Jeffery Deaver

The Rule of Threes

Chapter 1

Wednesday, September 20, 6:30 a.m.

Nothing to do but...

His mind can’t quite finish the sentence.

Sitting on the edge of the double bed, he looks at the low sunlight slanting inward through blinds that were white when installed. The sun hits the knife blade and bathes his face in reflected light nearly as pure as the original source, a million miles away.

Nothing to do but...

Out of bed, he lays the knife on the nightstand, showers meticulously, scrubbing, scrubbing.

Then into a pressed shirt, pressed slacks, pressed jacket that is the beige shade that matches his flesh. The shag carpet lifts away every noise but a heartbeat and a hum in the ears, a soundtrack to the edginess that enwraps the heart.

After walking to the window of his rigorously ordered apartment, he looks at the development, populated by middle manager school administrator auto dealer star salespeople senior bookkeeper residents. It’s earlyish. Soon they will be leaving for their jobs. Heading out into the world, taking on tasks lined up like hurdles, some low as curbs, some thigh-stretchers.

Some to trip you up and smack your head to the asphalt, maybe to race again. Maybe never to rise.

Nothing to do but...

Joseph Ray Whelan makes coffee with boiling water and a drip cone. He sits at his kitchen table. One sip. Two. Three.

He pours the rest out.

Three is magic. Three consumes him.

On his music app a song is looping. The “Queen of the Night” aria from The Magic Flute. In the opera, the main character, Tamino, is rescued by three governesses, servants to the queen, and starts his journey to enlightenment. He is guided by three young men. The opera is written in a key that has three flats.

Nothing to do but...

Birth, life, death... There’s three for you.

It’s almost three minutes to seven.

And time to go.

He gets the knife from the bedroom. And from the kitchen table he collects his gun and the roll of gray duct tape. Everything goes into his backpack. There are a few other items inside too, making the total more than three.

This doesn’t bother him. He’s crazy, yes, but not to the point of being weird crazy.

Finally he pockets a handheld compass, not an electronic one. Nobody uses traditional compasses any longer. That’s foolish. For one thing, there’s no GPS trail of where you’ve been.

For another, the North Pole never runs out of juice.

He slings the backpack over his shoulder and walks to the door. Three deep breaths.

Then outside into the damp end-of-summer day, in which there is nothing to do...

...but get to work and end a life.

Chapter 2

Just past 2:00 p.m., following a hard drive from Springfield, Constant Marlowe passed a sign.

Clark Valley

Your kind of town...

Founded 1789

She continued along Route 27 for several miles, through farmland, some crops harvested, others on hold. When she came to a brown Sheriff’s Office cruiser, low roof lights flashing, she slowed and turned onto the dirt and gravel road that led into Lone Ridge Park.

Two well-tanned sheriff’s deputies waved her to a stop about a hundred feet into the place. They’d be stopping all civilian traffic and she was in her personal car, clearly not law enforcement. The Honda was orange, a shade the vehicle was not born with. Marlowe had needed an undercover set of wheels to pursue a particularly unpleasant meth retailer and bought the sedan with her credit card. After the operation — and the successful collar — she decided to keep the thing.

It never broke down and the one bullet fired at it in the past week had missed the vitals — hers and the engine’s — and ended up in the headrest. She’d been meaning to cut it out.

She now nosed the vehicle into the low grass, killed the rattling engine and climbed out.

The taller deputy was shaking his head, seeing a woman in blue jeans, a white tee and black leather jacket, brown hair in a severe ponytail.

Thinking civilian.

Though perhaps wondering about the three-inch scar on her forehead.

His expression changed when she pulled aside the jacket, revealing a gold badge, sitting aside her small black pistol.

“Sheriff Tremain?” she asked.

The shorter of the deputies pointed to a clutch of vehicles and men and women in uniforms, the khaki of the Bowman County, Illinois, Sheriff’s Office. They were at the edge of a hundred-by-hundred-yard picnic and recreation area.

The man said to Marlowe, “He’s the cowboy one.”

She nodded and started toward them, over mown grass and then through rampant grass.

Fiftyish, Frank Tremain was tanned, veins prominent on hands and temples. His face was etched. He was trim everywhere but in the belly, which jutted. Though tight at the beltline, his trousers were baggy and his shirt partly untucked in the back. His weapon was not an efficient autoloader like every other cop in the universe sports, but a wheel gun, a revolver that held six rounds at most, maybe five. His boots were pointed and scuffed. His long face was lined not from age but from the out of doors.

Cowboy one...

He was chewing something, as, squinting, he looked around the park, face astute.

Then, briefly surprised to note her presence, he went still and his eyes remained on her as she approached.

“Well, the famous Constant Marlowe.”

The heads of those around Tremain turned. Marlowe nodded to them.

“All the way from Chicago.”

She’d been in Springfield. She didn’t correct him.

Tremain stepped past the others. His long face remained expressionless. “That’s it for me, hm? We fumble and BRK strikes again. So they bring in the big guns.”

“Nobody fumbled.” She said this because she might need him, not because it was true. “I’ve had experience, these sort of things.”

The man now offered some emotion, a look that might mean: keep your condescension to yourself, woman.

“Joint task force?” he asked.

“No.” Sealing his demotion.

It was tobacco, not gum. He turned and spit into the grass.

“K. I got stuff to do. You’ll need somebody local. Princess!” he called, his raspy voice rising in volume.

A sturdy woman of about thirty, in a deputy uniform, turned and gave no reaction to the blunt summons. She had a round, pretty face with large, dark eyes and a dusky complexion. Black hair, ponytailed.

He didn’t introduce them but left it to the two women.

“Watseka Eventide. I go by Zosette. Or Zo.”

“Constant Marlowe.”

“Brief the expert,” Tremain muttered angrily. “And don’t forget EB.”

“Yessir.”

He wandered off, to handle whatever “stuff” needed handling.

“Sheriff,” Marlowe called. She wasn’t here to cut off the snake’s head. She had questions for him and needed advice, thoughts.

“Princess’ll help you.” He waved a hand, spit and hiked to his car.

“He’s sort of that way sometimes, Agent Marlowe,” Eventide said.

“‘Princess’?”

“He started calling me that on the phone before he knew I was Indigenous. Then after we met, he decided — I’m guessing — that if he stopped calling me ‘Princess,’ that’d be racist. I could care less.”

“Call me Constant.” Without an explanation for the name. “I wanted to ask him about the forensics.”

“Done. Report should be at the office by now.”

Fast for a small town. The other question, which she kept to herself: Were the results any good?

“What did he mean by ‘EB’?”

“Eagle Brotherhood. A neo-Nazi crew. They hover around Morgantown. More Nazi than neo.”

“I read the NCIC on Monday’s murder.”

Today’s was the second victim of the perp the press had labeled BRK, Bludgeon, Rape and Kill. The first, Abigail Bills, had died three days ago.

Marlowe continued, “The MO is not survivalist/skinhead behavior.”

“I know. I took CE courses in profiling at the academy last year. Quantico.”

FBI.

Members of extremist political groups, even those inclined to commit deadly hate crimes, tend not to profile for homicidal sexual assault. In fact, it’s those crews that can be counted on for prison yard justice when it comes to sex offenders.

Eventide explained, “But Frank’s been looking for an excuse to put the leaders in Alton Max. His theory is it might be one of the Hitler Youth went renegade and he’s BRK.”

Marlowe was doubtful. “Abigail and Kelly...” The victims here. “They were white and the surnames don’t sound Jewish.”

“No, but Frank’s convinced himself they’re the go-to source of bad in the county.”

“Any leads linking the Eagles to either crime?”

“No.”

“Bottom of the list.” Marlowe wondered how Eventide would feel about taking orders from a newcomer. No problem apparently. She jotted a note and looked up cheerfully.

“TOD?” Marlowe asked.

“We make it noon, give or take.”

“Who found her?”

“She was jogging. Over there... You’ll see. Man on lunch break from Cargill, out for a run himself... I know, I know: not unheard of for the perp to report it.”

If you’re unhinged enough to commit murder, you’re unhinged enough to behave in either irrational or searingly narcissistic I’ll-never-get-caught ways.

“He had a platinum alibi. But even before I checked I knew. Easy to read.”

“Kinesics?”

“Body language? No. Well, yes. I guess. He puked. He took me to the body, looked at her and puked.”

Not easy to fake, Marlowe assumed.

“And where is she?”

“Medical examiner released her, but she’s still at the site.” Eventide nodded to a van, BCME printed on the side. A middle-aged woman in overalls leaned against the dented metal. Reading her phone, she was smoking. Marlowe used to. Tough to give up.

Marlowe looked to the eastern half of the parking lot, roped off by police tape. A half dozen reporters stood dutifully behind the line. In small towns, unlike cities, journalists don’t shout and bluster and jockey for camera position. Refreshing.

“Any description, the unsub?”

“Six feet, dark hair, size ten and a half shoes, weight one eighty to two ten. White. That was all crime scene. No witnesses.”

Marlowe said, “Kelly’s body. Show me.”

They started through a large swath of grass and trees that had been cordoned off with yet more yellow tape, here fluttering hypnotically in the breeze, like those optical-effects banners outside used car dealerships.

As they walked, Deputy Eventide said, “So this’s number two in three days. People’re worked up. Mike’s Gunshop’ll be out of ammo and pepper spray by closing time tonight.”

As they approached the site, Marlowe saw that the crime scene team had been good. They’d roped off the entire jogging path for a hundred yards on either side of the corpse, far more than most CSUs would have searched.

She paused, studied the forest around her and then stepped forward.

Kelly Nader lay under a green plastic tarp.

Donning gloves, Marlowe crouched and pulled the covering away.

The young woman, about five six, Marlowe’s height, lay face up on the path, face to her left — toward Marlowe. Her unseeing eyes were aimed at a purple flowering plant whose species the agent did not know.

This crime was similar to Monday’s — Marlowe had listened to the report on the drive here, via a pdf reading program. The killer had struck Kelly from behind on the crown of her head with a heavy object about an inch and a half in diameter. Several more blows resulted in her death by blunt force trauma. The cracked bone had horribly deformed what would have been quite the pretty face.

Her sports bra and T-shirt were tugged up. Her spandex shorts, black and purple, had been pulled off, as had a pair of off-white panties. One Adidas running shoe was on a white stockinged foot; the other was some feet away. She wore rings and a necklace. It held a diamond. Robbery was not one of the motives.

“The ME have an opinion?”

“Penile rape, not a substitute. Condom. Crime scene already has the brand — from the lubricant.”

Marlowe rose and made a 360-degree circuit, carefully studying the scene. Large swathes of dense forest were to the south, north and west. The park — with parking lot and picnic area and expanse of mown grass — was east. That clearing ended in a line of forest and, beyond, what seemed like marshland.

Impossible to see if anything had been disturbed, given the foliage. If one were intent on murdering someone and not leaving visible signs of approach and escape, this would be ground zero.

A final glance at the poor woman. Then Marlowe covered her again and rose.

A momentary thought: Tremain wouldn’t’ve called her in after the first killing — he’d keep his kingdom wrapped up tight — but someone at IDCI in Springfield might have.

This was exactly the sort of crime Marlowe made her specialty. She would have dropped anything and headed to Bowman County; if she had, would she have gotten leads to BRK sufficient to collar him, or at least gotten close enough to make him rethink today’s attack?

And avoided Kelly’s death?

For that matter, she herself could have scoured the wire, as she sometimes did, looking for crimes involving perps like this.

But she hadn’t.

Blame, though, had no place in investigations.

“The jogger who found her. He see anything at all helpful?”

“No vehicles, other than hers. No people. Oh, and the alibi? I pulled GPS from his car. He was in Anderson. His cell provider geolocated the phone right where he said he was. I confirmed it was him on the phone because I got a voice print of a message he left at 12:02. It matched his vocal profile.”

Well, Initiative Girl...

Marlowe was again looking around the cluttered woods, viny and stoked with leaves, saplings dying from encroaching parents, which stole sustenance and blocked out the sun.

“Where?” she said softly.

Eventide looked her way.

“How did he get to her? That’s the key.”

Where always was.

Where the perp lived, where they found the victim, where the would-be victim escaped...

Where got you who.

Sometimes it got you why but that didn’t interest Constant Marlowe much, and in this case, there wasn’t much doubt as to motive.

Where?

The forensic team would have good imagery of the tread of his shoes and that might prove to be of some help. What Marlowe was far more interested in was his vehicle, where tire treads and wheelbase and, occasionally, oil and gas and antifreeze leaks can lead directly to unsubs’ front doors.

She wanted to know: Where had he parked to start his hunt?

In her mind Marlowe made a chart, as she often did when considering the geography of a crime scene.

North

West Crime Scene Parking Lot East

South

She explained this technique to Eventide, who lifted an eyebrow, as if memorizing the idea. The deputy said, “Plenty of soft dirt in the parking lot and we didn’t find any of his shoe prints there. Or the stream. So he didn’t come that way.” She pointed.

At the eastern side of the park was a tributary that ran north and south. The muddy banks were three or four feet wide; no one could have crossed without leaving prints.

“South?” Eventide continued. “We searched a hundred yards both sides of where her car was on the pull-off. No Cross-Fits.”

“What was the ground like there?”

“Some gravel, some asphalt. Mud in a few places. If he really wanted to avoid leaving prints, he could’ve found a way to track her without leaving sign.”

Sign. The word hunters use to mean tracks left by prey.

Marlowe asked, “North and west?”

“We haven’t looked there. Not yet.”

So the “where” chart had been modified.

North (To be searched)

West (To be searched) Crime Scene Parking Lot (No) East (No)

South (Unlikely but possible)

Eventide said, “Oh, and if you’re wondering, our Public Affairs officer’s putting out a request for witnesses.” She shrugged. “We know how that goes, but maybe somebody’ll surprise us and step up.”

“I need a gas station, the closest.”

Eventide said, “That’d be Dunham’s. But BP’s a dime less. Five miles but definitely worth the drive if you fill up.”

“No. I’ll go with Dunham’s.”

Smiling, Eventide said, “That’s good of you.”

Marlowe looked at her quizzically.

“Supporting local. Not the chains.”

Oh, retail loyalty. An idea that had never occurred to Constant Marlowe.

Chapter 3

You could think of a body not in terms of twos — eyes, legs, arms. But in triangles.

The triangle made by the breasts and the navel. The eyes and the nose, the ears and the chin. You could see this clearly if you drew lines connecting them.

With a pen.

Or a knife.

Threes...

Pythagoras, the ancient Greek mathematician and philosopher, developed that famous law: the hypotenuse — the long side — of a right triangle is equal to the sum of the square of the other two sides. This observation gave rise to mathematicians dividing up the mother triangle into smaller ones — for whatever reason mathematicians divided things up.

The process was called “dissection.”

Joseph Ray Whelan was thinking of this now as he lay in the woods east of the parking lot at Lone Ridge Park. He was watching the police.

Dissection...

An appropriate word at the moment, as Kelly’s body, which the medical examiner’s team was loading into the van, was about to go under the knife.

Joseph Ray smelled honeysuckle, he smelled loam, he smelled pine. There was probably animal scat near where he lay but he smelled none of that. The air was fragrant and the air was warm. He shifted aside a, yes, triangular leaf of a plant, big as his head. It provided good cover, and good cover was just what he needed now.

He was intrigued by one thing in particular. The arrival of a new investigator.

She was an intense woman wearing casual clothing and he knew she was a cop from the gold badge on her hip and the pistol she wore.

Everything about her told him she was in charge: her eyes, her posture, the words she spoke — silent to him, but unmistakable in their meaning as revealed by the reactions of the other officers she was talking to. And if there were any doubt as to her role, he’d seen the sheriff skulk off angry and sullen after a brief discussion, kicked off the case.

Joseph Ray ducked lower, letting the leaf slowly rise back to its natural spot. The Outsider — as he automatically dubbed the new cop — turned slowly and examined the park. She couldn’t possibly see him but he felt unreasonable concern that she was, almost magically, putting together fragments of clues that told her he was here.

She’d be wondering if there had been any witnesses who could identify the killer.

A question he too wanted answered.

Ah, the Outsider...

How could he cast her in terms of threes?

The answer came to him suddenly.

This woman was smart, persistent, focused.

And what did that mean?

That meant she would not relent until she found her prey.

Which was all Joseph Ray Whelan really needed to know about her.

For the time being.

Chapter 4

Not a cloud in the sky...

Glen Hope was gazing out his picture window.

A fine day, pleasant, productive — errands accomplished — and now approaching one of his favorite times: a meal with his family.

The fit man, in jeans and yellow polo shirt, turned from the view — the sky was literally without clouds — and walked to his wife of twenty-four years. He looked over her shoulder at the needlepoint she was working on.

“You really are quite the artist.”

“Oh, hardly.” She gave one of her shy laughs. Modesty became Liz.

The image was a landscape of a field in which a tree, barren of leaves, stood out in the foreground. Liz’s stitching tended to be small, which made the images depicted on the cloth higher resolution, you might say. He smiled to himself to think of describing such a traditional form of art in high tech terms.

With the x’s of stitching, the work reminded him of that game Erik and Tamara used to play but had outgrown. Minecraft. Erik, seventeen, was now into first-person shooters and adventure games. Tamara, nearly twenty-one, had lost all interest in consoles and controllers (which made Christmas and birthday lists a lot harder).

As for Jason, who’d been born two years before Tamara... he hadn’t been into games at all. Glen felt the blip he always felt thinking about his eldest son and then chose not to think about him any longer.

It was a cloudless day.

Keep it that way.

The Hopes’ split-level sat on the outskirts of Clark Valley, on a one-acre rectangle, similar to most other residences in this neighborhood. Their yard was mostly grass but featured a bristle of trees and brush at the back, which Glen called the “beard.” Thirty years old, the structure featured four bedrooms, a marvelous screened in porch for all occasions, a kitchen in which Liz had produced hundreds of fine meals despite its being in sore need of updating. And a large cellar, in which the family had taken shelter from cyclones several times.

Pea-green skies presaging twisters are simply a part of life on midwestern plains.

Liz concentrated on the handwork, her fingers quick and sure as she gave depth to the landscape, rolling hills, cloudy sky. She paused occasionally to sweep from her downturned face strands of dark hair, laced with just a hint of gray.

Glen’s, blond, also had some gray.

Liz’s face, normally graced with a cheerful smile, was subdued at the moment.

“We knew it was coming,” Glen said softly.

She didn’t respond for a moment, “I know. Just...”

He squeezed her shoulder and planted his lips briefly on her hair. Smelling jasmine. Then he stepped away. “I like her rental.”

“It’s very nice.”

“And you know she’ll be fine. It’s a college town. And she’s more savvy than you and me put together.”

And with that his wife’s good mood eased back.

He walked to the couch, comfortable and worn. Liz was in her mother’s armchair — never their more comfy rocker — while needlepointing (no risk of stabbing yourself — the tapestry needles are blunt-tipped; it was hard for her to do the precise work when in motion). In addition, here there were two other armchairs, a big screen TV, a few ottomans. On the deep-red walls were scores of family pictures and her needlepoints and plaques proclaiming Glen H. Hope salesman of the year or marketer of the year or winner of this sales contest or that.

He had the gift, the tongue, the smile... and the eye for sizing up customers, turning the reluctant into partners in the transaction, so both parties ended up winners.

He could sell blanks to blanks... Pick your cliché.

Glen shuffled through stacks of documents on the coffee table. They related to his business as a real estate broker — and volunteer job as vice president of the Bowman County Commerce Club, a business booster organization. Many of the docs were Liz’s too. She was manager of one of the bigger insurance agencies in town.

“That Danny,” Glen said, jotting notes. “Tam called him ‘perfect.’ I think she’s right.”

“Agree with you there.”

Danny Morgenstern was the senior at Ellis College their daughter had been dating for the past month. His off campus house was not far from Tamara’s. After they’d dropped her this afternoon, the cheerful, athletic young man had shown up to help her unpack.

Husband and wife worked on their respective projects for ten minutes and then Liz rose and walked into the kitchen, smoothing the skirt of her floral dress — navy blue with tiny pink petals. “I’ll see about dinner.”

After a few minutes, the trim woman backed out of the fridge. “Meat loaf. Mashed potatoes?”

“Good. Comfort food. And after, Blandon?”

Liz said, “Oh, good. The new episode. It drops tonight.”

The English did great detective shows. The one they were currently watching was as addictive as popcorn. A detective inspector — a tough woman from East London — and her partner, a young South Asian man who was an Oxford graduate.

Quite the pair...

And, naturally, a gruff supervisor. And an oil slick of a bad guy. Or a man who appeared to be the villain.

Glen walked to the door of the smaller bedroom, the first on the right up the hall. He knocked and gave it five seconds — it would be at least twenty in the case of his daughter — and opened it.

The rangy boy, with tousled dark hair, looked up from his desk, where he was poring over Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain. He liked it better than Huckleberry Finn, the boy had said. Glen was embarrassed to say he hadn’t read either.

He was a bit somber, disappointed he’d missed the family’s picnic on the way to Tamara’s new place because he’d been in class.

“How’s it going?”

Now he brightened. “It’s the best.” He launched into a description of the plot. Apparently he’d finished it already — there were yellow Post-it Notes throughout the volume — although it had only been assigned a few days ago. Erik said he felt a lot like Tom.

Glen would pick it up; what parent wouldn’t want a way to get yet another glimpse into the mysterious minds of their teenage kids?

Glen glanced at the screen of his Dell — to make sure it was the book report he was working on and not one of the video games he loved and that could be bottomless wormholes for teenagers. Glen and Liz controlled his time online.

The internet... the blessing and the bane of all parents.

“You missing her?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

The two siblings had remained close even in their teen years, a time when many brothers and sisters tend to ease in separate directions. Certain things had occurred within the Hope household, of course, to draw them closer than they might otherwise be.

Uh-oh. None of those thoughts. Nothing to dampen the blue-sky day, which had been so pleasant and productive.

Then after a very fake frown, he said, “You know, I’d feel a lot better if I could have her room.”

A beat, then he laughed. His father did too.

Glen walked through the living room onto the front porch to assess the grass. It could wait four or five days for a mow. He looked over the trim rectangle. At the end was a white picket fence, interrupted by an arching trellis, both of which he’d built and painted with Erik’s help. Liz had planted wisteria, which now twined up the wood. Her fall roses were beginning to bloom.

Pretty...

He smiled as he thought the word. It echoed something from earlier in the day.

As the family had cruised east on Route 27 toward New France to deliver Tam to Ellis College, the girl had glanced at the park they were passing. “Hey, pretty, hm?”

Hm. Yep.

Glen had hit the turn signal, then pulled up the dirt and gravel road for a lunchtime stop in the idyllic place.

And he thought once again:

Not a cloud on the horizon.

Which is when he heard the rumble of an engine and watched as a battered car pulled up in front of the house, the vehicle’s color an odd orange. Behind it was a quieter, though also distinctive, vehicle: a police or Sheriff’s Office unmarked cruiser.

Two women got out. The driver of the official vehicle was a stocky woman with light-brown skin and black hair in a ponytail. She’d be Indigenous, as were a number of Clark Valley residents. She wore a deputy’s uniform. The other, with the pale complexion of someone who had clearly not spent the summer out of doors, was in a leather jacket and jeans, with a gold badge on her belt.

They oriented themselves, turned simultaneously toward Glen Hope and started up the walk — a strip of concrete that he’d had poured just after they’d moved in and that the family had christened by letting Tamara draw a smiley face in the still-wet square just below the stairs.

Chapter 5

Constant Marlowe introduced herself and Deputy Zo Eventide.

Glen Hope, a handsome, trim man of around fifty, didn’t do a double take at her given name. Some did, some didn’t.

He did, however, frown at the name of their employers. “Our daughter? Is everything okay?”

“No, nothing like that, sir,” Eventide said.

Marlowe: “We’d just like to ask you a few questions.”

“Well, sure, come on in.”

He opened the door and let them into a comfortable suburban home. Well-worn, mismatched furniture, cluttered with business papers and magazines and direct mail shoppers, coffee cups. The minor disarray added somehow to the comfort of the place.

A trim woman with shoulder-length dark hair — a bob style — appeared in the kitchen doorway. Her garment was a simple blue dress. Marlowe had done some research. She was Liz Hope, Glen’s wife and the manager of an insurance agency in downtown Clark Valley.

It was her face that was now tight with concern. “Tamara?”

“Nothing about Tam, they were saying.” Glen turned his face their way for another layer of confirmation.

“Nothing to do with your family,” Marlowe assured them.

The woman relaxed. “She just went away to school. You know how it is.”

Marlowe didn’t. Eventide might or might not.

Needlepoints were on the walls — landscapes mostly — and they were well done. There was a sewing setup by an old armchair, lots of skeins of yarn and cloth. The only needlework Constant Marlowe had done within the past year was to clumsily stitch together a Nomex glove, torn on a jagged piece of rebar when she’d been diving for cover under fire at a construction site near Cicero. Oh, and to patch up the bullet graze in her thigh to slow the blood’s escape and delay the infection. A CVS drugstore sewing kit.

Glen gestured to a couch. Liz asked about coffee or tea. The women declined both offers.

