© 2010

For reasons too numerous to mention, my thanks to friends new and old for their encouragement and support, especially Mark Voglesong, John Tinseth, James O. Born, Matt Seitz, and Brian and Donna Washburn. And, as always, to my mother, Inez Stroby, a single mom late in life who somehow made it all work. Much love and respect to all.

Sara steered the cruiser onto the shoulder, saw what was ahead, thought, Bad news.

Gravel crunched under the tires as the Crown Vic settled at an angle. The radio crackled.

“Eight-seventeen, are you on scene?” Angie, the night dispatcher. “Have you responded?”

Sara lifted the dash mike, keyed it. “Eight-seventeen here. On scene now. Will advise.”

In the blaze of her headlights, Billy stood behind his own green-and-white cruiser, looking off into the swamp, hands on his hips. Farther up on the shoulder was a gray late-model Honda Accord, trunk open. Blue, red, and yellow lights bathed the night.

She replaced the mike, tried to memorize the scene, wishing the grants had come through for the dashboard video cameras. She looked at her watch. Two ten.

Billy turned toward her, face blank. She could see his jaws moving. He was chewing gum. After a moment, he looked back at the swamp.

She hadn’t seen him at the Sheriff’s Office, but she’d known he was on duty tonight, had heard him on the scanner. Part of her had hoped they’d cross paths before shift’s end, part of her didn’t. When she’d gotten the call, shots fired, she’d feared the worst. Now here he was, staring out into the swamp, looking lost.

What have you done, Billy Boy? And why did you have to do it on my shift?

She opened the door, took her portable radio from the passenger seat, and stepped out onto gravel. She fit the radio into its holder on her duty belt and plugged in the body mike clipped to her left shoulder. Her thumb slipped the holster loop that held the Glock in place on her right hip.

The air was thick, the heat oppressive after the air-conditioned cruiser. Hot for mid-October. No moon, but a sky full of stars.

The Honda had New Jersey plates. Billy had parked behind it, angled to the left, in the standard motor vehicle stop position, so the cruiser would protect him from oncoming traffic when he got out.

He half-turned. “Hey, Sara.”

“Hey, Billy. You all right?”

He looked away from her, back at the swamp.

She had her hair tied up in back, could feel sweat form at the nape of her neck, drip beneath the Kevlar vest under her uniform shirt. She came up to stand beside him, followed his gaze. They were looking down a slight incline to the edge of the swamp. There was a patch of sodden grass, then a deeper dark where the trees started, Spanish moss hanging from them like cotton. In the grass, just short of the trees, a man lay facedown, right leg twisted under left, right arm extended.

“There he is,” Billy said.

She looked around. She’d seen no traffic since she’d gotten the call, taken the turnoff for CR-23. Only locals used this route, few at night. To the east, acres and acres of sugarcane, then the distant glow of town. To the west, the gray ghosts of cypress trees, endless miles of wetlands stretching to Punta Gorda and the coast. She could smell the swamp, the rotten egg scent of sulfur.

The cruiser radios crackled in unison, the sound muffled by the closed doors. Off in the dark, as if in answer, bullfrogs sounded. Then another, deeper noise, the low bellowing of a gator. The light from their rollers painted the trees, the swamp, illuminated the body below.

“Is he dead?” she said.

He nodded. “Or close to it. He hasn’t moved at all. EMTs on their way.”

“I heard.”

She took the heavy aluminum flashlight from the ring on her belt and pushed the button. The bright halogen beam leaped out into darkness. She swept it across the man’s back. His head was turned to the right, and even from here she could see his eyes were open.

Chinos, blue dress shirt, a deep, dark stain between the shoulder blades, shirt soaked with blood. A black man, young, dressed too well to be from around here.

“I’m going to have a look,” she said.

“Careful. You step into a chuckhole down there, you’ll break your ankle.”

She shifted the light to her left hand, took a step down the incline, her right hand resting on the Glock. She could hear sirens in the distance.

She picked her way down the slope. When she reached the grass, she felt it give spongily under her shoes, water coming up around them.

She shone the light along the wet ground, looking for snakes. Something moved and splashed in the darkness. The noise of the bullfrogs stopped for a moment, then started again.

The gun was about a foot from the man’s right hand. She held the light on it. A blued revolver,.38 maybe, rubber grips. She made a grid with the flashlight beam, looking for another weapon, footprints. Nothing.

“Anyone else in the car?” she called up. The sirens closer now.

“No. Just him. I told him to stop. I told him.”

She crouched, not letting her knees touch the ground. Up close, she could see the gold wire-rim glasses twisted beneath his face, one side still looped over his ear. He looked like a teenager, hair close-cropped, a small gold ring in his right earlobe. His eyes were wide.

She played the beam down the body. Left arm folded beneath, right outstretched as if pointing to the gun. The shoes were tan leather, polished, the upturned soles shiny and new. No way he could have run on this grass, gotten away.

She touched the side of his neck. A faint warmth, but no pulse.

From above her, Billy said, “He dead?”

“Yes. He’s dead.”

Something moved in the trees, and her hand fell to the Glock. A shadow separated itself from the blackness, took wing silently. She looked up, watched it fly away, etched for an instant against the stars, wondered what it was.

She went back up the incline, careful where she put her feet. When she reached the gravel, Billy was standing beside the Honda’s open trunk.

“Check out this shit,” he said.

She went over and shone the light inside. The trunk was empty except for a nylon gearbag, partially unzipped. She saw the glint of metal within.

“You look in there?” she said.

“Yeah. He was acting nervous, so I asked him to open the trunk. When I saw the bag inside, he took off. I told him to stop. When he got down there, he rounded on me, drew down.”

His voice was unsteady. She looked at him, saw his eyes were wet.

Sirens rose and fell in the distance.

“Cold out here,” he said. “When did it get so cold?”

He paused between words, chest rising and falling rapidly, as if he were hyperventilating. The onset of shock.

“You should sit in the car,” she said. She tucked the flashlight under her arm, took the thin Kevlar gloves from her belt and pulled them on, punching the Vs of her fingers together to get the fit tight.

“I’m all right,” he said.

“You don’t look it.”

She shone the flashlight into the bag, reached down and pulled the zippered edges apart. Inside was a boxy MAC-10 machine gun with a pistol grip and a dull black finish. Under it were two semiautomatic handguns: a chrome Smith and Wesson with rubber grips, a blue-steel Heckler and Koch, both 9 mm. Boxes of ammunition, extra magazines for the MAC-10. No wonder he ran.

She heard a noise, turned to see Billy bent over on the shoulder, hands on his knees. He spit his gum out, gagged, vomited thin and watery onto the gravel.

“I’m okay,” he said. He raised a hand to ward her off. “I’m okay.”

He spit, straightened, turned away from her, bent and waited, ready to vomit again. She could hear his rapid breathing. He’s going to pass out.

He put his hands on his hips, sucking in air, getting his control back. She watched him for a moment, then walked around the Honda and shone the light through the windows. There was a folded Florida map on the front passenger floor. In back was a child safety seat and a brown leather overnight bag.

“He has a kid,” Billy said. “You see that seat? He has a kid.”

Maybe not.

She looked down the road. Coming over a small crest, she could see emergency lights-two cruisers and an EMT van.

She looked at him.

“Anything you want to tell me before the sheriff gets here?” she said.

He looked at the approaching cruisers, then back at her, shook his head.

“No,” he said. “I’m sorry, Sara. I never had a choice.”

“You did what you had to do. It’ll be all right.”

Sirens all around them, the cruisers pulling up abreast of her own, the EMT truck pulling ahead. She moved closer to Billy, stood beside him.

The sirens rose, fell, and died. Car doors opened and closed around them. They stood together in the nexus of rolling lights.

She looked up, saw the far-off silhouette of a bird against the starfield. An instant later, it was gone. She wondered if it was ever there at all.

Snow was swirling in the air-just flecks of it, only October still-when Morgan steered the old Monte Carlo onto Lyons Avenue. Rows of burned-out brownstones on both sides, abandoned and stripped cars. He passed an empty lot, saw two men standing around a fire in a fifty-five gallon drum. They watched as he drove past.

At the next corner, there was a makeshift shrine against a telephone pole. Flickering votive candles, a stuffed bear, a white T-shirt pinned to the pole. Something written on it, too far away to read.

He had the stereo on-Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes’ “I Miss You,” the long version-and he turned the sound down now, swung a right onto a side street. He slowed, watched the houses, the car’s exhaust rumbling. The brownstone he wanted was ahead on the left; broken-down porch, weathered plywood over the big front windows.

He drove past slowly, taking in the barren front yard, the gang tags on the plywood. Hoped they didn’t have a dog.

He went up a block, made a U-turn, and parked in front of an empty storefront. He switched the engine off, the big V8 quivering for a moment with pre-ignition, then going silent.

Watching the brownstone, he got the bottle of Vicodin from the pocket of his leather car coat. He was feeling the pain again, on his right side just below his ribs. It always came with stress. He shook a pill into his palm, broke it in two, put half on his tongue, and dry-swallowed it. He caught a glimpse of himself in the rearview, not liking what he saw. His face thinner, his hair grayer, the color of ash.

Time to get on with it. He put the half pill back, the bottle in his pocket, opened the door.

When he got out of the car, he felt the deep arthritic ache in his hips. This cold this early, it would be a rough winter. He locked the door, looked up and down the street, saw no one. The houses were all condemned, an urban renewal project that never happened. The only people in them would be squatters-fiends and smokehounds looking to get off the street as the weather turned.

Early afternoon and the sky a hard gray, his breath frosting in the air. He wore cotton work gloves, but his hands were still cold. As he walked toward the house, bits of glass crunched under his boots: crack vials, broken bottles. This part of the city was paved with them.

He stopped outside the brownstone. Three stories, a wealthy white man’s house back in the day. The front yard was small and sloped, the stone steps that led up to the boarded-over door chipped and discolored. An extension cord ran from a second-floor window into the house next door.

He got the cell out, speed-dialed the number. Rohan answered on the first ring.

“Yo.”

“It’s Morgan. How do I get up in this place?”

“You early. Come around the side, man.”

Morgan closed the phone, went around the house to the small side yard. A toppled birdbath lay broken in the weeds. There was a door there, and it opened as he approached. Standing inside was a chubby teenager-fourteen, fifteen-with a red North Face jacket, baggy jeans. Under the jacket was a black T-shirt with red letters that said STOP SNITCHING. Morgan towered over him.

“You got a dog in there?”

“What?”

“Dog,” Morgan said. “You got a pit in there or something?”

“No, man. No dog in here.”

Morgan went past him into a big, bare kitchen, all the fixtures ripped out. The ceiling was sagging plaster, water-stained, ready to drop.

The boy locked the door behind them. Two dead bolts, a police bar that fit into a slot on the floor, all new.

“Hold on,” the boy said.

Morgan turned, raised his arms. The boy reached under his coat, touched his sides, then around to the small of his back, knelt, patted his ankles. He ran his hands down the sides of the coat, felt the bottle of pills, took it out.

“What are these?”

“Those are mine,” Morgan said.

The boy rattled the pills in the bottle, then dropped it back in Morgan’s pocket. He nodded at a hallway. “Awright.”

Morgan went down the hall, past a set of stairs with gaps in the railing. A series of linked heavy-duty extension cords snaked down the steps from above. Morgan followed them into the living room.

Rohan sat on an old couch in the center of the room, a scarred-up coffee table in front of him. He was hollowing out a cigar with a razor blade, a plastic bag of marijuana at his elbow. A floor lamp a few feet away was the only light. Next to it a space heater glowed red.

“You boys live here?” Morgan said to him. “You crazy.”

Rohan didn’t look up. He brushed tobacco onto the floor, packed marijuana into the blunt.

“No, man, this the shop,” he said. “Just business here.”

He was in his mid-twenties, wearing an identical North Face coat, a white basketball jersey underneath, black jeans, Timberlands. His hair hung long in braids. Morgan could see the three tattooed paws on the side of his neck. A chromed automatic rested on the cushion to his right.

The boy brushed past Morgan, went over to stand by the heater, the mantel of an old dead fireplace at his back. He stood wide-legged, arms crossed. Morgan could see the butt of the gun in his waist.

Rohan licked the edges of the blunt, pushed them together, surveyed his work, licked some more. He took a plastic lighter from the table and passed the flame back and forth over the wet edges to seal them.

“How old are you?” the boy said.

Morgan looked at him. “What do you care?”

“Just askin’.”

“Morgan a player back in the day,” Rohan said. “A straight-up OG.” He looked up for the first time. “He be the Trouble Man back then. Like the movie.” He looked at the boy. “You see that flick, Raj? Marvin Gaye music? Dude drive around in a Lincoln Continental, blowing up people’s shit?”

“Nah.” Raj shook his head.

Rohan fired the lighter, got the blunt going. He drew deep, held it out. Raj took it, hit off it, gave it back, the acrid smell of it filling the room. Rohan blew a long stream of smoke to the side, held the blunt in Morgan’s direction. Morgan shook his head.

“This the chronic,” Rohan said. “Not that weak-ass shit Mikey-Mike peddling these days.”

“Where’d you get that from?” Morgan said.

Rohan shrugged, held the blunt out, and Raj took it again.

“Free market these days, yo,” Rohan said. “If the product weak, if the price ain’t right, people gonna go elsewhere. Everyone know Mikey’s weed ain’t been for real since the Colombians got busted. His coke and dope, too. And now he facing his own case. He scraping, and everyone on the street know it.”

“That’s temporary.”

“Maybe. Maybe not. But he couldn’t even make the re-up last time, if I remember correctly. Now I moved a lot of his shit when it was good, and we made mad money together, but things different now.”

Raj handed the blunt back, and Rohan set it on the edge of the table.

“He knows all that,” Morgan said. “He’s working on it. He’s making some moves, get the good stuff flowing again soon.”

“When he do, we talk. If the shit’s good, then we do business. If it ain’t, we don’t. That’s the way things work.”

“You two go way back,” Morgan said. “Word gets around you’re not with him anymore, it’s bad for everyone.”

“You talking about loyalty? It’s about product, yo. Tough enough to make a living as it is, without slinging bad shit, taking people’s money for it, expecting them to be happy because of who it came from. I’ve got a responsibility to my people, you know?”

“I understand. Mikey got a sample of the new stuff, wanted me to lay it on you.”

Rohan looked at Raj, then back at Morgan. “Why you wait so long to tell me that?”

Raj laughed. “Yeah, lay it on us.”

Morgan looked at him, and Raj met his eyes, didn’t look away.

“Morgan still be talking that old-school jive,” Rohan said, “but I follow. Like it is, brother. Like it is. Where the shit at?”

“In my car. Up the street. I’ll give it to you, you try it. You like it, there’s more coming. You don’t, then that’s that.”

“You still got that hooptee? Cutlass or some shit?”

“ Monte Carlo.”

“You oughta shake some dollars loose from Mikey. Get yourself a new ride. That shit be out of style.”

Morgan went back down the hall to the kitchen, saw a gray blur cross the floor and disappear into a doorless pantry. Rat.

Raj came up behind, started undoing the locks.

“Be back in a minute,” Morgan said.

“Best be.”

Morgan went through the side yard, down to the street. He walked the block to the Monte Carlo. Still no one in sight. He went around to the trunk. Raj watched from the doorway.

Morgan keyed the trunk open, raised the lid so it shielded him. He took the Beretta from under an army blanket, the metal cold even through his gloves. He put the gun in his right-hand pocket, reached into the wheel well, and took out the paper lunch bag there. Inside was a plastic sandwich bag of marijuana. He slipped it into his left-hand pocket, shut the trunk.

More flurries now, wet and thick, the wind blowing them around. A sheet of newspaper flew along the gutter, wrapped itself around his leg. He pulled it loose, let the wind take it, walked back to the brownstone, hands in his pockets, feeling the weight of the gun.

The pain was gone now. He went up the walk and into the side yard. Raj stepped aside to let him through.

Morgan handed the plastic bag over. Raj took it, shut the door, worked the locks. He held the bag up, shook it. A gust of wind rattled the door.

“Looks like the same old shit to me,” he said.

“Fire it up. See.”

They went into the hall, Raj leading the way. Morgan let him get a few steps ahead, then took the Beretta from his pocket and said, “Yo.”

The boy turned, saw the gun, and Morgan shot him twice in the chest, the noise loud in the narrow hallway. The impact bounced him off the wall, left blood there, and Morgan stepped around him as he fell, moved quickly into the living room.

Rohan was already up from the couch, the gun in his hand. Morgan shot him through the left shoulder. His legs tangled and he went down, clipping the edge of the table. The gun fell back onto the couch.

Morgan kicked the table away, held the Beretta on him. Rohan rolled onto his side, gasping. He lifted a hand as if to ward off another shot.

“Cash,” Morgan said.

“Fireplace. Up in there. The stash, too.”

Morgan went to the fireplace, still watching him. With his left hand, he reached up into the flue, felt material. He lifted until it came loose, drew it down and out. A canvas knapsack. It thumped on the floor when he dropped it.

“It’s all in there, man,” Rohan said. “Just take it.”

Morgan knelt, unzipped it. Banded stacks of money, a G-pack of vials. He shook it all out onto the floor. Rohan lowered his hand, pressed it to his shoulder inside the coat, the white jersey turning red.

Morgan stood, pointed the Beretta at him, his finger on the curved trigger. He nodded at the couch. “If you’re gonna reach for that piece, son, now’s the time.”

Rohan shook his head. “I ain’t reaching for anything.”

“All right, then,” Morgan said, and fired three times. Casings hit the floor. Bits of insulation from Rohan’s jacket floated in the air.

Morgan put the cash back in the knapsack, hefted it, left the G-pack on the floor. A reward for whoever found the bodies.

He decocked the Beretta, put it in his pocket, went around and picked up casings. He had to hunt for the last one, found it under the couch. He was breathing heavy by the time he was done.

When he was satisfied he’d left nothing behind, he went back out through the hallway, picked up the two casings there. Raj lay still, but there were red-flecked bubbles on his lips. Beneath the bloody T-shirt, his chest rose and fell in shallow breaths.

Morgan left him there, undid the locks on the kitchen door, closed it behind him. Wind pulled at him as he walked back to the Monte Carlo. The street still empty, he opened the trunk, dropped the knapsack inside, shut the lid. He unlocked the driver’s side door, got behind the wheel.

As he pulled away from the curb, he turned the stereo up. The same song, Teddy Pendergrass singing to an ex-lover, telling her how he’d changed.

Morgan made a right onto Lyons, back toward downtown Newark. At the next intersection a crossing guard stepped out into the street. She wore an orange vest, blue uniform, carried a STOP sign.

He braked smoothly. The guard moved to the middle of the crosswalk, and the kids came across. Fourth, fifth grade maybe. Girls with ribbons in their hair, winter coats, pink vinyl knapsacks, the boys running ahead, laughing.

Last to cross was a girl no older than nine or ten. She turned and looked at Morgan, met his eyes through the windshield. Not smiling.

Don’t look at me like that, little girl, he thought. I know what I’ve done.

The crossing guard hurried her along, smiled at Morgan. He raised a hand to her, drove on.

The snow was sticking now, the wind driving it against the windshield. He switched the wipers on, listened to them thump, turned the music louder, Teddy still pleading: Miss you, miss you, miss you.

She found him sitting at the bar at Tiger Tail’s, a shot glass and Heineken in front of him, Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues” coming from the jukebox.

“You played that, didn’t you?” she said.

He turned. “Hey, Sara.”

She took the stool to his right. Althea the barmaid saw her, came over.

“Evening, Deputy Cross. Guinness?”

“Please.”

Billy sipped from his beer, toyed with the empty shot glass.

“What was that?” Sara said.

