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“I’m saving my husband’s life… and his mind.”
“You scared your husband half to death. What was with the blood on the safe door? Huh?”
“I had to make it look real,” she said. “Besides, he doesn’t remember trauma for more than an hour anymore. But I can help him. I can give him back his life. I’m smarter than Beckett. I tell him what he wants to hear and do just enough to make it believable.”
“Doing just enough o make it believable got Solomon and Robert killed.”
“That was not my intent,” she said, as if that made it right. “I advise you to take the same approach with him. Our species isn’t gonna make it, anyway. I might as well get all I can out of life.”
He shook his head slowly. “I refuse to believe that. There’s hope— there’s hope because of the very work we’ve done, and others are doing.”
She shrugged and resumed driving. “Maybe you’re right. But if there’s any chance I can have my husband back, then that’s enough.”
“What about the solar tile?” he asked.
“What about it?”
“What did you do with it?”
She glanced out her window, effectively hiding her expression. “I crushed it and tossed the pieces into the river.”
It was a lie and he knew it. She’d put thousands of hours into the solar tile, same as he had. There was no way she could bring herself to destroy it. Was there?
Maybe there was. Maybe he’d never known Carrie at all.
“I came to your wedding,” he said, “We’ve been friends for?—”
“That’s why you’re still alive, Harrison,” she said softly.
“I’m not selling out to him. I won’t.”
She sent him a worried look. “Then I don’t know if I can stop him from killing you. But I’m giving you a chance,” she said. “You have to convince that filthy rich lunatic that he needs you alive more than he needs you dead. Understand?”
He wanted to shake her and realized he’d never known her at all. “Before I end up dead, I’m curious, how did your boss know about my flight home, that I was at my dad’s, or what time I’d land?”
“I don’t know. I heard him say Senator Tompkins owed him a bigger favor than he owed Garrett Brand. Could that have had something to do with it?”
Harrison thought of the gifts in the private jet’s galley, the friendly, helpful note from its owner, the senator. It made him wonder aloud, “Honest people are few and far between, aren’t they?”
“Endangered species,” Carrie replied.
The family gathered at the ranch. That was what they did when trouble came. They pulled together. Most of the elders were out with law enforcement, searching. Drew and her mom, Penny, were working from Penny’s home office. She had access to all her P.I. stuff there.
Maria was petrified— she felt as if her body had gone rigid and brittle. There was a low-level tremor that felt as if it was emanating from her soul, but for Lily and Hyram, she kept a brave face. They were in the living room, on the sofa. Blue Boy had taken up position on their feet, as if he knew they were in need of comforting.
Willow got off her phone call and said, “We’ve located every last one of those vehicles, abandoned in different areas. None were registered or had a lick of paperwork in them. They’re running down the VINs, but they were bought for cash and delivered to a vacant lot where they were signed for by John Smith.”
“It’s Beckett,” Maria said. “It has to be.”
Every phone in the room chirped, and Maria pulled hers out to see a message on the family loop.
Drew: Attaching list of 5 closest Beckett-owned properties.
Maria opened the file. It was a list of addresses.
“That first one’s one of his homes,” Jessi said. “His whole family— kids, grandkids— are there every June. Unlikely he’d take Harry where there are so many people.”
Bubba said, “I know the fourth one. It’s a honky tonk out on Finn Road. I can check that.