Marlowe said, “You were in Lone Ridge Park around noon today.”

The couple regarded each other briefly with surprise. He said, “That’s right. We were driving Tam to school. Ellis College. New France.”

Eventide said, “Did you hear about the murder today?”

“My God, no.” A glance at the powered-down TV.

“A woman was killed in the park. Probably the same killer as in Stevensville on Monday.”

“BRK, the rapist? Where we were?” Glen whispered. “Today?”

Liz stammered, “He... he actually, you know, attacked somebody, killed them when we were having lunch?”

“Around that time, yes.” Eventide was speaking with consummate calm.

“Jesus,” Glen muttered.

Marlowe glanced to Eventide, who opened a map of the park on her phone. “Where were you exactly?”

Glen looked at the screen. He pointed. “We were parked there and sat at a picnic bench maybe there.”

Marlowe noted they would have had a good view of the woods when they left or returned to the vehicle.

“We have a rough description,” Eventide said. “He has dark hair, wearing Cross-Fit Plus running shoes, don’t know the color, weighing one eighty to two ten. He’s white.”

“No. We didn’t see anybody.” Glancing to his wife, who was nodding in agreement, he said, “Remember, I was saying to Tam, we have the whole place to ourselves.” Looking back to the officers. “You know, in parks sometimes people have boom boxes, or kids, little kids, running around? Noisy? But we were the only ones.”

“Did you see a yellow Camaro on the pull-off along Route 27? Near the park entrance.”

They hesitated and shared another glance, answering the question. Liz said, “Gee, I don’t know.”

But Glen seemed to feel a need to be honest, though admitting he’d seen it might have consequences. “Yes, I remember it.”

“Anybody near it?” Eventide asked. “Watching it or watching Kelly?”

Both Glen and Liz were still for a moment; they hadn’t heard her name yet. And the personification slapped them hard.

“No,” Glen said, looking at his wife, who confirmed what he’d said with a nod.

Marlowe asked, “Any other cars?”

Neither of them had noted any. Marlowe believed them.

Another figure appeared from the hallway. A teenager, tall, his head covered with a mass of dark curly hair. A good-looking boy. He was in the uniform of teens nowadays: jeans and a sweatshirt with the logo of a pro soccer team.

Glen introduced her to Erik, who gave a concerned frown and — as with all boys his age — looked immediately at their weapons. If he played first-person shooter games — why even say “if”? — he’d know as much about Glocks, and every other form of armament, as police did.

Glen explained that Erik hadn’t been with them on the drive but had been in school.

“That thing in the park?” His eyes widened as he looked at his parents. “Lone Ridge. This dude beat some girl to death. And, you know...”

Glen stared at him. “How did you—?”

“You know, online, a Reddit feed.”

Marlowe knew the sprawling social media and news site, which was curated by its members, not a central server like Facebook or Twitter, or X, or whatever they were calling it now. The name was a play on “I read it.”

“Did anyone post they knew anything about what happened? Or was there something in the comments?”

He shook his head. “Not really. I mean, it was just a story. People were like, oh, sh... Oh, hell, lock your doors. Buy a gun. If I caught him, I’d cut, you know, them off.”

Liz gave him an exasperated, watch-your-language look.

He continued, “But nobody said anything specific.”

Marlowe thanked him, and Eventide asked if he heard anything helpful, could he call them?

“Totally.” He returned to his room, and Mom and Dad appeared relieved — the news of his parents’ and sister’s proximity to a killer had not upset him.

Glen was now frowning. “How did you find out? About us, I mean?”

Marlowe explained she had gone to a nearby gas station and viewed security videos, looking for trucks or motor homes that were in the area around the time of the killing. “They’d be more likely to have dashcams than sedans. We got some license numbers and called the owners. One couple, in a camper, got an image of you turning into the park entrance. We ran your tag.”

Glen gave a brief laugh. “We watch those crime shows. Cops... I mean, police’re always doing smart things like that.”

Liz said, “And fingerprints and DNA and facial recognition.”

Marlowe asked, “You were there for how long?”

Again, a silent conference. Liz said, “Fifty minutes, an hour, tops.”

“You were at the picnic table the whole time?”

Glen said, “Well, Tam called her boyfriend, so she went to another table.” He scoffed. “Even though she was just about to see him.”

Liz’s eyes narrowed. She asked, “How close was it?”

Marlowe: “The murder?”

She nodded.

“Lizzie. Doesn’t matter.”

But the woman kept her eyes on Marlowe’s. The agent said, “About twenty yards into the woods from the tables. West. And thirty or forty north.”

The woman’s face grew dismayed. “Oh, my.”

“Honey, he wasn’t going to hurt us.”

“No, just... I don’t know. Being that close.”

Marlowe asked for their daughter’s full name and number. She and Eventide would make the drive to Ellis College for an interview. Marlowe avoided speaking to witnesses on the phone. And her parents would not have to be present; they confirmed she was over eighteen.

“Erik and Tamara. Any other children?”

A fraction of a pause. “Just the two,” Glen said evenly.

Marlowe had seen a picture on the mantel of three youngsters, an older brother most likely, given the resemblance to Erik.

Glen’s tone and Liz’s still face possibly spoke of some tragedy. No need to pursue it.

Marlowe handed a card to Glen. “If you think of anything that could be helpful, give me a call.”

“Sure.”

“Lock your doors and keep those security lights I saw on at night.”

This threw Liz.

Threw her bad.

“Wait... are you saying we might be in danger?” A whisper. Shock in her face.

Glen too appeared not to have considered this. He looked to Liz and back to Marlowe.

“Very unlikely. It’d just be best to take a few precautions.”

Eventide added, “The profile of a suspect like him is that he’s a sociopath but that doesn’t mean he’s stupid. After the crime, they put as much distance as they can between themselves and the scene. It’s too risky to stay around and look for witnesses.”

Glen was frowning. “But what if he came back later? And, I don’t know, he followed you here?”

Marlowe said, “We took precautions.”

The deputy added, “We drove miles out of the way. And stopped twice just to make sure we weren’t being followed.”

Marlowe, of course, had hoped they had been followed, in which case the predator would become the prey.

“But,” Glen said, lifting his palms, “that means you at least thought it could be a risk.”

“There was definitely no one behind us.”

Zo Eventide added, “You really don’t need to worry, Mr. Hope. It’d be next to impossible for him to know you even exist.”

Chapter 6

Joseph Ray Whelan sat in his car, hunched down, out of sight, on the pleasant block where lived the Family Hope, 1755 Maple Crest Avenue, about a mile from downtown Clark Valley.

Yards trimmed, bushes trimmed. True to the namesake, the maples were thick, the oaks too. They were interspersed with the circular tombstones of Dutch elm. That poor tree just couldn’t get a break.

He studied the house, “guarded” by a fence and trellis a fawn could get over.

He was reflecting:

The thing about witnesses is they often know something even when they don’t know something.

That is, they might not have seen the bloody act itself or a man in a dark raincoat, collar turned up, acting suspiciously.

But they could have seen something as inconsequential as a beige sedan with a middle school bumper sticker expressing pride in a youngster, a woman carrying flowers from a grocery store, a pizza delivery boy.

Nothing dubious, nothing out of the ordinary...

But that might be just the missing piece that leads investigators to the killer’s door.

Of course, witnesses might also have seen you actually swing the pipe into the skull of the victim.

Or they might have seen nothing at all, just as they’d claimed.

Which meant that one had a decision to make: Was it worth the risk of getting caught to eliminate — such a chilling yet appropriate word — someone who might or might not be a liability?

On the whole, Joseph Ray decided that the answer was probably yes, it was a risk worth taking.

Nothing to do but... feel the sadness begin to unspool within him. It was like a dog. Sometimes it slept, sometimes it was awake and standing attentive on its tense and quivering terrier legs, ready to strike. Now, it was utterly alert and Joseph Ray Whelan needed to kill.

The two women officers left the Hopes and returned to their cars. They made fast U-turns, requiring him to duck and drop his head even farther, all the way to the opposite seat, bending over the center console.

Then Joseph Ray was upright once more and he glanced into the rearview mirror to see them heading out of the neighborhood. He was sure they had not seen him. He now angled the rearview his way and noted that the dodge had dislodged a few strands of his perfectly trimmed dark hair.

He removed a comb from his pocket. It was white and made of whalebone. The substance was politically incorrect and likely illegal. But whales died of natural causes too, didn’t they? And what would happen to the bones? Might as well give them a second life.

With the skill of an artist he arranged the coif perfectly.

Joseph Ray now extracted from his backpack one of the items that ruined the Rule of Threes regarding the contents: a police radio.

He listened to the transmissions.

Smart, persistent, focused...

The Outsider would be smart, yes — being the big gun brought in to solve the case. But she hadn’t been smart enough to think about somebody listening in to the Bowman County Sheriff’s Office comms frequency, on which Deputy Eventide had reported where they were going to speak to possible witnesses: the home of Glen and Liz Hope. Son, Erik, seventeen. Daughter, Tamara, twenty.

So one of them, or the family collectively, might know something about the attack.

Social media didn’t give him a lot of information. Like much of the world, they had lost interest in Facebook and had no Twitter/X presence. The kids were on some of the newer platforms but not very active.

Then something occurred that made him change his mind about the Outsider and he understood that he’d slipped, underestimating her.

A car pulled past him. It was a sedan, five, six years old. Some dents and scuffs.

And the license plate was government.

The plainclothes officer drove past the Hopes’ place and parked on the opposite side of the street, from which he had a good view of both the front and back entrances of the home.

Goddamnit.

Had the Outsider worried that she’d been followed from Lone Ridge Park?

Had she worried that the county comms system had been compromised?

Or was she simply being cautious?

The officer’s presence was irritating, of course. But it was also an affirmation: It meant one of the threesome inside, or the dippy daughter, knew something about the crime.

The bodyguard was — momentarily at least — a deterrent. So he started the engine and drove away from the curb. Not slow, not fast. Just the right speed to avoid attracting attention. He didn’t, Joseph Ray saw. The cop in the front seat was texting.

Great security man, he reflected, with the sarcasm he was occasionally known for.

He listened again on his radio to see if he could learn where the Outsider and the deputy were going. Nothing.

He drove out of Clark Valley toward the development where his apartment was located, the apartment that would be as he left it, filled with a silence rising from the gray shag and sunlight dancing off knife blades, only a few lumens dimmer than the sun.

As he drove, he fished for a burner phone in his backpack, then placed a call to the Sheriff’s Office. Many law enforcement agencies, he knew, did not accept calls from blocked or undisclosed numbers, but he used a service to give himself a fake caller ID number and name. He was James Torrence of Clark Valley, Illinois.

“Bowman County Sheriff’s Office.”

“Yes, uhm, I’m Jim Torrence, a reporter with Western Illinois News. I’m writing a story on the incident today at Lone Ridge Park. I’m trying to get the spelling of the lead investigator. Can you help me with that, please?”

“The sheriff’s Frank Tremain.”

“Oh, I know that. I have a quote from him. This is someone else. A woman, from some other agency, I think. She’s not with the Sheriff’s Office.”

“Oh, her. Yessir. Hold on.”

A hand went over the mouthpiece and a brief, muffled conversation ensued. The woman came back on. “That’d be Constant Marlowe. She’s a special agent with the state Department of Criminal Investigations.”

“Constance?”

“No, it’s Constant. I checked.”

He thanked her and disconnected.

“Constant,” he whispered.

Smart, persistent, focused...

And she was one thing more, which ruined the Rule of Threes, but Joseph Ray Whelan didn’t mind one bit.

Constant Marlowe was also like a guide on a hunting trip, an expert, leading customers directly to what they wanted to find: game.

Bear, deer, elk... or in his case — witnesses.

Chapter 7

Flat.

That was an appropriate word to describe Clark Valley, Illinois, and its surroundings.

It was one of several towns around the state named after the Revolutionary War general George Rogers Clark, who in the late 1700s defeated the British, in a series of rather unspectacular confrontations and, as a result, more than doubled the size of the thirteen original colonies.

Clark Valley, CV to most locals, was one of those rare midwestern plains towns whose population — twenty-nine thousand — was not described as “down from” a larger number as of the prior census.

Constant Marlowe liked to know her surroundings and had done the basic Google and ChatGPT searches. She’d turned them into pdfs and listened on the drive here — second in the text reading queue after the Abigail Bills case file.

Clark Valley was the seat of Bowman County, and there was some irony in the names. Joseph Bowman was a junior officer to the bigwig, General Clark, who only got a town named after him — and a fairly modest one, at that.

Driving now into downtown, Marlowe noted that CV had not seen any of the decay evident in Rust Belt circles to the east along this latitude — Ohio and Indiana. Probably because Clark Valley was and had always been agricultural, not a mill or iron town.

As she followed Zo Eventide’s cruiser through downtown to the Sheriff’s Office, Marlowe noted the demographics were not representative of west central Land of Lincoln. She saw mostly white faces. Being not terribly far from St. Louis and other centers of populations of color, this surprised her.

Eventide led her into the BCSO’s parking lot, a large patch of asphalt surrounded by unenthusiastic chain-link. Stealing or vandalizing cruisers was probably not a sport around here.

Together, the women walked toward the two-story building of red brick, like every official structure aligning with county government. Built, according to the cornerstone, in 1934.

“Yes, ma’am, Andy of Mayberry,” Eventide said, as she badged her way through the door.

TV or movie. Marlowe didn’t know.

Didn’t ask.

She followed Eventide down the stairs to the lower level of the dim structure — to save on electrical bills, every other bulb had been removed. The hallway smelled of some undefinable chemicals and recent burn. A lamp? A Hot Pocket in a microwave?

Marlowe now asked, “The Bureau involved?” There was, as yet, no indication of federal jurisdiction, but the FBI often consulted in serial crime investigations.

“Apprised, but they’re not active. It’s a big deal for Bowman County. But they’re also only the second and third homicides this year. After Jim Gibbons went off the deep end because his wife made the casserole, the only casserole, once too often. Technically, since he also killed himself, I guess make that four homicides. The Bureau doesn’t have a nearby field office and they’ve got terrorism they’re working on mostly. And then there’s been some hate crimes, some LGBTQ but mostly race based.” The deputy scoffed. “You hear people say, ‘What? In this day and age.’ And the answer is ‘Hell yes.’”

Deputies and staff greeted Eventide as they walked past. Marlowe received glances of curiosity. One or two seemed impressed she was here. She knew she had a reputation among some circles.

“Your name?” Marlowe asked. “The first one you mentioned?”

“Watseka. Named after a Potawatomi woman, the eighteen hundreds. Her uncle was the chief of the Kankakee band of the Potawatomi Nation, which was a big deal. Anyway, she was also known as Zozette. My husband says it makes me sound like a Parisian cancan dancer.”

They entered a storeroom that had been converted into an operations center, supplies shepherded to the far end, the recent dust tracks on the floor revealed. Two fiberboard tables had been set up and Redweld accordion folders and black-and-white file cartons sat on one, notebooks and yellow pads and pens on another. An ugly green wall nearby held two nailed up case boards, their surfaces dry erase white. The left was devoted to Monday’s murder, the right to today’s.

Marlowe was surprised to see that the latest crime had been well documented on the board, even though the murder was only hours old, and she remembered too that Eventide had told her the forensics had already been completed. A speed record for small town investigations.

A large, shaved-headed man, his skin matching the mahogany window trim, was taping color pictures to the board. There were dozens of them and the crime scene photographer had done a good job, shooting the body and the surrounding terrain from all angles.

The man turned.

“Constant Marlowe. DCI.”

“Odell Davis.”

“You work the scene?” Nodding at the board.

“No. I’m Patrol but the sheriff called us in when we heard about the second one.”

Us?

A woman entered, tall, trim, with blonde hair pulled back tight. She too was in a uniform. “Mattie Charlotte.”

Oh, us.

It was not a conjoined first name; the breastplate read “M. Charlotte.”

Marlowe introduced herself. Firm handshakes all around.

“We’re doing the canvassing,” Charlotte said. “Following up on evidentiary and witness leads.”

Davis said, “Together. Sometimes it helps.”

“Double-team the witnesses. Keeps them—”

“Off guard. But no leads so far. The park’s not the most popular. Nothing to do there.” Davis shrugged.

“Except smoke pot if you’re a teenager.”

Marlowe sloughed her jacket and hung it on a coatrack. She declined Eventide’s offer of coffee, and walked to the boards, crossed her arms and examined the photographs of Abigail and Kelly. Their eyes were in that eerie focus-unfocus that you never got over — either when seeing the corpse in person or... well, whenever the images decided to resurface; maybe when you were shopping for groceries, driving fast on a clear fall day, or at night when sleep approached.

Or — yes, it happened — when making love.

Then her attention went to the notations on the board:

Incident 9/17

Victim: Abigail Bills, 29, marketing manager.

Location: 2449 Lake View, Stevensville, her residence.

COD: Blunt force trauma.

TOD: approximately 5:00 to 6:00 p.m.

Injuries to genital area consistent with rape by penile penetration, not manual or object.

On the right board:

Incident 9/20

Victim: Kelly Nader, 28, manager, health club on Clark Turnpike and Highway 4.

Location: Lone Ridge Park, Bowman County.

COD: Blunt force trauma.

TOD: approximately 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.

Rape, as in 9/17 incident.

Marlowe had worried about the quality of the investigative work.

She need not have.

The boards both, even today’s killing, contained other notations: among them, detailed descriptions of chemical compositions, product brands, physical dynamics of the murders, charts of the locations and scores of photos.

Marlowe removed a notebook from her backpack and jotted down a summary.

• the brand of the condom. Everett Products For Him+Her.

• Shoes — Cross-Fit Plus running shoe, size 10 ½.

• Black hairs, no bulb — no DNA profile possible.

• Eye-Protect eye drops on both victims (no bottles found in either victim’s homes).

• Fibers consistent with cloth work gloves.

• Fibers consistent with gray ski mask or stocking cap.

• Murder weapon, possibly plumbing pipe.

• No robbery.

• A total of 285 friction ridge prints recovered at the Bills scene. Most were victim’s. None in IAFIS.

• Seventeen individuals interviewed in Abigail’s neighborhood. Her fiancé is Stevensville police officer. He interviewed an additional seven before being removed from case as procedural matter.

Equally impressive was the canvassing effort. Davis and Charlotte had hit nearly sixty-five stores in search of purchasers: of the shoes, condoms, the eye drops, work gloves and ski masks in the past month, specifically interested in those paying cash.

Marlowe commented on the work.

“Sweat labor,” Davis said. “Just have to do it.”

Charlotte shrugged. “No breakthroughs. All the cash purchases? Most of the stores turned out not to have video. And the shoes?”

“Probably a pair stolen from a mall store, Alberts,” Davis explained. “But that could have been anytime in the past two months — when they did the last inventory. Condoms too might’ve been lifted. Happens a lot. We’ll keep at it. Our search circle—” He looked at Charlotte. “What’d we decide?”

“We started with twenty miles. Now we’re up to thirty.”

Impressive search perimeter.

Davis snapped his fingers. “Howell Springs.”

“Can’t forget Howell Springs. Next on our list.”

Marlowe asked, “What lab are you using?”

Davis said, “Ours, Agent Marlowe.”

“Constant.”

“I’m sorry?”

“It’s her name,” Eventide said.

“Your lab did all this?”

Davis and Charlotte nodded in unison.

The latter said, “People tell us it’s not half bad.”

This was true. The lab had established the suspect’s weight by correlating the size of the shoe sole in square centimeters and the depth of his stance in dirt, whose compacting quality they’d tested with a device one of the crime scene people had made themselves. She’d never heard of the technique.

“Any other sexual assaults, with similar MOs?”

Eventide said, “Nothing like this. We checked going back what...?”

Charlotte offered, “Ten years. Drunk boys at Ellis College, a few predators around schools, Henry Comes and his daughter — he’s still doing time for that. Three forcibles, but they’re still in the slammer. Most recent was that trucker from...”

“Des Moines,” Davis said.

“Assaulted two women. Ski mask, knife. Didn’t kill either of them.”

“And he’s?”

“No longer with us. His third victim—” Davis began.

Charlotte corrected, “Potential.”

“His third potential victim kept an LCP three-eighty in a bra holster. She reloaded to finish the job, which the prosecutor might’ve taken a dim view of — perp was dead halfway through the first six rounds — but he didn’t.”

“Farther afield, Illinois in general? NCIC?”

The National Crime Information Center compiles data about all felonies from around the country. It’s an essential tool, though days, weeks or even months can pass before officers get around to writing and submitting details of crimes.

“Nothing fitting this MO.”

Marlowe nodded and fished out her phone. She composed a text and sent it off. A moment later she got a reply.

K. will look into it. How’s Downstate?

She typed.

Lot like Upstate. Only Down.

Her eyes were drawn to a map of the park and she was thinking the word that had hovered in her mind earlier:

Where?

She posed the question to the others in the room: Where did they think he’d entered the park to come after her?

Charlotte said, “We’ve pondered that. He was smart enough to track her and come after her from the brush — too much ground cover to leave footprints. Just don’t know.”

“Dogs?”

Davis said, “Don’t have ’em. Expensive. But we borrowed Tony Williamson’s hounds.”

Charlotte said, “They just got bored.”

“Keep up with the canvass.” Marlowe was testing the waters, as to her authority here. But the pair nodded agreeably. She added, “You’re doing a good job.”

“Thanks,” Charlotte said for both of them.

To Eventide, Marlowe said, “I’m going to check into the hotel. Then we’ll take a ride out to the college to talk to Tamara.” Her eyes slid to another map — this one of Bowman County as a whole.

“Where... Where...”

Once again, Marlowe was unaware that she’d spoken aloud.

Eventide said, “We’ll find it. Tire tread on the shoulder where he parked, or that Cross-Fit print somewhere.”

Marlowe was asking a different question, though. Eyes scanning the towns and residential areas on the map, she said, “I mean, where is he going to strike next.”

A pause, then the deputy asked, “You think he will?”

“Oh, yeah. And soon. I’ve run these cases before. An interval of two or three days between kills means he’s losing control. It’ll be Sunday at the latest.”

Eventide looked at a third board and hesitated. Then she pulled it forward and opened the easel. At the top she wrote:

Next attack probable no later than 9/23.

Chapter 8

The isolation of Clark Valley had another advantage, Marlowe noted, if you rooted for mom-and-pop stores — as Zo Eventide apparently did, based on her opinions of gas stations.

The big-box stores had not destroyed downtown.

Here were a bakery and bookshop and music store and bridal salon and a haberdashery, whatever that word meant (something about fashion; tight-fitting men’s clothing covered eerie faceless mannequins). Appliances. Electronics. “Dry Goods” — cloth and yarn, it seemed. No cheap prepaid phone and minutes card stores told her there was a small or nonexistent immigrant population.

Through the dusty, late summer afternoon, the sun angular, Marlowe was walking from the Sheriff’s Office, where she’d left her car, to the one hotel downtown, the Illinois Country Inn. The name dated to the 1700s when the entire Upper Mississippi watershed was dubbed a self-governing entity.

Marlowe often walked through the towns in which she was running cases, picking up a sense of the locale and those who populated it. Their respect for law, their contempt. Controlled substances of choice. Clothing, from male and female boardroom suits to men’s sleeveless tees. Number of tats and the age of those inked and messages conveyed by the artists’ needles. Lawyers’ offices whose windows featured placards about DUI representation or immigration or divorce or weapons. Soccer versus gridiron versus NASCAR.

As she looked about, she noted again the absence of diversity, even more pronounced than earlier. You could not be a law enforcer in America without having a finger on the pulse of race.

Then she was out of the healthily breathing — if not bustling — downtown and walking through an area that was going through renovation.

Some buildings along here had been torn down completely and signage promised a new development. Interesting. The company putting it up was Buonafortuna Properties — maybe foreign development. Maybe—

Marlowe grunted as a burly hand shot from an alley and clamped down on her jacket collar, tugging hard.

“Hey, little lady, hold up there a minute, wouldja?”

She stumbled back into the alley, not going for her weapon, reluctant, as always, to shoot, unless necessary, and it usually wasn’t.

There were two of them. But she could only clearly see the one in front. Obscuring his buddy, he was nearly 250 pounds. Balding, with blond hair lacquered into a tricky comb-over. His hazel eyes leered.

A walking cliché.

And what was this about? Obviously, he hadn’t wanted her dead; that would have been easily accomplished.

He stepped aside slightly, revealing the second man. More hair, bushy from want of a cut. Slim, cheeks sunken. They were both in gray dungarees and dark windbreakers. The smaller one had on a black T-shirt, with a rock group logo, faded in both senses, the cloth and the ’90s musicians. The bigger one was in a navy-blue work shirt, stained. Some sweat, some other substances.

Not asking why, not yet, not offering: Are you crazy, or you’ve got the wrong person.

Irrelevant.

The world had suddenly become tactical.

Constant Marlowe was assessing.

The ground, the surrounding buildings.

The alley behind her was a cul-de-sac, the only way out blocked, a dumpster to her left, the two thugs in the opening to the right.