“Peppermint schnapps.”

“I didn’t think anybody over sixteen drank that.”

“Yeah, it’s pretty awful. But it gets the job done.”

Althea came back with the pint of Guinness. Billy pushed a wet twenty toward her. She took it, moved away.

“Hard to believe you’re still on your feet,” Sara said. “You get any sleep today?”

“A little.”

Althea brought the change. The Guinness was colder than Sara liked, but dark and strong. For a while, she’d taken to black and tans, mixing it with a lighter beer. She drank little these days, though, and when she did she found she preferred the Guinness straight. It always surprised the men she met, the few she drank with.

“They give you a hard time this morning?” she said.

“Boone from the state attorney’s, he’s okay. Used to be a deputy down here, you know that?”

“No.”

“Yeah, bottom of the ladder, just like you and me. Made his way up to undersheriff under Hammond. When Winston ran for state attorney, Hammond put a block of votes his way. Flip side was if he won, Winston had to take Boone. Before your time, I guess.”

“He rewarding him or getting rid of him?”

“Maybe a little of both. Boone’s a good man, he’s just a little…” He took a sip of beer. “Ambitious. He and Elwood did the interview together. Videotape, the whole thing.”

“Who’s writing it?”

“Boone, I think.”

“What’d he say?”

“That it looked like a clean shoot. What else could they say? It was. Part that bothers them is I was the only person there to say one way or another. At least the only one still breathing. They talk to you yet?”

“No,” she said. “Elwood called me. I’m meeting them tomorrow. I won’t have much to add, though, except what I saw when I got there.”

“I’m sorry about that.”

“About what?”

“That you had to be there, take the call. I didn’t even know you were on.”

“When you called it in, I was closest to your ten-twenty. I just wish I’d gotten there sooner. It might have gone a different way.”

He looked at the clock over the bar. Almost ten. “Kind of late for you to be out, isn’t it? Who’s watching Danny?”

“JoBeth. I was worried about you. Figured I’d drive past just in case. Saw your truck.”

She turned on her stool, looked around the bar. Two Mexicans-or Guatemalans more likely-playing pool in the alcove in the back. A couple of booths on the far wall were occupied. She saw Angie, the dispatcher, at one, with two men Sara didn’t know, a pitcher of beer on the table between them. Angie was laughing, waving a cigarette. She caught Sara’s eye, saw who she was with, and turned away again. Great, Sara thought. Maybe coming here was a mistake after all.

There were a handful of serious drinkers at the bar on either side of them, a couple of whom Sara recognized. She’d met most of the hardcore alcoholics in St. Charles County, either booking them for DWI or helping pull them out of their overturned pickups.

Billy signaled to Althea, pointed at his shot glass.

“How many of those you have?” Sara said.

“This is my third. Was my third, I mean.”

“Better take it easy. You’ll pay for it in the morning.”

“I’m paying for it now.”

Althea came down, poured from the bottle, took his money.

Billy raised his glass to Sara. From the jukebox came Warren Zevon’s “Lawyers, Guns and Money.”

“Now this, I know you played,” she said.

“More than once.” He sipped the schnapps. “ ‘Dad, get me out of this.’ ”

“Is Lee-Anne around? Maybe you ought to call her.”

“She’s down with friends in West Palm. She’s coming back in a couple days.”

“She know what happened?”

“She knows.”

“And she’s not coming back sooner?”

“Soon enough,” he said and drank.

She sipped Guinness. In the mirror behind the bar she could see Angie in the booth, talking to the men but looking toward her every few minutes. Sara suddenly wanted to be somewhere else.

“So what happened?” Billy said. He’d turned to her.

“With what?”

“With us.”

“Ah, Bill.”

“It’s one of the things I regret most, you know. Out of everything. Not being able to make it work.”

“Let’s not start this up again.”

“I could have been better for you, I know. Sometimes I wish I could go back, figure out exactly when it was things started to go wrong.”

“I don’t know,” she said. “Maybe about the time you started sleeping with Dolly Parton back there, what do you think?”

He looked over at Angie’s booth.

“That was a mistake,” he said.

“That supposed to make me feel better?”

“I’m sorry.”

“Just leave it, Billy.”

He emptied the shot glass, looked at her. She’d worn jeans and a long-sleeved Harley-Davidson T-shirt despite the heat, not wanting to send him the wrong signal if she found him. But he was appraising her openly now, more than he would have sober. For a moment, it made her feel good. She knew he would ruin it, though, and seconds later, he did.

“Are you seeing anybody?”

“Come on, Billy.”

“It’s a simple question, isn’t it?”

“Somebody,” she lied. “Off and on.”

“Off and on? What’s that mean?”

She drank Guinness, put the glass down.

“All you’ve been through,” she said, “you really think this is the right time for that conversation?”

He rooted through the bills on the bar, pushed a five forward, folded the rest. “You’re right. I think I need to get out of here.”

When he got off the stool, he lost his balance for a moment, put one hand against the bar. “Leg’s asleep.”

She looked at him, feeling that familiar sensation. Years since she’d known it firsthand, but here it was again, stronger than ever. Disappointment, almost resignation. You always let me down, Billy Boy. Always. And you don’t even know it.

“Hold up,” she said. “You get DWI’ed out there, how’s that look for the review?”

“I’m okay.”

“You’re not. Even if you were, why take the chance?”

He looked at her, his eyes watery, the skin around them taut and red.

“You know I’m right,” she said.

He raised his hands to shoulder height. Surrender.

“I’ll drive you home,” she said. “You can get your truck tomorrow.”

She slid off the stool. Althea nodded to them.

“I’ve got to take a leak first,” he said and went off to the men’s room near the pool table, his walk unsteady. The two players looked at him for a moment, then went back to their game.

She waited by the front door. When he came back there was a wet spot on the front of his jeans. Like a little kid. When they first met, his childishness had appealed to her in some ways. Then it had begun to feel like just another burden.

She opened the door for him. Over her shoulder, she saw Angie in the booth, watching them as they went out.

It had rained briefly, and puddles in the dirt lot reflected the neon from the window signs. She’d parked under a southern pine near the edge of the lot. She got the keypad out, beeped the doors open.

“You need anything from your truck?” His black Ford F-150 pickup was parked nose first against the fence a few spots away.

He shook his head, followed her to the Blazer. She opened the driver’s side door, waited until he got up in the passenger side without falling before she climbed up herself.

She started the engine. It coughed, hesitated.

“Needs a tune-up,” he said.

“Doesn’t like the wet weather.”

“Points and plugs.”

“Next paycheck, maybe.”

She turned out of the parking lot, splashing through puddles.

“They oughta pave this,” he said. “Make it not look so Florida white trash. Proud as I am of my own Florida white trashness.”

She smiled at that, turned east on the county road, woods on both sides of them. He powered down his window, and she turned the air-conditioning off, slid her own window down a little.

They drove in silence for the first five minutes, headlights cutting a path through the night.

“You ever hear from Roy?” he said.

“You’re the second person today to ask me that.”

“So I guess the answer’s no?”

“He’s not coming back. Even if he was, I can’t live my life worrying about it, wondering about it. Three years is a long time. If he was going to, he would have.”

“Never could understand that.”

“What part of it?”

“Leaving a woman like you.”

“You mean a woman with a son?”

“That, too.”

“I wonder about that myself,” she said.

“Birthdays? Anything?”

She shook her head.

“You could find him if you want to. These days it isn’t hard.”

“Who says I want to? And what’s with all the ancient history tonight?”

“Sorry,” he said and sat back.

He was quiet for a while, and then he said, “You know what I can’t get out of my mind?”

“What?”

“That car seat.”

“Don’t let it bother you so much,” she said. “A lot of times for a drug run, gun run, they’ll put a car seat in the back. Makes them look less suspicious if they get stopped.”

He picked up a plastic brontosaurus from the floor, looked at it, turned it over in his hands, put it back down.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I think that one was for real.”

She saw the lights of his house up ahead, the red lens that marked the mailbox.

“With what you’re making now,” she said, “you could have moved closer to town a long time ago.”

“Why would I do that? I like it out here. Reminds me of what I come from.”

She made a right into the long dirt driveway, slowed to ease over the ruts and bumps. The house loomed up on the right. It was bordered by woods on two sides, on the other a long-dead cornfield. There was a carport in the sideyard, empty now, a dirt front yard, concrete steps leading up to the front door.

She pulled up, cut the headlights, left the engine running. It was the first time she’d been out here in two years. Light shone through the kitchen curtains. She remembered standing at that window, doing dishes he’d let pile up for days. She’d look out at the desiccated cornstalks, the woods beyond, grateful she didn’t live here.

“Want to come in?” he said. “It’s been a while.”

“I don’t think so.”

He made no move to get out. She could hear crickets, the muffled hoot of an owl off in the trees.

“It’s late,” she said. “You should go inside.”

“I know.” He cocked his head slightly, a look that used to make her warm to him no matter what, and he knew it. He leaned close, and she didn’t move away. Their lips met. He kissed her hard, and she let him at first, tasting the schnapps, let his tongue slide in, and then it all felt wrong, bad wrong, and she put a hand on his chest, pushed him away. He sagged back against the passenger side door.

“Sorry,” he said.

“You don’t need to apologize. But you need to go.”

He opened the door. The courtesy light went on, and she could see the disappointment in his face and something else, despair even, or close to it.

He got out, turned to her.

“It’s good to see you,” he said. “I miss you sometimes.”

“I miss you, too. Sometimes.”

He smiled a little, and it made her feel better to see it. He shut the door, crossed around the front of the Blazer, tapped the hood twice as he started toward the house.

She watched him go up the steps, open the screen door, fit his key in the lock. He turned to wave to her, and she waved back. He shut the door behind him. Another light went on inside.

She sat that way for a few minutes, engine running, watching the house. Wondering if he would come back out, and what she would do if he did.

After a while, she backed up, swung around, turned the headlights on, and drove home.

The office had hard plastic chairs, joined together in groups of four. Morgan had been sitting for almost a half hour, sharing the room with a heavy woman, her crying baby, and an old white man with toothpick-thin arms and legs. There was a TV mounted high on the opposite wall, a soap opera playing without sound.

The receptionist had shut the window above her desk. Morgan could see her on the phone behind the pebbled glass. On his lap was a two-month-old Newsweek. He flipped through the pages, reading an item here and there, looking at the ads.

The door beside the desk buzzed, opened, and a short black woman in a white coat came out.

“Mr. Morgan?”

He took off his reading glasses, folded them and put them in a shirt pocket, and got up, his knees aching. He dropped the magazine on his seat. She held the door open, and he followed her down a hall to a treatment room.

“You can hang your coat there,” she said, and he took the leather off, hung it on a peg on the back of the door. She weighed him on a scale, took his blood pressure, pulse, and temperature, noted them on a clipboard chart. She told him the doctor would be with him shortly, closed the door, and left him alone.

He sat on the treatment table, paper crinkling under him, looked around. There was a cutaway chart on one wall showing the progression of heart disease, cholesterol buildup in the arteries. Another had the seven warning signs of Type 1 diabetes.

After a few minutes, the door opened and a tall, skinny white man came in. Midthirties, short blond hair, glasses.

“I’m Dr. Kinzler.” He put out his hand. Morgan shook it. “Dr. Rosman at the clinic sent over your file this morning.”

He picked up Morgan’s chart from the counter, looked at it, flipped pages.

“You saw Dr. Rosman last week?” he said without looking up.

“Tuesday.” It was the first he’d spoken.

“You know you’re down five pounds from then?”

Morgan shook his head. He was worried it would be more.

“Vitals are fine, temperature normal.” He set the chart down. “Any pain?”

Morgan touched the right side of his stomach. “Here, sometimes.”

Kinzler felt there, probed gently.

“Liver size seems normal,” he said, “but we’ll run some more blood work.”

He slid the chestpiece of his stethoscope up beneath Morgan’s sweater, the metal cold, asked him to breathe deep. He did the same in back, between his shoulder blades.

“How long with the pain?” he said.

“Three, four weeks. Bad the last week or two.”

“You taking anything for it?”

“Vicodin when I need it. Try not to take it unless I have to.”

“Good.”

He made notes on the chart and then stepped back and leaned against the counter, clipboard held in crossed arms.

“So you know about the other test results, the second biopsy?” he said. “Dr. Rosman discussed them with you?”

“A little.”

“Goblet cell carcinoid is fairly rare. It only strikes one in about a hundred thousand people. And it can be fairly unpredictable. We don’t know a lot about it yet, but there are some relatively standard ways of treating it. You’re…” He looked at the clipboard. “Fifty-seven?”

“Fifty-eight. Next month.”

“You’re in good shape for your age. Fit. That’ll help. But a lot of this-and what we decide to do-will depend on how early we caught it. That’s why we’ll do a full set of blood work today. Then we can discuss how to proceed. Have you had an MRI or CAT scan?”

Morgan shook his head.

“You have insurance?”

“No.”

“Medicare, Medicaid, anything?”

“No.”

“That’s an issue. There’s a range of treatments that might be required, once we figure out which way to go.”

“I can get the money. I’ll do what I need to do.”

“What line of work are you in, Mr. Morgan?”

He shifted on the table. “Handyman, construction, whatever I can get.”

“Construction, huh? Union?”

“No.”

“Pension?”

Morgan shook his head.

“There’s various things you can apply for,” Kinzler said. “Social aid, some elder programs you might be able to get in on. All of it’s worth looking into. You’re likely eligible for Medicaid as well.”

“I’ll pay what I have to pay.”

“You seem confident.”

Morgan shrugged.

“Either way,” Kinzler said, “we can’t waste much time. We have to be proactive with these types of cancers. They removed the appendix when?”

“August.”

“So it probably took at least a couple weeks for the initial biopsy results to come back. Did you have any symptoms before that?”

“No. I had the pain, I went to the clinic. They sent me to the hospital.”

“That’s one of the ways goblet cell presents,” Kinzler said. “Or at least one of the ways we catch it. Routine appendectomies, and if they find a tumor in the removed organ, bingo. There you are.”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m saying early is better. And we might be fairly early here, which is good news. Depending on how far it’s gotten, where it’s spread, surgery may be an option as well. We go in, take out as many of the tumors as we find. Afterward, we put you on a maintenance diet of chemo, maybe radiation, if it looks like it’ll be effective. Then we test you regularly, see if they come back.”

The woman came back in, carrying a kit she opened on the counter.

Kinzler put out his hand. “Doris will draw some blood. We’ll get back to you when we know more.”

“That’s it?”

“For now.” He kept his hand out until Morgan shook it. “At least a few days before we know anything. Then we’ll set you up for a scan. You’re not going anywhere, right?”

“No,” Morgan said. The woman had a plastic syringe out, cartridges, a blue rubber strap.

“I’ll leave you in good hands, then, Mr. Morgan. We’ll speak soon.” He shut the door behind him.

The woman tugged at the left sleeve of his pullover. He rolled it up, and she tied the strap around his upper arm and swabbed the crook of his elbow with an alcohol pad. When he made a fist, the veins rose in his forearm. She laid the needle tip on the thickest one, and he winced as the steel slid in.

An empty plastic cartridge went into the syringe. She pressed it home, and he watched dark red blood swirl into the tube, slowly fill it. His blood. His life.

The hill. It was always the hill that killed her.

Sara ran hard, her legs like lead, eyes on the road ahead, the top of the hill. She was waiting for the pain to stop, for the bliss of oxygenated blood to take over, but it hadn’t. Just more pain and more hill, the sound of her breathing and the noise of her sneakers on the blacktop.

Counting the paces now, distracting herself from the pain, and then she was up, at the top, the road long and straight in front of her. She resisted the temptation to slow. Engine noise behind her. She moved farther up on the shoulder, kicking up pine needles as she ran. An empty flatbed truck went past, Howie Twelvetrees from the municipal garage at the wheel. He blew the horn, and she waved to him without breaking stride.

Ahead was the creek, the wooden bridge, her turnaround point. She crossed it, sneakers thumping on the wood, then circled to the other side of the road, started back. One mile up, one mile back.

Downhill she had to watch her speed or risk taking a header onto the pavement. When she reached the bottom, she slowed, breathing hard but knowing the worst was over.

She thought about her interview with Elwood and Boone that morning. It had been shorter than she’d expected, less than a half hour. No, she hadn’t heard the shots. Yes, Billy had told her what had happened. No, she had no reason to believe it had gone any other way.

The questions touched only briefly on their relationship, and Boone had seemed almost embarrassed about it. Still, the sheriff had been right. In Hopedale everyone knew your business.

She slowed when the house came in sight, breathing deeper, filling her lungs. She saw the front door open and Danny come out on the steps to meet her, JoBeth behind him. Sara felt the smile come to her face unbidden. She lifted her arm in a weary wave.

Morgan lay on his bed, drew deeply from the joint. Eyes closed, he held the smoke inside, let it out slowly. A boom box on the bureau played low, a Best of the Delfonics cassette. After a while the pain in his stomach began to fade.

He was almost out of Vicodin, didn’t want to go back into them tonight. He kept a small stash of reefer in the room but only smoked at night, when he was alone and the pain grew too much. Then he would double-lock the door, the Beretta on the nightstand, let the smoke carry him away.

He pinched the roach out, set it in the nightstand ashtray, felt himself slipping into sleep. When he woke, he could hear the muffled thump of music from the club across the street. He went to the window, looked out. A man stood on the corner below, cell phone to his ear. A dark BMW with tinted windows was parked half a block down.

Morgan had lived in this residential hotel for five years, paid seven hundred in cash every month and another hundred on top of that to the manager, to let him know if anyone came around or asked about him. He’d installed his own dead bolts in the door, kept the only keys. His second-floor room looked out over the front entrance, which was why he’d chosen it. From the window, he could see anyone coming or going from the building.

His mouth was dry, cottony, but he was hungry, too. There was a sink in one corner of the room, and he ran water, waited for it to clear, and then drank from the faucet, spit it out, and drank more. He got his cell out-thirty minutes left and he would toss it, buy another-and called in an order to the Chinese restaurant down the block.

His was one of the few rooms with its own bathroom-a toilet and shower stall in a space no larger than a closet, the door barely clearing the seat. Morgan stripped, looked at himself in the mirror. His stomach was loose and sagging, had once been rippled with muscle. His chest hair was mostly gray, a few shiny black ones still hiding in there. He touched his scars. The keloid near his left shoulder where he’d been shot in 1988, the year the crack wars had hit the city. The puckered flesh below his right nipple from being shanked in the chow line at Rahway. Low on his right side, the most recent one, a three-inch mark where they’d removed his appendix.

He showered, dressed, put on the leather coat, the Beretta under it in back. He went out, locked the door behind him. The stairwell smelled of mold and stale fried food. The lobby was empty, no one behind the bulletproof glass at the registration desk. That bothered him.

At the front door, he scanned the street. The man with the cell was gone. The BMW, too.

He went outside, the air cold and clear, crossed the street, and headed up the block to Halsey. He kept the Monte Carlo in a parking garage two blocks away, paid another hundred and fifty a month for that, but he used the car only when he had to.

He turned right at the corner. The restaurant was the only lit storefront on the block, the front windows steamed. Two teenagers stood outside talking on cell phones, wearing puffy coats, long white T-shirts, baggy jeans. One cut a look at Morgan as he crossed the street, then went back to his conversation.

A handful of tables inside, all empty. The Asian woman behind the register-she could have been twenty-five or fifty-five, he couldn’t tell-put his bagged food on the counter without speaking. He paid her, waved off the change, the same ritual every time.

The bag was warm against his left side as he went out. His stomach rumbled with hunger. The teenagers were gone, the street empty. He looked up toward the corner of Halsey. A police car passed by, going fast.

