave another growl, deeper, more insistent, and the scruff of his neck stood up. Something was coming down that road. Something that scared him.
    “Rat.”
    At last the boy looked up, filthy with soot. He saw the dog, and his gaze snapped up toward the road. Only then did they hear the faint growl of an approaching vehicle, making its way into the valley.
    “They’re coming back,” he said. He grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the cover of trees.
    “Wait.” She yanked free. “What if it’s the police, looking for me?”
    “You don’t want to be found here.
Run
, lady!”
    He turned and sprang away, moving faster than she thought possible on snowshoes. The approaching vehicle had cut off their easiest route out of Kingdom Come, and any trail up the slope would leave them fully exposed to view. The boy was fleeing in the only direction left to them, into the woods.
    For a moment she hesitated; so did the dog. Nervously, Bear glanced at his departing master, then looked at Maura as if to say
What are you waiting for?
If I follow the boy, she thought, I could be running away from my own rescuers. Am I so thoroughly brainwashed that I’d willingly stick with my kidnapper?
    What if the boy is right? What if Death is coming down that road for me?
    Bear suddenly took off running after his master.
    That was what made her finally choose. When even a dog had the sense to flee, she knew it was time to follow.
    She chased after them, her snowshoes clacking across the frozen mud. Beyond the last burned house, the mud gave way to deep snow again. Rat was far ahead and moving into the woods. She labored to catch up, already out of breath as she frantically kicked up powder. Just as she reached the trees, she heard the sound of a dog barking. A different dog, not Bear. She ducked behind a pine and looked back at Kingdom Come.
    A black SUV pulled to a stop among the ruins, and a large dog jumped out. Two men emerged, carrying rifles, and they stood scanning the burned village. Although they were too far away for Maura to make out their faces, they clearly seemed to be searching for something.
    A paw suddenly landed on her back. With a gasp, she turned and came face-to-face with Bear, his pink tongue lolling out.
    “Now do you believe me?” whispered Rat, who was crouched right behind her.
    “They could be hunters.”
    “I know dogs. That’s a bloodhound they got there.”
    One of the men reached into the SUV and pulled out a satchel. Crouching beside the hound, he let it sniff the contents.
    “He’s giving it the scent,” said Rat.
    “Who are they tracking?”
    The hound was moving now, wandering among the ruins, nose to the ground. But the smell of the fire seemed to confuse it, and it paused beside the blackened timbers where Maura and Julian had earlier lingered. As the men waited, the dog circled, trying to catch a whiff of its quarry while the two men fanned out, searching the area.
    “Hey,” one man yelled, and pointed to the ground. “Snowshoe prints!”
    “They’ve spotted our tracks,” said Rat. “Don’t need a dog to find us