The big man crossed his arms. His knuckles were red. Black grit filled the crescents under his nails. He was a scrapper and could do some damage. Though he was hardly Tyson Fury. Fat can’t jab.

The smaller one wasn’t a fighter at all, but he didn’t need to be. His right hand held a pistol inside his jacket. Something small. He lifted an eyebrow, which apparently meant: Look what I’ve got here.

Offense sized up, the playing field mapped, Marlowe asked, “And?”

Not expecting an answer but the big man answered anyway. “You picked the wrong friends, lady.”

And who would that have been? The only person she’d been seen with downtown was Zo Eventide.

Ah, Native American.

A less-popular hate crime than some, Marlowe knew. But hardly unheard of. Maybe the oversize man, though, was, like far too many, an all-purpose bigot and simply targeted whatever ethnicity or race wasn’t his when he stumbled across it.

The big man balled up his fists.

So the little one was going to cover them, while the partner went to work to punish her for her open mind.

Time to find out why.

Slim began to lift the pistol, a small semiauto, from his jacket. But before it hit air, Marlowe speed-drew her Glock and had it aimed at his chest.

Really should’ve had your piece on me from the git-go.

She didn’t share this. Constant Marlowe occasionally thought banter but rarely spoke it aloud.

“Shit.”

She gestured with her gun. “Drop it.”

“It might go off.”

“They don’t do that.”

The big one said, “Naw, I knew somebody—”

She narrowed her eyes.

The gun landed with a thunk.

“You?”

The Bigot shook his head.

“Turn your pockets out and pull your shirt up.”

“Bullshit—”

She aimed at his foot. “You won’t walk right ever again.”

This wasn’t banter. It was negotiation.

“Fuck.” He did as told.

No weapon.

She looked around. No one here. No one even nearby. Why they’d picked the spot.

Good.

“Back up. Into the alley.”

Each man shot a frown the other’s way, but after the briefest of hesitations, they followed instructions, swapping positions with her.

She gestured them farther back. Twenty feet into the shadows. “Stop.”

Now, she had them trapped. No escape.

Marlowe looked them over. “Who hired you?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Bigot said this. Bluster.

A sure sign that he knew what she was talking about.

“Who?”

“Look, we made a mistake.”

Constant Marlowe didn’t smile much but she came close, hearing the words. He didn’t grasp their meaning.

“Who?”

“Not a soul. We didn’t like you hanging out with somebody like her.”

Without much effort, she nailed him in the gut with a left jab. He gagged and went down, clutching his chest, desperate for air.

After a moment Bigot climbed to his feet and cocked his head, breathing hard. The snide smile was back. “Put that away and make it fair.”

“All right.”

From her jacket pocket she took a gray bag, carbon fiber and opened it, slipped her gun and Slim’s Beretta in and affixed the fingerprint lock, sealing it.

If she was going to be in a fight she had time to prepare for, Constant Marlowe took firearms off the table. Oh, the opponent might pull out a switchblade or pick up a rock or — thinking of BRK — a blunt object like the pipe or whatever used on Abigail and Kelly. No worries there; she could handle weapons like that easily.

Guns were different.

She set the bag on the ground at the base of a building that was being demoed. Bigot’s eyes filled with gratification. Now, the odds were even — except they really weren’t, because he outweighed her by more than a hundred pounds.

“You’re so fucked,” he whispered and came for her fast, rolling forward like a tank.

Chapter 9

Constant Marlowe dodged his fierce blows, keeping to her toes mostly — footwork, always footwork.

She could see he hadn’t expected a boxer.

Which is what Marlowe was. She had been a titled amateur and pro. Her first name had come from a reporter who’d described her in an article as a fighter who trounced her opponents with a “constant” barrage of blows. The day after that story ran, she went to the courthouse and dropped her parents’ choice — Prudence — in favor of the journalist’s delightful adjective.

In the ring Bigot would be known as a swarmer. They continually swing and move relentlessly forward, trying to box their opponents into the ropes or the corner with their flailing. It’s sloppy boxing and fans don’t like it, since there’s little technique. It can be effective, of course. Mike Tyson knew how to swarm.

It also can exhaust you, as was beginning to happen now — because Marlowe’s tactic was out-boxing, keeping her distance and making him do all the work. She used her dancing to avoid his blows and make him come to her, striking fast when she saw an opportunity. Out-boxers also study their opponents carefully. She was getting a sense of his tiny repertoire of moves.

Once he missed but swung too hard with his right, leaving himself open. She leapt in, switching to her favorite boxing style: the slugger, using slow, powerful blows, intended for knockouts or TKOs.

Fans loved sluggers.

Bigot stumbled back, then — embarrassed and in pain — came in again, rage in his eyes, swarming still, but not looking for good targets; Constant Marlowe could certainly be stopped; she had been from time to time in the ring. But Bigot wasn’t looking for vulnerabilities. He was now down to barroom brawling, where pushing, pulling, grappling and pounding were the rules of the day.

Sweating in the late summer heat, she moved in a pattern that would make no sense to him but was purposeful — to keep him deep in the alley. If the brawl had spilled onto the street, then somebody might have seen and called one of the deputies — maybe even the sheriff himself.

She wanted to have a “conversation” with Bigot alone and she had a feeling that the tobacco chewing Tremain would cover the big man’s back. They seemed cut from the same bolt. Maybe they were even kin.

Another swipe at his face, testing. He backed away. She lowered her guard for a moment — but he didn’t move in.

Which gave her the message.

Just before Slim reached her from behind, she spun and landed a left jab in his abdomen and then an uppercut to the jaw.

“Ah, ah...” He went down on his back, puking.

Marlowe held up her palm to Bigot, meaning give me a minute. He blinked in surprise. She bent down, rolling Slim onto his side, so that he wouldn’t aspirate.

Then she was up and turning to Bigot, who was now consumed with anger. They circled for a full minute, neither trying to land any serious blows. He was studying her defensive moves — out-boxing for a change.

Now came the frontal assault. He stormed forward.

But her defenses had been fake. Taking stock of your opponent only works if they’re using their true moves.

So when he pressed in, flailing again, he was completely unprepared for her onslaught. Two uppercuts, a right cross, then leaping back. She intentionally stayed within range but when his blows came, she’d positioned herself such that his meaty fists struck with the lowest velocity of the swing.

The ballet went on for a minute or two, until she sensed his weariness moving to a different level.

It was time to get to work. With her iron-hard left arm, she landed a series of jabs to his cheek and face.

The coup de grâce: a brutal one-two to the solar plexus; and the icing, a roundhouse to the jaw.

Bigot was done.

But, ah, a problem. Unexpected. She’d delivered her paralyzing blows with her back to the dumpster.

Nearly unconscious, he was going to pin her to the ground when he collapsed.

But her strong legs propelled her out of his trajectory just in time. His head thunked onto the side of the waste container.

He lay there, blinking and breathing hard.

Only slightly winded herself, Marlowe rolled to her feet. She checked on Slim. Still retching but he’d be fine.

Back to Bigot. Fortunately, he was face up and she didn’t have to roll him over, which, she’d decided, might be impossible to do, given his mass.

She climbed onto his round belly, straddling, as if she were horseback riding.

“Can you hear me?”

“I...”

“Can you hear me?”

A sort of nod.

“Who hired you?”

“Fu—”

The blow was hard and sharp and she dislocated his nose.

He yelped. He lifted his right arm. She punched it down.

“Who?”

Because it was clear they were pros. Not good pros, but they were doing this for money.

Another blow. This one with her left. The nose again.

Hm. She believed she’d fixed the dislocation.

“No!”

Constant Marlowe was a sworn law officer, well versed in the Fourth and Fifth Amendments — and the Fourteenth, which applied those federal protections to the states, which was her bailiwick. Most interrogations of hers were carried out according to the book. But sometimes, if she needed a response quickly, she drifted to alternatives.

Especially when her subject had started it.

“Who. Hired. You?”

“I keep saying. I just saw you with her. Pissed me off.”

“Who?”

The next blow, a fast jab to the jaw, was because he wasn’t answering her question. Well, maybe partly from his caustic tone.

He struggled to dislodge her. She rode the bronco for a moment and stayed aboard. She drew her fist back once more.

Which is when the bullet slammed into the dumpster beside them. It landed with a loud clang, and a boom of a large-bore rifle filled the air.

Marlowe rolled off him and snatched up her weapon bag. The lock was open in less than a second and her gun was in her hand. She crouched behind the dumpster.

She also speed-dialed 911. And dropped the phone on the ground. She didn’t know the name of the street they were on, but dispatch could geotag an emergency call in minutes.

Another shot snapped the sound barrier over their heads. This slug shattered as it hit a piece of demoed building waste behind them, sending up a puff of cement dust.

Bigot rolled away and struggled to his feet.

Two more slugs came their way. One buried itself in the ground near them, another hit the dumpster again. She couldn’t see the front of the unit but doubted that the bullets had penetrated the sheet steel.

Then silence.

Marlowe looked quickly over the construction waste and then ducked back to cover. The shooter was on a railroad embankment about twenty-five feet in the air and fifty feet away.

No target at that distance — her Glock had a short barrel and who knew where her slugs would go? There might have been a school or office on the other side of the tracks.

It seemed the silhouette aimed once more toward her.

She dropped.

In a painful crawl, Bigot started for his partner, still clutching his gut, still dazed. Both men were now stumbling toward the sidewalk. They were in no danger. Only she was the target.

Which made her really want to know who the man on the embankment was.

They hit the street and vanished, as Slim shouted something back at her.

Maybe “Bitch.”

Marlowe couldn’t tell. Another cluster of three bullets hit the dumpster, setting it ringing like urgent bells in a church tower.

Chapter 10

“Extraction,” Marlowe told Sheriff Frank Tremain.

“How’s that?” he muttered, looking her over as if nothing like this’d ever happened in CV until she arrived.

“The shooter? They weren’t trying to hit me. They had their chance. From up there?” Nodding to the railroad embankment. “Impossible to miss, even with iron sights. They were pinning me down so those two could escape.”

“You see the shooter?”

“No. Just a silhouette.”

“Describe the other two.”

She did.

He didn’t take notes, she saw.

He observed her observation and didn’t care she wasn’t happy.

She asked pointedly, “You know a pair like that? Somebody big, somebody small hang out together? Bars. I smelled alcohol. Didn’t sense drugs. They didn’t have tweaker fidget. They’d be pros, hired by somebody — though I wouldn’t hire them to chase a squirrel out of my backyard.”

Tremain said, “Nup.”

Eventide mused, “No bells rung. I’d guess they’re outcounty.”

Tremain’s eyes were on the alleyway. He seemed bored.

Odell Davis and Mattie Charlotte, the BCSO’s resident canvassers, were interviewing potential witnesses. Given the quasi-demolished nature of the hit zone, Marlowe doubted they would find many. Webcams either.

The sheriff’s phone hummed. He looked at the message. Sent a brief reply.

Marlowe asked, “He had a distinctive build and facial structure. The big one. Don’t suppose you have mug shots indexed by phenotype?”

“What?” Tremain snapped.

“Height, weight, hair.”

“No.”

“Maybe we should do one, Sheriff.” Eventide was nodding.

Tremain squinted his incredulity at the idea. “In all our free time.”

She said, “No rings, tats, inkings, scars that I could see.”

“Hm.”

“I pulled that out of his pocket.” She pointed to the dark gray cloth glove lying on the ground. She’d left it there to minimize contamination.

He grunted. Then: “Your shooter. Weapon?”

“Didn’t see it. But it was some large caliber hunting rifle.”

“How d’you know that if you didn’t see it? You ask me, an AR-15 sounds a lot like a Ruger from the business end.”

Marlowe could debate that, having been shot at by both assault and hunting rifles. But there was another reason for her deduction.

“Four shot cluster. Then a pause, then three.”

Tremain grunted, like he resented that she was right. Most hunting rifles are not like assault rifles, which have large detachable magazines. In a hunting long gun you push three bullets into a slot built into the gun itself. There’d been four shots to begin with because he’d loaded a round ahead of time.

“Hunting rifle. All right. Well, that narrows it down to, let’s see, half the population of Bowman County.” Then he got to what was really eating him. “You bring some baggage into my town with you, Agent Marlowe?” He walked to the curb and spat.

She glanced toward Eventide. “He said it was because I was with you.”

It took a moment. Finally, Eventide said, “Oh, that. We have our share of bigots around here.”

“Eagle Brotherhood assholes,” Tremain grumbled.

She noticed he didn’t apologize for his accusation that the fight and shootout were solely her fault.

Eventide said, “But this’s about something else, I’m guessing. Grey Valley.”

Marlowe lifted a querying brow.

“A land claim by some Native people. One side wants it to go through, the other doesn’t.”

“Why beat me up?” Marlowe didn’t understand. “I’m here to run a homicide.”

Which engendered a scoff from Tremain, apparently still angry he’d been displaced. “Maybe some people don’t know that. They know big fancy law comes in from out of town, dressed like a biker, think you’re tipping the scales on behalf of all those politically correct folk upstate.”

He growled, “Don’t touch anything here or on the trestle. There’s a freight due in thirty-two minutes and I gotta call Missouri Central and have ’em stop a fifty-car freight. Now, that’s going to go over really good. And there won’t be anything up there anyway. Ever-body collects spent shells ’round here, even if they’re not using law enforcers for ducks in a state fair shooting gallery. Brass costs money, you know.”

He ambled back toward the office.

Chapter 11

She’d shower later.

Constant Marlowe dumped her large gym bag and backpack on one of the double beds in the Illinois Country Inn’s highly pastel room. Light blue, light pink, light green. The decorations were — no surprise — of the Mississippi, which was maybe the least picturesque of all the rivers in America. The boats were nice to look at, though. Paddle wheelers.

An examination revealed a few burgeoning contusions from the fight and a scraped knee from her dive out of Bigot’s way when he fell like a lumberjack’s trophy. Her knuckles could have used some ice, but no time for that now.

She dressed in new jeans and was just fishing for a clean blouse, dark gray, from her gym bag when her mobile rang.

“’Lo.”

A pause. A man’s seductive voice: “What’re you wearing?”

“I think you’ve got a wrong number,” she said sternly. “This is Sister Mary Magdalene of Sacred Heart Church.”

Another pause. “I can’t go anywhere with that one,” said Evan Quill, who was usually good with comebacks.

He was particularly talented at doing so in court; he was a rarely defeated prosecutor in northern Illinois.

The low voice again: “But I will repeat the question, re: garments. Or preferably lack thereof.”

Constant Marlowe laughed about as often as she smiled, but with Quill there were occasional chuckles. As now. “It’s six ten p.m. What’m I wearing? Clothes.” And pulled the shirt over her white sports bra.

“To my disappointment.” Then he was business. “I got your text. Where Downstate?”

“Bowman County. West central. Near the Illinois River.”

“I thought you were looking into the Springfield thing.”

“The kidnapping. I ID’d the unsub, handed off to the State Police. They’ll close it. Down here, it’s multiple rape homicides. Drove down this afternoon.”

“Ah.”

Silence ensued.

He didn’t ask what he was thinking: Did her boss know?

The answer was no.

Marlowe had several people up the chain from her position as investigator. She didn’t think of them as her bosses, though it was true if she decided to run a case on her own she’d technically need approval. She usually forgot about it.

BRK was a serial rapist murderer.

Constant Marlowe would not waste time on paperwork in hunting him down.

Quill had deduced this. But it wasn’t his job to correct, though he had a legitimate concern she was going to insubordinate herself into getting fired.

He wasn’t troubled that it would be a blot on her record, but because she’d go stir crazy.

Her opinion was she’d do just fine. A badge made it easy to find and stop bad guys. In Constant Marlowe’s opinion, though, it was optional.

And sometimes it impeded the process.

“Well, there you are. Downstate. What do you need? My pen’s ready.”

She pictured the handsome, dark-haired man, late thirties, sitting at his desk in the DA’s office. His sleeves were often rolled up and he wore a tie pulled down and collar open — a look many men affected for comfort. In Quill’s case though, it was only partly for that reason. Wearing the garments in that way was also so he could be instantly presentable if he had to make an unexpected court appearance. (“Unroll, button, tug. And I’m ready.”)

She asked, “Any sexual assaults or homicides related to sexual assaults past twenty-four months. Make it Illinois only. Keywords six-foot-tall male, white, about one eighty to two hundred ten pounds, dark hair, Eye-Protect brand artificial tears. Everett Products for Him+Her condoms. Unknown on distinguishings. Cross-Fit Plus shoes, size ten and a half. And if that rings any bells, I’ll see if I can get a Danagraph.”

Cop shorthand for a DNA chart.

“Maybe a plumbing pipe or some other blunt object like it for murder weapon. I’ve tried NCIC. Was hoping you could use your own special sauce.”

As a prosecutor Quill would have access to more reports and more details about crimes than the national database. NCIC offers general information; what Quill could compile was the nuts-and-bolts details actually used in investigations and prosecutions — like granular forensics and witnesses’ statements.

“I’ll see.”

“And one other thing?”

“Sure.”

“Eagle Brotherhood.”

Quill responded immediately. “A fanatical group of survivalist neo-Nazis, bigoted and dangerous. Misogynist. Armed to the teeth.”

She was surprised. She herself had never known of them until today. “How’d you hear about them?”

“I didn’t. But with that name, I figured they’d fit a certain profile. Those boys ought to hire an image consultant. Need a name like the Sunday Baking and Flower Club, or the Organization for Voting Fairness.”

Marlowe had to give another brief laugh. “Anybody affiliated with them investigated for sexual assault.”

“I’m on it.”

Her laptop was open and she was studying the map of Lone Ridge Park — the picture she’d shot in the storeroom and the Sheriff’s Office.

Thinking: Where...?

Quill’s enthusiastic voice was describing the Owen case, a homicide trial he’d been running. “Best judge we could ask for.”

“Really?” she asked absently, looking for the best place where BRK would have parked then hiked to the jogging trail for the assault on Kelly Nader.

“There’s the detective. It’s Holcomb. You know the problem there but...”

Quill continued speaking. Marlowe didn’t hear a word. An idea was forming. Now, she went to a website and typed fast.

Ah, okay... Interesting...

A possible lead to be explored.

Too late tonight. They needed to interview Glen and Liz Hope’s daughter at her school in New France now.

But tomorrow.

Then Marlowe was suddenly aware of silence on the other end of the line. She sensed Quill had said or asked something that required a response.

Fess up she’d been ignoring him, or bluff?

She debated. It was a 50 percent chance she’d nail it.

Marlowe went with: “Good news.”

He didn’t reply for a moment.

Hell, had she blown it?

Had he just said that he’d lost the case and the defendant, Riggs Owen, went out on the street and shot up a Walmart?

His voice gave no clue as to his frame of mind. “All right. I’ll start digging.”

“Thanks, appreciate—”

Then Evan Quill was gone.

Evan Quill, who had the miraculous skill of effortlessly whipping welts into his opponents’ hides in the courtroom.

Evan Quill, who had rich brown eyes and a strong body — he was a long-distance bicyclist — and that rare way about him that moved them to take each other’s hand at spontaneous moments and walk into the bedroom or to a more convenient couch.

And sometimes, depending, a carpeted floor.

Evan Quill, who would, she believed, have asked her to marry him if she hadn’t kindly but firmly explained right up front that she was not a “spend-the-night kind of girl.”

Which took marriage or even its distant cousins off the table.

Had he been upset now by her distraction?

Maybe she should have been more attentive.

Maybe she should have told him the truth about the sports bra.

Then Evan Quill and the complexities surrounding him vanished like smoke hovering over burned down cornfields, as she glanced out the window.

Her ride had arrived.

Chapter 12

One day of summer remained.

But summer it was still.

By the book summer.

Hot, humid summer.

Bug flitting summer.

But as they drove along straight, uncongested (and oh, so flat) Route 27, Constant Marlowe was aware that autumn was waiting impatiently. Leaves had not yet turned but were dry and late season tired.

And now, 7:00 p.m., dusk was approaching.

Marlowe said, “I’m going to need some things looked at. We’re sister outfits but I’ll be asking you to handle them.”

“That’s not a problem. Rather work for you than... Well, rather work for you.”

“I need to know if there was any connection between Abigail and Kelly. And find out from their friends and family, coworkers, neighbors, if they had any stalkers or enemies. Not likely but I want to know if the attacks were really random.”

“On the list,” she said and put a notation in her notebook to prove it.

“Get Mattie and Odell to help you.”

“So you think maybe they dated the same guy? Like a Tinder thing? Abigail had that fiancé. And he checked out. And Kelly just moved here from out of state.”

“Just want to fill in all the details. Sometimes, happens hardly ever, somebody stages a crime. Makes it look like something else. It’s really for revenge, for insurance, for who knows?”

“Sure.”

“Tonight.”

A nod.

They drove for a mile or so in silence and Marlowe took in the deputy’s face, lit occasionally, and starkly, by oncoming traffic.

“You’ll do fine.”

A glance Marlowe’s way and a faint smile — of someone who’d been busted. Eventide said, “The casserole thing? Wasn’t anything like this. It was murder and it was awful but neither of those two were God’s gift to humanity. And no one was surprised. And, fact is, I didn’t do much. I’ve run overdoses — that damn fentanyl and crank and ice. Those’re sad. This is...”

“Different.”

“Yeah, different.”

“If I didn’t think you could handle it, I could’ve called Springfield and had somebody from my office drive down.”

“Thanks.”

After a few more miles, the deputy said, “There it is.”

Marlowe looked to their left, the south entrance to Lone Ridge Park. About all you could make out in the dusk were white fluttering bands — the police tapes bleached of their yellow color by the vanishing light.

Marlowe scanned the line of trees, a solid slab of dark green turning black. And thought once again:

Where?

Down the highway, a quarter mile or so, a large square of white loomed, lit boldly by a bonfire. It was a handmade banner, strung between trees, white cloth, red lettering.

DON’T STEAL OUR LAND!!

“The treaty?” Marlowe asked.

Eventide nodded.

“Our Nazi friends?”

“No. They’re not making much of a stink about it. It’s not a prejudice thing. The protestors’re mostly the people who own the property that’ll be taken. Eminent domain. If the treaty’s authenticated.”

“How’d the treaty surface? Must go back hundreds of years.”

“It’s a detective story. Somebody ought to make a movie out of it. So, a professor at Ellis College — where we’re going now — found a treaty. It’d been in the archives forever. It was between Congress and one of the bands of Potawatomis or Peoria. It created a reservation in Bowman County, all of this land we’re driving through now. It’s still being authenticated. And there’s some dispute about what the boundaries are. No longitude or latitude. The footprint’s defined by landmarks. Fort Defiance’s the north — a Revolutionary War fort overlooking the Grey. Standing Rock is south. West is Sutter Dam. East is the ‘River Bend.’”

“What’s in dispute?” Marlowe asked.

“There’s no record of which river bend. The Grey’s like a snake. Depending, it could mean the difference between five hundred acres and two hundred.”

So Bigot, Slim and the shooter were working for the still unidentified person who was assuming she was in town to... well, what, exactly? Somehow help the local constabulary enforce the treaty?

Completely unaware that she had nothing to do with the issue.

Well, she’d find him. And get the identities of the pair in the alley.

She’d run two cases simultaneously before.

Nature of police work.

They passed a series of billboards, a happy faced car dealer, some fast-food restaurants, a promo for Buonafortuna, the company developing the site where she’d been attacked and several others. It said only,

BUONAFORTUNA RESPECTS THE RIGHTS OF ALL PEOPLES.

Eventide said, “Subtly saying they’re supporting the treaty. Wonder if they believe it, or if it’s just politically correct.”

Marlowe was amused to see that the company was not based in Milan or Rome, but in Arizona, Nevada and New Jersey. Carrying on the long tradition of selling mundane co-ops with exotic names. Retirement properties maybe.

They continued in silence for a time. Eventide said, “One thing I was going to ask.” This prelude was spoken in a serious timbre.

“Hm?”

“I’m just curious. You had your weapon? During the fight?”

“Right.”

“Cuffs?”

“I use zip ties. But yes.”

“And you got the Beretta away from the small guy?”

So. The conversation was going there...

Marlowe asked the rhetorical query: “Why didn’t I get ’em trussed up and wait for backup?”

“Yeah.”

Marlowe told her the truth. “Because I needed him to tell me who they were working for. And if I’d hogtied him and put him into the system, that would have limited my ability to get answers. And I needed them right away.”

Silence as the woman, thoughtful, piloted the car, with its beefy engine and tough suspension, through the evening.

There was nothing more for Marlowe to say. What? Tell Eventide, who was to all appearances a fine, hardworking and savvy deputy, that Marlowe occasionally did her job in a way that some people found troublesome?

Or unacceptable?

Maybe into this category fell Zosette Eventide, who, hearing that her carmate and temporary partner was going to torture a man to get to the truth, would skid to a stop, order Marlowe out and let her Uber or hitchhike back to the hotel.

Thus ending her involvement in the BRK case.

A mile, two.

Lights on the horizon. The college town loomed.

Eventide asked, “Did it work? You get anything from him helpful?”

“No.”

More silence. Then: “That’s just too fucking bad. Maybe, it happens again, we can make sure you have enough time to turn him more talkative.”