He crossed the street in the opposite direction from which he’d come, taking the long way back. He cut across a vacant lot and into the narrow alley that ran behind it. Abandoned warehouses here, loading docks with graffiti-covered metal gates. A rat scuttled out of an overturned trash can, ran from him along the alley wall.

He stopped a few feet into the alley, turned to listen. Nothing. Kept going.

After two blocks, the alley grew wider. Now it ran behind a row of old houses with small bare yards, low wooden fences. He’d walk up to Mulberry, make a right, double back to the hotel.

He heard the noise then, a slight scuffing far behind him, back by the warehouses.

To his right was a house, the back window lit. A white sheet hung from a clothesline strung between dead trees. He stepped over the fence into the shadows of the yard, moved behind the sheet. There were cutout Halloween decorations in the window: a cat with an arched back, a jack-o’-lantern.

The noise again, then a low voice. The chirp of a cell phone being used as a walkie-talkie.

He set the bag on the ground, got the Beretta out, held it at his side. The chirp again, then silence. He waited.

Five minutes later, the man came up the alley after him, into the light wash from the back window. He wore a black watch cap, baggy denim. Morgan saw the three tattooed dog paws on the side of his neck.

The man looked at the house, then back the way he’d come. Morgan could see the automatic in his right hand. The other held the cell. He lifted it to his face. It chirped. He spoke low.

“Nah, man. He gone. He must be out on Mulberry by now. Bring the car around.” He clicked the phone shut, looked at the house.

Morgan followed his glance. There was a boy-nine or ten at most-looking out the window, his arms folded on the sill. He watched the man without expression.

Black Cap lowered the gun so it was hidden at his side. He said, “Hello, little man,” and then Morgan stepped out from behind the sheet, raised the Beretta, and shot him through the head.

He fell without a sound, the quick spinal looseness of instant death. Morgan stepped over the fence, looked back down the alley the way he’d come. There was a figure there, moving toward him, an outline against the streetlights at the far end. Morgan raised the Beretta, fired, heard the bullet whine off pavement. The figure leaped, hit and hugged the ground. Morgan turned and ran.

Mulberry was in sight, a block ahead. He headed for it, pain in his chest, and then the BMW screeched to a halt at the alley entrance, half on the sidewalk. He saw the back driver’s side window roll down, the shotgun barrel come out. He fired at it twice, heard bullets punch metal, break glass.

There was a gap between the front bumper and the alley wall. He made it through, ran across Mulberry toward an empty lot, heard the engine roar, tires squeal behind him.

Another alley here, close walls and cracked blacktop. He ran, tripped, went down hard, the Beretta flying from his hand, skittering across the ground.

He lay on the blacktop, out of breath, the pain an iron band around his stomach and sides. The far end of the alley was about thirty feet ahead. He looked toward it but could not move. He looked behind him, back down the alley to the street beyond. The BMW was gone.

He sucked in air, felt the pain in his chest, rolled onto his side. His left palm was bloody where he’d tried to break his fall. Bits of gravel were embedded in the skin.

He got to his feet, looked around until he found the Beretta. He shuffled toward it, one hand on the wall for support. When he bent to pick it up, dizziness swept over him. He leaned against the wall until it ended. He could hear distant sirens.

When he reached the end of the alley, the street was empty. Still breathing hard, he waited in the shadows. A cab went past slow, stopped at a light. He slipped the Beretta into his right-hand coat pocket, stepped out into the street.

The sheriff was at the coffee station, with a mug that bore the eagle, globe, and anchor of the Marine Corps. Sara had just come on duty, hadn’t picked up her keys yet.

“Who was that?” she said.

He looked at her. “Who?”

“That woman yesterday.”

He sipped coffee.

“Need to talk to you about that,” he said. “Come on in.”

She followed him into the office.

“Close the door.”

He stood at the window, sipped from the steaming mug, looked out. The flag was popping in the wind, the metal lanyard clanging against the pole.

“I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised,” he said.

“About what?”

He gestured at the chair across from his desk. She sat.

“That woman’s name is Simone James,” he said, “and she claims to be Derek Willis’s wife, if not in a strictly legal manner. She says they have a child together. A three-year-old boy. She showed me pictures.”

“What’s she doing here?”

He put the mug down, sat. “Collect the body, when it’s ready to be released. Ostensibly at least. Raise hell, most likely, is what I think.”

“What did you tell her?”

“That we were conducting a full investigation. That it appeared to be a case of justifiable use of lethal force. She says Willis never carried a gun in his life. Wouldn’t know what to do with one.”

“He had one that night. More than one.”

“That’s what I told her. And his prints were on the.38. She didn’t seem to buy it. I gave her Boone’s number, the ME’s, too. She’ll call them, I expect. Get a lawyer, too, if she hasn’t already. Being as you were a witness, you should be prepared.”

“Everything I saw is in that report.”

“I know, but she might want to talk to you. That’s my read on her, at least, from my brief exposure. And you’re not going to do that, right?”

“Of course not.”

“If it comes down to a suit, lawyers and a deposition, we’ll talk to the FOP attorney, see what he says. Until then, we don’t do anything. I’ve promised her access to the basic reports, but that’s it. She’s a cool customer, though.”

“What do you mean?”

“I expected her to come in here with guns blazing, call us all a bunch of racists at least. Instead she asked her questions, and when I gave her answers, she asked more. Wasn’t too forthcoming when it came to my own questions, though.”

“Like what?”

“The car that Willis was driving was registered to a Wendell Abernathy, remember? Turns out Mr. Abernathy is seventy-five years old and hasn’t renewed his driver’s license in six years.”

“What did she say to that?”

“She said it doesn’t matter. She’s right.”

“Anything else turn up in the car?”

He shook his head, sipped coffee.

“What was in the overnight bag I saw?”

“Clothes. We put a drug dog on the car, too. No hits.”

“Doesn’t mean anything.”

“You’re right.”

“So she asks around a little bit, maybe blows off some steam, then goes back to New Jersey.”

Or stays here and causes trouble for all of us.

“Maybe, maybe not,” he said. “We’ll see. I’ve been going over those reports again, though.”

“And?”

“There are a couple things that bother me. Boone and Elwood didn’t think they were an issue, but I’m not so sure.”

“What?”

“Billy says Willis was speeding, driving erratically, that he pulled him over because of that.”

“So?”

“So he’s already maybe a little nervous, doesn’t know what he’s getting into. New Jersey plates, that road, that time of night, no one else around. He knew something was up when he pulled that car over.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Unusual situation. Remote location. SOP would have been to call it in, sit there and wait for backup before approaching the car. Instead, he calls it in and then gets out, engages the driver. And things get crazy.”

“The way it happens sometimes.”

“I know. But most deputies in a shooting situation-especially if they’ve never been in one before-will end up emptying their magazines, out of panic, instinct. They fire at the threat until it’s eliminated. Billy only fired three times-just enough to do the job-and all of them in center body mass. Pretty good shooting for a man in fear of his life.”

“You’re blaming him because he didn’t panic?”

“Not at all. Just another wrinkle in this thing. Something else to keep it from being as simple as it should.”

“What else?”

He put the cup down.

“Why’d Willis run?” he said.

“Because he didn’t want to go to jail.”

“He’d be facing a gun charge, sure, but he’d be out on bail in a day or so. With a decent lawyer he might even beat the case, being as it wasn’t his car in the first place. But he had no warrants, wasn’t a fugitive. Why get into a gun battle with a deputy?”

“Maybe he was the one that panicked.”

“Maybe. I just wish the whole thing made more sense.”

She thought about what she’d told Billy at his house, how the sheriff was convinced it was a clean shoot. The relief in his face.

“I need to get out on the road,” she said.

“I know. And I’m sure I don’t need to remind you, Sara, but don’t talk to anyone about this-anyone-without a lawyer from the county or the FOP present. That includes Billy.”

“He’s a fellow deputy. He’s having a hard time with all this. How can you say-”

“Trust me, it’s for the best. Now, I know you feel bad about what he’s going through, you want to support him. I understand that. I do, too. But you need to be careful.”

“It sounds like you’re expecting the worst.”

“I always expect the worst. It might be a good idea to stay away from him in general until all this gets cleared up.”

There it is. What you were waiting for.

“I don’t-”

He raised his hand. “I’m just saying. You need to keep in mind, someday you may be sitting in this chair instead of me.”

“I don’t know about that.”

“I do, and that may come sooner than you think. If you want it, that is. In the meantime, you need to stay clear of things that could come back to haunt you later on.”

“What do you mean?”

He sat back, looked at her. “This is going to sound cold,” he said. “And maybe it is. But if things go bad on this, I don’t want you catching any of it. You might be in an awkward position, because of that past situation-and because you were out there the night of the shooting. If someone has to take the hit on this, I want you well clear of it, for your own sake.”

She watched him, waited for more.

“I tell you about when I was with the Rough Riders?” he said. “Running supplies into Khe Sanh?”

“Some of it.”

“When I got there in ’sixty-seven, there was only one road in and out. Highway Nine all the way from Ca Lu. One lane, through some of the worst territory you can imagine. NVA everywhere. From midnight to noon the road went in, from noon to midnight it went out. They’d have one of us in a tanker truck, driving five thousand gallons of JP-4, sandbags on the floor, an M-16, and that’s it. One man. I made that run about a dozen times. Saying every prayer I knew along the way.”

“Maybe it helped.”

“Maybe it did. But what I didn’t find out until later was the philosophy behind it, the way it operated. Our guys were getting blown up all the time, mines, snipers, RPGs. There was no way to hold and control the jungle around the road. The logistics officers figured we were losing an average of three to five percent of everything that tried to get through. No matter what they did. Three to five percent of the supplies lost, three to five percent of the men killed.”

“That must have been tough.”

“You know what solution they came up with?”

She shook her head.

“Add five percent more men, supplies, trucks. Make your losses sustainable. Get more trucks, more men out on that road so you can lose five percent without impacting the efficiency of the base. It made sense, unless you were one of those guys that didn’t get through, or their families.”

“Doesn’t seem fair.”

“Fair or not, it worked. You know what that’s called?”

“What?”

“Management. Take it easy out there, Sara. Be safe.”

When the knock came at the door, Morgan got the Beretta from the nightstand, looked through the peephole. C-Love and Mikey were outside.

“Come on, man,” C-Love said. “It’s freezing out here.”

Morgan undid the lock and night latch, opened the door, the Beretta at his side. As they came in, he looked past them into the parking lot. The Suburban was parked in the shadows near a Dumpster.

“The twins out there?” he said. He shut the door, locked it.

“Yeah, why you ask?” C-Love said. He was carrying a black plastic grocery bag. Mikey walked around the room, poked the bathroom door open.

“What are you looking for?” Morgan said.

“Nothing.”

“You bring what I asked?”

C-Love hefted the bag, dropped it on the bed.

“We need to talk about some shit,” Mikey said. There was a table and chair under the front window. He pulled the chair out, straddled it.

“That boy you murked in the alley,” he said. “That was Philly Joe from around the way.”

“So?” He set the Beretta on the nightstand.

“His people gonna be looking for you.”

Morgan went to the bed, opened the bag. Inside was a ziplock plastic bag filled with greenish-gold marijuana. C-Love stood near the door, watching him.

A plane came in low overhead. The lamp on the nightstand rattled.

“That’s good shit,” C-Love said. “Best hydro around right now.”

Underneath, two brown plastic prescription bottles without labels. He twisted the top off one, saw the Vicodin inside.

“What you need that shit for, dawg?” Mikey said. “You never told me.”

The tablets were five milligrams each. Morgan broke one in half, put it on his tongue. He dropped the other half back in the bottle, put the cap on. He went into the bathroom, palmed water, swallowed it.

“That shit will fuck you up,” Mikey said.

Morgan drank more water, came out of the bathroom.

“You scarfing down those pills so quick,” Mikey said, “you don’t even see what else is in the bag.”

Morgan looked. There was a black plastic bundle at the bottom, ends taped shut with duct tape. He drew it out, knew what it was. “This for my trouble?”

“That’s an advance,” Mikey said. “I need you to take that little trip for me. Shit I told you about.”

“How much is in here?”

“Five Gs.”

“Not much.”

“For expenses, for now. Traveling money. Good timing, too, since Philly’s boys looking for you. There’s that thing with Rohan, too. Gonna be a while before all that shit quiets down.”

“You talk to them?”

“That Trey Dog crew? Can’t do that just now. They’re screaming for blood, and they know you with me. I can get messages back and forth, with an intermediary. But I gotta watch my back on this, too.”

Morgan sat on the edge of the bed. “Tell me about this trip.”

“Told you some of it. Pipeline’s been dry since the Colombians went down. Even if they beat the case, they ain’t gonna be up and running anytime soon, if ever. Now I got this RICO shit hanging over my head, and these lawyers, man, they keep wanting more.”

“Go on.”

“Word was some Haitians down in Florida had a good line on powder, shit coming in through the islands. They the new power down there now. Making mad money. We set up a meeting, place called Belle Glade. Curtis went down there.” He nodded at C-Love. “It looked good. They had their shit together, steady source, but they don’t know me well enough to want to do business. And those voodoo motherfuckers don’t trust anyone didn’t grow up poor and barefoot like them.”

“So you sweetened the deal?” Morgan said.

“You know my cousin Leon? He in Rahway now, longtime, but he used to run those corners down near Baxter Terrace. His son Derek was wanting to get ahead, put some work in. Smart boy, too. Going to Rutgers, wanted to be a teacher or some shit. But he got a little one now, a baby mama, too. He needed cash, you know? He came to me, wanted me to help him out, bring him along a little. So I gave him a shot.”

“You sent him down there?”

“Set him up good. Route, expenses, every damn thing. He had a cash advance for the first shipment, prove we were serious.”

“How much money?”

Mikey twisted a thick gold ring on one finger. “A lot, man. More than I could afford.”

“How much?”

“Three hundred fifty K. I threw in some iron, too; as a gift. Island boys love their guns.”

“Why didn’t you send the twins?”

“With their jackets? Some cop pull them over, think he hit the lottery. Derek was clean. No sheet on him.”

“What happened?”

“Some shit I still ain’t figured out. He got pulled over in some cracker town down there. They say he drew on a deputy, but that’s bullshit. They capped his ass and took my money.”

“You know this?”

“Much as I need to. I ain’t known Derek to ever carry, but he might have been, I don’t know. Might have got nervous, cash in the car, dealing with some niggas he didn’t know. But shoot it out with a cop? Nah. He ain’t got the stones.”

“Maybe he got scared.”

“Maybe he did. Maybe it happened exactly like they said. But ain’t nobody said shit about the money yet. And it was in all the papers down there. They impounded the car, probably ripped the thing apart. If they found the money, some motherfucker took it.”

“Or they’re holding it and not telling anybody. Waiting to see who comes looking for it.”

Mikey shook his head. “There ain’t no DEA, no FBI involved in this. If there was, I’d have heard. This is a bunch of redneck Confederate-flag-flying small-town motherfuckers. Whether it was one motherfucker or two, or the whole goddamn town, fact remains. Somebody stole my money.”

“Hard to believe you sent that boy down there on his own like that.”

“Best way to do it. Down there, two niggas in a car get pulled over for sure. Cash was in a panel under the trunk. All he had to do was leave the car where we told him, then rent another, drive back. Didn’t have to deal with them any more than that.”

“So it went bad. Nothing you can do about it. Walk away.”

“Can’t take that kind of loss. Not now. Too much shit going on. I need that money or I need that powder so I can sell it and make that money back. Now I ain’t getting any product out of those Haitians, because that money never got to them, and they not gonna believe me when I tell them what happened. Or care, even if they did. So I need that money.”

Morgan got up. The Vicodin was kicking in, easing the tension in his stomach, taking the edge off the pain. He went to the window, bent the blinds, looked out. It was raining lightly, the parking lot shiny with it. The Suburban hadn’t moved.

“If the cops do have that money,” he said, “they’re using it to build a case. No way you’re going to get it back. And if someone stole it, they stole it. Either way, it’s gone.”

“If some nigga broke into my house and stole three hundred fifty K of my money, you think I’d let it go? Say, ‘what the fuck, it’s gone, forget about it’? Just because that shit happened in Florida doesn’t mean it’s any less fucked up. If I start letting people steal from me, I might as well pack this shit up right now. Or let some motherfucker put a bullet in my head, get it over with.”

“I still say walk away.”

“I can’t, dawg. I need that money. I need you to go get it for me.”

Morgan looked at him, then at C-Love.

“This shit can’t stand,” Mikey said. “I need that money. That’s my money and I’m going to get it back, whatever I need to do. I don’t have no choice.”

“I do,” Morgan said.

“You do. But you ain’t even asked me the terms yet.”

“Terms?”

“Three hundred and fifty K,” Mikey said. “No way whoever took it could have spent it yet. All the shit in the news down there, they’d be laying low. So somebody dug a hole and buried it till things calm down. You find it, keep a third. You find the whole three fifty, you keep an even hundred twenty. That fair?”

A hundred and twenty thousand, Morgan thought. Combined with what was in the safe deposit, it might be enough for the treatment, maybe enough to get him started in another town. More money than he’d ever had at one time before. Might ever have again.

“Well?” Mikey said.

“I don’t know anything about the South. D.C.’s the farthest I’ve ever been.”

“You don’t need to know shit about the South. Like I said, that’s a backwater cracker town, man. They still burning crosses and fucking their sisters. I’ve already got someone looking into things down there.”

“Who?”

“Derek’s shorty. She went down there to bring the body back. She ain’t too happy with the way things played out, but there it is. He took the chances. She don’t want shit to do with me, but she’s looking into things, seeing who’s who, what they say happened, all that shit. Maybe she gets us some names, too.”

“And then?”

“You go down there, straighten that shit out, get my money, and bring it back here. Take your cut. Then we clear.”

“You make it sound easy.”

“It ain’t nothing you haven’t seen before, dealt with. It’s the same thieving bullshit, man. That’s all it is.”

Morgan scratched his elbow, looked at C-Love.

“You’re the only one I can trust with this,” Mikey said. “If you get down there and it don’t work out, then it don’t work out. I’ll pay you for your time.”

“How much?”

“Twenty K.”

“I’ll need to think on this.”

“All right. But one other thing. If you do find the motherfucker that got my money?”

“Yeah?”

“You need to put him in the ground. Cop, sheriff, judge, mayor, whatever. I don’t give a fuck. Put him in the ground.”

Sara was in the kitchen, drying the last of the dishes from dinner, when her cell trilled on the counter. She looked at the display. Billy’s number.

It was a little after eleven, Danny asleep, JoBeth home. After leaving Tiger’s, Sara had driven aimlessly, until the crying stopped, not wanting JoBeth to see her like that. She felt tired, drained.

The phone trilled again. She wiped her hands on a dish towel, picked it up. Thought about pushing the SILENCE button, setting it back down, ignoring it.

She hit SEND.

“Hey, Sara. I’m glad I got you.”

She leaned back against the counter, closed her eyes.

“Sara? Are you there?”

“I’m here. What is it?”

“I’m really sorry about that. I don’t know what to say.”

“You don’t have to say anything.”

“It’s Lee-Anne. Sometimes she’s just… I don’t know.”

Something flared inside her. When she’d seen them in the truck, she’d felt only shame. Now came anger.

“Billy, I don’t want to have this conversation.”

“I embarrassed you, and I’m sorry about that. I shouldn’t have let that happen.”

“It’s none of my business.”

“I’m trying to apologize, Sara. Can you let me do that? Just this once?”

There was something in his tone, almost a pleading, and she felt herself soften. She shifted the phone to her other hand.

“I don’t know what to say, Billy. I don’t know what you want me to say either.”

Silence on the line.

“Billy?”

“I used to be able to make you laugh,” he said. “I loved that sound.”

