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other end. "Listen to me. Take cover. Take cover now ."
    "Who the hell is this?" O'Reilly demanded.
    "A bomb's about to go off on Abigail's back porch."
    He was already yelling. "Take cover, take cover! Scoop, Abigail, Fiona!"
    The phone crackled.
    Lizzie heard a loud booming sound.
    An explosion.
    "Lieutenant!"
    The connection went dead.

Chapter 5
    Boston, Massachusetts
2:37 p.m., EDT
August 25
    T wo almost simultaneous explosions shook the triple-decker and knocked Bob O'Reilly off his feet. He landed on his left side, more or less in a sprawl, his cell phone clutched in his hand. He'd banged the hell out of his elbow but otherwise was all right.
    He rolled onto one knee and jumped up, his ears ringing, his heart racing. He yanked open his back door and ran out onto the open porch of his top-floor apartment.
    He could hear glass cracking, metal popping and what he swore was the hiss of flames.
    "Fiona!" he yelled. "Scoop!"
    Scoop Wisdom, another detective, had the second-floor apartment, but he and Fiona were picking tomatoes in Scoop's garden in the postage-stamp of a backyard.
    Fiona was the eldest of Bob's three daughters.
    Had they heard him yell for them to take cover?
    "Dad! Daddy!"
    Fiona.
    She was screaming, but it meant she could talk.
    His baby was alive.
    Bob gripped the railing and leaned over, trying to see through the black smoke billowing up from below. "Hang on, Fi." He sounded as if he were being strangled. "I'm coming."
    "Scoop. Scoop! " She was shrieking now. "Oh, my God!"
    Her next words were unintelligible.
    Bob tried not to react to her panic and fear. He saw flames now, licking up the support posts of the two porches under him.
    He'd never make it down the back steps. He'd burn up.
    He retreated into his kitchen and grabbed the small fire extinguisher by the stove, a Christmas present from Jayne, his youngest, who'd printed off a checklist of what to do to prepare for a disaster--power outages, floods, earthquakes, hurricanes.
    Bombs going off.
    Keira was in Ireland. How had she known about a bomb on Abigail's porch?
    Who was the other woman with her?
    Bob forced his thoughts back and tucked the fire extinguisher under his arm as he ran through his living room and out into the main hall.
    There was no smoke in the stairwell. That was one good thing.
    Was another bomb ready to go off?
    Using his thumb, he hit 911 on his cell phone as he charged down the two flights of stairs. The dispatcher came on, and he identified himself as an off-duty police officer and gave his address, stated the nature of the emergency.
    An explosion. A fire. Possible injuries.
    "I think an off-duty officer is hurt," Bob said. "Detective Sergeant Cyrus 'Scoop' Wisdom. He's out back with my daughter, Fiona O'Reilly, age nineteen."
    "Where are you?"
    "First floor. Inside. I'm checking on a second off-duty officer, Abigail Browning."
    The interior door to the apartment she shared with her fiance, Owen Garrison, and the main door into the building were both ajar, which Bob took as a positive sign that she'd gotten out. He burst outside and ran down the front steps, expecting to find Abigail out on the sidewalk. Owen had left earlier. Bob had heard them laughing down on the street.
    Her car was there, but she wasn't.
    He said to the dispatcher, "She could have gone out back to help Scoop and Fi. That's where the fire is."
    "You need to find a safe place and stay there."
    "I'm a police officer. I know what I need to do. Stay on with me. I'll let you know what I find out."
    "Lieutenant, you need to wait for help."
    "I am the help."
    "There could be another explosion. If there's a gas grill, the propane tank--"
    "That's it," Bob said. "The second blast must have been the propane tank to Abigail's grill."
    "Then you understand the need to stay where you are."
    True, but Bob yanked open the unlatched gate to the narrow passage between his triple-decker and the one next door. Smoke blackened the still, late-summer air and burned his