Chapter 13

Tamara Hope looked the part of the essential college junior.

Blonde and with blue eyes that matched her father’s. The young woman had a pixieish face and the trim figure of a soccer player or runner. She wore torn jeans, a loose burgundy sweatshirt atop some undergarment with bright-red straps.

The law enforcers were with Tamara and her boyfriend in his small house, just off the Ellis College campus, whose name, Eventide had told Marlowe, had come from Presbyterian reverend John M. Ellis. The man of the cloth had inspired the Yale Bands, students from the famed college in Connecticut, to travel to the Midwest and establish schools centuries ago.

Daniel Morgenstern was tall and broad-shouldered, with dark hair trim on the side, but plentiful from the forehead up. A current look, Marlowe believed. His square jaw was softened by circular tortoise-shell glasses. He was in sweats — gray top and red pants.

Daniel had blinked when the two officers knocked on the door and his face registered a hint of concern; there was the residual odor of pot in the air. It was legal in Illinois but she guessed the reaction came from the era — ages ago, it seemed — when weed and police did not mix.

The rooms were small and close and warm and cluttered with a dozen moving boxes, some open, others still sealed. The school year had just started but Marlowe got the impression that Daniel had moved in a while ago and had simply not bothered to extract his belongings, but used the Mayflower boxes as dressers.

Male, female difference maybe, though Marlowe had cartons sitting in her living room unopened from a move four years ago.

Hands in motion, eyes wide, Tamara said, “So, Mom and Dad called. About what happened. It was on the news.” A whisper, like it was bad luck to speak the initials loudly: “BRK. Mom was pretty freaked. She had me come over here, to Danny’s.”

Marlowe remembered Liz Hope’s stricken look when she’d suggested locking doors and turning on security lights.

Daniel suddenly seemed to realize he was the host and, embarrassed, cleared off a couch and a chair. The women sat and Eventide withdrew her notebook.

The students took seats on an old couch. On the coffee table, in front of where Daniel perched, were history books and test prep books for MCATs — the medical school entrance exams.

Another stack of books sat in front of Tamara. She was an education major, it seemed, specializing in PE. From her energetic presence alone, Marlowe guessed she’d be a good teacher, especially with the younger grades. Constant Marlowe didn’t recall much about her own earlier school days. Except that she got bored in class and looked forward to calling out bullies for after-school “fist-fests” on the asphalt.

Daniel’s hand was inked. Marlowe couldn’t see the image clearly. Was it a character from a cartoon or movie?

In response to the standard questions of seeing cars or people in Lone Ridge Park, the young woman replied that she had not. Her face was earnest and it was clear she was trying to be helpful but had not, in fact, seen anyone or any vehicles.

Then Marlowe pointed out, “During lunch you moved to a different table.”

“Yeah, I was calling him.” An adoring look up. “Mom is such a snoop, I had to move.”

“You were closer to the jogging trail.”

In a soft voice, “Where she was killed.”

Marlowe nodded. “Okay, no people in the park, no cars. Was there anything you saw or smelled or heard that was out of the ordinary?”

“Smelled?”

“Aftershave maybe, exhaust, cologne?”

A frown, blowing breath from puffed cheeks as she considered. “No. I mean, plants, I guess. I smelled the lawn and flowers or something. But that’s all was there. A million plants. I’m sorry.”

“You’re doing fine,” Eventide encouraged.

Marlowe asked, “Animals?”

“Uhm. Well, birds.”

“Were they moving, like they’d been disturbed? Flying away?”

“Oh, like he was there?”

Marlowe nodded.

“God. I don’t know. They were just being birds.” Then, eyes even wider. “Well, you know, maybe I did see something.”

“What?”

“I don’t know, except it was shiny.”

“Might be helpful. Where?”

“In the woods. On the ground. It was gold or yellow.”

“Metal, plastic, glass?”

“I don’t know, just shiny.”

Marlowe hadn’t recalled a reference on the murder board. She looked to Eventide, who shook her head, meaning no such item had been collected at the scene. And Marlowe was so impressed with the CS unit of the Sheriff’s Office, she was sure that if the object had been in the park during the search, the team would have discovered it.

Out came the map again and Marlowe held it up.

The girl squinted. “Like about there.”

Near where Kelly was found.

What was it and what had happened to it?

“Until we find him, would you be willing to go back home? Stay with your parents?”

A pause. “Classes just started. I can’t miss them already.”

Daniel then offered, “You could stay here.”

Their eyes met and then she looked to the officers. “Would that be okay?”

It wasn’t Marlowe’s first choice. But it was better than Tamara’s staying in her own rental, where there’d be a paper trail to the identity of the renter — assuming BRK was willing to go to that much trouble to find potential witnesses. “All right. Just be smart when you’re out.”

“But don’t you think he’s gone?”

“I was him,” Morgenstern said, “I’d be a thousand miles away.”

“Hope for the best, plan for the worst,” Eventide said.

A clichéd expression that Marlowe was sure they must’ve heard. But apparently not, at least the young woman, who nodded gravely and said, “Oh, yeah, totally!” as if she’d just received the wisdom of the world from a spiritual leader atop a Himalayan peak.

Chapter 14

His hands were shaking.

This was new, a condition that had just arisen.

Joseph Ray Whelan was considering the tremor carefully. Were the spells coming in bouts of three?

At first it seemed so.

But then he decided no. And told himself that while his life was presently governed by the Rule of Threes, he shouldn’t make too great a fucking deal of it.

Joseph Ray was doing what take-a-life day had turned into: sitting in his car, parked under tree branches that arched downward. Despite the encroaching autumn it wasn’t shedding leaves but some little capsules of buds that dropped silently onto the hood and windshield. An attempt to launch the lifeboats and keep the species alive.

They’d been inside for about a half hour, Constant Marlowe and Deputy Eventide.

The house, he’d learned, belonged to a management company that specialized in renting to students. Those records would be impossible to find, but there was no need; his secret radio espionage told him that the renter was college senior Daniel Morgenstern.

Joseph Ray had no interest in him personally. His existence had no bearing on his mission, other than that he was probably a friend of witness Tamara, the older of the Hope children. Maybe he was a romantic interest.

This could be a problem.

Logically, the police girls would stash Tamara here, under the protective wings of Daniel. His Facebook page showed he was large and athletic. A kind face, smiling more often than not. But even the most face-licking golden retriever will rip apart the throat of an intruder as if it were a tennis ball.

So, he would have to pay attention to Mr. Morgenstern.

He studied the nighttime street of New France. Largely deserted. A few students, some professors. Or people of student and professor age, whether connected to Ellis or not.

This was supposedly a good school. Joseph Ray had gone to State and had not enjoyed or disliked the experience one way or the other. His true calling began after he’d graduated.

And could take to the streets.

He eased back and thought, Three.

His mind went to storytelling.

The hero. The villain. The man, or woman, caught between the two.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

Arthur, Guinevere, Lancelot.

Joseph Ray fished into his suit jacket pocket and removed a silver pillbox. He clicked it open with a trim nail, fished out a white tablet and swallowed it dry. It was a muscle relaxant, meant to take the edge off his anxiety. He wasn’t sure of the dosage, as he’d stolen it.

The need.

The emptiness.

Would it ever be filled?

Would he ever get a chance to get his prey before him, on the ground?

Wait! What was he thinking? He’d only taken one pill. He now took two more.

Phew, close call.

Three...

The door of the run-down and sagging single family house opened and compact Constant Marlowe and solid Deputy Eventide stepped out the front door.

The agent might have glanced at the car, but it was only in passing. And she would not pay him any mind. It was a different vehicle from that which he used to conduct his surveillance this afternoon. This was the era of the multiple-car household.

Even those living alone, like him.

Alone...

Thinking:

One. The First Triumvirate in Rome, which resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths.

Two. Bad news comes in threes.

Three. A gladiator’s trident — the three-pronged spear.

He watched the deputy’s car leave and — oh, with an irony that made him shiver — it made a three-point turn.

He remained where he was for a half hour. Ms. Agent Constant Marlowe did not order a babysitter for the girl, as she’d done for the parents. Probably believing — obviously incorrectly — that because she was not staying in her house here in New France, which was on Elm Avenue two miles away, she was in no danger of being discovered.

And then too Marlowe would be reassured that there was shining knight Daniel to look over the girl.

Tamara Hope.

Hope, he reflected.

And was reminded of another group of three, which he’d just read about in his obsessive poring over books and the internet in a futile effort to dull the sadness/rage within him.

One of the tales in Greek mythology. Pandora was known for unleashing evils into the world, of course. But many people didn’t know that one thing remained in her infamous box: Elpis, the goddess of Hope.

How was that for a coincidence? “Hope.”

Then there was one last character in the myth, making up the threesome:

Hope’s daughter, Ossa, or Anticipation.

Exactly what was fueling Joseph Ray at the moment.

Anticipation...

The promise of something significant to come — for good or for bad.

Chapter 15

Thursday, September 21, 7:30 a.m.

Dinner last night had been Oreos, double filling. Milk.

Calories.

At least, the carton of 2 percent would have contained something beneficial.

So now she was working on a ham biscuit breakfast sandwich, courtesy of the Illinois Country Inn.

Constant Marlowe was in the basement of the Sheriff’s Office — in what had been dubbed the “warstoreroom” by the canvassers, Odell Davis and Mattie Charlotte, who may or may not have been a team outside the confines of the BCSO. Marlowe voted that they were. Something about the gaze and the way she reminded him to take an extra magazine for his gun when they were headed out. He always held the door for her.

Marlowe glanced at the notation on the board.

Next attack probable no later than 9/23.

Which was now day after tomorrow.

Some called it the incident board. The point board. The connection board.

“Murder board” was best, Marlowe felt. That kept the severity front and center. She was digesting the canvassing reports of the maybe couple. No one had seen — or admitted they’d seen — the alleyway fight yesterday, nor the rifleman. The shots had been reported but the sounds alone had no value. It’s next to impossible to guess the location of a gunman by a firearm discharge. No cars or trucks had been spotted near the railway track. A pinned-up notice also reported:

Crime Scene searched the embankment and discovered no usable footprints or other indicators of the presence of any suspect. No spent shells were recovered. Note: complaint from Missouri Central RR referred to Bowman County Legal Department.

She had tried to create images of the two assailants from Stable Diffusion — the artificial intelligence image generation system. And the software had done a good job, though it had taken many input prompts to refine the artwork. Davis and Charlotte had taken these images to the five tough-guy bars in the county, as well as the Bowman lockup. No one recognized them.

And so Marlowe and Zo Eventide would plod — spend the morning circumnavigating Lone Ridge Park in hopes of finding BRK’s access point along the eastern and northern borders.

The BCSO pair would continue the canvass for purchasers (or shoplifters) of the Cross-Fit Plus shoes, condoms and other products that might lead back to BRK.

Marlowe hit the halfway point of the sandwich, pitched the rest out.

The floor of the warstoreroom was carpet and so she didn’t hear the footsteps approach behind her.

The only announcement was a soft grunt.

Sheriff Frank Tremain was carrying an old-fashioned and extremely battered attaché case.

“Disrespectful.”

He took his cowboy hat off and set it on a nearby table. He had a full head of hair. She’d thought he was trying to cover up baldness with the Stetson.

She’d sent the sandwich to the recycle bin, not the trash, against the directive of a large red sign.

But it wasn’t this he was referring to. He nodded at the headline of the muted story on the monitor that hung unevenly on the nearby wall. A local newscast.

“Those initials. ‘BRK.’ The press just loves their damned shorthand.” He scoffed. “Two girls dead and they treat it cute.”

A variation of Marlowe’s very thought.

The sheriff grumbled, “First Amendment, all good. Freedom of speech. Bring down bad presidents. Catch senators can’t keep it zipped up. Yippee. But show some respect.”

“I saw the notes from the embankment.”

“No shoe prints, no business cards dropped accidental. No brass, like I promised. The railroad’s asking twenty-five thousand. Spoiled fish or something. I only stopped it for an hour.” Tremain walked to a trash can, spit tobacco and returned to her, sitting heavily. He kept one leg extended. She’d recalled yesterday the man retreating sullenly to his vehicle after he’d been ousted. She thought he’d walked stiffly out of anger. Maybe it was an injury. Or arthritis.

Marlowe said, “Talked to the Hopes’ daughter last night.”

She nodded to a notation she herself had written out on a three-by-five card which she then pinned up with a purple-headed thumbtack. Her first contribution to the board.

Tremain glanced at it, then gestured for her to elaborate. He frowned as he listened to her account of what the girl had seen. He shook his head. “Shiny. Yellow or gold. Park was searched an hour after the incident and it wasn’t there then. You think she’s just making up stuff, so we paste a gold star on her forehead? As witnesses will do, you know.”

“I’m sure.” Marlowe read kinesics like a large-print edition of a book.

“Got something for you.” He tossed a plastic bag on the table. It contained a slug. A chain of evidence card was attached — a wire through a loop on the end of the bag. “Three oh eight. You hear people say, same as NATO seven six two, but it’s not. They’re interchangeable, sure, but dimensions’re just a bit different. Your face, you know this.”

“My long gun’s a Winchester seventy.” Inherited from her father. You could find that fine weapon, first introduced nearly one hundred years ago, chambered for many different calibers. Hers happened to be a .308 as well.

One of her tats, mostly covered by her black tee, was of the NATO round he’d just mentioned. The other inking was the initials. DK.

She picked up the bag. The round was largely intact. “JHP.”

A jacketed hollow point. The bullets also came full metal jacket and soft point, but JHPs caused more damage in flesh when they struck — the speed and the expanding cavity at the tip.

He said, “The ones hit the dumpster and rocks? They’re toast. Dug that one out of sandy soil, thirteen inches down. Now, tested the residue. Gunpowder was a little rare, if you can have a little-rare thing. Like being a little pregnant.” He squinted. “I don’t know that works. So. Powder. It’s Winchester StaBALL match grade. Can tell because of the nitrocellulose to sulfur proportion, and the fact it’s double base with copper fouling reducer.”

He wheeled to the trash can and spit once more. Rolled back. “You state people got all that fancy database stuff, looking into who bought what when.”

True. The DCI had access to huge datasets of purchases of guns and ammunition through retail and wholesale outlets.

The sheriff scoffed. “Everybody spies on everybody nowadays. Information’s gonna be there whether anybody wants it to be there or not. May as well use it to put assholes in jail. Funny how complainers stop complaining when they get mugged or burgled.”

Privacy advocates had protested the state’s access to records as being civil rights concerns.

She said, “Not like we scoop up brands of underwear and how much liquor you buy... Or tobacco. That’s not good for you, you know.”

He sneered. “We’re all gonna get squashed by a asteroid in ten years. Like the dinosaurs.”

“Give me the details of the ammo again.”

He handed her a printout. She read, then loaded a secure site on her laptop, hammered in a passcode and typed a request for purchasers of the ammo in Bowman and surrounding counties. It was to a friend of hers in the Analysis Support Division — a harmless name that didn’t even hint at the skill and depth of the bots scooping up information.

Marlowe hit send. She received back an almost immediate answer that the man would get her the information as soon as possible but it would take a little time. There was a queue.

She read his final paragraph. “He says Chicago’s taking priority. Mayor’s trying to do something about the guns there.”

Tremain chuckled. “Eighteen thirties, Clark Valley was bigger.”

“Than what?”

“Than Chicago.”

“No.”

“Oh, yes, ma’am. They had cows and pigs. We had cows and pigs plus the best schools in the state.” He nodded at her computer. “I know it was my idea, but whatever your buddy finds, it’ll be a long list. We’re coming up on season, and to the dismay of many a deer, there’re a lot of .308 sold around here. But you do what you have to do.”

He rose and pinned the printout about the bullet and the brand and specifics of the gunpowder residue on the board. Then a photo of Slim’s Beretta.

Marlowe said, “I saw it had the serial number ground off. You know there’s a way—”

He waved a hand. “Started with magnetic particle — you know, you magnetize the gun and coat the spot where the number was with a solution of ferrous particles. The stamping deforms the magnetic field and you can sometimes read the numbers. That didn’t take, so next up was chemical restoration. Fry’s Reagent — hydrochloric acid, cupric chloride and distilled water, and the magic ingredient.” He lifted an eyebrow. She shook her head. He said, “Acidic ferric chloride solution. Number came up clear as day.”

This was high-end forensic science. Worthy of the FBI’s lab.

“The piece was stolen from a gun show two years ago. Outside St. Louis. So he’s maybe from down thataway. Oh, tried for prints on the slugs. You can get a hit if they were reloaded by hand. Gave it a shot — you might say — but zippo.”

“I’ve got to say, Sheriff, in Springfield or Chicago, our DCI labs, we have to fight for results. We can wait three, four days for that kind of lab work.”

“Now that is a shame because last I checked, bad guys don’t take three, four days off and give you a chance to catch up.”

“Your lab’s up the hall. I can smell the Bunsen burners.”

“It’s the Hewlett Packard, but yeah.”

She looked out the door. “Anybody from the CSU team in? I want to thank them.”

“You’re welcome.”

A beat of a moment.

He punctured her confusion. “I’m it.”

“You?”

“Whole kit and kaboodle. I search the scenes, do the lab work. Sometimes have somebody help me. But like it better to handle things on my own. You got that look again, Agent Marlowe. Weren’t expecting to be appearing on that famous TV show CSI: Bowman County, were you?”

“Never heard of a sheriff doing his own forensics work.”

“Hardly wanted to at first. But had a robbery/murder and I called the state barracks — all respect to your outfit.”

Marlowe wasn’t State Police; DCI was separate. But she said nothing.

“And all my charm didn’t do squat.”

With this he rolled and spit.

“I even begged. I had a shooter at large, for the good Lord’s sake! They said it’d be three hours to get somebody to run the scene and a coupla days for the results. Nup, not good enough for me. I looked at everybody in the office. I didn’t know a lot but they knew less. So I bought some new coveralls from the company store at Morgan’s Lickin’ Chicken, booties from a surgical supply store, gloves from Walmart. Got to work. Found a hair. One single hair. That’s all it took for a takedown and conviction.”

He studied the board. “Fact is, I don’t like people much.” He glanced at the Oreo package, sitting open in the top of her backpack. The sandwich had been the breakfast entrée, a cookie or two would be breakfast dessert. Why shouldn’t that meal end on a high note too? This had been Evan Quill’s observation.

She nodded to the bag.

The tobacco mass disappeared into a paper towel and then the garbage. He started working on the cookie. He looked at it. “These’re thicker than I remember. Hm. Always wanted to be sheriff, ever since I could remember. My dad was a cop in Frederick. My mom worked 911 dispatch. My brother was an MP in Afghanistan. Of course I was gonna be law. No question there. I wasn’t going to be just line. I wanted the top spot. Worked like hell. And my wife ran a campaign that’d get a lamebrain president elected to the White House. That woman is a fireball. I ran on public safety, and that’s a platform hard to argue with. I won.”

Marlowe said, “You’re the dog caught the school bus and you don’t know what to do with it.”

“Nail and head.” Tremain ate another cookie. “I’d say these’d turn me off chaw, but that ain’t going to happen. So I’m in office. Chief Sheriff and Bottlewasher. And then come the politics and squabbles in the ranks. And budgets and HR and facilities repairs and be-nice-to-kiddies when they come to visit on field trips. Jesus.”

“Quit. Make a full-time crime scene unit. Hire out to other counties. You can charge.” A wave at the boards. “This’s good stuff.”

“Thought about it, time to time. Maybe I just will.” He nodded to the doorway. “I’m baking something in the lab you might wanta see.”

That was what she’d smelled earlier: a gas chromatograph, which burns samples of unknown substances collected at crime scenes and measures the resulting gas to turn mixed compounds into their separate elements. “They’re not a piece of cake to run, I hear. You take a course?”

“Naw. Just bought one. Instruction manual wasn’t that helpful. But found stuff online. And there’s YouTube, of course. TikTok too. That part, I’m kidding.”

Tremain rose and walked down the hall and returned a moment later with a printout. He was reading as he sat. A grunt. “That glove you got, from the big boy attacked you? Odell and Mattie? Those two canvass like the wind. They found out it’s sold in hundreds of stores all over the state. No way to trace a buyer. But.” He lifted the printout. “Had some stains on it. Poly-alpha-olefin — it’s a nonpolymeric. An API Group IV hundred percent oil, mixed with a metallic soap. Lithium, polyurea, calcium, sodium, aluminum and clay.”

“Which is?”

“Automotive grease. Motor-XPL brand, to be specific. Commercial level sales. Your boy’s a car mechanic, I’m sending our two lovebirds out canvassing dealerships and garages, with those pictures you made from that software.” He finished a cookie and shook his head. “Why those two don’t just get hitched and have done with it is beyond me.”

Chapter 16

Zo Eventide piloted her unmarked BCSO Dodge east along Route 27, the artery linking CV with college town New France.

“So. Kept people up last night but got some answers. Like you asked. Friends and family.” She exhaled. “I’ve had to make car wreck calls. Talking to kin. Tough.”

“It is.”

“Well, no, Abigail and Kelly didn’t know each other. The only connection was they looked alike. Nobody’d ever heard of any serious stalkers.” She shook her head. “Abigail’s fiancé. He’s helping her mother make arrangements in Chicago. He said she had a boyfriend three or four years ago. He was weird, stalky, but then he got married and moved east. Kelly? She just moved here. But of the people she knew in Bowman and back home? Nobody’d ever heard of anybody’d be a threat. I kept hearing she was just the nicest person in the world.”

The deputy’s voice tightened.

Nothing wrong with the Feel. That emotional wire between you and the victim. It’s what made you “keep people up” at night, all night, looking for clues.

“So it’s what it seems. Random.”

Eventide nodded. “No pattern other than body type and age and hair color. And I’ll tell you, Constant, after yesterday, you will not find a box of Ms. Clairol blonde or red in a single store in Bowman County.”

Eventide now turned left, north, onto Kankakee Road, the western border of Lone Ridge Park. “Let’s go fishing.” The deputy slowed to five mph and Marlowe rolled down her window, studying the roadside, looking for signs of a car recently parked — perhaps leaving the magic print. This was so far the most likely approach BRK had taken to the jogging path. There was a lot of brush and reaching the trail meant a hike over Lone Ridge itself, only seventy feet high at the “peak” but steep.

Yet the route was easily navigated by someone strong, as the majority of serial killers were.

“He apologized.”

“Frank?” Eventide asked.

“Yes.”

“By not apologizing.”

Marlowe confirmed with a nod.

“That’s our sheriff.”

Ahead of them, Marlowe could see the Grey River, a two-hundred-yard-wide expanse of water, flowing rapidly west. Marlowe wondered if the name came from the British spelling, with an “e”; she’d learned that this land was once controlled by King George.

Eventide had told her that the name of the river in Potawatomi was Nokmes, meaning grandmother.

“Nothing,” Marlowe said. She saw no sign of anyone parked along here recently. Marlowe now revised her Where diagram.

North (To be searched)

West (Possible, no obvious signs) Crime Scene Parking Lot (No) East (No)

South (Unlikely but possible)

Kankakee Road dead-ended into Riverside. The deputy braked to a stop. In front was the river and, to the left, an overgrown lot, in which sat a plaque indicating some historic site. To the right was a private residence.

This was the house that Marlowe had noted yesterday on a map of the area while she was speaking with — well, ignoring — Evan Quill. It was the closest structure to the jogging trail where Kelly Nader had been killed.

And she wanted to have a talk with the residents.

The ranch house was white and could use a paint job. Small, though the lot it squatted on was an acre in size, maybe more. A FOR SALE sign rested slightly askew in the lawn near the mailbox.

Last night, Marlowe had only noted Zillow’s opinion on the house’s selling points and price. Eventide now looked up the particulars of the property. “Gerald McCabe. Married. Wife is Randi. No warrants, no record.”

They climbed out and approached. Eventide pressed the bell button. No sound. They gave it fifteen seconds and she rapped.

A moment later the inner door opened, then the outer aluminum screen. The man had long dark-blond hair and was skinny, his jeans dangling low and revealing a swatch of taut belly between belt and St. Louis Arch souvenir tee. One arm was sleeved with intricate red and black inking.

“Mr. McCabe?” Marlowe asked.

“Uhm, yeah.”

The wary eyes, Marlowe assessed, were not shit-hide-the-meth wary. Just, Oh-hmm-here’s-a-cop wary.

A shy little girl, blonde, in a T-shirt printed boldly with a cartoon character, species impossible to guess, peeked out. Marlowe thought of Tamara Hope’s boyfriend, Danny, who sported the tat of some cartoon character on the hand with which he’d comforted the girl during last night’s meeting.

Somewhere in the house a TV or video screen was flickering.

The women identified themselves.

“Maybe if we could have a word in private?” Eventide asked.

“Honey, go back to your flakies. There’s more milk, you want. You want more milk, Kylie?”

“No.” With a last glance at Marlowe the girl turned.

“You hear about that attack in Lone Ridge yesterday?” Marlowe asked.

“Yeah.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Just about in our freaking backyard. BRK.”