“Billy, please-”

“I’m sorry it all ended up like this.”

She felt the sadness then, moving like slow fatigue through her body. You are not going to cry. Not now.

“I’m sorry too,” she said.

“I’m getting you upset again. I didn’t mean to.”

“Billy, I’ve got too much going on in my life right now to deal with this. To deal with you. We make our choices, and we live with them. I’m living with mine. Why can’t you do the same?”

“I’m trying,” he said. Something seemed to break in his voice. “I’m trying my best, Sara.”

“It’s late. I have to go.”

“I’m sorry for everything,” he said.

“Good night, Billy,” she said, but he was already gone.

When Sara ended her shift, Hammond’s office was already dark, the door closed. Still in uniform, she drove out to his house on the far west side of the county, the road winding through shimmering cane fields. The air was filled with the harsh, sweet smell of a distant burn-off.

When she pulled up the driveway, he was out on the porch steps, tying flies, a tackle box open beside him. His cruiser and pickup were parked in the side yard. She pulled the Blazer up behind them, cut the engine.

He watched as she came across the lawn. He was out of uniform already, wore jeans and a blue workshirt.

“Figured I’d find you out here,” she said. A wind chime on the porch sounded in the breeze.

“Knocked off early,” he said. “Don’t tell the taxpayers.”

He set the fly in the box, stood, took a handkerchief from his back pocket, wiped his hands.

“Something wrong?” he said.

She shook her head.

“Then come on up. Get out of that heat.”

He held the screen door for her. She went into the coolness of the hallway, a ceiling fan turning above.

“I made some sweet tea a little while ago,” he said.

She followed him into the kitchen. Through the doorway into the living room, she could see a TV table set up in front of a recliner. The television was on, the sound turned down.

“I leave it on sometimes,” he said. “Company, I guess.”

He opened the refrigerator, took out a pitcher. “Glasses up there,” he said.

There was a sideboard against the wall, a shelf holding white china with blue rims. On it were two framed photographs. One was a studio portrait of his daughter, Laura, a young woman with Asian features, long black hair. The other was of his wife, Lien-Thi, who’d died of cervical cancer the year before Sara joined the Sheriff’s Office. In the photo, she stood at the railing of a cruise ship in a Hawaiian dress, wearing a lei. She looked slightly embarrassed and impossibly happy.

Sara got glasses down from the cabinet.

“Have a seat,” he said.

He poured tea, set the pitcher on the table, sat across from her.

“You hear from Laura?” she said.

He shook his head. “She’s got her own life. She doesn’t like coming back here unless she has to. Too many bad memories.”

“Sorry to hear that.”

“Another year and she’ll take the bar. I thought she might get out here for Thanksgiving, but she says she’s got too much going on. She’s seeing a fellow, too, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they end up getting married.”

“You must be proud of her.”

“I got pretty lucky, is the way I look at it. The Good Lord watches over drunks and fools, I guess, especially if they’re fathers. She didn’t have an easy time of it, growing up here. Between my issues and her mother getting sick…”

“Sounds like you did a pretty good job of it anyway.”

“I don’t know. Maybe she got where she is in spite of, rather than because of. That would be my bet. Only reason I kept this house after Lin died was I thought Laura might want it someday. Doesn’t seem too likely now, though.”

Sara drank her tea. It tasted of honey and mint.

“I was up at the Starlite today,” she said.

“Just for lunch, I hope.”

“I saw that woman.”

He sipped the tea.

“I went out there,” she said. “Maybe I shouldn’t have.”

“And?”

“She thinks her husband was murdered. That Billy shot him without provocation.”

He looked at his glass, swirled his tea. “She would, though, wouldn’t she?”

“I guess.”

“What else she say?”

“That I might not be sorry now about what happened, but I would be.”

He frowned. “She say how-or why?”

“No.”

“Did you take that as a threat?” he said.

“I wasn’t sure how to take it.”

“Well, she hasn’t gotten a lawyer yet, far as I know. All her inquiries have been on her own. That bothers me, though, her bracing you like that.”

“She didn’t come to me. I went to her.”

“Either way, it bothers me.”

“She showed me a picture of her little boy. He’s three.”

“I know. I saw it. What’s on your mind, Sara? I mean exactly?”

She looked past him, out the kitchen window. The sun hung dark and red over the tree line.

“I met Elwood the other night,” she said. “At Tiger’s. Unusual to see him there.”

“Sam likes a beer every once in a while.”

“That’s what he told me, but I got the impression he was keeping an eye on Billy.”

“That might be the case.”

“Then you don’t buy his story? Our story?”

He put the glass down. “I told you I had some concerns,” he said, “but not much more to go on than that.”

“More than you let on, though.”

He crossed his arms. “Nothing I’m about to say leaves this house. You know that, Sara, right?”

She nodded. Here it comes.

“Turns out Elwood had his own concerns, after the fact,” he said. “He and Boone did the interview, but Boone wrote it, wanted to. Sam let him.”

“And?”

“On paper, it all matches up. And everything that happened after you got there was strictly by the book, no worries there. Sam’s like a dog with a bone, though. Once he gets to chewing on something, he won’t let it be.”

“You told me it was a clean shoot, that’s what they decided.”

“There’s not a single piece of evidence that says otherwise.”

“Except Elwood’s gut? And yours?”

“Sam came to me, told me he was ruling it in policy. Boone and the state attorney’s office agreed. Then this Simone James set us both to thinking.”

“You’d believe her over one of your own deputies?”

“Not at all. That’s not what I’m saying.”

“Maybe she didn’t know what Willis was down here for.”

“That’s possible. Likely even. But let me make this clear, Sara. None of what Sam and I discussed is on paper, anywhere, and this department never has and never will be in the practice of airing its dirty laundry in public or to other agencies.”

“Meaning what?”

“I signed off on the papers this morning. Flynn’s free and clear. No charges of any kind. If there’s a legal issue, a suit, that’s something else, but as far as this department, this county, and the State of Florida are concerned, that shooting was one hundred percent justified.”

“But you’ve asked Elwood to keep his eyes open.”

“I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t. And if it turns out there was more to that shooting than Flynn told us, I’m going to make sure he leaves this department with the kind of recommendation that’ll keep him from getting another law enforcement job his entire life.”

“You sound like you’re already convinced something’s wrong.”

“Not at all,” he said. “I just want you to know where we stand, and that all of this is in-house at the moment-you, me, and Sam Elwood. For the immediate future, that’s how it’s going to stay.”

“I understand.”

“How much do you know about Flynn’s girlfriend?”

“Lee-Anne? Not much. She used to dance at the Sugar Shack out on Seventeen before they closed it down. That’s how she and Billy met. He couldn’t stay away from that place.”

“I can see how you two wouldn’t exactly be friends.”

“She doesn’t bother me.”

“Brings into question his judgment, though, doesn’t it?”

“It’s none of my business anymore what he does,” she said.

“Sam ran her through the computer, just for the hell of it. Turns out she had a couple minor arrests in Orlando back in the nineties-possession, shoplifting. Nothing much. But she did show up as a person of interest in a pending case. Seems that a couple days before the shooting, she went down to the West Palm area. That’s where she was when it happened.”

“I knew that. Billy told me.”

“Sam’s got a friend at the Palm Beach County SO, so he chased it down. She showed up during a surveillance down there. They ran the car tag, got her name.”

“What kind of surveillance?”

“Narcotics case. Haitian gang. They’re taking up where the Jamaicans left off, moving a lot of weed, coke. Got a big old house down there near Belle Glade, apparently all they do is party. Task force is working it-PBSO, FDLE, DEA. No arrests yet, but they’re building a case.”

“They sure it was her?”

“For the record, no, but the car was hers, St. Charles County plates and all. Sam got on the horn to Orlando PD. They found an old booking photo, faxed it down to West Palm.”

“Sam’s been busy.”

“He has. An FDLE agent looked at the photo, was pretty sure it was her. White woman hanging out with all those gangstas couldn’t help but catch their attention. She hasn’t been back, though, as far as they know.”

“What was she doing there?”

“Who knows? Just partying, maybe. She popped up on their radar, but they can’t tie her to anything else. Maybe she just likes Haitians. You say Flynn knew she was down there?”

“Yes.”

“He know who she was with, what she was doing?”

“He said she was with friends.”

“I guess she was.”

A breeze moved through the house, bringing with it the smell of cane smoke. The chimes on the front porch rang softly.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know about any of this.”

“You don’t need to worry on it. But you asked, so I needed to tell you.”

But there’s more you’re not telling me. And you’re not telling me because you’re not sure you can trust me.

“I should get going. Thanks for the tea.”

They walked together back through the house and onto the front porch.

“I appreciate what you’re going through,” he said, “and I know none of this makes it any easier. You’ve got enough on your hands as it is.”

“I’ll be okay.”

“I know you will.”

They walked toward the Blazer. To the west, the sun was slipping behind the trees in a dirty haze of smoke. She got her keys out.

“Been a while since I’ve been out here,” she said. “I forgot how peaceful it is, quiet.”

“Too quiet sometimes, with no one around. But it doesn’t bother me that much. My life is pretty simple these days. I get up at six every morning, seven days a week, and I always have my Rule for Today.”

“What’s today’s rule?”

“Don’t drink. I can do anything else I want, but I can’t drink. You know what the Rule for Tomorrow is?”

“What?”

“There is no Rule for Tomorrow. There’s only today. And when I wake up tomorrow morning-if I wake up tomorrow morning-then the only thing I have to worry about is the Rule for Today.”

“And that is?”

“Don’t drink.”

She opened the door, and he slapped her lightly on the elbow. She got behind the wheel and started the engine, and he stood there, watching, as she turned around and headed back down the driveway.

The Indian woman behind the counter didn’t greet him, watched him as he made his way down the aisles. Basic foods, brands he’d never heard of, cans with faded labels. Stretches of dusty shelf with no product at all. Morgan remembered the A &P on West Market Street when he was a boy. A city block long, it had seemed. Endless rows of fluorescent lights, everything clean and bright. A store a boy could get lost in.

He picked up two overpriced quarts of motor oil, a handful of chocolate bars. There were no baskets, so he carried it all in the crook of his arm.

On a shelf near the counter, he saw a turn-rack of cassettes with sun-faded labels. A handwritten sign read 3 FOR $5.

Stock left from the previous owners, he guessed. Nobody bought them anymore.

He scanned the titles, remembering what he’d left behind at the hotel. He chose a Sam Cooke collection, O. V. Wright, the Impressions’ greatest hits. The tape cases were covered with a thin film of dust. He found six he wanted, brought them to the counter.

The prepaid cells were on the wall behind the register, between hanging sheets of scratch-off lottery cards.

He pointed. “Two of those.”

She scanned the items without a word. He pulled a roll of bills from the pocket of his leather, handed over three fifties. She frowned, unfolded them on the counter one by one, and passed a counterfeit detection pen over each. Then she opened the register, gave him his change, put everything in a single thin plastic bag.

He went out into the fading daylight, started across Elizabeth Avenue to where the Monte Carlo was parked. He’d taken the chance on driving. With the stops he had to make, a cab would be too much trouble. The bag dangled from his left hand, his right hand free. His coat was open, the Beretta in back. He put the bag in the trunk, got behind the wheel.

His next stop was three blocks away, a hardware store tucked between a fast-food chicken place and a shuttered shoe repair shop. He went up a flight of narrow stairs, through a glass door with an old-fashioned OPEN sign.

Otis was behind the counter, grinding a key. His hair had gone solid gray in the months since Morgan had last seen him. Reading glasses hung from a cord around his neck.

He saw Morgan, stopped what he was doing, the key machine winding down.

“My man,” he said. “Long time.”

“How you doing, Otis?”

“Day by day. Like everybody else.”

Morgan took his outstretched hand in a soul shake.

“Took me a while, after you called,” Otis said, “but I think I got everything you want.”

“Solid.”

Otis came from behind the counter, went to the door and worked the two dead bolts, flipped the sign to CLOSED. “Come on back,” he said.

Morgan followed him behind the counter and into the rear of the store. Otis limped, a souvenir from an Aryan Brother who had stabbed him a half-dozen times with a bedspring shank. Two days later, Morgan had caught the Brother alone in a hallway off Five Wing and taken out both his eyes with a sharpened spoon.

It was overhot back here, smelled of metal, oil, and dust. A radiator clanked. Morgan saw the double-barrel sawed-off that hung on pegs just above the inside of the door, within easy reach. Knew it was loaded.

Otis stopped at a tall shelf of plumbing supplies, put his glasses on, peered up at the boxes there. He took one down marked SHUT-OFF VALVES, set it on a worktable.

“There you go,” he said.

Morgan opened it. Inside were five gray boxes of Winchester Super-X 9 mm shells, fifty rounds in each. Morgan thumbed one open, checked them.

“Early Christmas shopping?” Otis said.

“Something like that.”

“You wanted to see something small, too, in a hand carry? I just got a couple new pieces in. Russian, but they’re in good shape. I’d let them go cheap.”

“Junk.”

“Maybe, but they’ll go quick. Corner boys love that shit. None of them can shoot worth a damn anyway.”

“What else you have?”

Otis took a second box down, handed it over. Inside was a small black automatic wrapped in oilcloth.

“Walther PP,” Otis said. “German police gun. Nine millimeter, like your Beretta.”

Morgan took the gun out, ejected the empty clip. The slide action was smooth, the gun recently oiled. No traces of rust. He pushed the clip back in.

“Light,” he said.

“Get the job done.”

“It’s good.”

“Got something else you might want to look at. Had it for a while, made me think of you.”

He went to a shelf on the other side of the room, came back with a long, unmarked box, set it on the table. When he took the lid off, Morgan saw the short-barreled black-and-chrome Remington 12-gauge pump inside, resting on a bed of rags.

“Model 870,” Otis said. “You used to keep one of them back when you worked for Poot O’Neal, didn’t you? Around the time he got to warring with the Johnson brothers.”

“Sometimes.”

Morgan couldn’t resist. He took the shotgun out, looked it over, feeling its familiar weight. He worked the pump, checked that the breach was empty, saw where the serial number had been filed off. After a moment, he shook his head, used a rag to wipe down where he’d touched it, put it back in the box.

“Not this time,” he said. “I’m good.”

He took the money roll out, peeled off four hundreds.

“Too much,” Otis said.

“It was a rush job.”

“Twist my arm.” He took the bills. “Let me give you something to put those in.”

He went out front, came back with a cheap canvas gym bag, set it on the table.

“Been hearing some things about you,” he said.

“Like what?”

“That you been going up against those boys from around the way. Took down a couple of their people.”

“What else you hear?”

“That they looking for you. I see you in here buying all this, makes me wonder what you got in mind. There’s a lot more of them than there are of you.”

“My warring days are over.”

“Don’t look like that to me.”

Morgan put the wrapped Walther and the ammunition boxes in the bag, zipped it shut.

“Let me ask you something,” he said.

“What?”

“You ever sell to those Three Paw boys?”

“Sometimes. Why?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

Morgan hefted the bag, put out his hand. Otis took it. They clinched, released.

“We go back a long way,” Otis said. “Thirty years at least.”

“ ’Bout that.”

“And you always one of my best customers. So don’t take no chances you don’t need to.”

“I never do,” Morgan said.

It was ten thirty when she heard the knock at the door. She was stretched out on the couch in sweats and sneakers, reading a Jude Deveraux paperback, her hair tied up. The knock came again, soft.

She put down the book, went to the front window, and inched the blinds aside. Billy was on the steps, holding a pizza box in one hand, a plastic bag in the other.

She undid the chain and dead bolt, opened the door, looked at him through the screen.

“Hi,” he said. “Hope I didn’t wake you.”

She brushed a loose strand of hair from her eyes. “What are you doing here?”

He raised the box. “Thought you might be hungry.”

“Have you been drinking?”

“Not at all. Just wanted to come by, see you. That’s all. Figured I’d bring a peace offering.”

“I never eat this late. You know that.”

“Then do you mind if I have a slice? I haven’t had dinner yet.”

She unlocked the screen door, pushed it open.

“Thanks,” he said. She held the door for him as he came in.

“Danny’s sleeping,” she said.

“I’ll be quiet. I tried not to knock too loud, but I was worried you wouldn’t hear.”

She closed the door behind him.

“Long time since I’ve been here,” he said.

She took the pizza from him, went into the kitchen. He followed her. She put the box on the table.

“Paper plates on top of the refrigerator,” she said.

He set the plastic bag on the floor, got two plates down, napkins and a salt shaker, set them on the table.

“I’m not eating,” she said.

“In case you change your mind.”

A piece of Danny’s artwork was on the front of the refrigerator, held there by magnets. A colored pencil drawing on construction paper of a blocky police car, a figure with a smiling face behind the wheel. Next to it he’d written in oversized letters MOM.

Billy looked at it, smiled. “He’s getting pretty good,” he said.

“He’s growing up.”

“Are you going to let him trick-or-treat this year?”

“I don’t think so.”

“You should. I mean, what’s the harm?”

“Well, that would be for me to decide, wouldn’t it?”

“You’re right.” He sat, opened the box, the smell of the pizza wafting up. He dragged a slice onto a plate.

“This is the only house on the block with no decorations,” he said. “Couldn’t help but notice.”

“I didn’t want to make him feel worse. Remind him of what he was missing, that he couldn’t go out with the other kids.”

“Makes sense, I guess. If you say so.”

She sat across from him. “How’d you know I didn’t have company?”

“Just a feeling. I’ll leave if you want.”

“Eat your pizza first.”

He slid another slice onto a plate, edged it toward her. She ignored it.

“You have anything to drink?” he said.

“Some Bass in the refrigerator. Ice water, soda.”

“I’ll take a Bass, if that’s okay. Want one?”

“Sure.”

He got up, took two bottles from the refrigerator, opened them.

“You want a glass?” he said.

She shook her head. He set the bottles on the table, sat down again. She could smell his cologne.

“Where’d you park?”

“On the street. Didn’t want to leave my truck in the driveway, get your neighbors talking. I got sausage. Hope that’s okay.”

“You trying to make me fat?”

“No. You’re in great shape.”

“For my age?”

“You know what I mean.” He salted a slice, folded it, and began to eat.

She’d felt irritation when she answered the door but found it fading now. It was good to have him back here, in the closeness of the kitchen, sitting across from her. It reminded her of a better time, back when she was naive enough to think they would someday be a family.

She sipped Bass. It was cold and sweet. He reached for the plastic bag.

“I saw this today,” he said. “Thought Danny might like it.”

He took out a square box with a painting of a tyrannosaurus on it.

“Plastic. The parts snap together. They’ve got a whole series.”

He put it on the table. She looked at it.

“That’s a lot of parts,” she said.

“I know. I was worried about that. The box says ages eight and up, but he’s a smart kid. I figured he could handle it. Think he’ll like it?”

“He’ll love it.”

He ate in silence for a moment, wiped his mouth with a napkin, drank Bass.

She looked at the slice in front of her, pulled a piece of sausage off with her fingers, ate it.

“That was a bad scene last night,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

“You already apologized.”

“I need you to know that, though, how I felt.”

She nodded, didn’t look up.

“If I could make it up to you, I would,” he said.

She turned away, looked out into the hall.

“I’ve got a better idea,” she said. “How about we just never mention it again?”

“Okay.”

She pulled off another piece of sausage.

“Pizza’s good, isn’t it?” he said. “I got it from Sabatico’s. Haven’t had one in a long time. Last time I was there the old man asked me how you were. He must have seen the look on my face. He let it drop.”

“This where you ask me to feel sorry for you?”

“No. I know better than that.”

She pulled the slice toward her, tugged it into ragged halves. She dropped one on his plate, wiped her hands on a napkin.

