Say Goodbye (Romantic Suspense #25) by Karen Rose

            “A.W.,” Tom repeated, his pulse starting to thrum. “Initials and facial recognition software might be enough to find this guy. Did SacPD try to find him?”

            “If they did, they didn’t try very hard, because they never managed a true ID. But Kowalski was a minor player at the time. Definitely still clawing his way up the ladder. The brass had arrested all the top guys in the organized crime syndicate. After that, the momentum fizzled.”

            “And you never tried?”

            “No,” Rafe said. “After I closed that case, I took some time off to grieve Bella.”

            The woman he’d lost at the crime boss’s hands. “Got it.”

            “Did you grieve your Tory, Tom?” Rafe asked gently.

            “I saw her murderer get justice,” Tom said grimly.

            “Not the same. Not even close. If you haven’t grieved, you can’t move on.”

            Tom closed his eyes, not wanting to have this conversation. “I grieved, okay?” he snapped, mostly to make Rafe shut up. Then realized that he really had grieved. “Liza let me talk about her,” he added quietly.

            “Oh,” Rafe breathed.

            Tom cleared his throat, remembering the gentle but pained expression on Liza’s face as he’d talked about Tory for hours as they’d made the drive from Chicago to Sacramento after the holidays. “Yeah. I thought she was grieving with me.”

            “Maybe she was, and maybe she was grieving more than Tory. She, um, well, Gideon said that she talked about Fritz when they were helping her move in. Said you know about him.”

            “Yes, I know.”

            “She said it was easier to tell us because she’d already told you and—” Rafe cut himself off. “Others,” he finished lamely.

            “ ‘Others.’ Like Daisy and whoever else she went with this afternoon.”

            “Gotta go, Hunter. Call if you need anything else on Kowalski. I’ll do a lineup if you need me to. Night.” The line went dead.

            Tom barked out a frustrated laugh. At least Liza had people who cared about her. Rafe wasn’t going to betray her confidence any more than Irina had.

            He stared at his phone again, seeing the day’s ignored calls to Liza in his call log. She’d avoided him all day long. Get used to it. Because he didn’t think she was coming back.

            I need more than that, she’d said, her voice breaking.

            Absently, Tom pressed the heel of his hand to his heart. Did he need more?

            He had no fucking idea. He only knew that he couldn’t let her go.

            He picked up the phone and started a text to her. But what to say? He’d already said he was sorry. He’d told her that he wasn’t okay.

            If he were a better man, he’d say goodbye. He’d let her go.

            He needed to end this. He needed to let her go before he hurt her any more. He started to type. Good—

            He couldn’t do it. He could not force himself to type “goodbye.” “I guess I’m not a very good man,” he whispered, his feelings too raw and torn to analyze.

            His finger pecked out the rest of the phrase. —night.

            Saying good night was the best he could do. He hit send, set that phone aside, then picked up his work phone and dialed Raeburn. It rang so many times that Tom didn’t think his boss would answer, but then he did.

            “What have you found?” Raeburn demanded, abandoning any pretense of politeness.

            “I’ve got a photo of Kowalski. I’m sending it to you right now.” He transferred the photo from his burner to his work phone and forwarded it to Raeburn. “His initials are A.W. and he has a six-year-old son.”

            Raeburn whistled. “Where did you get this?”

            “From one of my sources. You want me to start running facial recognition?”