Then he looked to a shotgun in the corner. He was prepared if any perverts showed up. Marlowe noted that there was a lock on the trigger guard, required by law if there was a child in the household. The responsibility suggested that he would be a more reliable witness than someone who left guns lying around for five-year-olds to play with.

She asked, “Did you see anybody along Kankakee or Riverside around eleven to two yesterday?”

“Well, me? I was working. I’m second shift at Harvester. Eight to four. So I left here seven-thirty. Randi and me, we work out our shifts. For her.” A nod toward the girl.

“Can you call your wife?”

“Yes, ma’am.” He placed a call and after it was connected — his body language made clear when — McCabe explained about the officers and then posed the question.

He listened. “Okay. Hold on.” Looking up. “She doesn’t remember seeing anybody. But she said she’s seen construction crews across the street, that field, a couple of times in the past weeks. I remember ’em too. Maybe they were here yesterday and saw somebody. She can’t say. She was making biscuits. And Disney was on.”

Marlowe glanced back toward the lot as a light-colored car, a solo driver at the wheel, cruised past. Was the driver looking their way? She turned back to McCabe. “Any idea who was doing the construction work?”

He shook his head. “I don’t, no.” He then posed the question to Randi. After a moment, he looked up. “No, she doesn’t either. You know, you see crews, you don’t really pay attention.”

Eventide said, “Thank her for us.”

He did and then the man’s gentle voice asked, “You want soup tonight?... Good. I’ll get it on... And, you bet, I’ll give her a big hugster from Mommy.”

The women handed out business cards, then stepped outside.

Marlowe nodded to the field across Kankakee, where the construction work had been going on. Maybe there was a sign on the site about who was doing the work. The women pushed through the barrier of brush into the field. Just a large area of recently planted grass and plants around some old stone ruins about sixty or seventy feet from the cliff’s edge. This was, the plaque reported, the remains of Fort Defiance. Not much of a historic site.

There was no construction crew signage.

“Can we find out who did the work?”

As they returned to the car, Eventide made some calls. There was no record of a public project here. Her face tightened. “Private. That’s a lot of contractors to call,” she said. “Hundreds of ’em in the tri-county area. Sometimes I wish there was a dozen of me.”

A sentiment frequent among law enforcers, Marlowe reflected.

Back in the car they trolled east, along the north border of the park. Just as along Kankakee, she spotted no signs of recent tread marks.

She wasn’t surprised, given the landscape. “What’re the odds he’d come at her from this direction?”

Eventide studied the dense tangle of foliage too. “I’d make it halfway between zero and none.”

“Not a betting woman but even I wouldn’t take you up on those odds.”

“Brush and bogs. Take too long to get away from the scene.”

“Agreed.”

Her mental chart was revised once more.

North (No)

West (Most likely, though no obvious signs) Crime Scene Parking Lot (No) East (No)

South (Unlikely but possible)

Marlowe glanced around them again, hoping to see the light-colored sedan, curious if the driver lived near here — another potential witness to talk to.

But she saw nothing of the vehicle.

They left the park behind and Eventide sped up. They passed a few houses. Like the McCabes’, several were up for sale.

Eventide said, “Most of this’ll be Native land if the treaty goes through, so people’re getting their houses on the market now. Government’ll pay for eminent domain, but lawyers and brokers’re saying they’ll get a better price if they sell private.”

They drove past a large poster for Buonafortuna, the development company presumably selling condos, or co-ops or whatever they specialized in. Then: a picturesque cemetery, on a grassy bluff overlooking the river. Many tombstones were eroded and illegible. She caught one date: 1779.

Was it the resting place of a Revolutionary War soldier?

Eventide tsked her tongue. “My. Was that a cute little girl, or what? She was a button.”

Marlowe supposed she was. She’d forgotten about her entirely.

Eventide asked, “You have any?”

“Kids? No.”

Marlowe watched a long barge filled with coal or ore moving west with speedy elegance, a tug behind.

“You have anybody in your life?” Eventide asked. “Stop me if I’m being a Gladys Kravitz.”

A frown in response to the reference.

“Someone in my life,” Marlowe said slowly.

Ah, the question of Evan Quill.

“Yes and no.”

“Ha. More one than the other?”

“Yes and no.”

Another laugh.

“Prosecutor Upstate. We work together some. We can talk. We can laugh. Important.”

“Oh, yes indeedy.”

She told Eventide the relationship didn’t go much past that, though, and explained as well how she’d told Quill up front that she was not a staying-the-night kind of girl.

The deputy exhaled a surprised laugh. “Well, now. Men and women, it’s the other way around most times. And he’s okay with that?”

“Probably prefer it different. But that’s how it is. I’m on the road most of the time.”

This was true, though not the entire story. Not even a big part.

Eventide gave her a conspiratorial little glance. “And between you two? It’s good, when you’re together? The up until the stay-the-night part?”

“Yeah, it’s good,” Marlowe said, and a memory appeared fast — the last time they were in his townhouse, lying in bed, sweat-glazed and motionless, other than their chests rising and falling in perfect unison.

“That’s as important as laughing.” The deputy chuckled. “Even when you’re on the clock.”

“Clock?”

“We’re trying to have a baby, John and me. And I will tell you, it’s more fun than wallpapering, but that time of month rolls around and it’s like the factory whistle blows and, ‘Come on, boy, the foreman’s calling!’” She shrugged. “No luck yet.”

“Been at it long?”

“Three months. I’m no spring chicken.”

“All of what? Thirty?”

“Thirty-one. Andi, my sister’s got two. And one’s starting first grade this year. But John and me’re hopeful.” She gave a soft laugh. “I’ve already figured out how I’m going to tell him I’m pregnant.”

“How?”

“You know how some women tell their husbands with a stuffed bear?”

She didn’t. Made sense.

“You notice back there at the McCabes’, he had his scattergun locked up. I saw your eyes.”

“Always check, there’s a child in a house.”

“Me too. So when I find out the news, I’m getting him a big package, all wrapped up, ribbon and bow. And guess what it is. An Anderson De-luxe fingerprint gun safe for my sidearm. I’m going to let him piece it together...”

Piece it together, piece it together, piece it...

Eventide’s words looped through Marlowe’s mind as the boxy and battered F-150 pickup appeared from a wall of brush to the right and aimed directly for them. Marlowe barked an involuntary “Hey” and threw up her arms as the truck struck the passenger side of the car and pushed it hard over the left lane and shoulder. Airbags popped, softening the impact and filling the compartment with powdery residue.

Tires squealing, tires smoking, the truck ran the squad car sideways toward the edge of a low cliff. The river was fifty yards away and Marlowe was thinking at least they wouldn’t land in the water and sink to the sticky mud of the bottom.

And they didn’t.

It was an oil-slicked canal they sailed into, a deep, murky body of water linking the Grey to the rotting loading dock of the defunct Morton and Sons Quarry, Gravel and Sand Our Specialty.

Chapter 17

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

Sitting at the kitchen table, lit by a shaft of burning sunlight, the man was playing a word game on his phone. “I didn’t think anything of it. Why would I?”

They were late sixties and both about the same build. One Halloween, when they still went to parties, they’d gone as Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee, from the Alice in Wonderland story. Only a few people had figured out who they were supposed to be.

Bob was in his retirement sweats. Doris was in what she called a housedress, which he didn’t know exactly what that meant but he could recognize one when he saw it. White and pink and buttoned up the back.

“Well, we have to tell them now,” she said, working away at the stubborn yolk on a white breakfast plate, her thick gloves matching yellow.

“I suppose.”

Four tries at the word.

Hm.

“Well?” she asked, defeating the stain. “Did you hear me? Call them now.”

“What’s to tell? A car parked outside. Driver sitting there. It was probably just a salesman. Aluminum siding or blacktop resurfacing. Oh, those guys...”

“You really don’t know, do you?”

No end to where that question could lead.

The last plate bit the dust.

He frowned her way, shaking his head. Subtly admitting his failing. And loaded a new game. You couldn’t get the Wordle archive anymore. A conspiracy. This game was similar. For some reason, not as much fun. “I don’t. No.”

Always — somewhat — safe.

The InSinkErator ground to a satisfying whir.

“That weirdo, the killer?”

“What weirdo? What killer?” Were they one in the same? Or two?

“BRK.”

No clue.

“Where have you been for the past three days?”

In retirement heaven, upstairs working on his model train set. That and puttering in the yard.

And the game, of course. Damn. Four tries. The word was FIGHTS.

Wordle was five letters. Easier.

“Bowman County’s got its own serial killer.”

“No! And you think that was him?”

“I don’t know. But the news, that anchorwoman, WCLK.”

“The blonde?” He asked this eagerly.

A scowl. “No. The good one. She says if you see something, say something.”

“It was just a car.”

“Where it shouldn’t’ve been.”

Granted.

She picked up the mobile they shared, pressed in a number and he heard the click as she activated the speaker. This was how they talked to the kids and grandkids and placed DoorDash orders.

“911, what’s your emergency?”

Lord, he thought, now either it would be an embarrassing moment or word was going to get back to the psychotic killer or to the weirdo or to both of them that they were witnesses.

Lose-lose.

“Aluminum siding,” he whispered.

Doris silently shushed him with a hand.

“We want to report a suspicious vehicle.”

No, we don’t.

But the mule train was already on its way.

“What’s your residence?”

“We’re at 3877 West Thompson, with an H, Clark Valley.”

“And is the vehicle still there?”

“No, this was yesterday.” A cool glance from her to him. “I just found out about it. But we’ve heard about this killer. BRK.”

“Yes, ma’am. How many people were in the car?”

She looked pointedly at her husband, who said, “One.”

“Did you get a description?”

Bob said no to both the nice operator and his wife and he added, “There were bushes in the way and there was glare — right in my eyes.”

Doris was looking at him suspiciously, maybe wondering if there were bushes in the way, how could he see there was glare?

Though it was possible and it was the truth.

He glanced at the next puzzle. He got it in one try. PLANTS. Hollow victory.

“And the vehicle?”

“Light colored, sedan. That’s all I could tell.”

“Only that one time?”

Now Bob was in for it.

“Well, he might’ve been back last night.”

Her look was downright withering.

“What time?”

“Midnight, ’round about. He got out and walked up the street.”

The operator: “And he was looking at your house?”

“No, not us. It was the houses up the way.”

“Do you know who lives there?”

They regarded each other, considering. This mission seemed to have calmed her.

Doris said, “Ernie and Sarah Gardiner. Mike and Jo-ellen Moore. Two words. Jo and ellen, lowercase, if it matters. With a dash in between. And their son moved back in, Trey. He used to be a troublemaker when he was twelve, don’t know about now.

“Oh, and one other couple. The Hopes. Glen and Liz, well Elizabeth, I guess, but I couldn’t tell you for certain.”

Chapter 18

Constant Marlowe felt the brutal forward tug as the cruiser decelerated from the impact. It bobbed briefly and began to go down, bow first.

Beside her, Eventide was stunned; her head had struck the window when the car went into the water; the airbag had already deflated by then.

Everyone in the State Police, even DCI agents, takes tactical survival, which includes escape from sinking vehicles. There’d been no refresher for years but she remembered enough of it.

Get out through the window or sunroof, not door; you’ll drown before the pressure equalizes enough to push it open.

The electrical system may work long enough to roll a window down.

Marlowe did this and the passenger side one lowered, but only about ten inches before the system shorted out.

You can’t break through the windshield. The glass is too strong. If you need to break a window to escape, use a side.

“Glass break tool?” she shouted.

Eventide replied groggily, “Trunk.”

Of course, deputies would only need the steel bar to get someone else out of a vehicle.

She lifted her phone. It was already drenched and useless. Eventide’s had been in the center console and was MIA.

Her head lolled.

“Stay awake,” Marlowe ordered. Head injuries were always alarming. “You with me?”

“Sort of. I’m sort of with you.”

Marlowe undid their belts. And the women eased into the back of the compartment — the higher portion — to escape the rising surface of brown chalky water.

The car continued its nose-first descent.

How the hell deep was it? Very, most likely. Marlowe recalled seeing the barges, weighed down with thousands of tons of rock. There would be nothing left of the Dodge above the surface when it hit the bottom.

The air trapped in the rear of the compartment had slowed the sinking but only slightly. The water continued to rise, shockingly cold.

Marlowe gripped the partially lowered passenger side window and tried to muscle it farther open. No.

Both hands on it, she pulled and pushed. It didn’t break.

She eased back and kicked hard.

Her boots were rubber soled and did nothing.

Now the entire front portion of the passenger compartment was submerged.

Still stunned and moving lethargically, Eventide inhaled some water and began to choke. Marlowe gripped her collar with her left hand and struggled to hold her above the surface. Only three feet of air remained.

Then two and a half...

Last option.

From Eventide’s holster, Marlowe pulled the woman’s weapon, a Glock — a model 17, the nine-millimeter.

“With me, Zo?”

No response.

“Zo!”

“Yeah?” More choking.

“We’re getting out. Keep. Your. Head. Up.”

A lethargic nod in response.

The compressing air made Marlowe’s ears pop.

She took a deep breath and then went under, feeling for the partially open window.

She held the gun tightly, two handed, not knowing what the recoil from shooting it underwater would be. She knew the water would decelerate the round dramatically so she seated the muzzle directly against the glass.

First shot.

The sound — which would have been ear-slugging on the surface — was a muted thud and the recoil was, in fact, less than normal.

She felt the glass. Yes, the slug had penetrated.

Second round, third, fourth...

She fired in a rough U shape, all fifteen bullets. Then, after stuffing the weapon in her pocket, she gripped the glass and tugged fiercely. The piece broke away easily.

Back to the surface. The air pocket stank of gunpowder — the muzzle blast had created large bubbles that rose upward.

Eventide was near unconsciousness.

Minutes only. Marlowe reached underwater and undid Eventide’s utility belt — heavy ballast — and kicked her own boots off.

“We’re going now. Can you take a deep breath?”

Nothing from her.

Marlowe leaned close. “Gun safe, okay? Think about the gun safe! Zo! Your gun safe!”

“Anderson... Products.”

Only eighteen inches of air remained. Eventide’s head dropped again before Marlowe could prop her up. The woman caught more water and choked again.

Fuck...

“Breathe! Three deep breaths. Hold the last one!”

Marlowe was improvising. She had no idea if this improved lung capacity.

In any event Eventide didn’t seem to hear her.

Marlowe followed her own instruction and sucked in sour air three times, then she dunked the deputy. She guided the woman to the shattered window and aimed her out, headfirst. Marlowe pushed, her stockinged foot on Eventide’s rear.

Out she went and began a slow rise toward the surface, kicking by rote.

The car’s nose hit the bottom, sending up a cloud of gray silt and began to go over — on the side of the shattered window. The only means of escape.

Go!

Marlowe struggled out, one foot on the soft bed of muck as she pushed against the sedan’s roof to keep it from settling atop her.

Didn’t work.

Cars still weighed a shitload, even underwater.

But just as it dropped onto the side, she pushed herself outward into the deep dusk, free of the settling wreck.

No sign of Eventide.

Marlowe couldn’t see more than three feet around her.

Now, where was the surface?

No telling.

And she wasn’t rising spontaneously.

Goddamn leather jacket.

She tugged it off and squinted. The car was exuding bubbles.

Follow them.

She did, slowly rising.

Her lungs begging for air, chest in agony, kicking desperately, she came very close to inhaling the dubious water.

Then the world grew suddenly brighter and she broke to the surface with a whooping gasp.

Eventide was nearby, struggling and choking, the sound like an amplified death rattle.

Marlowe grabbed her collar and kicked toward a jumble of large rocks lining the shore. She clambered atop, dragging the deputy after her. They collapsed against the forty-five-degree bank of dirt and gravel and anemic grass, Marlowe drawing her weapon and scanning the cliff’s edge above them.

After a minute or so Eventide stopped choking. She lay still and breathed deeply.

They made eye contact — and the deputy’s stare was blank. Then she blinked. Tacit thanks? Or maybe a random what-the-hell-just-happened gesture. Or the head injury might be more severe than Marlowe thought.

Eventide closed her eyes once more and lay back.

Marlowe shook her. “Stay awake. Don’t go to sleep.”

“Yeah, sure.”

Marlowe kept scanning the ledge above them. The driver of the pickup had intended to kill them, obviously, but he couldn’t count on the collision and dunking to do that. He would probably be waiting in case they escaped.

Why he hadn’t appeared on the crest of the bank with a weapon was a mystery.

She scrabbled to the right about ten yards, ascended to the edge and looked quickly over it.

So. The driver had been stunned too. He was only now groggily climbing from the seat. His nose was bloody. It didn’t seem his airbag had deployed. Maybe there was none. They were valuable and she knew some meth-heads sold them for a hit or two.

Marlowe crested the ridge and, keeping the gun trained on him, walked slowly closer.

He rolled from the truck, fell and then rose. Extremely skinny, a shaved head, inkings on neck and forearm. His white T-shirt was spattered with blood and his jeans were dotted with black from the drops that had escaped from his nose.

Then he saw her and the weapon and lowered his head — in disgust, it seemed.

He’d failed in his mission.

Pausing for a moment, he shook his head and then drew a gun from his back waistband, a small revolver.

Marlowe went defensive, turning perpendicular to present the smallest target and centered her sights on his chest. “Drop the weapon or I will fire.”

She could easily have tapped him, even after the trauma of the collision. It was odd how fast the muscles you needed came back into service.

But he wasn’t aiming her way. He stared and was shouting some words she couldn’t make out. Rambling. His earlier dismay had morphed to anger. While his gun hand remained at his side, he pointed at her with his left, extending his index finger. “You... you people...”

Then he lifted the gun.

But not in her direction.

To his own temple.

“No!” Marlowe called. “Don’t!”

Now, she could hear his words clearly: “You’re never going to stop us! You’re not taking our land away!”

The gunshot, a second later, was a brief crack, but loud enough to send a dozen jays, robins and finches fleeing for their lives into the brilliant blue sky.

Chapter 19

“Jimmy Long,” Frank Tremain said. “Unemployed. Address in Foster. Which is the wrong side of the tracks even though there aren’t any ’round there.”

Her clothes still damp, her feet still bare, Marlowe nodded.

Puffing air from his cheeks, the sheriff continued, “Lord. Found a bushel-load of crap in his car. KKK. Sins of Communists and globalism. Off-the-rack racist stuff. As simple-minded as you’d expect. Posters against the treaty. Which they haven’t even authenticated yet. Not worth shooting yourself over. ’Less you’re pure looney. Which kinda answers my own question.”

The charge was attempted murder with a deadly weapon (a revolving definition and could include anything from a samurai sword to frozen ice cream container — Marlowe had run cases involving both). Technically an attempted capital offense, since the intended victims were law, though Illinois no longer executed.

Other officers kept arriving.

Also present were State Police brass and a half dozen county deputies, including canvassers Davis and Charlotte. The officers had been looking for accomplices and witnesses, though finding none.

Tremain, of course, had done the forensics of the car.

Now, attention was on the tow truck tugging Eventide’s cruiser out of the water, the two county deputies who were scuba certified bobbing nearby.

“Vehicles don’t float,” Tremain announced, and spit.

“Hm.” Marlowe studied the car for a moment then was looking at her phone, still dripping.

“You going to try the dry rice trick?” Tremain asked.

“Doesn’t work.”

“I know. But you got a wet phone, somebody’s got to suggest rice.” He took a call. Had a few words and disconnected. “Princess’s good. Concussion’s negative.”

Zo Eventide had been rushed to the hospital, the medics concerned about the head injury. Which can eerily, without warning, put you to sleep forever.

“Question, Sheriff?”

“Yeah?”

“These Neo-Nazis. I don’t know anything about them. Other than I guess he’s one. The kid.”

A nod. “He’s Traveller Stead’s nephew. Stead’s the head of the Brotherhood. The Führer — yeah, he really calls himself that.”

Coincidence or intended the man picked that moment to spit hard in the grass.

“Traveller? Know where that comes from? Robert E. Lee’s horse. Yeah, head of the Confederate army. Man is a walking cliché. Your question?”

She mentioned her reflection from earlier: “This is the most homogenized town I’ve been in. The Eagle Brotherhood responsible for that?”

“No. I keep a close eye on them, as you have heard. I don’t disagree about Bowman. Have been aware of it myself. Best I can come up with, it’s a fluke of geography. No passenger trains, no interstate. All we got for moving people would be the Grey. And last I looked river-commuting is not a thing that ever took off.”

“My thought is people opposed to the reservation might think that’d be a start. First, more Indigenous people. Then people of color. Go to extremes to make sure the treaty’s not approved.”

“And ‘people opposed’ could be Stead — being as his nephew played bumper cars with you.”

Marlowe asked, “He the sort who’d hire pros?”

“Stead? Possible. But I know mosta the roaches hang out with him and that pair you described aren’t among ’em.”

“Any luck tracking down my sparring partners?”

“Odell and Mattie hit all the dealerships and garages ’round here use Motor-XPL. No hits on those Cézanne drawings you ginned up. That places ’em way outcounty.”

Marlowe said, “Couple that with the stolen gun I took away from Slim. That means they’re probably working with a crew out of St. Louis.”

“Exactly. And Traveller doesn’t have congress with anybody down there. So I’m thinking there’s somebody else pulling the strings. Now, have to tell you about the Hopes.”

“Something happened?”

“They’re okay, fine. But BRK paid them a visit. Twice. Yesterday during the day, then he came back at night.”

Marlowe sighed. “So he made them as witnesses. Damnit. How?”

“Don’t have a clue on that one.”

The question, however, was for herself exclusively. Had she screwed up?

“Our babysitter?” She glanced toward the street.

“Asleep at the switch. Figuratively. He’s had a talkin’-to.”

“And BRK didn’t make a move?” she asked.

A shake of the head. “Checking security probably.”

“Where’s the family now?”

“Still there.”

“No,” Marlowe said. “They have to leave. I’ll talk to them. Can somebody drop me back at the hotel?”

“Sure.”

“And, oh, and here.” She snapped closed Eventide’s Glock’s locked-back slide, aimed toward the ground and dry fired the weapon, then handed it to Tremain.

“Thanks,” he said, his eyes suggesting extreme gratitude. The cost of the gun — around $500 — would’ve come out of his budget. “I’ll get you a chauffeur.”

Marlowe said, “First, I need to have a conversation.”

“You sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“Good luck with that,” Tremain said, and spit once more.

Chapter 20

Marlowe walked to the County EMT ambulance. In the back, she found two med-techs, male and female, bent over a figure, lying on a low gurney.

“I want to talk to him.”

“All yours,” the man said. His face revealed disgust at having to treat this particular patient.

The EMTs climbed out.

Marlowe took a seat beside Jimmy Long, the driver of the pickup truck. He looked toward her with eyes whose anger was dulled by morphine. “You... bitch! You shot me.” He glanced at his highly bandaged appendage. “You,” he mumbled. “You shot me... You shot me in the...” It took a moment before he conjured the word. “Hand.”

“I did.”

He’d be taken to the hospital presently, then the lockup, but Marlowe had decided he wasn’t going anywhere without a brief interrogation.

“My finger. You shot my finger off. They can’t find it!”

Marlowe wondered how hard anyone had looked. “I saved your life.”

Before he’d pulled the trigger of the pistol aimed at his temple, Marlowe had lifted her weapon and fired a single shot into his gun hand. Nobody that age — eighteen or so — should die for a reason that was both racist and possibly unnecessary, since the reservation treaty had not been authenticated.

“You don’t see the danger! They’re coming and turning US citizens into Communists. They’ll take everything away! There are these groups, they’re called cables, and—”

“Cabals.”

“No! I read it online. Cables, and they control everything and are taking our land away acre by acre. The tribes are in on it. The Indians and the Jews... and other—”

“Shush,” Marlowe said firmly. Her eyes were focused and hard. He shushed. “Who?” she asked.

“Huh?”

“Who put you up to it?”

He was thinking as fast as he could, it seemed. Which was clearly low velocity. Then a safe fallback: “God. God told us to protect our land.”

“No, She didn’t.”

A pause. “‘She’? God’s not a girl.”

“I want to know who the ‘us’ is. You said, ‘God told us.’ Who’s that?”

“They’re going to take our money. There won’t be any cash. And—”

She drew her weapon. He gazed at it with wide eyes, shocked.

“You want to lose another finger?”

“You fucking... wouldn’t.”

“Who?” She aimed, explaining that the story would be he lunged for her gun and it went off accidentally.

“You just tried to kill two cops and there’s no prosecutor on the face of the earth who’d even take your call if you filed a complaint.”

He didn’t say anything but he squinted. He was considering.

She leaned close. “I’m not your normal cop. And to me you’re just a fly.”

But the decision didn’t have to be made. She heard Tremain’s voice as he and someone else approached.

She sighed and slipped the weapon away.

Jimmy Long lay back and tightly closed his lips.

The sheriff and Odell Davis approached.

“He say anything?”

“Yes, in a way. He wasn’t solo on this. Somebody else was behind it. Like Bigot and Slim.”

The sheriff frowned then nodded. “Who?”

“Short of shooting off another finger, he’s not going to tell us, though.”

Tremain cocked his head. Was she really asking if she could park a slug in him?