“Table manners elegant as always,” he said.

“Shut up and eat.”

She folded her half, bit into it. It was still warm, the cheese thick, the crust thin and crunchy the way she liked. She finished it in three bites.

“That’s more like it,” he said.

“That’s an extra thirty sit-ups tonight.”

“You’ve got nothing to worry about.”

“You think it’s easy, staying in shape with all the junk food and bad coffee I consume on a normal shift? It’s not. It’s work.”

“I know. You always were more motivated than everyone else around you. One of the things I admired most.”

He opened the box, pulled another slice onto his plate.

“Got a knife?” he said. “We’ll do it right.”

“I’ll pass.” She got up. “Back in a minute.”

She went down the hall, looked in Danny’s room. He was sleeping, face to the wall, the night-light the only illumination in the room. She pulled the door almost shut, left it open a crack. The old clock in the kitchen began to bong softly. Eleven o’ clock.

She went back into the kitchen, washed her hands in the sink. The slice was untouched in front of him.

“So where’s Lee-Anne tonight?” she said.

“I don’t know. Home, I guess.”

She dried her hands on a dish towel, turned to him. “How come you’re not there?”

He shrugged, rocking on the chair, all his weight on the back legs.

“Don’t do that,” she sat. “It’s bad for the chair.”

“Sorry. I forgot.”

He sat forward, let the front legs touch down. “I’ll clean up,” he said. He put the uneaten slice back in the box, got up and gathered the paper plates and napkins, put them in the trash can beneath the sink.

She went into the living room, looked through the blinds. His truck was parked down the street in the shadow of a willow tree.

She heard water go on in the kitchen, then shut off, heard his footsteps. She didn’t turn. She felt him come up behind her, smelled his cologne, let him slip his arms around her waist, pull her tight.

She closed her eyes. His face was buried in her hair, his chin on her shoulder. She knew his eyes would be closed. She felt his arms around her, strong but gentle, put her hands over his, fingered the thick veins, the knobby knuckles. A worker’s hands. A man’s hands.

He kissed the back of her neck, and she felt goose bumps rise, tilted her head to give him better access. What are you doing? Why are you letting this happen?

She pushed back against him, felt his hardness through the jeans. His lips explored the side of her neck, the hollow behind her ear. She reached back, felt his thickness straining against the material, the shape of him. He sighed softly and his hands came up, cupped her breasts through her sweatshirt. She was braless and her nipples responded, hard to his touch.

He turned her and she let him, eyes still closed. His lips brushed hers and she looked at him then, into those slate gray eyes, the question there. She lifted her lips to his in answer. He kissed her hard and she let his tongue into her mouth, felt his hands slide down her back, cup her buttocks. She closed her eyes as they kissed, let him guide her away from the window.

The backs of her legs were against the couch when he broke off the kiss, looked at her. She didn’t turn away. His hands began to work at the drawstring of her sweatpants. She helped him, felt the pants sag around her hips. Then she was sitting on the couch and he was kneeling on the carpet, tugging the pants down her legs, exposing the gray Jockey panties she wore beneath. He slipped her right sneaker off, freed the pants leg. She lifted her foot to help him.

He kissed the inside of her bare calf, flicked his tongue behind her knee. She was wet and ready, knew he could tell. He kissed his way higher, then stopped and looked at her, cocked an eyebrow. She nodded and he reached up, caught the elastic of her panties and pulled in opposite directions. They tore almost soundlessly, and she felt the cool air against her wetness.

She put her hands on the back of his head, her fingers in his soft hair, and closed her eyes.

He made Virginia the first day, keeping his speed under seventy, though the Monte Carlo’s big V8 wanted to do more. Other cars passed him in a blur.

He didn’t stop for food, ate two of the chocolate bars instead.

When his eyes grew tired, the white line double, he found a motel off 95. The fat white man at the desk wanted identification. Morgan turned away, was leaving the lobby when the man called him back. When Morgan handed him seventy in cash, the man counted it twice.

In the room, Morgan spread the map on the bed and traced his route. He’d try to make Savannah tomorrow night, would drive as late as it took. Then into Florida the next morning.

His cell buzzed on the bed. He picked it up, saw it was C-Love’s number.

“Yeah.”

“Take this down,” C-Love said.

“Hold on.”

He went to the writing desk, got a sheet of motel stationery, a pen. “Go ahead.”

“Where you at?”

“Place called Emporia.”

“Where’s that?”

“Virginia.”

C-Love read off a ten-digit number. “Woman’s name is Simone. She knows you’re on the way. Hit her on that number when you get down there. She says she got some information for you.”

“Anything I should tell her?”

“You don’t need to tell her shit. Just find out what she got, take it from there. They released the body, so she getting ready to fly back. After you hook up with her, call me. Big Man’ll wanna talk to you.”

“After I hear what she says, I’ll handle it my way, whatever I think is best. He knows that, right?”

“He knows. He just want to talk, see what your sitch is. See if you need some help.”

“No help,” Morgan said.

“Might change your mind when you get down there. Can’t never tell how that shit’s gonna play out.”

“I’ll call after I talk to her. Tell him that.”

“I’ll do that. You stay in touch, bro.”

Morgan pushed END. He was feeling the miles, the ache in his back and hips.

He checked the lock on the door, set the chain. He felt vulnerable without the Beretta. He turned the TV on, the sound low, just to have another presence in the room. He folded the map, switched the lamp off, lay on the bed fully clothed, the TV light flickering on the walls. In a few minutes, he was asleep.

After she clocked in, Sara went to the storeroom that held the SO’s single general-use computer. She signed on, typed quickly, sat back and waited, hearing voices in the corridor, a toilet flushing down the hall.

When the report came up, she scanned it, hit PRINT. Behind her, the printer chattered. She looked toward the half-closed door, hoping no one would come in, ask what she was doing.

The printer spit pages, went silent. She closed the file and signed off. She gathered the pages from the printer, went out into the hall, and closed the door behind her.

Morgan parked the Toyota on a fire road, out of sight of the highway, and walked a quarter mile to where the woods ended and the dead cornfield began.

It was dusk, the shadows thickening around him. Across the cornfield, he could see lights go on in the house. It had taken him twenty minutes to find it, out here in the middle of nowhere, and he’d driven by twice, feeling exposed, before doubling back and finding this spot.

He wore a black windbreaker he’d bought in Arcadia, had zipped it halfway to cover the Beretta in his belt. He’d run the air conditioner in the car, but here in the open he was sweating under the pullover, his hands clammy inside the cotton work gloves.

As it grew darker, the woods seemed to come to life around him. The chirping of crickets everywhere, louder noises he didn’t recognize. He found himself touching the Beretta through his jacket.

From the edge of the trees, the ground sloped down to the cornfield, giving him a clear view of the front and back of the house. A pickup truck and an old Camaro were parked in the carport.

The front door opened, and a woman came out. Late thirties, blond hair, one side braided, black T-shirt, jeans. She stood in the yard, turned back to speak to a man in the doorway. Jeans and white T-shirt, curly hair. Flynn.

The woman got behind the wheel of the Camaro, started the engine. The noise was loud, ragged, the telltale cough of a bad muffler. Flynn went back in, closing the door behind him.

When she pulled out of the carport, Morgan walked back through the woods to the car.

Sara signed on to the computer, got the keyword prompt, typed in “Taurus revolver,” hit RETURN.

Three hits, links to reports. The first was the Willis shooting. She clicked on the second, waited for it to come up. It was a case from a year ago that she remembered, an attempted armed robbery at a gas station, the suspect dropping the weapon as he fled. She wrote the evidence control number on a pad.

The third link was a domestic violence case from two years ago. Three guns had been seized as part of a restraining order-a Smith and Wesson.38 Chiefs Special, a Colt.45 automatic, and a Taurus revolver-but the Taurus was logged as being a.357. She wrote down the number anyway, did a fresh search on “Taurus” with no qualifiers, found nothing else. She signed off, tore the top sheet from the pad.

The Evidence Control Room was in the basement. A long, institutional-green corridor, pipes running along the ceiling, fluorescent lights hanging below them. There was a window halfway down the hall, a closed door beside it.

Charlie Stern was at the window, writing on a clipboard. She could hear his faint wheezing. He was in his late fifties but looked ten years older, his belly sloping over his belt, his flattop solid white.

“ ’Lo, Sara,” he said.

“Charlie, I’m wondering if you can help me with something.”

He looked at her, then at the clock on the wall behind him. “Five forty-five.”

“I know. This will only take a couple minutes.”

After six, when Charlie left, anyone wanting access to Evidence had to go through the sheriff. She didn’t want that.

“What have you got?” he said.

She handed him the slip of paper. “I need to see the weapons under these numbers. I’m looking for a Taurus,.38 caliber.”

“What’s this about?”

“Case I’m working. Just need to make sure they’re accounted for.”

“Hold on,” he said and left the window.

She waited. Through the window she could see rows of metal shelving rising to the ceiling, brown banker’s boxes. She could hear his breathing, his slow, heavy footsteps.

Five minutes later, he came back to the window, put two heavy plastic evidence bags on the sill, got his clipboard.

“You’ll need to sign these out,” he said.

“I just need to look. Only take a minute.”

She opened the bags, looked at the weapons inside. The first was the.38, with cracked walnut grips. The second was bigger, the.357, nickel plated. Both had yellow plastic cord threaded through the barrels and cylinders.

“Let me ask you something, Charlie.”

He raised an eyebrow. She could sense his impatience.

“When did we start computerizing all our evidence, logging it in?”

He shrugged.

“Nineteen ninety-nine maybe. They had a clerk in here for a while, backlogging the hard copies into the computer, but I don’t know how far back she got. Couple years maybe, why?”

“If I was looking for a weapon taken as evidence before that, how would I find it?”

“Well, if you knew the case file number, I could track it that way. Everything back here is in order, more or less. I need to go soon, Sara. Can this wait?”

She smiled at him.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “But as long as I’m down here… if you could just help me out a little.”

“We used to keep logs, hard copy, of all the weapons moved into Evidence. That’s before my time, though.”

“You still have them?”

He sighed, then touched a button under the window. The door buzzed open. “Come on in.”

When she went through, he shut the door behind her, pulled the grate down over the window, secured it with a padlock.

“Last thing I need is someone else coming along,” he said. “They’re over here.”

On one side of the room was a desk and wall shelves stacked with ledger books.

“Each of those covers about four years,” he said. “None of them are in the computer yet.”

She took the first book down, dusted her sleeve along the spine-1986-1990.

She nodded at the desk chair. “You mind?”

“Go ahead,” he said. “I’ve got paperwork to finish up.” He went back to the window and the clipboard.

The desktop was cluttered with papers. Near the phone was a half-eaten cheese sandwich on white bread. A fly crawled along its edge. She sat, opened the book on her lap.

It was set up like a standard financial ledger, headings for each year, then each month, tabbed columns. Most of the entries were in blue ink, some in green or red. The same spidery hand throughout. Charlie’s predecessor, whoever that had been. Each entry had a case number.

She ran her fingers down the tabs, looking at the annotations. Shotgun, 12-gauge, single-shot. Colt.45, Peacemaker. Star.25. All weapons that had been seized during or after a crime. She stopped every time she came to a.38. Smith and Wesson. Rugers. Dan Wessons. No Taurus.

She turned pages, scanned columns, her nose itching from the dust.

“How we doing back there, Sara?”

“Okay, Charlie. Sorry about this.”

“Let me know when you’re done.” Resignation in his voice.

She found it on the sixth page. March 1988. A Taurus.38, seized in a motor vehicle stop. The serial number was written down. At the end of the column, the case number.

She opened desk drawers. There was a Penthouse in the top one, an inhaler. She opened the second, found a blank sheet of SO stationery. She wrote down the two numbers.

“Charlie?” she called out.

They ended up in a bar on the far edge of the county, one she’d never been to before. Mostly Indians in here, up from the Seminole Reservation in Immokalee, all men. Sara felt self-conscious as their eyes lingered on her. The jukebox was playing Tammy Wynette, and the ceiling fans were doing nothing to reduce the hanging haze of cigarette smoke.

When she came in, Billy was already at a booth in the back, a cypress table marked with cigarette burns. He looked at her, at the waistpack she wore.

“I won’t ask what’s in there,” he said.

She slipped into the booth. “I don’t have a lot of time.”

He got up. “No waitresses here.”

He went to the bar. Sara looked around. A middle-aged Indian in a western shirt, hair slicked back, turned on his stool to look at her, smiling drunkenly. Christ, she thought. What am I doing here?

Billy came back to the table with a pitcher and two mugs.

“PBR,” he said. “All they had on tap.”

He sat down, poured.

“I would have asked for Guinness,” he said, “but I don’t think they have much call for it out here.”

“I’m not here to drink.”

“I know.” He slid a filled mug in front of her, looked at his own. “Like I said, I feel bad about the way we left things.”

She looked away, her patience fading. The Indian was still watching her. She stared at him, didn’t look away, and he shrugged finally, turned back to the bar.

“You feel differently about me now,” Billy said. “I know that. It can’t ever be what it used to be.”

“We don’t need to go into all this, Billy. There’s no reason.”

“When you’re a kid, sometimes you let things get away from you, you know? You’re twenty-five, thirty, it’s easy to say, ‘Yeah, it didn’t work out.’ Like there’s always another opportunity, someone else coming down the line. Get to be my age and you realize you’re running out of options. And sometimes the things you let get away from you are the things you should have held on to with both hands.”

She met his eyes.

“My age, you let something go and you end up wondering if that was the one,” he said. “That you let it go and you’re never going to get it back.”

“I wasn’t the one, Billy. Get that out of your head. If I was, we wouldn’t be in this situation. You made your own decisions. You can’t blame them on anyone else.”

“I know that. It’s just that with you…” He looked away. “I just got scared, I guess. You, Danny. The way he is. I tried to be there, you know? Be strong. But sometimes I just couldn’t handle it.”

“I’ve heard that before.”

“What do you mean?”

“When Roy left, right after Danny got sick. That’s one of the things he told me. He loved Danny so much, he couldn’t stay around and watch him die. You know what that meant? That meant he was a fucking coward. And Danny’s still here. He’s not dying, and he’s going to get better, and I’ll do whatever I have to do to make that happen. Roy couldn’t handle Danny? That was his excuse. He couldn’t handle anything.”

He looked at his beer.

“You were his friend, Billy. You knew him. You know what I’m talking about.”

He nodded without looking up.

“Go ahead and drink that if you want,” she said. “I don’t care.”

“You’ve got a right to be mad, I understand that.”

“Do you?”

“And you’re right, some of the choices I made weren’t the best.”

“I’m not your therapist, Billy.”

“I know. But sometimes I think you were the only real chance I had to be happy, to have a normal life. And I let it slip away.”

“You’ve had lots of opportunities to be happy,” she said, “and they’ve got nothing to do with me. That’s your own responsibility. You can’t put it on other people.”

“You’re right. But lately things have gotten… complicated. Sometimes it seems like everything’s so fucked I’ll never get out from under.”

“What do you mean?”

He shook his head. She sensed him pulling back. Give him space, let him talk.

She sat back, lifted the mug, and sipped beer. It was thin, harsh. She frowned, put it down. Johnny Paycheck on the jukebox now, “Take This Job and Shove It.”

“They’re telling me I’m clear,” he said. “That it was all in policy.”

“That’s right.”

“They look at me differently now, though. You do, too.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Elwood came out to the house the other day.” He looked at her. “To talk to Lee-Anne, when I wasn’t there. She had nothing to tell him, but still… I mean, if it’s open and shut, it’s open and shut, right?”

“Maybe they want to make sure all the Ts are crossed. For your sake.”

“Or maybe it’s just that nigger woman stirring up trouble.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you use that word before.”

“Dammit, Sara, I just-”

“I have to go, Billy. Thanks for the beer.” She started to get up.

“I know you still care about me, Sara.” He looked at her. “Everything we’ve had between us. The other night, too. I know you get angry with me sometimes, but you’re still on my side, even though things didn’t work out. I know that. I can feel it.”

She squeezed out of the booth. “I have to go home. You should, too.”

“I think I’m going to stay here a little bit. Drink some of this beer. Enjoy the change of scenery. At least out here I don’t have to worry about anyone spying on me, do I?”

“Good night, Billy.”

“Good night, Sara. I don’t blame you. I really don’t.”

She turned her back on him, headed toward the door.

When the man with the dreadlocks came into the garage, Morgan put the muzzle of the Beretta to the back of his head.

“One in the chamber,” he said. “You know what that means, right?”

The man froze. Morgan pushed him toward the Navigator.

“Hands on the hood.”

He did as he was told. He was bare chested in jeans, his dreads loose, a blue bandana tied around his neck. He smelled of reefer.

Morgan used his left hand to pat the man’s pockets, took out a wallet. He put it in the windbreaker.

“Anyone else in the house?” Morgan said.

He shook his head.

“Answer me.”

“No, no one.” A faint accent.

“If there is,” Morgan said, “I’ll shoot you first.” He took the gun away. “Turn around. Go back in.”

The man took his hands off the hood, turned to look at Morgan, the gun. His face was slack with fear. “I don’t know what you want, brah, but there’s nothing here.”

“Go on,” Morgan said.

He went up the steps into an empty kitchen. Morgan followed, pulled the connecting door shut. On the counter were a cell phone and a big automatic, a Desert Eagle.44. The back door was locked and chained. Morgan opened another door, saw steps that led into a basement, listened, heard nothing. The man watched him.

“Living room,” Morgan said.

They went in. The sliding glass door was closed, the vertical blinds drawn. A tall straight-backed chair was against one wall.

“What is this place?” Morgan said.

“How you mean?”

“Who lives here?”

“No one yet. A friend of mine, he sells these places. He’s letting me stay here.”

“Face the couch.”

When he did, Morgan hit him hard on the side of the head with the Beretta. He cried out, fell to his knees. The floor lamp threw his shadow large on the wall.

“Stay there,” Morgan said and backed away. He put the Beretta in his belt, took out the wallet. Inside was a hundred dollars in cash, credit cards in three different names. A Florida driver’s license with a picture, in the name of Jean-Pierre Delva, a Riviera Beach address. He tossed the wallet on the couch.

Delva had a hand to his head, blood coming through his fingers. “There’s nothing here for you, man. That’s all the money I got.”

In the kitchen, the cell began to play music, a tune Morgan didn’t know. Delva looked up.

“Who is that?” Morgan said.

“I don’t know.”

Morgan could sense his nervousness.

“Your girlfriend?”

“Who?”

“The white girl. The one that was here last night.”

The tune played for a few seconds, stopped.

“Her boyfriend know about you two?”

“What boyfriend?”

“Flynn. The deputy.”

“I’ve got lots of women, man. Maybe he know, maybe he don’t. Why you ask me?”

“Get up,” Morgan said. “Sit down over there.”

He rose unsteadily, settled into the wooden chair, looked at his bloody hand, all the fight gone from him.

“Where’s the money?” Morgan said.

“What money, brah?”

The cell phone rang again. They both looked toward the kitchen. The tune stopped.

Morgan took the Beretta back out.

“I’ve come a long way,” he said. “You think I’m just going to walk out of here?”

Delva looked at him. “You from up north, right? You work for that fat man.”

“I don’t work for anybody.”

“I can’t help you, man. I don’t have it.”

“But you know who does.”

“Talk to the woman. She knows. They told me nothing.”

“But you helped set it up, right? So you’ve got a share coming.”

“I passed along some things I’d heard. That’s all.”

“And now they’re holding out on you? Making you wait?”

Delva looked at the floor.

“Who put it together? You, the girl, Flynn. Who else?”

“What do you mean?”

“The other deputy, the woman. Was she part of it?”

“I don’t know who that is, who you’re talking about.”

From outside, the sound of a car engine, low. Morgan looked into the front room. Big windows there, with blinds. No headlights outside. The engine sound faded.

“We have to get out of here,” Delva said.

“Why?”

“They’ve been looking for me. These boys down here don’t play. They coming to talk.”

“About the money? Why they never got it?”

Delva didn’t answer.

Morgan went into the front room, looked out the window. There was a single streetlight down the block, mist hanging around it. The street was empty.

“They’ll come back,” Delva said.

Morgan looked at his watch. Ten minutes after midnight.

“Get up,” he said. “You’re coming with me.”

The phone chimed again. Morgan backed into the kitchen and picked it up, still watching Delva. He opened the phone, lifted it to his ear.

“Yo, papi why you not answering?” A thick island accent. “We outside, boy. Let us up in there. We need to talk, konprann?”

Morgan looked at the sliding glass door, at the dining room window. A shadow passed by it. He’d waited too long. He wondered how many of them were outside.

“You there, gason? Don’t fuck around.”

He closed the phone, dropped it on the counter.

“What are you doing?” Delva said.

Two bangs at the back door, someone rattling the knob.

“Louvri la pot!”

Footsteps on the deck.

Morgan started toward the front door. It would be his best chance. If he ran, he could lose them in the night, make it back to where he’d parked the Toyota. They’d be too busy with Delva to chase him.

The sliding door exploded. Glass showered inward, a cinder block skidding across the wood floor. A figure pushed the blinds aside to come through, and Morgan fired twice, sent it reeling back onto the deck. He put another shot into the darkness beyond, then swiveled and aimed at the dining room window, the shadow that had reappeared there. He fired, blew glass out.

There was silence then. Delva was on the floor, using the couch for cover. Shards of glass fell from the frame of the sliding door, broke on the floor. He could hear them out there, getting ready to try again. Time to move.

He went to the front door, fired through it in case someone was on the other side. He worked the locks, kicked the screen door open, went out fast and low. He heard shouting to his left, fired in the direction of it, and then his foot hit wet grass and slid out from under him and he went down onto his side.

He grunted with the impact, heard shots popping behind him, gunfire from inside the house. He got to his feet, half sprinted, half slid down the slope of lawn to the street. Shouts behind him, more shots. He twisted, saw two men in the doorway, blue bandanas around their necks, guns pointing at him. One of them called out, “Andre! Andre! Get him! Vit!”

Morgan fired at them, blew off a piece of door frame. They ducked back inside.

He started to run, away from the streetlight, then saw the dark shape of the car parked ahead. A man was coming around it fast, an automatic in his hand. Ten feet between them, no cover. They raised their guns at the same time, and Morgan saw the blocky shape of the Russian pistol, heard the click. Then another.

The man lowered the gun, pulled on the slide. Jammed. Morgan shot him twice in the chest.

More shouts from the house. Morgan ran past the car, across the street. A shot whined off the pavement to his left. He kept running, saw the empty lot a block away, the construction equipment.

When he reached the bulldozer, he swung behind it and sat down in the dirt, his back against the treads. He was breathing hard, tightness spreading across his chest, a solid ball of pain in his right side.

Muffled shouts. A car starting. He pressed back against cold metal, the damp ground soaking through his pants.

Headlights, engine noise. Beams lit up the empty ground to his left. They’d have the windows down, weapons out, looking for movement.

The car passed, the ground going dark again. His breathing was starting to slow, the pressure in his stomach and sides easing.

After a few minutes, the car came back from the other direction. Headlights played across the bulldozer blade. He gripped the Beretta, wondering if they had the courage to get out of the car, look for him on foot.

The car rolled by. The shadows around him turned back into darkness.

How long he sat there, he didn’t know. After a while, he heard the car again, coming from the direction of the house. It went past the bulldozer without slowing, engine noise fading in the night.

He looked at his watch. One forty. He tried to stand, his legs stiff, had to sit again. It was easier the second time, one hand braced against the muddy tread. He heard his knees pop.

He set the Beretta on the bulldozer seat, looked back toward the house. Light in the windows still. No car out front.

He rubbed his legs until feeling returned. The next time he checked his watch, it was two.

He started back, the Beretta at his side. His knees and hips ached, but the stomach pain had subsided. He crossed through backyards and empty lots until he was opposite the house. No sound or movement from inside.

No body in the street, just a glistening on the pavement where it had been. He went across fast, then along the side of the garage. The Navigator was still there.

He went around back and onto the deck, listened for a moment, and then stepped through the shattered door and twisted blinds. The living room was empty. He checked the other rooms quickly. No one.

The gun and cell were gone from the kitchen counter. The cellar door was closed. He’d left it open when he’d checked it earlier.

He raised the Beretta, twisted the doorknob, pushed. He pointed the gun down the steps into blackness. No sound below, no movement.

He felt for the light switch, tripped it, illuminated wooden steps, a concrete floor. Went down slowly, gun up, the steps creaking.

Delva was in the center of the basement. They’d brought the chair down, tied him to it, clothesline knotted around his chest. He was slumped forward, naked, dreadlocks hanging over his knees. His jeans lay on the floor a few feet away. Below the chair, a pool of dark and drying blood. Morgan could smell the copper tang of it.

He pointed the Beretta at him, moved closer, knew what he’d find. There was an entry wound behind his left ear, the dreads there matted with blood.

Near the chair, a set of bloody pruning shears. Delva’s left arm dangled almost to the floor, but the pinkie and ring fingers were stumped, blood spatter on the concrete beneath them. The blue bandana was tied tight around his wrist, a makeshift tourniquet to keep him from bleeding out while they worked on him.

Morgan put a gloved finger on his forehead, gently pushed. The mouth sagged open and something fell out, bounced from a naked thigh to clatter on the floor. A black domino with six white circles.

Morgan went back up the steps, turned the light off, closed the door.

He’d parked the Toyota in a stand of scrub pine three blocks away, hidden from the street. The night was quiet around him. As he neared the car, he raised the Beretta, in case they’d found it, were waiting for him. No one.

He got in, touched wires to restart the engine. Then he reversed out of the trees, cut the wheel hard, started back.

Sara spun the wheel and turned into Billy’s driveway, dust kicking up around the Blazer. The Camaro and truck were both in the carport.

She braked, leaned on the horn. Eight thirty in the morning, but she’d been up most of the night. She hit the horn again, held it, saw curtains pushed aside in the kitchen window. Woke them up. Good.

The door opened, and Billy came out. Jeans, white T-shirt, flip-flops. Lee-Anne in the doorway behind him in cutoffs and Jack Daniel’s T-shirt.

Sara opened her door, stepped down. He tried to smile as he got closer, his face still puffy from sleep, eyes bloodshot.

“Jesus, Sara,” he said. “A little early for a Saturday, isn’t it?”

She stepped to him, swung with her right hand, putting her hip into it as she’d been taught. Her fist cracked into his left cheekbone, snapped his head to the side. She felt the impact all the way to her shoulder. He stagger-stepped, recovered.

“What the fuck, Sara?”

She heard the screen door slam, turned to see Lee-Anne coming toward them.

“Keep your hands off him, bitch!”

Sara turned to face her, got ready.

Billy stepped between them, caught Lee-Anne’s arm. “Whoah,” he said.

She tried to push past him. Sara held her ground, waiting for her to close the distance. Billy used his body to turn Lee-Anne back toward the house. She twisted out of his grip.

“Who the fuck do you think you are?” Spittle flew from her mouth. “Don’t you ever fucking touch him!”

He caught her arm again, tried to steer her away. “It’s okay,” he said. “Enough. It’s okay.”

She lunged, her face bright red, and Sara took an involuntary step back. Billy held her tight.

“Why can’t you just leave us alone?” Lee-Anne said. “What’s your fucking problem?”

Billy squeezed her arm, turned her gently.

“It’s all right,” he said. “We’re just going to talk. Go back inside.”

She pulled away from him, turned back to Sara, but didn’t come closer. Sara could feel her heart pumping, her face warm.

“Stay away from here. You come back again, deputy or no, I’ll beat your dyke ass.”

“Inside, Lee-Anne.” He put a hand on her lower back to guide her. She pushed it away, and he slipped an arm around her waist, whispered in her ear, turned her back toward the house again.

They watched as she went up the stairs and inside, the screen door slamming behind her.

“I think you should leave,” he said. “She means it.”

“No chance. What were you doing outside my house last night?”

“I wasn’t.”

“No? Then who was driving your truck?”

He slipped his hands in his back pockets, turned to look at the house, then back at her. There was a red blotch on his cheek.

“Let’s go somewhere we can talk,” he said.

“What’s wrong with here?”

“Not a good idea.”

She looked past him, saw Lee-Anne standing behind the screen, watching them.

“Okay,” Sara said. “Get in.”

She K-turned and headed back down the driveway, trembling with adrenaline. When they reached the main road, she said, “Where are we going?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

She turned left.

He touched his cheek, the redness already darkening into a bruise. “You still hit solid. Guess I deserved that, all I’ve put you through lately.”

“You want to tell me what’s going on?”

He looked out his window. They reached the highway intersection, turned toward town, neither of them speaking. Ahead on the right was the old Hopedale Diner, sign long gone, windows plywooded over. She pulled into the cracked lot. A rusted newspaper honor box lay on its side near the entrance.

She killed the engine, looked at him. He angled the rearview toward him, examined his cheek, the spreading bruise.

“I know about the Taurus,” she said.

He pushed the mirror back, looked out the window.

“And?” he said.

“And it’s time you start talking to me. What were you doing at my house?”

“I was worried about you.”

“Worried about what?”

“A lot of things.”

“Like how much I know?”

“Maybe.”

“You need to tell me what’s going on, Billy, before all this gets out of hand.”

He powered down his window, looked at the diner’s boarded-up entrance. “Would you believe me if I told you there was an explanation?”

“I’m listening.”

“What do you know about the gun?”

“That it came from the evidence room at the SO. That you planted it on Willis.”

“You’re right.” He met her eyes. “I did.”

There it is. So why are you not surprised?

“Christ, Billy. Why?”

“Why do you think? I got scared.”

“What happened out there? Really.”

He took a breath.

“It was pretty much like I told it,” he said. “He was speeding, wandering all over the road. I pulled him over, looked at his documents. He was nervous, so I asked him if there were any drugs or weapons in the car, anything I should know about. He said no, so I asked him to open the trunk. That’s when he bolted.”

“He was already out of the car?”

“He said the trunk release up front didn’t work, he had to use the key. He went around back, as if he were getting ready to open it, then tossed the keys at my face, took off down the slope. I told him to stop, and when he turned around I saw a gun in his hand. At least I thought it was a gun. I drew and fired.”

“What was it?”

“I don’t know. When I got down there I couldn’t find anything. I hunted around. I was sure I saw it, you know? But there was nothing. That’s when I started to panic.”

“You had the Taurus with you?”

“In a wheel well in the cruiser. I’d been carrying it for about a year, I guess. I’d heard it was what the old-timers used to do. Keep a throwdown handy, just in case.”

“Thirty years ago maybe. If the sheriff had found out about it, you would have been fired.”

“I know. I never thought I’d have to use it. I’d almost forgotten it was there.”

“What did you do then?”

“I could tell he was dead, or close to it. The Taurus was already wiped clean, and I’d taken the numbers off it a long time ago. I climbed back down there, fit his hand around it, got his prints on it. Then I went back up to the cruiser and called it in, found the keys and opened the trunk, saw the bag there. That’s when you came along.”

“You should have told me the truth. You owed it to me.”

“And if I had? Told you I’d used a throwdown, planted evidence? What would you have done?”

“I don’t know.”

“Kept it to yourself?”

“I don’t know.”

“I do. You wouldn’t have. You’re too good a deputy for that. You would have told Elwood or the sheriff. If not that night, then the next day, when you thought about it some more. I know you, Sara. You would have, and you know it.”

“Maybe it would have been better off that way.”

“Better off? He was black, Sara, and I’m white. You think I would have gotten a fair hearing, shooting an unarmed black man? FDLE would have been involved, the state attorney, the governor before it was over. Every minister in Libertyville would have been screaming for my head.”

“You would have been cleared. They would have understood.”

“You’re dreaming. I would have been fired, at least. Criminal charges, more than likely. Maybe prison. And how do you think I’d make out there?”

“There had to be another way.”

“Burned that bridge, Sara. There’s no other way. Not now.”

She watched a semi rumble past, raising dust.

“How long have you known about the gun?” he said.

“Since yesterday.”

“You tell anyone about it?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

She looked at him. “Why do you think?”

He looked out the windshield.

“If you want all this to go away, you need to face some things,” she said. “You need to start telling the truth.”

“It has gone away. At least that’s what they’re telling me.” He looked at her. “The only one that can say different is you.”

She couldn’t meet his eyes, felt her anger, her momentum, slipping away. Somehow she’d lost the advantage, could feel it, knew he felt it, too.

“There were guns in the trunk, Sara. You saw them. He was no college kid.”

“He was unarmed.”

“I didn’t know that. I’m sorry you got involved in all this. Sorry you had to be there. I never meant for any of this to happen. You have to believe that.”

“I’m not sure what I believe anymore.”

“What’s that mean?”

She shook her head, watched cars go past.

“You know me better than anyone, Sara. What I had with you I never had with anyone else. Probably never will again.”

“Don’t.”

“It’s true. Whether you want to believe it or not.”

“That’s got nothing to do with this.”

“It doesn’t? I’ve told you everything, Sara. And only you. You want me in Raiford? Get out your phone, call the sheriff. I’ll be in custody before the hour’s over. Is that what you want?”

She didn’t answer.

“Or maybe you’re wearing a wire,” he said, “and that’s what this is all about.”

She started the engine.

“You should get back,” she said. “Lee-Anne will be waiting for you.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know.”

“That’s not good enough, Sara.”

“It’ll have to be.”

He looked at her. “I can imagine the way you feel,” he said. “The position I put you in.”

“Can you?”

“If I could go back and change what happened that night, I would. But I can’t bring him back. My going to prison won’t change that. I can’t undo what was done. No one can.”

“You’re right about that. Go on, get out.”

“What?”

“It’s only about a mile back. You can walk it.”

“I’m wearing sandals.”

“I know.” She looked at him. “Go on.”

He opened the door, met her eyes for a moment, then climbed down.

“Tell me something,” she said.

“What?”

“Have you ever told me the truth? Ever?”

“Don’t be like that.”

“About anything?”

They looked at each other for a moment. Then he shut the door.

“Billy.”

He turned to face her through the open window.

“If I ever see you around my house again,” she said. “If you come around me or Danny or anyone I know outside duty hours…”

“You’ll shoot me?”

She looked at him.

“I would never hurt you, Sara. You know that. Never could, never will. Danny either. But I’m wondering if you feel the same way.”

After a moment, he turned and started for the highway. In the rearview she saw him standing on the shoulder, waiting for a break in traffic.

She took out her cell, opened it, scrolled to Sheriff Hammond’s home number. Her thumb lingered over the SEND button.

In the mirror, she saw Billy cross the highway to the opposite shoulder, start to walk along the grass there, heading home.

She closed the phone, tossed it on the passenger seat. Then she shifted into drive, pulled out of the lot.

Morgan woke tangled in sodden sheets. Bright light was coming in around the curtain edges. The nightstand clock told him it was three. He’d slept almost eleven hours.

Pushing the sheets away, he sat naked on the edge of the bed. His joints ached and his throat was swollen, his forehead warm to the touch. He realized he was shaking.

When he had the energy, he made his way into the bathroom, stood under the hot shower until the trembling stopped. Then he toweled dry, put the toilet seat down and sat there, head in his hands. You have to get up, he thought. You have to keep moving.

After a while, he went back into the room and got dressed. He stripped the sheets from the bed and pushed them into a pillowcase, along with the clothes from last night. He’d take them to the laundry room later, wash away the stale metallic smell that seemed to linger on everything he touched.

He opened the door, looked out. The sky was cloudless, the sun flashing off the Monte Carlo’s windshield. He’d left the Toyota beside a collapsed barn off a rural road two towns away, out of sight, then walked to where he’d parked his car and driven back.

Birds chattered in the trees, and he could hear the rush of the creek. Far above, a plane left a white contrail across the sky.

He wiped a wrist across his slick forehead. A band of pain circled his skull. He couldn’t afford to be sick, not now. Couldn’t afford to lose a day.

He went back in, closed the door, opened the top panels to let air in. In the bathroom, he swallowed a Vicodin half, then went to lie on the bare mattress, looking up at the water-stained ceiling. After a while, he took the Beretta from atop the nightstand. He set it in his lap, the metal cold in his grip.

If it ever got too bad, if the pain was too much, if the doctors couldn’t help him, this was what he would do. When his system began to shut down, when his skin turned ashen from the waste his kidneys couldn’t process, this was how he would end it. Vicodin and then the gun. The cold muzzle against the roof of his mouth, his finger on the trigger.

They had an early dinner at the Dairy Queen, Danny picking at his hamburger, pushing fries around his plate. It was his favorite place to eat, and seeing him like this worried her. She reached across the table, put the back of her hand to his forehead. It was warm.

“You okay, little guy?”

He nodded, broke off a piece of hamburger, chewed it. The tyrannosaurus model was on his lap. He’d been carrying it all day.

She took another bite from her hamburger, realized she had no appetite. Her right hand was stiff, the knuckles still red.

She looked around the restaurant. Late Saturday afternoon and mainly teenagers in here, an elderly couple near the front window, the woman cutting up the man’s food for him. There were decorations on the windows. Cutout jack-o’-lanterns, witches.

“Maybe a pirate,” Danny said.

She looked at him. “I miss something?”

“For Halloween. I could be a pirate.”

“Danny…”

“I know.” He looked down at his food. “I was just thinking about it, that’s all.”

“You feel like you have a fever?”

He shook his head.

“Your hamburger okay?” she said.

He nodded.

“You have room for ice cream?”

He looked up. “Can I?”

“Try to eat a little more of that for me first, all right?”

He broke off another piece, chewed it. Her own hamburger was cold to the touch now.

When he’d eaten some more, she said, “That’s okay, you don’t have to finish it. Go on up, see what you want.”

When he went to the counter, she cleared the table, dumped the uneaten food in the trash bin, and stacked their trays on top. They ordered small chocolate sundaes, and took them outside to the plastic tables near the parking lot. The sky was blue and clear. She watched a plane pass by far overhead.

“How would you like to go by the garage?” she said. “See Howard and Reno?”

“Can we?”

“You think you can handle it? It’s pretty hot today.”

“Sure. I’m okay.”

He scooped ice cream with the yellow plastic spoon, ladled into his mouth.

“How’s your stomach?” she said. “You feel like you’re going to be sick?”

He shook his head.

“Let me know if you are.”

They finished their sundaes. She got rid of their trash, unlocked the Blazer, and opened the front and back doors to let the trapped heat out. As she helped him into the booster seat, he said, “I’m too old for this.”

“Not yet. But soon.”

When she had him secured, she got behind the wheel, started the engine, and cranked up the air-conditioning. He was playing with the tyrannosaurus, making growling noises, off in his own world.

Ten minutes later, they pulled into the lot at the Sunoco station that served as the Hopedale Municipal Garage. The flatbed was parked out front, along with two cruisers waiting to be repaired or picked up. Both bay doors were open, and she could see Howie Twelvetrees inside, standing under one of the lifts, looking up at the undercarriage of an EMT van.

He saw them, waved. A German shepherd/mutt mix trotted out of the bay, ran a circle around the Blazer.

“Reno!” Danny said.

She shut the engine off, reached back, and got Danny unstrapped. He let himself out the side door, and the dog reared up, planted paws on his chest, almost knocking him back. He laughed, the dog licking at his face.