The kid launched into another rant. “She’s a tool of the cables! Keep her away from me!”

Chapter 21

Showered, clothed and re-equipped, Marlowe was standing in the Hopes’ backyard, the rear property line defined by a trellis that matched the one in the front. On this one beans grew. Some were withered and Marlowe guessed the plants were for decoration not sustenance.

The sun was lowering, late afternoon. And going through her mind was the slogan from the warstoreroom:

Next attack probable no later than 9/23.

Tremain stood beside her, having cordoned off the miniature crime scene.

Glen Hope was with two colleagues, businessmen in Clark Valley. They were all, she’d learned, members of the Bowman County Commerce Club, a boosters organization for small businesses in and around the county. They were here working on plans for a fundraiser when they’d gotten word of BRK’s visit and the two men had decided to stay — partially as bodyguards, it seemed.

Bryan Coughlin, head of a local bank, was a fit man of about fifty. The other, Dean Stone, was bulky and had a personable face. It was familiar and Marlowe realized she’d seen his smiling likeness on billboards advertising his car dealerships.

Both looked like they’d enjoy five minutes alone with BRK.

A sentiment Constant Marlowe herself appreciated.

All three were in suits. Coughlin wore a tie; the other two did not.

He muttered, “Terrible. That girl.”

“Girls,” Stone corrected “Both of them.”

The businessmen and the sheriff and Marlowe were just outside a yellow-ribboned area — the scene that Tremain had already searched, coming up empty for evidence, other than some trampled down grass where BRK had stood. Two neighbors, Bob and Doris, had pointed out the spot to Tremain, before returning quickly to the safety of their house.

From here the killer would have a good look at the Hopes’, the back porch and ground floor windows in the rear.

Liz Hope joined them, now in jeans and a cowgirl shirt, blue with embroidered strips down the front. She nodded a greeting to Marlowe and the sheriff.

Glen asked, “So. He found us. How the fuck?”

“Honey.” She touched his arm.

Even horror occasionally took second place to propriety.

Marlowe reiterated what she’d told him when they’d first met: “We don’t know.”

Dean Stone looked around, as if BRK were still lurking.

“You should get away,” Marlowe said. “Until we find him.”

“If you find him,” Glen said.

“No, when,” Marlowe said evenly. “Are there any relatives you can stay with?”

Glen was looking across the backyard, as if it were a thousand acres he’d tilled and nurtured and from which he’d harvested a bountiful crop. He sighed. “I suppose. Where?” He was looking at Liz.

“Mom’s?”

“Maybe,” Glen said uncertainly. “It’s a thirteen-hour drive.”

Coughlin said, “Our lake house. An hour away. You can stay there. Tamara too.”

Marlowe said, “Yes, your daughter should come with you.”

“Thanks, Bryan.” Glen looked at Liz, who nodded. “We’ll take you up on that. Tomorrow, though. I’ve got three settlements.”

The sheriff: “We’ll leave the guard out front. Tell him to make trips around back too, from time to time.”

“Do you own a firearm, Mr. Hope?” Marlowe asked.

Liz answered. “No guns in this household.” Her voice and her face were stone.

There was meaning behind this.

“Call if you need us,” Marlowe said. The phone was new but the number remained the same.

As they walked to their respective vehicles, Marlowe asked, “The Hopes? They ever have an older boy?”

Tremain’s lips pursed. “I think so. Jason. But there was only the two, Tamara and Erik, when they moved here.”

“I saw a picture of the three kids together and they said they only had the two. With the way Liz mentioned the gun...”

“Suicide?” he muttered with some emotion. “I’ve run those calls. There is little worse on the face of the earth than a parent facing that.”

When they arrived at their vehicles Marlowe said, “Good they’re leaving town. You see Hope’s face?”

“Yes, ma’am. He’s out for blood. I don’t know him real good, but I hear he’s kind of Mr. Rogers. Mr. Let’s Settle This Nice and Peaceful. You know what happens when people like that decide to fight back?”

“They go overboard.”

Tremain scoffed, “And those other two? Coughlin and Stone? They’ve got ‘vigilante’ written all over them. Phew, amateurs. No end to the trouble they can cause. At least we’re lucky about one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“No firearms in the house. Think of the mess he could get into if he had one.”

Chapter 22

Hey, pretty, hm?

Glen Hope was thinking of his daughter’s words as they drove along Route 27 yesterday en route to her school.

He’d glanced left toward beautiful, misty Lone Ridge Park.

“Pull in,” she’d encouraged.

And Glen Hope had thought he should have taken in the nice view and just driven on, to New France.

But he hadn’t. He’d braked and turned into the park’s drive. He could still hear the tires crunching as they headed for the picnic area.

And a logical decision, a decision there’d be no reason to question otherwise, had become a mistake.

One hell of a mistake. It’d brought the devil directly to their doorstep.

Glen was not, however, inclined to judge anyone in his family, himself included, for making choices.

It had happened.

Let’s go from there.

Which he was doing now.

He climbed to the second floor of the house. In the hall to the guest rooms, a string dangled. He tugged down the attic stair contraption, unfolded it and continued up into the musty, webby place. He pulled a beaded metal cord — he was always afraid it would have an electric charge — and a dim light came on, a twenty-five watter.

It didn’t take long to find the box he sought. It was brown cardboard, a two-foot cube. With a pocketknife he slit the tape and pulled the flaps open. He studied the interior carefully, looking for small but potentially deadly recluse spiders.

None appeared but still, when he dug through the contents of books and envelopes of official paper, he dug carefully. He finally lifted out the cloth-wrapped bundle.

Slowly opening it, the way a doctor would remove bandages from a plastic surgical patient’s face.

He stared at the heavy black revolver and the yellow and green box of cartridges.

It was an old gun, an American-made Smith & Wesson model 10, 38 caliber. This particular brand of sidearm had seen service from World War I to the present, after a brief discontinuation. The six-shot model was the most produced pistol in the twentieth century and a workhorse for soldiers and cops. In fact the original name was the M and P.

Military and Police.

His grandfather carried it in the Second World War’s Pacific theater.

Ah, Jason. His son had been named after the man.

Jason...

Mr. Hope, I’m Deputy Peters, the State Police. I’ve got some bad news. It’s about your son...

News that involved this very piece of metal he now looked down at.

Then he tired of the sentiment, the softness, earned though it might have been. Glen slipped the pistol into one pocket, the box of bullets into the other. He shut the light out, climbed down the rickety stairs and pushed them into the ceiling.

Chapter 23

The house was what Constant Marlowe believed was called craftsman style.

Mostly wood, with green trim, a shade that matched the needles of the pines that surrounded the front and the sides. To the back was a descending lawn down to an oval pond.

Zo Eventide met her in the drive. “You’re going to ask if I’m okay and I am. Only the doctor said it wouldn’t hurt if I lost a few pounds. Should’ve gone to a different ER. And you?”

“My jacket. Other than that.” A shrug.

The fierce hug was unexpected, though Marlowe might have guessed it would be forthcoming. Words would only have diminished the gratitude for what she’d done at the canal, and Eventide remained silent. She stepped back. “One question?”

Expecting something serious, Marlowe nodded slowly.

“Were you aiming for his finger?”

“I’m good. I’m not that good. I was sighting on his weapon.”

“You get him to talk? I was hoping you could use your special interrogation techniques.”

You want to lose another finger?

“Didn’t get the chance.”

“Bummer. Come on in, meet my husband.” She nodded to a motorcycle, a big Yamaha. “His brother’s here.”

They walked up a few steps onto a porch.

Inside she was greeted with the smell of cooking, a roast maybe. Meat, some onion, garlic. Other herbs. The rooms were large, low lit and fitted out with subdued accents: Paintings mostly, some folk-art landscapes, some portraits of Indigenous men, women and children in Native American garb, seeming to date to the nineteenth century, a few abstract. A front den or bedroom had been set up as an artist’s studio. She wondered if the artist was husband or wife or both.

She thought briefly of Liz Hope and her excellent needlepoints.

Another room had been painted yellow and decorated with cartoon characters on a molding banner just below the ceiling. A yet-to-be-assembled crib sat in parts in the corner.

That time of month rolls around and it’s like the factory whistle blows...

“You can stay for dinner?”

“Can’t. But thanks.”

“Wine, beer, then.”

“Beer, any kind but light.”

They walked into the kitchen, which showed signs of use by someone who knew what they were doing. The utensils and appliances that were being used were ordered and sitting on paper towels. There were no spills on the countertops. Ingredients yet to be added — spices and vegetables and stock — had been prepped and rested in opaque plastic containers. A dozen of them.

One who didn’t cook, Marlowe, for example, could only be impressed.

Taking the Heineken, she followed Eventide, who was drinking sparkling water, out onto the back porch, where two men lay in loungers, holding beers of their own. Both were of dark complexion and had black hair. One’s was trimmed, the other’s done in a taut, foot-long ponytail. Brothers clearly, close in age. They could almost be twins.

They rose and there was no doubt which of the two was Eventide’s husband. The ponytailed one went directly to Marlowe, who braced for another hug. This one was even more fierce than his wife’s. He finally stepped back. Was he crying? “What you did, you saved her. She told me what you did, you saved her life.” He turned to his brother. “She’s the one. I was telling you. She shot out the window!”

Marlowe wanted to deflect. “Just standard procedure.”

Probably wasn’t.

Zo had apparently kept her maiden name; her husband’s surname was Notawkah. John, the given.

“I don’t know what to say. If there’s ever anything I can do. Some furniture. A bureau? A buffet. I’ll make you one.”

Eventide explained, “John’s a fine woodworker.”

His brother said, “We call him a fine fine woodworker.”

Eventide said, “My brother-in-law, Kit.”

He gave a smile. No hug, but a warm handshake.

John said, “You’ll stay for dinner, Constant. It’s that? Not Constance?”

“That’s right.”

“He makes furniture, he paints, he makes decks. And he cooks. What’s not to hate about this guy?”

“I can’t. Maybe another time.”

“Sure. Yes, another time.”

The men wanted to hear about what had happened. Marlowe left it to Eventide to provide the narrative. She wasn’t one for war stories.

“Shot his finger off!” John’s eyes were wide. Kit only laughed.

Marlowe said, “That was just a bonus. Sometimes you get lucky.”

Kit said, “We heard a call. No idea that was you two.”

He was fire service in Frederick County, which she recalled adjoined Bowman to the south. She had wondered about the small, concealed weapon just visible when his untucked Hawaiian shirt rose. She knew it wasn’t unusual for firefighters to be armed. They were often called in for any situation that involved injury, which might have to do with a car crash or fire, but might also be a potentially deadly domestic or robbery.

Kit asked, “Why’d he do it, do you think?”

“Probably because he thought I was here about the treaty.”

“Oh, that?” John was shaking his head. “It hasn’t even been authenticated yet. It’s in the hands of the lawyers and document experts. What’s that got to do with you and Zo?”

Eventide: “We were driving along what would be the reservation border.”

Marlowe said, “And, he was crazy. Rambling. Hard to hear most of it. What I could tell, it was racist, conspiracies. That.”

John said thoughtfully, “You know, you get your driver’s license, forget the vision test. They should do a psych exam.”

Kit and Marlowe said simultaneously, “Or IQ.”

Everyone laughed.

Conversation turned to life in the flatlands of Illinois, the furniture trade, fire service, Marlowe’s itinerant investigating jobs. After a half hour, John and Zo disappeared into the kitchen to get dinner ready.

Marlowe looked at her new phone for the time.

Kit said, “Have to go?”

She held up the bottle. It was a third full. “I can stay long enough to finish it.”

“Hourglass made out of beer. Maybe that’s a product line to start.”

“Already sell them on Amazon.”

They sipped and looked toward the horizon, the valley stretching out, first day of fall hazy, the checkerboard of fields burned back or naturally fallow, the Grey River an insignificant strip far away. The sun was huge and setting fast.

Kit asked, “You close to getting this guy? BRK?”

By his familial relations and his career Kit was automatically vetted.

“No major leads yet. Cases like this? They hinge on the smallest of things. A witness decides to take a chance and come forward. A gas station video cam’s pointed just the right way... My Christmas present’d be a tire print.”

Where...

She found herself looking him over, from boots up, lean legs, thin waist, broad shoulders and solid arms — the weathered face, too — he looked like someone out of the Wild West. You could clearly picture him on horseback.

Then her eyes returned to the sinking sun.

She asked, “If the treaty’s valid will that Grey Valley land be a reservation, like the others around the country?”

“Just like them, yes. First one in Illinois. In the eighteen hundreds, Presidents Monroe and Jackson and the Northwest Territory governors — that’s what Illinois was back then, the northwestern corner of America — they all promised they’d respect the Indigenous. ‘We’ll treat them fairly; we’ll never coerce them to leave their lands.’ Direct quote from Monroe. A few years later, that was all a joke. No Indians east of the Mississippi. Moved the Potawatomi, Kickapoo, Illinois, Kankakee, the Sauks, everybody. You know the Trail of Tears?”

Marlowe grimaced. “Inexcusable. Jackson ordering a forced march to Oklahoma. Thousands died.”

Kit nodded. “We had our own version. A move from Indiana and Illinois west to Kansas. Eighteen thirty-eight. Our name for it was different: the Trail of Death. The fatalities were mostly children.”

“Zo was saying that someone just happened to find the treaty?”

Kit said, “Some professor at Ellis College. It was an agreement between Congress and a small offshoot of the Peoria or Kankakee. The story is some chieftain had a friend in Washington. There was talk that he had saved a congressman’s family from Black Hawk — he was a Sauk — when he tried to take back lands around Chicago and the lawmaker in Washington managed to get the document signed. Nobody knows why it disappeared. If, in fact, it ever existed.”

“So it might be a forgery?”

“Maybe.” Kit sipped beer. “The experts’ll tell us.”

“You all moving?”

“John and Zo and me? We don’t trace our ancestry back to the tribe that was involved. Anyway, I like living where I am. Dirt bike trails, Walmart and Whole Foods all within a twenty-minute drive.”

Where “I” am, she’d noticed. Not “we.”

He turned and looked over the landscape, growing dimmer and mistier. The smell was of smoke and wet grass.

Marlowe sipped. The beer hourglass had not shrunk much.

“Zo says you’re a boxer.”

“Was.”

“Kind of famous, she said.”

A shrug. What to say to that?

Marlowe told him a bit about her career.

He hadn’t known much about the history of women’s boxing.

“Goes back a long time. My hero? Elizabeth Wilkinson was maybe the top boxer in England in the early seventeen hundreds.”

“No! Seriously?”

“Oh, women’ve boxed nearly as long as men. Elizabeth’s specialty was bare knuckle fighting. One of the biggest matches of the day was her versus Hannah Hyfield. The venue was packed. The rules were different — it’s like cage fighting now — and boxers kicked and gouged. But for the Wilkinson — Hyfield match, the promoters wanted to class it up. So they made both women hold coins in their hands so they couldn’t use their fingers and nails.

“But then, surprise, men took notice and there were laws passed, in almost every country. You could go to jail for fighting in a match if you were a woman. Finally sanctioned matches were approved and took off in the late nineties — yes, the nineteen nineties. Finally recognized by the Olympics. I thought about trying out. But women had to wear skirts. And that killed it for me.”

She recalled thinking that she probably would have worn one on her own, but wasn’t going to let anyone dictate a dress code to her.

Kit shook his head.

“I had a good run. I liked it. But I got tired of the full-time circuit. Bored really. Still box some, but rather use the skills in real life.”

“Beating up assholes in alleys.”

So the story had gotten around.

She said no more. A hit of beer.

Kit asked, “You get down here often?”

“Not so much. Which is good news for the citizens of Bowman County. I handle violent crimes only. If I end up someplace it’s because something bad’s gone down. Or is about to.”

They talked about their respective hometowns, and their residences. Kit won; despite his earlier ribbing, he apparently had a craftsman’s eye and hand like his brother. He’d built his home too, a modern A-frame, much of it by himself. Of his five acres of land, an eighth of an acre was devoted to growing vegetables. Marlowe’s residence, halfway between Chicago and the Wisconsin state line, aspired to be a double-wide trailer. She’d had the grass removed and replaced with gravel, since she was rarely home to mow it and wouldn’t have wanted to even if she was.

There was silence between them for a moment. He asked, “Today, when the car went into the canal, you think you were going to die?”

“It occurred.”

“Change anything for you?”

“Change?”

“Like a wake-up call?”

A serious question deserving of her consideration. She thought for a moment. Then: “No.”

Kit nodded slowly. “We had a multialarm call. A factory in Menasha. Bad. No way we could’ve knocked it down. We would’ve never gone in except there were still some employees unaccounted for. I was on the second floor when I got a call they’d been found outside. Was going to evac down the stairs but just before I got there, I fell through the floor. Got stuck, legs dangling.”

She frowned, imagining the terror.

“Managed to get out. Finally. Ten pretty long minutes. Three or four probably, but it seemed longer.”

“I was curious if you survived.”

Kit smiled. Then he grew serious. “I wondered if it’d change things for me.”

“Did it?”

“Matter of fact, yeah.”

She asked, “What was that?”

“I decided I’m only going to fight fires in basements from now on.”

The lighthearted atmosphere faded. He looked into her eyes. She easily held them. He said, “I joke. But, yeah, it did tell me something. Don’t let opportunities pass you by. You find something in life that appeals, go for it. Don’t let it get away. You know what I’m saying?”

And Constant Marlowe thought: she knew exactly what he meant. She lifted the hourglass beer and tapped her bottle against his.

Chapter 24

Friday, September 22, 6:10 a.m.

For this moment at least, BRK and racist fanatics were locked away in the back of her mind.

Constant Marlowe was in a place of relative peace.

The bedsheets, which had been sweat-damp around midnight, were now dry and the quilt, reportedly of real goose-down, was pulled up high.

Her back was to the man lying beside her in the Illinois Country Inn and she was feeling his heat against her skin.

You find something in life that appeals, go for it...

How true.

He now stirred and he rolled onto his back. She did the same, then kept going and lay facing him, her arm on his chest.

“You know, I could’ve sent a pdf,” Evan Quill told her.

Last night, after finishing the hourglass beer, and saying good night to Eventide and her husband and Kit, she’d texted Quill. She’d asked if he could bring her the crime reports he’d been looking up for her.

He’d queried:

You mean, in person?

Her answer:

Yeah.

It was a four-hour drive.

He’d typed:

K.

Apparently either she’d answered the mystery question about the Owen trial correctly yesterday when they’d been on the phone — after her mind had wandered — or he’d been uninterested in a response.

Or maybe he’d been as distracted as she was.

They’d greeted each other briefly last night with an embrace just inside the hotel room door and made directly for the bed, not a word between them.

This was not unusual.

It was, however, exceedingly odd to end up in these circumstances: where the never-staying-the-night girl had maneuvered herself into a place where staying the night was the only option.

She knew he was surprised.

As was she — by the fact that Constant Marlowe was experiencing no tension, no perspiration, no anxiety.

Good, so far.

He stretched. He kissed her shoulder.

Marlowe mused, “I was at a local deputy’s house, that one I’m partnered with down here? I had a conversation with her brother-in-law. Nice guy. Fire service. He invited me back to his place for the night.”

“Did he?”

“I decided I like the idea in theory, only I wanted a different cast member. He took it well.”

“If you’d gone with him, I could’ve saved gas money.”

Now she kissed his shoulder.

She looked around, at a room defined by sharp sunlight.

So this is what the morning after looks like.

It wasn’t as bad as she’d anticipated.

“Breakfast?” he asked.

“Coffee. Something light maybe.”

He looked over the room service menu. Quill had quite the appetite for a slim man, though he also burned calories like dry brush, bicycling easily fifty, sixty, sometimes a hundred miles a day. He ordered bagels and butter and cream cheese and scrambled eggs, fruit and the coffee.

He lay back in bed. Whispered, “We have twenty minutes till it gets here.” He pulled her down and kissed her hard.

She kissed back, also firmly, but said, “Time for business.”

An image had come into her mind once again.

Next attack probable no later than 9/23.

One day or less.

She rolled from bed and, naked, walked to the bathroom. Quill might have glanced at the scars and the tats. She didn’t think there were any new ones since they’d been together disrobed. Oh, the CVS drugstore stitching on her thigh. But that was largely healed.

A fast shower and she was back.

Quill had dressed in one of the hotel-provided robes, pulling some documents out of the backpack he used as a briefcase.

“Yesterday,” he said, not looking up. “The car. The river.”

She could sense he wanted to say something important about the incident.

Quill then noted her eyes going straight to the paperwork, and he clearly understood that she wished the topic to go no further, that it was like speaking in a language she could not possibly translate and had no desire to learn. What was the point of trying?

And so he dropped the matter instantly, and she knew it would never be brought up again.

Adding to her comfort with the stay-the-night morning.

She too pulled a robe on and rubber banded her unruly hair into a sloppy ponytail. “What do you have?”

“Eagle Brotherhood. They’re as repulsive as we guessed. Mostly talk, supporting extremist candidates. Disrupting the other side’s rallies, protesting immigration policies. They’re on the Bureau’s radar but not in a red-notice file.” Another shuffling of folders. “Now, my other job, I found two somewhat similar incidents to BRK’s MO.”

“I heard the qualifier.”

“No deaths. Women about the same age, late twenties. Both in Illinois. Trenton Falls and Hampton, drivable from here. In the past twelve months. Attempted sexual assault. First one, he subdued her with a blunt object. She never saw what. Pulled her shirt off. It didn’t get to rape because a car pulled into the alley where he’d dragged her and he took off. Second one was similar. He hit her with a hammer and started on her clothes but she fought back and he ran. Neither made it into NCIC. Detectives’re comparing notes now and sending me the Danagraph and serum. I’ll get it to you right away.”

He handed her the files and she skimmed through them. They were by-the-book investigations, medical and crime scene details, witnesses, webcams, usual suspects.

There were indeed some similarities. Body build of the perp, fibers from work gloves, though a different color from the ones BRK had worn. Use of condoms — different brands there too. Different color ski mask. He wasn’t wearing Cross-Fits, but plain soled shoes, leather, in one case, size ten. Adidas in another. Size eleven. The blow was on the top of the head with the one victim, so the suspect would have been the same height as BRK. Most tellingly, the victims were white, midtwenties, with short dark hair, like the victims here.

“If it was him, and it seems to be,” Quill said, “he’s graduated to homicide.”

Not uncommon. Sometimes the satisfaction diminishes and the need evolves. Addiction.

Now, she was looking away. She said, “Don’t know your schedule. But I’ve got to go to East St. Louis, whenever this’s wrapped up. Police chief’s asking for an outside look, his investigation procedures.”

East St. Louis. An unfortunate city whose population is a quarter of what it was not that long ago and that has one of the highest homicide rates in the country. Marlowe’s outfit, the Department of Criminal Investigation, often assisted smaller law enforcement agencies in the state, when they found themselves overwhelmed by caseloads.

“I was thinking of taking a day or two off.” Constant Marlowe noted an extremely alien lump of vulnerability and uncertainty within her. A pause. Then she pushed on. “There’s an inn up near Quincy that Zo told me about. Sounds nice.”

In anticipation of calling Quill, she’d asked Eventide last night if there were any picturesque places to stay somewhere drivable from ESL.

“You mean romantic?” the deputy had asked.

“I mean picturesque.”

The woman had recommended the place where the couple had honeymooned. Ozark Hills Inn.

“It’s not in the Ozarks and there’re no hills. But you’ll love it. Oh, and they have a hot tub in the shape of a heart!”

Now, having mentioned this, while neglecting the hot tub part, she glanced toward Quill.

Staying the night.

Suggesting a trip.

Was she possessed?

“Sure. I’d like that.” His voice was as eager as a nail-hardened prosecutor’s could be. “I’ve got Owen maybe coming to trial but the judge had to recuse himself and it’ll be a while before another’s assigned.”

“Spell.”

He frowned.

“‘It’ll be a spell.’ It feels South here.”

“Y’all got that right.”

Then, the dramatic decision made, the offer laid on the table and accepted, she relaxed.

She dressed in jeans and black tee, double-checked her weapon — round in the chamber and the mag fat with six. Clipped it into the holster, which went inside her belt. No safety latch on Glocks; it was ready to shoot.

Marlowe checked her email and found that her contact in the state’s Analysis Support Division had finally compiled a listing of nearby purchasers of .308 Winchester ammunition with the particular formulation of powder that had propelled the bullets toward her in the downtown alley yesterday.

Forty-two total.

She heard Frank Tremain’s words.

To the dismay of many a deer, there’re a lot of .308s sold around here...

She scanned the list. Thirty-six in Bowman, the others in neighboring counties. From the names she could see most were men, two women. Women boxed; women hunted. Though around here, apparently not very many of the latter.

She forwarded the email to Tremain with a note to review the list and see if any of the forty-two had been in trouble in the past.

She hit send.

As he pulled on business slacks and a light-blue shirt, Quill said, “Something I’ve been thinking about.”

“Hm?”

“You’ve been attacked twice. You think because of the treaty. Even though—”

“I have no jurisdiction. But we’re assuming the perps or whoever hired them don’t know that.”

He said, “But is anybody asking why? What exactly don’t they want you looking into?”