“Reno!” Howie said, coming out of the bay. “Easy.”

The dog got down, flopped at Danny’s feet. He scratched behind its ears, under its chain collar.

“Hey, Howie,” she said as she got out.

He wiped his hands on a rag, slung it over the shoulder of his jumpsuit.

“Sara,” he said. “So easy to look at, so hard to define.”

He was in his late forties, she guessed, his complexion weathered by sun and wind. His jet black hair was lank and fell over one eye, his expression impassive. He could have been sixty for all she knew. She had never asked.

Reno had run back into the bay, come out with a cowhide pull toy, and dropped it at Danny’s feet. He picked it up, hefted it over his shoulder, and tossed it across the blacktop. The dog spun, streaked at it, caught it on the ground and carried it back, dropped it again.

“What can I do you for, Sara? Don’t usually expect to see you on a Saturday.”

“I was wondering if I could have a look at that Accord. The one from the shooting.”

He looked at her, rubbed his hands on the rag. “Sheriff send you?”

She shook her head.

“I didn’t think so,” he said.

“Just curious about a couple things.”

“Curious.”

She waited.

“No harm in it, I guess,” he said. He whistled sharply. “Reno! Back!”

The dog wheeled to face him, the toy in its mouth. It trotted up the short driveway and through the gate that led to the wrecking yard behind.

Howie led the way. The yard was high-fenced on three sides, chain link and barbed wire. There was a plywood doghouse against the back of the building. Reno dropped the toy, drank noisily from a plastic water dish.

There were three cars in the yard. A Ford station wagon with a crushed grille that Moss Harmon, the town’s director of public works, had run into a cedarpost fence last month, half drunk. A VW Jetta that had been abandoned in Libertyville and impounded. Near the back fence was the gray Accord.

Danny squatted beside Reno. The dog finished drinking, picked up the toy again.

Sara walked around the Accord, remembering it that night, bathed in the light from their rollers. There were traces of white fingerprint powder on the doors, trunk, and hood.

“Locked?” she said.

Howie shook his head.

She opened the passenger side door. The rocker panels had been removed, dumped in the back. The safety seat was facedown on the floor, the back of it gone. She opened the door wider, saw the inside panels had been loosened. Wiring hung from beneath the dashboard.

“We took the whole thing apart,” Howie said. “Sheriff’s orders.”

“Who’s we?”

“Me and Sam Elwood. Sheriff dropped by to supervise for part of it.”

“Find anything?”

“Where you going with this, Sara?”

“Like I said, just curious.”

“Uh-huh.”

“What are you worried about?”

“Me? Nothing.”

“It’s okay,” she said. “I don’t want to put you on the spot. I’ll ask the sheriff.”

“Nothing personal, Sara.”

She went around to the driver’s side, pulled open the door. The console between the seats had been dismantled. She knelt on the seat, leaned over and opened the glovebox. Empty.

“They took all that stuff,” he said. “Registration, insurance, whatever else was in there. Sheriff’s got it all.”

“I guessed.”

She backed out of the car.

“You looking for something specific?” he said.

“I’m not sure what I’m looking for.”

“You have to be careful about what you’re not looking for. Sometimes you find it.”

“Don’t go getting all Indian on me, Howie.”

“One thing we did find, though.”

“What’s that?”

“Reach in and pop that trunk.”

She looked at him a moment, then leaned back into the car and felt around under the left side of the seat. She found the trunk latch, pulled, heard the click.

“Come have a look at this,” he said.

She followed him around to the trunk. He lifted the lid. It was empty inside, the carpet sagging in the middle.

“Where’s the spare?” she said.

“We took it out, cut it open. What’s left of it is in the shop. Nothing in it, though. Feel around behind that left taillight.”

She did, tracing the wires to where they disappeared into the taillight mount.

“Up on the left,” he said.

Her fingers found the small lever there.

“Pull it?” she said.

“Uh-huh.”

She heard a click.

“Now lift up the carpet.”

She did. A section of trunk bottom to the left of the spare well, about two feet across, had risen slightly.

“You could look at the floor of that trunk all day, not see it,” Howie said. “Whoever built it did a good job.”

She got her fingers under the edge, pulled. The section swung up on small hinges.

“It didn’t roll out of the Honda factory that way,” he said. “I can guarantee you that.”

She looked into the space beneath. Bare metal. Empty.

“Anything in it when you opened it?”

“No. Just the way it is now.”

“There were guns in the trunk when he pulled the car over,” she said. “In plain sight.”

“That’s right.”

“But nothing in here?”

“Nope.”

She put her fingertips on the compartment lid, pressed it down so it clicked into place, flush with the trunk floor.

“Something, isn’t it?” he said.

“It is.”

“Doesn’t make any sense, does it?”

“No.”

“Didn’t to the sheriff either.”

“I wouldn’t guess it did. Any fingerprints on it?”

“Wiped clean.”

“Find anything else?”

“That’s it.”

“Thanks, Howie.”

“If the sheriff asks if you’ve been around, what do I say?”

“Tell him the truth.”

Behind her, Danny was laughing, in a tug-o’-war with Reno over the pull toy. The dog was winning, Danny giving ground inch by inch. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d heard him laugh like that.

“Come on, honey,” she said. “We need to go.”

He released the toy and the dog fell backward, sprang up, and brought it to him again. He took her hand, rubbed the dog’s head a final time. Howie walked them back to the Blazer.

“What’s that?” he said.

“What?”

He knelt behind the rear bumper. “This.”

She walked around. There was a soiled strip of silver tape on the bottom right side of the bumper.

“I don’t know,” she said.

He clawed at it with a fingernail, got it loose. It peeled off in a single piece, left shiny chrome beneath it.

He looked up at her. She shrugged.

“First I’ve seen it,” she said. “I don’t know where it came from.”

He rolled it into a ball.

“Nothing, I guess,” he said. “Take care of yourself, Sara. Let me know if there’s anything else I can do for you.”

“Thanks, Howie.”

She helped Danny get belted in, started the engine. Howie waved to them from the bay door, the dog at his feet.

“ ’Bye, Reno,” Danny called out, though the windows were closed.

He was quiet as they headed home. The sun was setting, the air growing cooler, a cold front moving in. Wisps of fog were beginning to rise from the ground. She thought about the empty compartment. Billy sitting beside her that morning, saying he’d told her everything.

If the guns were in the trunk, what had been in the compartment? They’d gone over the car with a drug dog, gotten no hits, no traces of residue. More guns? Money?

She’d been on the scene minutes after the shooting, Willis’s body still warm. If Billy had taken something from the car, he couldn’t have gone far with it. Too much of a risk to put it in his cruiser. He’d have hidden it nearby. Tossed it into the cane or the swamp, gone back to get it later.

You’re holding on to your denial with both hands, aren’t you? How much more do you need to know?

From the backseat, “Mom?”

“What, honey?”

“Did you find what you were looking for?”

She turned to him. He held the tyrannosaurus in his lap, didn’t look up.

“Yes,” she said and looked back at the road. “I guess I did.”

Morgan moved through the woods in the dark. He pushed branches aside, stepped over fallen logs. Soon he could see the lights of the house below. He reached the edge of the trees, looked out across the dead cornfield.

The Camaro and truck were both in the carport, the Camaro’s trunk open. Figures moved past the lighted windows of the house.

The cornfield was a dark mass below him. He’d have to make his way through it, try to come up on the house from behind. And stay quiet while he was doing it, try not to break an ankle in a hole, or step into a nest of snakes.

He was halfway down the slope when the front door opened. Flynn looked out, scanned the yard, then disappeared back inside. When he came out again, he was carrying a suitcase and a long-barreled revolver. He walked to the Camaro, eyes on the yard, the cornfield. He set the suitcase in the trunk, went back in.

A few minutes later, he came out with a smaller case. He put it in the trunk, shut the lid, looked around, the gun still in his hand. Went back inside. Morgan waited.

Five minutes later, Flynn and the woman came out together. They spoke briefly, and she got behind the wheel of the Camaro. Flynn stepped away, looked down the driveway, then cut his eyes back to the cornfield, the woods beyond. His gaze seemed to pass over Morgan, move on.

She started the engine, headlights flashing on, illuminating the truck. Flynn watched as she swung the Camaro around, pointed it back down the driveway, the exhaust rumbling loud.

Morgan waited for Flynn to go inside, then walked back through the woods to the car.

Fog was settling in as Sara drove the two miles to JoBeth’s house. It hung thick over the road, reflecting her headlights back. She turned the wipers and defrosters on. She thought about what Simone James had said.

It’s not the way I wanted it, but it might be too late to stop it.

Danny stirred in the booster seat, still asleep. She’d taken him from the house in pajamas with a change of clothes in his knapsack, along with the tyrannosaurus. She’d called JoBeth and then dressed quickly, jeans and boots and sweatshirt. The Glock was in her waistpack.

There were headlights behind her now, several car lengths back. She watched them in the rearview. As she neared the turn for JoBeth’s street she signaled, slowed. The headlights swung into the left lane and pulled ahead. An SUV jeep of some kind. Its taillights vanished in the fog.

When she pulled into JoBeth’s driveway, all the lights were on in the house. Danny stirred again.

“Come on, honey,” she said. She swiveled, got him unbelted.

He rubbed sleep from his eyes. “Where are we?”

“JoBeth’s.”

“Why?”

“You’re staying here, little guy, for tonight at least. Come on.”

He wrapped his arms around her neck, and she maneuvered him into the front seat with her and opened the door.

“It’s foggy,” he said. “I’m scared.”

“It’s okay. There’s nothing out there.”

She grabbed the knapsack with her free hand, shut the door. As she started up the slate path, the front door opened. JoBeth stood there with her father. He held the door for her as she carried Danny in.

“Thanks, Andy,” she said. He wore a bathrobe over pajamas, slippers. He still had the erect posture and flattop haircut of the state highway patrolman he’d once been.

JoBeth reached for Danny. Sara handed him over.

“Sorry to call so late,” she said. “I appreciate this.”

Danny laid his head on JoBeth’s shoulder and closed his eyes again. She carried him down a hall into a bedroom.

Andy took the knapsack. “Is everything okay, Sara?”

“It might be nothing. I got a phone call that bothered me.”

“From who?”

“I’m not positive. But I need to go back to the SO for a while, and I’d feel better if I knew Danny was somewhere safe.”

“Back to the office? It’s after midnight.”

“I know. I may ask you to keep him tomorrow night, too, if that’s okay.”

“Of course. But you’re worrying me.”

“Don’t be worried. And thanks. I’ll call to check in later, if that’s okay. I’d feel better.”

“Sure, Sara, whatever. He can stay here as long as need be. You, too, if you want.”

“Thanks, I’ll be okay,” she said. She took a last look down the hall where JoBeth and Danny had disappeared. Then she went back out into the fog.

She froze. The steady click of the hazards seemed to grow louder.

Stupid. How did I let this happen?

“Put your hands on that window.” The voice a rough whisper.

She thought about turning the Maglite to blind him, pulling at the tab until the Glock was in her hand.

The muzzle touched the base of her skull.

“I’ll do you right now. I don’t give a fuck.”

The driver’s door opened, and another man got out. He wore a denim jacket over a hooded sweatshirt, his face in shadow. She wondered if one of them had been the driver of the gray Toyota.

The one behind her reached around and slapped the Maglite from her hand. It hit the blacktop, went out. He pushed her into the side of the Range Rover, pressing on the gun so her cheek touched window glass. His other hand came around, brushed across her stomach and down to the waistpack. He found the buckle and tugged at it until the weight fell away from her. It thunked on the ground.

The gun left her head.

“Open the door.” His voice husky as if from a throat injury.

Remember that detail. Remember everything.

“I’m not getting in there.”

The muzzle again, at the nape of her neck.

“I’m not,” she said.

“No? Then maybe we’ll go back to where you dropped that boy off. Do our talking there. Your choice.”

She closed her eyes. Don’t panic. Think.

“We need to hurry up,” the driver said.

“I called it in when I saw your vehicle,” she said. “There’ll be deputies here any minute.”

“Not soon enough for you.”

He caught the collar of her sweatshirt, pulled her away, and kicked her left leg out from under her. She went down onto her side, grunting with the impact, her leg twisted beneath her.

“DeWayne, what the fuck?” the driver said.

Silence. Then the man behind her said “You stupid, you know that?” and she knew he was talking to the driver. Now they would kill her for sure.

“Get up.” He hauled up on her sweatshirt and she stood, her left leg threatening to buckle under her. He pulled at the door latch until it opened, the interior light showing a bench seat within, tan leather upholstery. He pushed her in.

“Get down on the floor,” he said. Then to the driver, “Get her ride. Pull it off the road. Kill those lights.”

“Why?”

“Can’t leave it sitting out there. Just do it.”

DeWayne crowded in behind her, pushed her down. The muzzle returned to the back of her skull. He pulled the door shut behind him.

“Be cool. We just want to holler at you a little. Don’t do nothing stupid, make me put one in your dome.”

She heard the Blazer backup, crunch against tree branches. The headlights and emergency flashers went off, the inside of the Range Rover going dark.

She lay with her right cheek pressed into the carpet, DeWayne’s weight on her. Her left leg throbbed.

Pain is good. Pain means you’re alive.

The driver got behind the wheel.

“We need to get out of here, man,” he said.

He started the engine, shut the hazards off, backed up into the road.

DeWayne took the gun from her head.

“Just stay there,” he said. “Nothing gonna happen to you.”

He reached into the front, pressed a switch that reclined the passenger seat enough that he could squeeze past her and into it. She looked up at him for the first time. He was half-turned to face her, a chromed automatic in his left hand, her waistpack in his lap. He wore a hooded black sweatshirt, had a lazy left eye.

Another detail. Remember it.

He pushed the hood back, looked down at her. He was heavier than the driver, but there was a similarity in their features.

“Where we going?” the driver said. “Where we taking her?”

“Just drive. We’ll do our talking right here.”

She tried to sit up.

“Stay down there,” DeWayne said. “We cool like this.”

They picked up speed. She wondered how long Angie had waited to put the call out, if there was a cruiser behind them somewhere now.

Too late.

DeWayne pulled the tab on the waistpack. The front flap fell away, exposing the Glock.

“Check this shit out,” he said. He tugged it free. “Sweet.”

He opened the big glove box, put the Glock inside, shut it.

“We gonna make this brief,” he said to her. “Where it at?” He moved the gun to his right hand.

“I don’t know what you-” she said, and he leaned forward and slapped her hard in the face. It snapped her head to the side, stung her cheek. Tears came to her eyes.

“Gonna be a long night, you keep that shit up,” he said.

“We should go back to her house,” the driver said. “Nobody there now.”

“Nah,” DeWayne said. “They find her car, they might go there looking for her. We cool where we are.”

“I don’t like this fog, man. I can’t see shit.”

“Just take it slow. We be all right.” He looked back at her. “I’ll say it again. Where it at?”

“I don’t understand.” The fear strong inside her now. They wanted something she couldn’t give them. When they realized that, she’d be no more use to them.

“What, your boyfriend cut you out of the deal? Didn’t give you a slice of that nice pie? Three hundred and fifty gees. Should be enough to go around. He keep all that shit himself?”

Three hundred and fifty thousand.

She thought about the empty compartment in the Honda.

Oh Christ, Billy, what did you do?

Four A.M., and the Sheriff’s Office was abuzz. Off-duty deputies had shown up as the news got out. Sara sat slumped in the chair facing the sheriff’s desk, her right ear still echoing with the shot DeWayne had fired. She ached all over, and the adrenaline aftershock was starting to fade, a stonelike fatigue taking its place.

She could see the sheriff and Sam Elwood talking by the dispatcher’s desk, Sam with his hands on his hips. He turned, met her eyes.

She stretched her legs, rubbed her calf where DeWayne had kicked her. Outside, she could see thin fog drifting past the floodlights, stars starting to appear in the sky.

The sheriff came back in carrying a manila folder and a bottle of water. He cracked the cap, handed it to her.

“Thanks.”

He closed the door and settled behind his desk. “How do you feel?”

“Tired,” she said.

“I can imagine.”

“I just want to see Danny.”

“You will. I talked to Andy Ryan a few minutes ago. Everything’s fine. I sent a deputy out there as well.”

She took a long drink of water.

He opened the folder, took out a black-and-white photo on printer paper, and set it in front of her.

“New Jersey State Police sent that down. Look familiar?”

She pulled the photo closer. It was the man DeWayne had called Morgan.

“That’s him,” she said. “He’s younger here, though. Man I saw was in his fifties, sixties maybe. Like he’d been around.”

“He has. That photo’s a few years old. Name’s Nathaniel Morgan. Fifty-seven, kind of old for this sort of thing. He has a jacket going back to the sixties-assault, attempted murder, manslaughter. Did seven years on the last one, 1980 to ’87.”

“Who were the other two?”

He read from the file.

“Dante and DeWayne Coleman. Brothers. Both have substantial sheets. DeWayne, the big one, just got out of state prison two months ago, for aggravated assault. A couple of princes, those two.”

“Have you found Billy?”

He sat back. “Sam just came back from his place. He’s gone, of course. I left Minos McCarthy and Ed Strunk out there in a cruiser, see if he comes back. I’m doubting he will. Looks like he packed up, hit the road. Any idea where he might have gone?”

She shook her head. “I tried his cell a half-dozen times,” she said. “It’s turned off. I think he’s got a brother in Ocala-”

“We know. I put in a call to the Marion County SO up there. They’re out at the house now. No sign of him, and the brother says he hasn’t seen or heard from him in weeks. No, I’m thinking it’s somewhere nearby, somewhere he thinks is safe. A fishing camp or a hunting cabin or something.”

“If he has one, he never told me.”

“On the other hand, if all this is true, he can go a long way on three hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”

All of it was catching up with her now, hearing someone else speak it. The signs she should have seen. The things that were in front of her all along she never put together, didn’t want to put together.

Now here you are. What good did you do after all?

“We put a BOLO out on the truck,” he said. “Unless he’s got another vehicle stashed somewhere, we’ll find him soon. My guess is he’s holed up somewhere close, especially if he’s carrying that money around.”

“Maybe he isn’t. Maybe Lee-Anne has it.”

“If she did, someone took it from her.”

“What do you mean?”

“Call came in about an hour ago. FHP found her car abandoned down in Hendry County. Gone off the road, all busted up. Blood on the seat.”

“And?”

“They alerted the Sheriff’s Office down there. Tracks show there were a couple other cars at the scene. They’re trying to chase it down. She had suitcases in the trunk, but someone had been through them. From the amount of blood, the condition of the car, unlikely she walked away.”

“Someone took her.”

“Looks like. And not to a hospital. This thing’s sprawling, Sara, and bad. FDLE’s out at your scene. Tampa FBI’s been notified as well. This whole thing gets taken away from us in twenty-four hours, I’m guessing. Unless we find Billy first.”

“Can you GPS his phone?”

“No luck so far. Either he shut it down or figured out how to deactivate the tracking applet. If he uses it again, we might get lucky. Until then…”

He tapped an unsharpened pencil on the desk.

“Elwood’s got your service weapon,” he said. “He’ll give it to you before you leave. You’ll need to clean it good, though. Some dirt in the barrel and all.”

He touched his left cheek. “You might want to do something about that too.”

She raised a hand to her face, felt the stickiness there. He took a tissue from the box next to his terminal, handed it over. She folded it, dabbed it with water from the bottle, wiped her cheek. It came away red.

“You handled yourself well out there,” he said.

“How’s that?” She dabbed water, wiped again. More blood. “I had my service weapon taken away from me. Twice.”

“You came back in one piece. That’s the main thing.”

“I guess.”

“Maybe this Morgan did you a favor, taking those two out like that. Kept you from having to make that choice. It’s not an easy thing, shooting a man. It can be tough to live with. You can give it all the context and justification you want, but it still goes against human nature. I haven’t fired a shot in anger since the war, and that’s the way I want to keep it.”

She looked at the bloody tissue.

“That’s one of the things I can’t get my head around,” he said. “Billy shooting that boy that way. What makes a good man-a good deputy-do something like that?”

“Money.”

“Did he really think he was going to get away with it? That much money? That someone wasn’t going to come looking for it?”

“I don’t know. Maybe he was tired of the way things were. Maybe he saw this as his chance.”

“His chance to get killed.”

“Maybe he thought he could handle it, handle whatever came after, too.”

He tapped the pencil.

“Would have thought he was smarter than that. But money can do that to a person, I guess. Wake up one day, think they deserve something they haven’t earned. Decide to go out and take it. But it never works out. They can never hold on to it.”

“I wouldn’t know,” she said.

“Money. People think it’ll cure all their troubles. Then they find out the way things really work.”

“How’s that?”

“Forget about money,” he said. “Pain’s the only currency. And everybody pays their way.”

By the next afternoon, the cold front had blown through and gone. Sara drove out to CR-23 in the Blazer, pulled onto the shoulder and parked. The sky was bright blue, dotted with billowy white clouds. Sugarcane moved in the breeze.

Why she’d come here, she wasn’t sure. She got out, walked along the edge of the incline. There was no sign of the teddy bear or cross, though she knew she had the right location. She wondered if a roadside trash crew had picked them up.

She took off her sunglasses, hung them from the collar of her sweatshirt, looked around. Swamp on one side, cane fields on the other, the dark shape of the abandoned Highfield refinery in the distance. Billy’s father had worked there, his grandfather before him. It had been closed for fifteen years, all those jobs gone south, out of the county, the building left to rot.

The air was cooler now, the sun starting to sink. Her left leg ached, and there was still a faint ringing in her right ear. She went back to the Blazer, sat with the door open, got the Aleve from the glove box, shook two out, washed them down with a long swig from a bottle of water. She looked back at the refinery, already deepening in shadow.

She hung her sunglasses on the rearview, got her cell phone from the waistpack, called JoBeth.

“How are you making out?” Sara said.

“Fine, we’re watching TV. I was about to start making dinner. Are hot dogs all right?”

“Sure, Danny loves them. Is there a deputy there still?”

“Yes. They changed shifts again. Should I bring something out to him?”

“Not a bad idea.”

“When will you be back?”

“Twenty minutes, half hour at the most.” She looked at the darkening refinery. “But if Danny’s hungry, go ahead and start without me.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, that’s fine. I’ll call you on my way back.”

Maybe it’s worth checking out. Have a look, scratch it off the list.

If she called the sheriff, he’d scramble a tactical team double time, maybe twenty men, half a dozen vehicles. Bring them all the way out here so she could sheepishly explain why she’d called in the cavalry for no good reason. Why she hadn’t bothered to check it out herself first, had sat in the car until the men arrived. And if there was nothing there, it would all be a waste. Worse than a waste.

You’re a sheriff’s deputy. You’re out here now. It’ll take five minutes. Have a look, head back.

She shut the phone, dropped it on the passenger seat, started the engine.

When she stepped through the doorway, she heard Billy come in behind her, the rusted creak of the hinges, a bolt being thrown. He touched her on the back, prodded her forward.

“Go ahead,” he said. They were in almost total darkness.

Noises to her right. She turned to see him lighting a Coleman lantern with a match. He set the lamp atop an overturned crate, adjusted the wick until the flame grew brighter. He still held the Python. Her Glock was tucked into his belt.

They were in a big, high-ceilinged room, the concrete floor stained and chipped, the remnants of some type of machinery in one corner. On the front wall, massive sliding doors, closed now, a smaller door beside them. Grids and gaps in the concrete where other equipment had once been, empty crates. An iron staircase led up to a second-floor catwalk. There were gaping holes in the ceiling, and she could see the first stars against the blackness.

“What am I going to do with you, Sara? You always complicate things.”

He eased the Python’s hammer down, pointed to her waistpack. “Your cell in there?”

She shook her head.

“You sure?”

“It’s back in the Blazer.”

Something fluttered near the ceiling. She looked up.

“Pigeons,” he said. “Bats in here, too. Didn’t get more than an hour’s sleep all night.”

Her eyes were adjusting. There was trash scattered on the floor, broken bottles, graffiti on the walls. A sooty blotch against one wall, as if from a fire.

“Nice place, isn’t it?” he said. “Go on up those stairs there.”

“Why?”

“Just do it, Sara. We don’t have a lot of time.”

The stairs were spotted with pigeon droppings, rust. She went up slowly, heard him behind her. He’d left the lamp where it was, but its glow was bright enough that she could see where she was going. Sweat crept down the nape of her neck.

“Up there on the left,” he said.

She reached the catwalk, saw the open door there.

“Go on,” he said. “I’m right behind you.”

She went in, heard the scratching of another match. He lit a thick candle, set it on the floor.

It was a long empty room, stripped of machinery, a tangle of pipes protruding from one wall. The ceiling was pressed tin. There was a single big front window, half the panes missing.

On the concrete floor near the window was a wooden pallet, a sleeping bag stretched out on it. Atop the sleeping bag was a Bushmaster AR-15 and an olive drab duffel bag. There was a small camping stove in the corner, a cardboard box of groceries.

“Over there,” he said. “Stay away from the window. Go ahead, sit down.”

She lowered herself to the floor, her back to the wall, watching him. To her left was a black nylon gearbag, zippered shut.

He went to the window, looked out.

“I saw you,” he said. “From up here. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised. You never did give up easy.”

He set the Python on the windowsill, picked up the rifle. He looked out again and then used the butt to bump out the remaining panes of glass.

“I’ve got the high ground,” he said. “That’s something, I guess.”

He sat on the sleeping bag, his back against the wall, facing her, the window above him, the rifle in his lap.

“I used to come here as a kid,” he said. “I ever tell you that?”

“No.”

“My father was assistant foreman, until his accident. My mother and I would come here sometimes, bring his lunch. I couldn’t wait to get out of here, away from the noise, the dust. Those rollers would be going nonstop, twenty-four seven. You could almost feel that shit in your lungs.”

He pulled the candle close to him, ejected the rifle’s magazine. She looked at him, at the Python on the sill above him.

“All I could think about was how I never wanted to end up in a place like this.”

From the duffel, he took another magazine, a roll of duct tape. A draft came through the window, set the candle flame flickering.

As she watched, he ripped strips from the roll, taped the magazines together, open ends in opposite directions.

“Who are you expecting?” she said.

“Someone. Soon.”

He fit the magazine back into the receiver, slapped it into place.

Easy. Calm. Don’t let him know you’re scared.

“Billy, this has all gone too far.”

“I guess it has.”

“Lee-Anne-”

“I know. He told me.”

“Who?”

“One of the men who did it, maybe. I don’t know.” He worked the bolt, laid the rifle across his lap, rubbed his right sleeve across his forehead. “Christ, it’s hot in here.”

“This doesn’t have to go any further,” she said.

“Too late for that. How much you tell Hammond?”

“All of it.”

“Too bad.”

Moonlight was beginning to filter through the window. He looked at his watch.

“We agreed on an hour from now,” he said, “but I imagine he’ll be along a good bit before that. Maybe bring some people with him, too.”

“What people?”

“Ones that money belonged to, I expect. Or them that want it now. Doesn’t matter either way. Didn’t know how long I’d need to hide out here. It was almost a relief, getting that call.”

She thought about Danny at JoBeth’s, eating dinner now maybe, or watching TV, wondering where she was.

You have to think clearly. You have to get out of this.

“They’re coming here?” she said.

“One of them is, at least. He said he wanted to cut a deal. I told him yes.”

“What kind of deal?”

“I keep a little, give him the rest. That’s what he told me. Can’t imagine that’s their plan, though. Anyway, I’m ready for them.”

“Billy, this is crazy. We need to get out of here.”

“I’ve already killed one man. What difference does it make I kill a couple more?”

“We can walk out of here right now.”

“I can’t go to prison, Sara. You know that.”

“We can talk to the sheriff.”

“You think that’s going to do any good? This isn’t about any throwdown, Sara. I shot that boy. I told him to walk down into that swamp and turn and face me. And when he did-so scared he was almost pissing himself-I looked him right in the eye and I shot him in the chest. Then I shot him twice more. To be sure.”

She said nothing.

“He didn’t understand what was going on, even after I shot him the first time. He never knew.”

“You’re not going to be able to get away, Billy. The only way out of this is to give yourself up.”

“You’re right about one thing. The people that want that money, they’ll keep coming. Even if I did get away, they’d keep chasing me. That’s why it’s got to end here, tonight, one way or another. It’s the only chance I’ve got.”

“This is wrong. This isn’t the way to do it.”

“I’m sorry you had to be here for this, Sara, but I’m out of options. If they want that money, they’re going to have to take it from me.”

The patch of moonlight grew on the floor.

“It’s not too late,” she said. “We can walk out to the Blazer, be gone before they get here. We can call the sheriff. He’ll listen to your side of it.”

“Always looking out for me, aren’t you? Trying to get me to do the right thing, keep me from fucking up. And I never cut you a break, did I? I fought you all the way.”

He pointed at the gearbag.

“Go ahead, open it,” he said. “See what all the fuss was.”

“I don’t want to.”

“No, you should. Go ahead. That’s what this is all about, right?”

She tugged the bag closer, still watching him.

“Go on.”

She worked the zipper slowly, as if the bag were full of snakes. As the edges parted she saw bricks of money inside, wrapped in clear plastic. The top brick was hundreds.

“Hell of a thing, isn’t it?” he said. “They make that in a couple days up there. Selling poison to kids.”

“That give you the right to take it?”

“It belongs to whoever has it. When I first saw that money, all wrapped up like that, you know what I thought? That’s my ticket out. Enough money to start over somewhere else, away from here, get something going. I guess I should have known better.”

“It was Lee-Anne, wasn’t it? It was her idea.”

“Doesn’t matter now.”

“It’ll make a difference to a jury.”

“Drop it, Sara.” He took a pair of stainless steel handcuffs from the duffel.

“I’m not putting those on,” she said.

He tossed them clattering at her feet. “Don’t make this harder than it is,” he said. “We don’t have much time.”

“Go ahead and shoot me now. I’m not doing it.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Try me.”

He set the Bushmaster on the floor, took the Glock from his belt, and put it beside the rifle. In a flash he was on her. She kicked out, but he batted her foot away, dropped his weight onto her. She got the heel of her hand under his jaw, pushed up, her nails scoring his skin, but his left hand locked around her throat, pinned her down, all his weight on it.

Her knees pumped, trying for his groin, thumping into his legs as he changed position. She got her right hand free, made a fist, and swung hard into his temple.

His face was mottled red above her, the veins and muscles standing out in his neck, lips pulled back over his teeth. She could smell him, woodsmoke and sweat and something else beneath it all, sour and vile. Spots were beginning to flash in her peripheral vision. I’m going to black out.

“Stop it, Sara. Goddammit… stop fighting me.”

She hit him again, a short sharp jab to his face, and then his own hand raised up, and she saw the fist coming down, tried to turn away from it.

Her head snapped back and hit the floor, and for a moment waves seemed to pass in front of her, as if she were standing too close to a fire. She let her hands drop, Billy’s face swimming before her eyes. Then she felt his weight leave her, something hard cinch across her right wrist and ratchet closed. He dragged her across the floor, her arm stretched from the socket. Then a second ratchet and he was away from her, breathing heavy, retreating to his spot near the wall.

She looked at the ceiling, gulped air. Her face felt swollen and thick.

“Goddammit, Sara.”

The room steadied around her. She touched her face. No blood, but she could already feel the swelling there. She looked to her right, saw he’d locked the loose cuff around an L-shaped bend of copper pipe that came from the wall, ran down into the floor. She pulled at it. It didn’t move.

She tried to sit up. He was touching the nail marks on his chin, looking at the blood on his fingertips. He picked up the Glock.

“Easiest thing for me to do is kill you right now,” he said. “Smart thing, too. One less loose end. You know that, right? It won’t matter much in the long run. At least not to me.”

She tasted blood in her mouth, turned her head and spat.

He rose, looked out the window again, silhouetted against the moonlight, brighter now.

“You shouldn’t have come alone, Sara,” he said without turning. “You shouldn’t have come at all.”

A hundred yards up the service road, Morgan stopped, shut the engine off. In the distance, he could see the refinery, moonlight on broken glass, gaps in the roof.

He slipped out of the car, the Beretta in his hand. Separating this road from the refinery was a half mile of choked undergrowth, stunted trees. He heard night noises, animal sounds he couldn’t identify. A splashing from the canal behind him, a low bellow in the dark.

As he started up the road, the breeze shifted, brought with it the smell of swamp. Then something else. Cigarette smoke.

He stopped where he was, waited for his eyes to adapt to the dark. There was a shape ahead, a car, someone at the wheel. The glow of a cigarette being drawn on, and then sparks as it sailed from the window, landed in the dirt.

He held his breath. A mosquito landed on his neck. He didn’t touch it.

He counted to ten, then moved closer. It was a dark four-door sedan, a Lexus maybe. He came up silently on the driver’s side. The man at the wheel had dreadlocks, a blue bandana around his neck. The woman had talked. The Haitians had beaten him here.

He swung the Beretta through the open window, hit the driver across the bridge of the nose. It snapped his head back, and Morgan hit him again before he could cry out, yanked at the door latch and pulled it open. The man spilled out onto the ground. Morgan pushed his face down in the dirt, hit him twice more with the gun.

He shouldered the door closed, the interior light winking out, rolled the man onto his back. A teenager, eyes half closed, nose flat and broken. Morgan could see the glint of tiny diamonds woven into his dreads.

There was an automatic in the boy’s waistband. Morgan took it out, tossed it into the brush, used the bandana to wipe blood from the Beretta. Then he pushed the gun into his belt, caught the boy’s wrists. He dragged him off the road and into the trees, left him facedown.

He waited, listened, then went back to the Lexus, opened the door again. When the light blinked on, he saw the AK-47 propped against the passenger seat; dark wood stock, banana clip. He took it out, looked it over, pulled back the bolt to chamber a round. The selector switch was set to semiautomatic fire.

He touched the car hood. Even through the glove he could feel the engine warmth. It hadn’t been here long.

He started back up the road.

Sara jumped when she heard the shooting. It came from behind the refinery, the flat crack, crack, crack of an automatic rifle.

Billy looked at her. Then they heard movement out front, and he was back at the window, firing, the AR-15 bucking, brass clattering on the concrete floor. She could hear yelling, the noise of the rifle drowning it out, echoing through the room.

He wheeled away from the window, and shots came through the empty frame, punched into the ceiling. A stray bullet sparked the wall near her, whined away inches from her ear, hit something farther back in the room. Then more shots, shouting from outside.

He took aim again, fired until the bolt locked back, swung away.

“Got the bastard that time.”

He ejected the magazine, reversed it, slapped the full one in, turned back to the window.

She pulled hard on the cuff, heard the pipes rattle, pulled again, felt a little give. Then the shots and shouting were closer, and she knew they were inside.

The shots sounded almost as one. Sara saw Billy spin away, the Colt fly from his hand. He twisted, fell hard, and then she was running down the stairs, and when she reached the bottom, Morgan was pointing his gun at her.

“Just stay right there,” he said. “No need to come any closer.”

She didn’t move. After a moment, he lowered the gun, crouched, turned the bag right side up, gathered the bricks of money from the floor, put them back in, watching her. When he had them all, he tugged at the zipper, got it halfway closed. Then he lifted the bag by a carry strap, looked at her, slung it over his left shoulder. He shook his head.

“Foolish,” he said. Then he turned his back on her and walked away.

• • •

Morgan went back the way he’d come. Up the steps to the loading dock, through the ruined door. The bag was heavier than he expected, the strap cutting into his shoulder. It felt good.

He scrambled down from the loading dock. The man in the dirt hadn’t moved. Morgan headed for the trees.

Morgan stepped over the body, started down the road to the Monte Carlo. He could hear far-off sirens.

When he reached the car, he decocked the Beretta, pushed it into his belt, got the keys out, dropped them. He felt fresh sweat on his forehead, a growing pain in his stomach. He bent, picked up the keys, and the vertigo hit him. He fell against the side of the car, put a hand on the fender to steady himself.

Not now, he thought. You need to keep moving. You need to get out of here.

He got the driver’s side door open, set the gearbag on the seat, pushed it over as he got behind the wheel. He fumbled with the keys, his fingers unresponsive, dropped them again. He got the ignition key in, pulled the door shut. He ground the starter on the first try, got it going on the second.

The road was too narrow to turn around, and he couldn’t risk backing up all the way down to the highway. He set the Beretta on the seat, pulled ahead. There was a clearing past the Lexus, enough room to make a three-point turn, face back the other way.

He swung left, cleared the car and the body, trees scratching the driver’s side. He turned the Monte Carlo across the road, reversed until his rear bumper crunched into undergrowth. He had to do it twice more to bring the car’s nose around.

Lights off, he looked past the Lexus, down the length of the moonlit road to the highway beyond.

Sara stood beside an EMT van, a blanket around her shoulders, and watched them bring the bodies out. They’d tried to get her into a van, take her to the hospital-Not yet-and eventually Hammond had given in. Her chest hurt to the touch, but she could breathe without pain.

There were nearly a dozen emergency vehicles parked in front of the refinery, radios crackling and squawking. The sun was up, had chased the shadows away. Birds sang in the trees.

They’d dressed and wrapped her wrist, made her take the blanket because they were worried she was slipping into shock, but she knew she wasn’t. One of the EMTs hovered nearby.

Elwood came up alongside her.

“Anything?” she said.

“Not yet. Statewide BOLO. Jersey plates, he won’t get far.”

“Sorry I couldn’t get the tag number.”

“Priorities, Sara. What’s important is you’re all right.”

They brought them out on covered stretchers, one at a time, loaded them carefully into the back of the other EMT vans. When they brought the fourth stretcher out, the sheriff walked beside it, and she knew it was Billy.

She let the blanket slip from her shoulders to the ground. The sheriff came around the stretcher to head her off. The EMTs stopped where they were, unsure what to do.

She looked down at the stretcher, the rough green blanket covering him. The sheriff put a hand on her shoulder.

“Is he bagged?” she said.

“No.”

She pulled the blanket down over that face. His head was tilted to the left on the stretcher, eyes half open, looking off at something only he could see.

She should feel something, she knew, but there was nothing there. Just a numbness that seemed to stretch far down into her, fill her entirely.

She reached down, and one of the EMTs said, “Hey,” but the sheriff motioned to him and he was silent. She laid fingers on Billy’s eyelids and gently closed them, then lifted the blanket back over his face.

She stepped away from the stretcher. The EMTs looked at the sheriff. He nodded.

They carried him away.

The line rang once, twice. Sara waited, cell phone to her ear, wondered if she had the right number. The sheriff had run interference with the phone company, backtraced her home phone, gotten the number for her, hadn’t asked why.

She was in the living room, lit by a single lamp. Danny was sleeping, his door half open. The house was quiet.

After the fourth ring, there was a pause and then the woman said “Who is this?”

“Sara Cross.”

Silence on the line, then, “How did you get this number?”

“I just wanted to call, to tell you thanks.”

Another pause. “I didn’t do that for you.”

“I understand.”

“It was for that little boy.”

“I know. That’s why I wanted to thank you.”

“Well, now you have. And there’s no reason to be calling this number again, is there?”

“No,” Sara said. “There isn’t.”

“Then we’re done,” Simone James said, and the line went silent.