Marlowe considered this. “Like there’s some secret about it they’re afraid I’ll find.”

He nodded, slipping on his socks and then shoes, carefully polished. “Something that’ll prove it’s authentic... or a forgery. The age of the paper. Was XYZ ingredient really found in the ink of the eighteen hundreds? Was the quill tip the sort that was used then?”

“Or maybe something substantive,” she said slowly. “Did the elder or leader who signed it die a year before? Or the congressman?”

“Exactly. Or did somebody cheat when they were surveying the boundary? Or maybe—”

“Wait. Boundaries...” She was thinking of what Zo Eventide had told her about the reservation being defined by landmarks, not coordinates.

And recalling where the women had been yesterday — at the McCabes’ house, just before Jimmy Long’s vehicular attack. Marlowe lifted her phone, looked up a number and placed a call.

“Bowman County Historical Society. Can I help you?”

She identified herself and said she needed some information as part of an investigation. Did they have any local maps dating to the 1800s?

“Yes, Agent Marlowe, we do. A lot of them. What in particular are you looking for?”

“The Grey River valley. A few miles on either side of the bridge on Route 43.”

“Let me check.”

They heard clattering. She was quite the typist.

The woman said, “Hold on a minute. I’ll look in the archives.”

A few minutes later: “Hello, Agent Marlowe?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t know what to say, but the shelves where they should be are empty. All of them. That’s impossible, except” — Marlowe deduced a shrug — “they’re definitely gone.”

“Stolen?”

“Oh, they couldn’t be. Who’d steal them? They’re not worth anything. I’m sure they’re just mis-shelved. I’ll have somebody track them down.”

Marlowe could have said, don’t bother, they’re already ash. But on the off chance that one of them had been missed by the thieves she thanked the woman and asked her to call if she found any. She gave her number and disconnected.

“Somebody stole them.”

“Just google. There’ll be some online.”

“No, I need originals. Not copies. Admissible evidence.”

The two regarded each other. She said “Real estate plat” at the same time as he said, “Plat.”

The filed survey for deed recording was, after all, a map too. Sometimes it was just the property being transferred itself; sometimes it expanded to the surrounding area.

Maybe the thieves hadn’t considered this.

Another call.

A bored woman’s voice offered a punctuation-free sentence: “Bowman County Recorder of Deeds can I help you?”

She identified herself again. “I’m in town on an investigation.”

“Yes, ma’am.” She perked up. Ah, a tale to tell her husband over dinner.

“I need a copy of the plat of the Gerald McCabe residence on Kankakee Road in CV.”

“You’ll really need to fill out—”

“I’m here investigating BRK.”

“Oh, my. I suppose we can make an exception.”

“Every time the property was transferred, from the first recording date, I’d appreciate it if you could take pictures of the plat in the deed book for me.”

Marlowe had heard of herself that she was a woman who could make the verb “appreciate” sound like a threat.

She added, “I’ll need as much of the surrounding area that’s in the book as you can shoot. Margin to margin.”

A hesitation. “You won’t use my name?”

She hadn’t given it and Marlowe hadn’t asked. “Never.”

A moment later her phone began to hum with incoming MMSs.

The first picture of the McCabe property plat was from the 1860s. It didn’t show what she was hoping to find.

Neither did the one from 1871.

In both of those cases the cartographer had focused only on the property that was being sold and bought, the lot where Gerald and Randi and Kylie now lived. There was nothing of the surrounding area.

A plat from 1874 showed more.

It was just what she needed.

“Oh, hell...”

Again, speaking without meaning to.

Frowning, Quill turned her way.

Without a word to the diligent, if nervous, clerk/photographer, Marlowe disconnected and punched in another number fast.

Hoping she’d be in time.

Chapter 25

The sorrow of the killer.

No one ever talks about that.

Not an ounce of sympathy.

The burden in your heart as you go after your prey. Because you’re compelled to. You’re ordered to.

The soldiers.

The death row executioners.

Pontius Pilate...

It was the governor of Judea, responsible for the death of Jesus, who had put this thought in Joseph Ray Whelan’s mind, as he’d sat in a small Protestant church early this morning.

Drawn into the austere building by, of course, his obsession with threes.

The Trinity.

Pilate’s burden.

Joseph Ray’s burden.

If he could wave a wand and get relief some other way, he would do it in a minute.

But he was stuck with the fact that the only solution he had to pierce the bubble of sorrow was to kill.

These thoughts, complicated as the Pythagorean theory, complicated as Christian theology, now vanished as his attention was taken by some motion from across the street.

The boy.

Erik Hope was on the move.

Joseph Ray had left the church an hour earlier and stationed himself here, near the Family Hopes’ house — out of view of the police guard, now far more attentive, after having missed Joseph Ray’s visit yesterday.

The kid was dressed in black jeans, black shirt, black jacket. Sunglasses.

A helmet. Not black, but near — in gray.

His parents weren’t going anywhere, it seemed, so Joseph Ray decided to follow the boy. His backpack slung behind him, Erik kick-started the bike and skidded into the street.

Joseph Ray was concerned that Erik was going to play motocross but, no, he drove the limit and stopped for yellows. It was easy to follow him.

The kid was hunched over the bars, not looking in the rearview mirrors much. When he did he missed Joseph Ray altogether. No double takes at the tail. No evasive moves, which would have been a piece of cake for somebody on a dirt bike.

Probably, Joseph Ray’s mission wouldn’t be helpful. It appeared that the boy was simply riding to school.

Ah, but now he was riding past the school.

And why was he cutting classes?

To go hunting, of course.

Hunting for BRK.

What was in the backpack? Books? A tablet?

Weapons?

Like what was in Joseph Ray’s.

Erik would feel immortal — like all seventeen-year-olds, of course. And he’d be aware that the killer had been spying on them yesterday, from the backyard. Which meant that, in the tradition of the best first-person shooter games, which the boy simply had to play, it was now time for him to go on the offensive.

He followed for a mile, until the kid pulled off the side of the road and nosed his bike into a stand of brush. Then, looking around — and completely missing Joseph Ray’s car — he plunged into a dense forest.

Pulling over quickly, Joseph Ray grabbed his own backpack and climbed out, following the target.

Finally he saw what the boy was up to.

And it was pretty damn clever.

These woods skirted an athletic field. Ellis, the best school in the county, was in New France, forty miles away. But CV was home to several colleges too: some community and one four-year private. This field was connected with Haversham Community, whose main campus was, coincidentally, on Route 27, not far from the killing field of Lone Ridge Park.

Erik would have come here thinking that with the young women working out on the field and jogging along these very paths, BRK might have come here to target another victim.

A woman that appealed — trim with short, black hair.

The third victim...

The kid’s foolish mission was to find BRK in the act of stalking — as unlikely as that was — and call it in to the police.

Or, given the kid’s youth and the reality-is-optional attitude of most teens, attempt to arrest or maybe even kill BRK himself.

Joseph Ray knew nothing of the family, of course, but he decided the latter was what the boy had his heart set on. Prove himself to be the hero. Slay the dragon, the orc, the dark knight.

Was there some odd psychological quirk that pushed him on this quest? Something from his past maybe.

Rebelling against a boring suburban family?

Proving himself to his father.

That was always a good one.

Ah, family dysfunction.

Erik moved silently through the woods, looking about constantly. Maybe he was a real hunter.

He’d stop and squint, looking for something in the field, or more likely across, in that portion of the forest.

Keeping low and placing his feet carefully, Joseph Ray moved closer. He caught sight of Erik every dozen or so yards, when the foliage thinned out, and it was clear the boy still had no idea he was being followed.

Carrying his backpack, to minimize his profile, he thought of the contents — specifically, of course, three of the items. The knife, the duct tape, the paper towels, which he would use as a gag.

He wondered what the sound of a male scream would be like, when muted by the wad of towels and tape?

Still pretty loud.

But in the back seat of his car, windows rolled up? Probably nearly silent to anyone nearby.

Looking about, Joseph Ray continued on, remaining about thirty feet behind and to the left of the boy, who was now on a jogging path.

Joseph Ray moved closer now.

Then he froze — at the thud, thud of footfalls, moving quickly in his direction.

He reached into the backpack and withdrew his knife.

The knife that was so sharp it could cut paper.

Not to mention what it could do to flesh...

The footsteps drew closer yet.

Chapter 26

“What were you thinking? What on earth?”

Erik Hope avoided his father’s angry face and looked down at the floor. He remained silent. Though he was nearly as tall as the other men in the room — Deputy Odell Davis and his father — he appeared much shorter, given his slumped posture.

“I just... I don’t know.”

How many times had a teenager said those very words to his, or her, parents, as if they were a logical explanation for every sin a youngster could commit?

And it was Mom and Dad’s fault for not understanding.

“He was looking for BRK,” Deputy Davis said. “At the Haversham sports annex, off Maple Crest.”

Erik glanced up, then down again. “It’s where he’d go. You know, to try to kill somebody else. I was going to find him.”

“Son...” Glen was momentarily at a loss for words.

“Erik, you have to leave that sort of thing to us.”

“I guess.”

“Son. Respect.”

“Yessir, Deputy Davis.”

It seemed that the Hopes’ vehicles and tag number were on a countywide wire, Davis explained. The whole family was under an informal protection order. “A city police cruiser had spotted the boy’s bike pulling into the woods beside the sports complex. Sheriff Tremain sent me to check on him.”

“Thank you,” Glen said emotionally. Then he frowned, “And did you see anybody?”

“I’m... I don’t think so.”

“Think?”

Davis said, “He thought maybe somebody was in the bushes. I looked. There wasn’t anybody there.” A shrug. “There might’ve been some shoe and knee impressions but it was impossible to tell for certain.”

With some effort, Glen controlled his anger. “You could’ve been killed.”

The boy’s eyes remained aimed downward but now registered a dash of defiance. “I would’ve found him first and fucked him up—”

“Erik! Enough. You’re grounded.”

“Dad...”

“Grounded. Now. Get to your room.”

He stormed off.

Davis shook his head. Meaning: teenagers.

Liz had been to the store and she pushed inside quickly now, troubled, of course, that Erik’s dirt bike was still here, not at school, and a deputy’s cruiser sat in the drive. Her face was taut with alarm.

Davis held up a palm. “It’s all right, Mrs. Hope. Seems your boy was playing detective.”

“What?”

Davis explained.

“What was he thinking?” Liz whispered.

Her husband’s very words.

Davis said, “Well, he had a good motive. He told me he was worried the killer was hunting for the family because they were witnesses, even though you weren’t.”

“He told you that?” she asked.

A nod.

Davis said, “I’ve got to get back to work. Keep an eye on him.”

“We will. Believe me. We will.” Husband and wife shared a troubled look.

After he left, Liz walked into the kitchen to put the groceries away.

Glen walked to the front window where just the other day he’d thought, Not a cloud in the sky.

A little different now.

The family had been through this before with Erik. He had a mind of his own. So did Tamara but unlike his older sister, who was a planner, Erik acted impulsively. Joining clubs, taking up activities, playing video games.

Devouring books.

Glen hadn’t read Tom Sawyer, no, but he had skimmed Wikipedia and found that it was set in an 1840s Missouri not far from Clark Valley and that the central figure was a cutup and somewhat of an antihero, skirting the law on more than one occasion. At one point Tom found himself in a deep cave in Missouri, where a man who wanted to kill him was hiding out.

Eerily similar.

Then his son faded from his thoughts as he looked at his watch. “I’ve got to meet Tam.”

Liz hugged him. “Good luck.” She handed him a coffee thermos. He kissed the top of her head and she settled into her armchair to work on her latest needlepoint, which was nearly finished.

Soon Glen was piloting his SUV east along Route 27, over the limit, but not by much. He didn’t want to be stopped. He was, after all, illegally armed.

A glance at the dashboard clock. He’d be at Lone Ridge Park in twenty minutes.

Chapter 27

Glen Hope drove past the charming town of Hamilton, where people would sit outside at cafés and bakeries and solve the problems of the world or enjoy the comfort of like-minded banter. It was a gingerbread place.

He passed the abandoned Eccles Manufacturing, which had fabricated metal parts that ended up in Detroit and performed an obscure function. The kids said the place was haunted by a worker who’d been disemboweled on some piece of machinery.

He passed Windermere Estate, a posh development with houses large enough so that two of the Hopes’ homes could fit inside.

He passed Cogswell Farms, over a hundred acres of largely flat grazing land. Cattle did their thing: chewing and standing. The family produced some of the best beef in the state.

He passed Haversham Community College, where Tam had gone for a year, earning high grades, enough to get her into Ellis, a prestigious private college, two hundred years old.

Jason had gone to Haversham for two years and earned an associate’s degree with honors, before going into the service.

Ah, Jason...

And it seemed that the pistol in his pocket grew heavier.

Haversham, whose sports annex Erik “Tom Sawyer” Hope had just been nabbed in.

Honestly, Erik...

He now glanced at the road that would lead to the heart of the Indian reservation, if the treaty were authenticated. If that happened then all those locales he’d just noted along Route 27 — quaint Hamilton and ghostly Eccles Manufacturing and snooty Windermere Estate and organic Cogswell Farms and functional Haversham Community College — would, in a finger snap, become something very different.

He arrived at Lone Ridge Park now and saw Tamara’s car near where the second victim had parked her yellow Camaro the day she was killed.

After parking along the highway, he joined his daughter, only to discover that they had coincidentally dressed similarly. Jeans and T-shirts and dark jackets — black in her case, brown in his.

They hugged. “All good?” he asked.

She nodded. “Yeah. Danny and me, we keep looking around for anybody hanging near his place. Like you had behind the house. We didn’t see anybody.”

“Everything good with Danny?”

“Yeah, fine.” She looked around. “Why’s it still sealed?”

Yards of yellow tape fluttered.

“No idea. You’d think they’d have everything they needed. I mean, the crime scene people.” He looked around and gestured north. “That way. And watch where you’re walking. You hear about that cobra?”

“What, like the poisonous snake? Here?”

“It was on the news. Guy in CV imported one illegally. The feds tracked him down and he released it before they arrested him.”

“No shit.”

Glen nodded. “He was thinking he was getting rid of the evidence. So, they arrested him for importing animals without a license and reckless endangerment.”

She gazed down. “What do they look like?”

“There was a talking head on the show. He said cobras’re real hard to spot.” Glen added in a dramatic voice, “He said they’re masters of disguise.”

And father and daughter laughed.

Chapter 28

Marlowe found the sheriff and Zo Eventide at Edward’s Diner on Route 55.

She wondered: Why not “Eddie’s”? For a place like this — all done up in chrome, red Naugahyde stools and benches, windows and ceiling in need of washing — the full formal given name didn’t work.

Tremain and the deputy were at a booth, their flapjacks and oatmeal half-eaten, courtesy of Marlowe’s urgent call fifteen minutes earlier.

Nods as she sat. The waitress came by, wearing a real diner’s uniform. Marlowe shook her head.

“Now,” Tremain began, “I just sent an officer hell-bent to somebody’s house on the basis you seem to know what you’re talking about. Most of the time. So. Explain. S’il vous plaît.”

He’d nailed the French accent. Tremain was nothing if not a mass of contradictions.

“Is he there, the officer? At the McCabes’.”

“She is, yes. Lily Figg. Who can outshoot either of us. Or both at the same time. Did I ask a moment ago: Why?”

Marlowe pulled her phone from her pocket. Called up a picture and displayed it.

Tremain squinted. “A land plat. Deeds Office. Corner of Riverside and Kankakee.”

Eventide peered too. “Where the McCabes’ place is now.”

Squinting as he read, the sheriff said, “Eighteen seventy something. Four, I think. Hard to read. Whatta you say, Princess?”

“Eighteen seventy-four.”

Marlowe said, “We’re not interested in that property. This surveyor included more than just the bounds of the lot on the corner that was being deeded out. Look to the west.”

“I’m looking.”

She expanded the picture. “See what’s on the edge of the cliff?”

“Yeah. It’s Fort Defiance. General Clark put it up to do some fighting against the British. Revolutionary War. Then later some militias used the fort when Black Hawk and his Sauks did their marauding.”

Marlowe said, “The fort’s not there anymore.”

“Whatta you expect? Was a long time ago.”

“No, I mean the ruins still exist but not where they were back then. They’ve been moved.”

Eventide examined the map once more and nodded. “We just saw the ruins yesterday. It’s now maybe fifty feet south. In eighteen seventy-four, it was right on the cliff’s edge.”

“Hm. You got a band of fort-movers. What about it?”

Eventide said, “Under the treaty, the fort’s the marker defining the north border of the reservation. Whoever moved it shrank the amount of land the Native people would get.”

“Okay, now you’re getting my attention.”

Marlowe added, “Somebody moved the ruins south, then planted grass and bushes to cover up the signs of their work. And the county librarian told me all the maps of that part of the county from the eighteen hundreds’re missing.”

Tremain said, “But you got the official plat. Smart. Where’s the original deed book.” He nodded toward her phone.

“With a friend. Evan Quill. It’s safe.”

Drawing an amused glance from Eventide.

“He’s a prosecutor from upstate.” Marlowe looked up. “He’s armed.”

As a DA, Quill had the right to carry a weapon. He never did, though he presently had one of Marlowe’s spares, a tiny LCP, in his pocket. He, the gun and the plat book were back at the Illinois Country Inn, where he was presumably working on his cases and eating the rest of the sumptuous breakfast he’d ordered.

Tremain lifted a tobacco pouch from his pocket. He didn’t even get it open before the waitress yelled, “Frank!”

The pouch sulked back into his jacket. “This is a pretty nice present, Agent Marlowe. Keep pulling ribbons.”

“McCabe or his wife saw the crew moving the fort. It was behind a row of brush but probably they got curious and walked over to watch. To them it was just some construction work. But they’re witnesses. Whoever tried to beat me up and sent Zo and me for a swim? They wanted to make sure we didn’t find out about the fort. And they’ll want to eliminate the family too.”

“And can you kindly define ‘they.’”

“No, I cannot. Yet.”

Tremain sent a text. As he did, he told Eventide and Marlowe, “I’ll get a couple others over to the McCabes’ too. Lovebirds Odell and Mattie and I’ll make sure they stay good and hid. Spring a trap on the undefined ‘them,’ if they show up.”

Eventide pointed out, “All right, they’re stealing Native land. It’s only fifty feet or so, but there’s got to be a reason. What do you think?”

Marlowe said, “It’s near the river so maybe it’s a water rights issue. Or somebody doesn’t want his family property or a business to be swallowed up. That cemetery too, the one on Riverside? Maybe some descendants don’t want their ancestors to end up on Native land. I don’t know. Let’s catch them first and figure it out later.”

Tremain laughed. “Now that is one good philosophy, Agent Marlowe. I’m making a sign for my desk.” He waved for the check.

Chapter 29

Glen Hope and his daughter were in the woods of Lone Ridge Park, near the jogging trail, where Kelly Nader had died.

Dry fall leaves and dry dead twigs snapped under their footfalls. No cobras appeared but various hopper insects leapt out of their path.

“I don’t know,” Tamara said. “Looks like they searched everything. I mean, all the yellow tape.”

It was serious crime scene work. Glen and Tamara could both recognize that. The family loved a true crime streaming series, Crime: American Style. They watched it every week and tried to outdo each other in guessing how the police would catch the bad guys (they never got away).

“We’ll find something,” he said. His voice was confident. He patted his pocket, unnecessarily. The pistol was heavy and never for a moment was he unaware of its presence.

Because of you, Jason is gone...

Concentrate, he told himself.

“There?” Tam was looking at a cluster of logs.

Glen squinted and studied it. “No.”

They kept looking.

There had to be something here.

The girl’s face brightened. “Oh, I know. There.”

They stopped. Glen was on his knees, shining the flashlight into a hollow log.

“Ah, you nailed it, honey! Good.” He rose and looked around. “You’ll remember where it is?”

She gestured. “Yeah, near that pine. The funny-looking one.”

Two trunks had grown together, an eerie deformation.

Glen returned to the 4Runner, while Tamara diverted to the restroom.

At the vehicle he pulled out his phone and googled the BCSO. When the option to call appeared he hit the phone icon.

“Bowman County Sheriff’s Office.”

“Yes, uhm, hi. I found something about BRK, that killer? Is the sheriff in? Sheriff Tremain. I was—”

His voice stopped abruptly, as Tamara’s piercing scream came from somewhere in the forest.

“Tam!” Glen shouted.

“Sir... do you need assistance?”

He ignored the voice from the phone and called again, “Honey, Tam?”

But the only response was his daughter’s plaintive cry, “Help, Daddy, help me!” Sounding much like she had when she was a little girl and had been awakened by one of her terrifying nightmares.

Slim, pretty and highly pierced, Randi McCabe didn’t recall seeing anything that could be used to identify the half dozen men who’d been doing the construction work in the field across from their house on Kankakee Road.

The McCabes and the “button” of a girl, Kylie, were standing with the three law enforcers in the kitchen of their house. The place was dim; all the shades were drawn, though solid and somber Lily Figg, the sharpshooter, Odell Davis and Mattie Charlotte were stationed at three of them, peering out.

Randi continued with her hazy recollection of the workers across the road.

They were white, she thought. They were wearing orange vests, she thought. There were a half dozen, she thought. There was a bulldozer, she thought.

There was a black pickup truck with a Confederate battle flag on it.

This she knew because the flag offended her.

Tremain muttered, “Sadly could describe a few too many of our citizens. Illinois was Union but parts of it had one foot in Jeff Davis land.”

It took Marlowe a minute: the president of the Confederacy during the Civil War.

“Anything?” Tremain called to the three sentries.

“All clear,” Figg replied. Davis and Charlotte concurred.

If Marlowe’s theory held, the unknown “they” might be planning an assault on the family at any moment.

“Let’s get ’em out of here.”

Now that the officers had as much info as they could gather from Randi and Gerald McCabe, the family left, to drive to her parents’ in Estonia, two counties away. Deputy Figg would be their bodyguard, Odell Davis and Mattie Charlotte would remain in the house, a surprise party for anyone coming to kill the family.

Tremain, Eventide and Marlowe crossed the road and pressed through the brush to the site where the fort had been resituated. From his uniform pockets, Tremain extracted his crime scene gear — booties, shower cap and gloves.

Marlowe would not have been surprised to see a magnifying glass materialize.

The sheriff went to work, examining the remains of Fort Defiance. It was really just a low wall, about fifty or sixty feet in length. At most it was three feet high. Much was just single blocks. Marlowe had had no idea the Revolutionary War extended this far west. You tended to think of Lexington and Concord and Valley Forge.

After fifteen minutes, Tremain was done. “Yeah, it’s definitely been worked on. Plenty of evidence. Fresh tool marks in the stone that couldn’t be more than two weeks old. And they bound some of the rock together with fresh concrete. Sixty-two-point-five percent aggregate and thirty-six percent paste and entreated air.”

Marlowe lifted an eyebrow toward Mr. Forensics. “You’ve got a concrete database?”

“No, I got a back deck, which I poured myself. And I’d say those boys left not a single fingerprint but not because they were crime scene savvy; fact is, nobody does this kind of work without gloves. You ladies stay here, if you would please. I’m goin’ hunting for shoe prints.”

He set down a few evidence bags near their feet and began shooting pictures with a small digital camera.

This took about ten minutes. When he joined them once more he said, “I make it a half dozen, probably men or heavier women, one eighty and up. With the plantings and rain the other night, can’t make out any brands of shoes or boot. Their vehicles? Pricks covered up most of the treads, but I scored a dually.”

Marlowe said, “Pickup with four rear tires.”

“City girl’s been around, Princess. The wheelbase probably makes it a Ram 3500HD.”

“Lot of those around here?”

“Some. But I’m going to start with one in par-ticular.” He turned to Eventide. “Go to DMV, Princess. And look up Traveller Stead.”

The deputy stared at him.

“I’m waitin’.”

After just a minute on her phone, she looked up. “You win the lottery, Sheriff. Your local Adolf Hitler owns a Ram 3500HD, three years old.”

The sheriff’s face blossomed with satisfaction. “Let’s get a move on.”

But before the operation — whatever it was going to be — could occur, Tremain got a text. He looked down, reading. His lips tightened.

“Have to postpone our social call. It’s the Hope girl, Tamara. There’s been an incident.”

Chapter 30

There was no doubt Tamara’s attacker at Lone Ridge Park was BRK.

Cross-Fit Plus joggers.

Dark ski mask.

An iron pipe.

Marlowe, Eventide and Tremain were standing next to Glen Hope, looking visibly shaken as he leaned against the front fender of his SUV.

An ambulance, lights flashing urgently was sitting at an angle on the shoulder, where it had skidded to a stop.

Marlowe asked, “What exactly did you see?”

“This man, holding a pipe, standing over my daughter. She was lying on the ground.” His voice broke.

Tremain asked, “And you fired at him, all six rounds.”

The gun sat on the 4Runner’s hood, its cylinder open.

A nod. “I don’t think I hit him. I aimed high. I was afraid of hitting Tam. He ran.”

“Did you go after him?”

“No. I tended to my daughter.”

Marlowe asked, “Which direction did he go?”

The man gestured toward Lone Ridge. “West.”

“Toward Kankakee Road.”

The unsub’s most likely entrance and exit point for Kelly Nader’s murder.

“See any vehicles?”

“No. All I was thinking of was Tam.”

Then there was motion from the back of the ambulance.

Helped by an EMT, Tamara stepped out. She joined the men. Her father began to hug her but backed away when she winced.

She explained, though, that the wound wasn’t bad. BRK had tried to strike her head but she’d heard a crack of a branch behind her and turned. The pipe had hit her shoulder.

She’d scrabbled away and he might’ve struck again, except Glen had charged into the woods, armed with a cell phone, connected to the Sheriff’s Office, and the old revolver, firing in his direction.

“Did you find him?” she asked.

“Not yet, but we’re canvassing for witnesses all up and down 27 and Kankakee and Riverside.”

Tamara could remember no more than her father had. Just a figure in dark clothing, the swinging pipe, which seemed to be stained with blood.

Glen Hope noticed Tremain eyeing the gun — which Marlowe recognized as a Smith & Wesson Model 10, a classic. Glen said, grimacing, “Wasn’t exactly honest. About that.”

Tremain said, “No, you were not. I’ll ponder charges but you may’ve caught me on a good day.”

Glen looked at his daughter and the expression was one of intense gratitude that she was still alive.

Eventide asked, “Mr. Hope, what exactly are you two doing here?”

“I got mad.”

“Mad?”

“That he came to our house. And those friends of mine, Bryan Coughlin and Dean Stone, you met them. They said I should do something about it. Fight back. They said they were going to help out and I was like sure, thanks. But then I thought, No. We’d do it ourselves, Tamara and me. Family. This is what family does.” Another glance between father and daughter. He continued, “Not what my hothead of a son was going to do. Play vigilante. We were going to be investigators. She said she saw some evidence that you, all respect, missed. We went to go find it.”

“That gold, shiny thing I saw.”

That Tremain’s crime scene search didn’t locate.

“And by God, we did. I was just calling your office when he attacked Tam. I’m thinking he knew he’d dropped it and came back to find it just like we did.”

“Only he didn’t expect to see you, armed to the teeth and playin’ Dirty Harry,” Tremain grumbled.

Glen gave a brief laugh. “Come on this way...”

He led them through the forest, making their way through the foliage.

The day was different from the previous ones. Like a switch had been flipped, autumn had arrived. The veil of summer heat had vanished, the haze too. The air was crisp. Even the light had that autumn angle, just a bit more acute than yesterday.

Glen was saying, “We started where the body was. And kept walking in wider and wider circles. Tam spotted something in a log.”

“In a log?” Marlowe asked.

The father and daughter oriented themselves. Tamara led them another twenty feet then pointed to a large, dead tree. A branch about ten inches in diameter had fallen. It was hollow.

Glen said, “Raccoon probably. They like shiny stuff. Like crows do.”

Tremain pulled a short halogen flashlight from his belt and aimed it inside.

“Well, now.”

He pulled on blue gloves and extracted an evidence envelope from his pocket. He reached into the log and removed an opened gold condom wrapper.

“Oh, good, maybe our first DNA,” Eventide said. “We can send it to CODIS.”

The national DNA database — like the FBI’s fingerprint archives, though CODIS is largely limited to criminal offenders.

He bagged the wrapper, filled out a chain of custody card.

Glen and Tamara left, he to return home, she to class, which she insisted on going to, despite the attack.

As the officers returned to their cars, Tremain’s radio clattered.

“Sheriff, it’s Davis.”

“Go ahead.”

“Got a witness, ’K.”

“Don’t bother with the alphabet soup crap. What witness and what’d they see?”

Now a woman’s voice. “On Kankakee, at 27.” It was Mattie Charlotte. “Just after the attack on Tamara.”

“Go ahead. Got our attention.”

“Car ran the stop sign and nearly T-boned this couple from CV.”

Davis said, “Couple said it was a light sedan. First letter of the tag was a ‘J.’ We’re pulling every registration in four counties.”

“Okay, if you get person-of-interest ID of a driver, dumpster dive at their house, office, wherever. Get me a straw, scraps of food, old toothbrush, anything and run it through the lab.”

“Sure, Sheriff.”

“But ’fore you do, I’ll meet you at the entrance, Lone Ridge. Got another sample for you to run. We’ll compare ’em.”

“Roger... sorry. Comes out natural. See you in five.”

Tremain said, “Let’s meet the twins, hand this off.” He held up the condom wrapper. “Then we suit up.”

“Suit up?” Marlowe asked.

Eventide popped open the trunk of her new cruiser and pulled out two ballistic vests. She handed one set to Marlowe. “He means nobody takes a meeting with Traveller Stead unless you’re suitably dressed. That right, Sheriff?”

“One hundred percent, Princess. One hundred percent.”

Chapter 31

Joseph Ray Whelan was sitting on the outdoor patio of a diner.

It was downscale, the chairs and table featuring paint-peeling metal legs and backs.

Probably like some café in Italy or France, an ancient, small town, not the sort you’d see in a touristy city.

Joseph Ray didn’t know. He’d never been to Europe. Probably would never go.

No, he was sure he’d never go.

The sadness of the hunter was still present.

His earlier expedition today — tracking Erik Hope — had not paid off.

In fact, some goddamn deputy — a large, dark-skinned man — had nearly stumbled on him. If the cop hadn’t changed direction at the last moment, spotting Erik, there would have been a collision.

Joseph Ray had slipped away. Glancing back, he’d noticed that the deputy was having a stern talk with the boy. From what he could deduce, the police were tracking the Hopes and their vehicles, aware that BRK was possibly targeting them as witnesses.

He’d slipped away before they’d had the chance to spot him.

And gone on to hunt for more game...

He’d been excited to find some: a potential witness, at Crabtree Mall in New France, but that had not panned out. And so he’d decided to come here, just off the Ellis College campus.

He was sipping coffee, though he had little taste for it.

The cup had dribbled three drops on the table.

Three drops of dark liquid.

Not a coincidence, a sign.

He saw on the campus lawn a poster supporting the Native American treaty and the creation of the reservation, which he didn’t care one way or the other about. But he did realize — with his heart rate speeding — that the document was about Potawatomi land.

That Nation was in the famous Council of Three Fires, along with the Chippewa and the Ottawa.

A sign...

Three...

“Anything else?” the waitress asked, startling him.

He’d gotten here an hour ago, sweaty and a bit frantic — his waiting state lately — and had just sat, sipping coffee. It was lunchtime and he wasn’t ordering lunch. He was not, however, taking up a table that would otherwise be occupied, though. He just wasn’t spending much money.

He looked up at her. The girl was earthy, pretty, round... and clearly not sure about him. Something made her uncomfortable.

Well, welcome to the club...

“No.”

He knew that the tautly buttoned suit jacket raised some curiosity. His precise hairstyle too, as well as the piquant scent of Vitalis. But this was not his problem. He wore what he needed to wear. He combed as he needed to comb.

He behaved as he needed to behave.

To end a life...

She walked away and his eyes returned to the beige stone building across the street.

The classroom building that Tamara Hope would soon be walking out of.

Students began ambling out the door.

Two, ten, dozens.

And now, yes, Tamara Hope.

He reflected, My, she’s pretty.

Pert, athletic.

He needed a third descriptor. Ah: a witness.

Book bag over her shoulder, she trod along the sidewalk, with head down, arms crossed — a curious pose, the arms. Defensive, one might say. Also, the attitude of someone lost in her thoughts.

He left money — including a large tip, to make the waitress guilty for... whatever she had done to wrong him. He decided: being passive aggressive.

Rising, he tugged his jacket down. He was troubled that the gun rumpled the cloth slightly. He was less worried about giving away the fact that he was armed than presenting to the world an unpresentable garment.

Chapter 32

“I had nothing to do with it. Not a single fucking thing.”

The skinny man, gray pallored, hands dirty with grease, was looking up from the engine compartment of an old F-150. Not unlike the one that had nearly killed Marlowe and Zo Eventide. This truck was older and had apparently been painted aftermarket. Ford wouldn’t dare ship vehicles in the color of old bloodstained sheets.

She had also scanned for the brand of automotive grease from Bigot’s glove but saw none of it present.

He continued to ratchet as he repeated stridently to Constant Marlowe, “Not a thing.”

Traveller Stead’s rambling compound on five acres in northern Bowman County was not only his home but was the Eagle Brotherhood’s headquarters and clubhouse. The area was known as Hadleyville.

Presently she was the only law in the garage. Outside, a half dozen men and women of the Brotherhood lounged about in chairs, on decks, or against vehicles, talking among themselves or on phones, drinking from coffee cups and from bottles — and all eyeing the other two officers, Eventide and Tremain, with varying degrees of hostility and amusement.

She’d come in to talk to Stead by herself. She recalled that at their first meeting, Eventide had told her of Tremain’s undying wish to put as many of the members of EB in prison as possible. That presaged bad outcomes for this get-together and Marlowe had pulled rank, insisting that he wait outside. “You can collar him, you want. But I bring him out.”

He’d scoffed but recognized the prudence of her position and, contrary to Marlowe’s concern, made no issue of it.

Marlowe didn’t ask what Stead was talking about. Instead she held up a piece of paper.

“Traveller Stead, I’m serving you a warrant to examine the tire tread of your Dodge Ram.”

She offered it and he took it in his soiled hands. She walked to the door, tugged it open and nodded. Tremain was now free to photograph the tires of the dually pickup — sitting unhidden near a stack of old, rusting appliances — and to dig out soil samples to compare with the dirt at Fort Defiance.

Stead now appeared confused. “Aren’t you here ’causa my asshole nephew? He did what he did, all his own. The little punk. Deserved to lose that finger. Boy is stupid as sand.”

Stead appeared grandfatherly, though the impression was mitigated by the swastika inkings on his biceps and the back of his hand. An iron cross was at his throat. He’d had it for ages. You could tell from the way the ink had bled and faded.

“Bowl, what we call him. Think it came from a haircut he had when he was a kid. I am aware that you stopped him from taking his own life, for which the family is appreciative. But I will repeat. He did it on his own.”

“No. Somebody put him up to it.”

A squint. “Well, now, miss, that is news to me. I didn’t. Would be the last thing I wanted because, fuck, here you are, and that viper of a bigoted sheriff is hovering outside.”

“Bigoted?” Marlowe had to ask.

“He hates us ’causa who we are, not for any particular thing we did to him. That’s the definition of bigotry.”

Marlowe scoffed, “You’re Nazis.”

“We prefer National Socialists. Political and economic. We don’t have death camps.”

She’d read what Quill had given her. “You’re white supremacists and want to cleanse the country of people of color.”

“Granted. There’s that. But not by killing anybody. Just move them somewhere. An island. Or Canada.”

“I think you settled here because it’s the whitest county in this part of the state.”

“Bowman does have its advantages.”

He missed her sharp glance. He was reading the warrant. Stead grunted and asked absently, “They ever find his finger?”

“I don’t think so.”

He tossed down the warrant. “Moving the fort.”

“We’ve got glove prints and boots and concrete that isn’t two hundred years old. And we both know that Tremain’ll find soil samples in your treads that match the dirt around Fort Defiance.”

He spun a socket wrench absently. “Hm. I’m curious, Agent Marlowe... There was a woman boxer a few years ago. A pro. Marlowe was the name. Made some money in Vegas on her. I don’t suppose you’re related?”

“No.”

He squinted. “Hm.” Then shook his head. “My poor sister. What that boy’s put her through. Bowl.” He now tightened another part under the hood. Sweat rolled down the swastika on his biceps. He looked to her. “Shit. All right. We did it. We moved the fucking fort. But it’s for their own good.”

“Stealing land from Native people? Their own good? Really?”

Stead gestured her to a doorway in the back of the garage. A sign over it said, THE BUNKER.

It was a room of fiberboard tables and mismatched folding chairs in uneven rows. About thirty of them. Two refrigerators. Ashtrays on pedestals, which you hardly saw anymore. On the walls were Nazi insignias and sepia pictures of presumably National Socialist figures from the 1900s. She recognized Hitler only.

There was a desk in the corner overrun with documents and boxes of ammunition and loose rounds. Empty coffee cups, soda and beer bottles, car and appliance parts, fast-food wrappers. She knew little about the Nazi era in Germany but she seemed to recall that the Third Reich was organized and tidy.

Stead dug through documents. “Now your treaty says that everything south of the fort goes to the Indians.”

“Yes.”

“How old’s your map?”

“Eighteen seventies.”

“Ah.” He continued to dig. “Eighteen seventies.”

Marlowe felt a ping in her gut. This often happened when fundamental assumptions she’d made were proved wrong.

Papers appeared and vanished under his filthy hands. Maps. And documents with old-time type. “Your treaty’s not the first one, you know. Ah. Here we go.” He smoothed a number of photocopies. “In the sixteen hundreds there was another treaty that granted the right to the French to build a fort on the Grey River or whatever it was called then. It was between France and the Illiniwek Confederation. Where ‘Illinois’ comes from.”

Not interested in history in the least, she ordered, “Go on.”

“The language.” He riffled through more documents. “The language in that treaty was that the colonists, or whoever, could build their fort but it had to be two rods from the river’s edge. So it wouldn’t interfere with fishing. That turns out to be about sixty feet. So, the fort gets built, back from the shore, right where it should be. All legal and everything. But guess what? Now, couple hundred years later, the river’s eroded so much the fort’s right on the shore — where it’s not supposed to be. All we did was move it back sixty feet from the shoreline, so everything’s rosy again.”

“Not out of your love of historical accuracy, you didn’t. Somebody hired you. Who? And why?”

“It’s kind of—”

“Who?”

“That development company you’ve maybe seen signs for.”

“Buonafortuna.”

“Yep.”

“They hired Nazis... oh, don’t give me that look. Nazis. A big development company?” Marlowe muttered sternly, “Explain. Everything. Now.”

Stead pulled a bottle of Budweiser from one of the fridges. Offered her one, then held up a palm, as if to ward off her piercing frown. After twisting off the cap, he sipped long. “Okay, let’s say the treaty goes through and the fort’s still on the cliff edge. And you want to run a road from State Route 43 — the only big highway around and the only one with a bridge over the river — want to run it along the shoreline to the Native reservation. Only you can’t because there’s a historical site in the way. The fort.”

“All right.” Where was this going?

He pointed a finger at her. “But if the fort’s back to where it should be, sixty feet from the shore, you can build yourself a be-autiful concrete road, sixty feet wide, storm drains, curbs, a cherry on top. And that road connects 43 directly to...” He let her make the deduction, lifting his hands like a preacher to his flock.

“A casino.” She was nodding.

“Bingo. And if that ain’t an opportune chance to use that word, I don’t know what is. The only way to make gambling work on reservation property here is connecting it to a highway with a bridge, and a dirt — and mud — road isn’t gonna work.”

Marlowe could only imagine the hundreds of ways the Eagle Brotherhood could make money with that venture. Some were even legal.

“Buonafortuna...” She shook her head. “‘Good luck.’ With offices in Nevada and Jersey. Las Vegas and Atlantic City.”

So it wasn’t retirement homes at all they were building.

“But why you?”

“If the company’d gone through proper channels — whatever that means; it’s their words — it could’ve taken years.”

Marlowe asked, “The McCabes?”

“Who?”

“People who saw you move it.”

He shrugged. “Oh, you thinking I’m calling in a pro hit team? Right, like I’m going to murder witnesses. Special circumstances homicide to collect another hundred G a year. I’m not crazy, Agent Marlowe. Yeah, I’m remembering now. That match. New Jersey, Atlantic City, six years ago. It was you!”

She said, “Kind of condescending, don’t you think? Indigenous people can’t make that decision about the road on their own?”

He chuckled. “Considering all the shit we’ve dumped on those fine folks over the years, being a little patronizing to get ’em millions a year? That’s a drop in the bucket, don’tcha think?... Atlantic City. Knockout in the third round? Never seen footwork like that.” He winked and returned to his truck.

She joined the others outside.

Tremain, holding evidence bags of dirt, looked her way expectantly.

Marlowe shook her head. “We don’t need it.”

She then explained what he’d said and the sheriff’s momentary optimism faded.

“Road. Casino. Son of a bitch. I thought we had ’em. I can get ’em on trespass and maybe construction without a permit. That’s about it. Damn.”

As they approached their vehicles, one of the bigger Eagle Brotherhood members, dressed in brown, the apparent couture of Nazism, lifted his right arm in a Hitlerian salute.

The man nearly fell, stumbling backward, when Tremain fired a wad of tobacco his way. It landed squarely on his polished boots.

Chapter 33

From the café, he stepped onto the sidewalk, the air redolent with the scent of greenery and loam and wet concrete. A sprinkler was at diligent work and a waist-high rainbow flourished.

Joseph Ray Whelan let it sweep three times and then he crossed.

Ahead of him was Tamara Hope, walking in that lovely lope of hers.

The classroom was a half mile from the house of her straight-arrow boyfriend, to which it seemed she was headed now. It would take her through the Ellis Gardens, an arboretum tucked away in a little-traveled part of the school. Usually deserted.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

He strolled along behind her, his own head down as he pretended to review and send texts.

Past the delis, past trade-’em-in textbook stores, past actual head shops — as if some aspect of students’ souls were locked forever in the 1960s. Odd, since this school was named after the Presbyterian minister who was responsible for spreading religious-oriented schools like prairie fires throughout central Illinois.

Looking around the streets.

No one paying attention to the two of them, as the distance closed.

Then the pedestrians thinned out.

And, yes, thank you cubed again, he thought, Tamara Hope turned to her right — and into the thickly forested arboretum.

Joseph Ray closed the distance. Though the path wound like a switchback, she was never fully out of his sight; her blonde hair and pale windbreaker were like shining beacons in the dense shadows of the park.

He couldn’t help but think of Lone Ridge and its ancient woods.

A hundred feet away.

Eighty.

Fifty.

Twenty...

Then he decided. Now. You have to. Do it.

He moved up closer yet, directly behind her, reaching into his pocket.

She heard him and, startled, turned. The girl’s eyes were wide. She said, “Whoever the fuck you are, you better know. I’m meeting my boyfriend. He’ll be here any minute.”

“Oh, Daniel. Good. I’d like to meet him too.” What he withdrew from his pocket was a badge holder. He displayed a gold shield and an identification card.

“I’m Detective Joseph Ray Whelan, Stevensville PD.”

Tamara stepped warily close — though not so close he could grab her — and read.

The documents were real. She nodded. “Okay.”

Joseph Ray took a breath and said the words that were so very hard to speak, words that made the sadness swell within him. “Abby... Abigail Bills was my fiancée. BRK’s victim on Monday. I’ve been hunting for him since then.” He put the holder away. “Can we go someplace and talk?”

Chapter 34

The Nazi fort-movers might have had nothing to do with the attacks on Marlowe but that case — against Bigot and Slim and their boss — was put on hold as the one against BRK began to move forward.

Tremain, Eventide and Marlowe walked into the lab up the hall from the warstoreroom and found Odell Davis and Mattie Charlotte standing over the rapid DNA unit.

“Talk to me,” Tremain grumbled.

Davis said, “Thirty-eight light-colored sedans with tags beginning with ‘J.’ One was interesting. Maybe a coincidence.”

“Are there any coincidences in this business, Agent Marlowe?”

“Not a one.”

“Well, Mattie stayed here and ran the condom wrapper. I hit the J-tag man’s rental house and got some fast-food cups and dental floss.” He nodded at the unit. “That’s what’s running now.”

“Who’s the person of interest?” Marlowe asked.

Charlotte showed her the list of registered owners. One name was circled in red. Marlowe’s heart rate rarely rose above low to normal. Now she felt a fast throbbing in her temple.

Would the DNA results of the deputy’s dumpster dive match the condom wrapper Tamara had nearly died trying to recover? That could mean the end of the case right there — apart from the technicality of actually arresting BRK.

Marlowe was looking around the dimly lit room. Tremain noticed. “Tell me you ain’t impressed.”

“I’m impressed.”

The lab was top notch. Small, but filled with what seemed to be state of the art equipment.

Tremain continued, “The county’s paying a lot more than they think they’re paying for the place. But our A to C ratio’s the envy of west central Illinois.”

The number of arrests that end up in convictions.

You can collar as many people as you like but if you don’t put the perps behind bars, simply hogtying them in a takedown only to be set free later isn’t exactly a feather in your cap.

Tremain sighed. “Gave up on a scanning electron microscope. Six figures. But come Christmas morning you never find everything you wanted in your stocking now, do you?”

“How’s it coming?” Eventide asked, eyeing the machine. The display connected to it revealed incomprehensible messages.

Tremain chuckled. “Can’t hurry deoxyribonucleic acid. Got a mind of its own.”

Finally, without a beep or any other dramatic indication, the test was done.

Tremain plugged the DNA profile from the soda cup and the one from the condom recovered at Lone Ridge into the analyzer.

He squinted. “It’s a match.”

BRK was none other than Daniel Morgenstern. Tamara Hope’s boyfriend.

Chapter 35

“Any answer?” Marlowe asked.

“Nothing,” Eventide replied.

They and a dozen officers were outside Daniel’s small rental house on a tree-lined block just south of the Ellis College campus, in New France.

They had texted and called Tamara Hope with news about Daniel, but the girl had not responded. Marlowe had also called Glen Hope and delivered the news, which made him understandably frantic. Marlowe heard his cracking voice urge his wife to call Tamara on her phone and the woman’s tear-tinged response, “She’s not answering!”

Marlowe remembered she’d been eager to get to class; the parents would try to reach her through the school.

Glen had said, “But... at the park. Lone Ridge. Danny actually attacked that woman, Kelly, while we were there?”

“I think he might have been following you. Maybe he was more obsessed with Tamara than he let on.”

“Tam said she thought he felt more for her than she did him. Jesus.”

“We’re at Danny’s now. Crime scene’s searching it. We may get some clues. We’re doing everything we can to find her.” Marlowe added, “But serial actors’ behavior is typically that their spouses or partners are the least at risk.”

Glen’s voice rose. “But he attacked her in the park, just today. Hours ago!”

“I think he was just trying to aim us away from himself. He intentionally missed her head. The injury was minor, remember?”

Glen was unmoved. “I’m going to look for her.”

“Mr. Hope,” Marlowe began. But he’d already disconnected.

Amateurs... Overboard...

At least Glen’s gun was in an evidence locker.

But if he’d lied about one weapon, he could just as easily have lied about a second.

She looked toward Daniel’s bungalow.

BCSO deputies stood near the front door. Their black MP-4s were slung, muzzle down over their chests. Another officer was in the back. The odds of the killer showing up, though, were minimal. If he knew he’d been made, he’d be on the run, maybe headed out of state.

Unless, in his sociopathic frame of mind, he suspected Tamara of turning him in and was presently tracking her down... this time to actually murder her.

In full crime scene jumpsuit, bonnet, boots and gloves, Frank Tremain stepped into the doorway and gestured to Marlowe and Eventide to join him.

“I’ve bagged and tagged. Come on in. You don’t have to dress like spacewomen.”

Items of evidence included a box of the condoms that he’d used in both of the attacks, a half dozen printouts of what seemed to be photos of real women being tortured. They were Latina in appearance, and Marlowe supposed these were screen captures from the videos widely available online of Los Zetas, the Mexican cartel, torturing and beheading members of rival gangs or citizens who had cooperated with the Federales.

The sheriff, who had noticed her looking at the pictures, explained, “Hoping we can trace them back to websites, a chat room that Daniel was in. Maybe he mentioned something that’ll let us figure out where he’s gone to hole up. I’ve already rattled the cage of the cybercrimes people at the Bureau. I need traceroute work done. And they know I’ll start calling supervisors if I don’t get it.”

Another bag: Eye-Protect artificial tears, the same brand as at the crime scenes.

And damnit, when they’d first interviewed Tamara here, she had noticed him blinking and not thought anything of it.

“Shoe print marks throughout the interior and in the yard. Cross-Fit Plus in the right size. No blunt object. But despite the evidence, nothin’s pointing us anywhere. No computers or phone. Took all the electronics with him. No diary... Yeah, as if anybody keeps one of those. No maps, receipts from motels, storage lockers. Random keys but no clue what they open up.”

He sighed. “So, it’s an APB at this point. Nothing to do but wait.”

Chapter 36

They were sitting on a bench in a clearing within the Ellis arboretum, Tamara looking him over.

Joseph Ray Whelan — he preferred his first two names — was odd.

Like out of a different era. Tamara recalled a TV show, Mad Men. About the 1960s or something. Funny suits, funny haircuts. The women too all dressed alike: tight dresses and industrial strength bras.

His eyes were distant and red — she thought of Danny with his eye problems.

Her phone hummed again with a text. She didn’t look. She wanted to concentrate on what Joseph Ray was telling her.

She said in a soft voice, “I’m... I’m sorry about your fiancée.”

He took out a silver pillbox, opened it and swallowed three small white pills. His eyes noted hers and he said, “Muscle relaxant to calm me down. I quote ‘borrowed’ some from the evidence room. Didn’t have time to get a doctor’s appointment. I get depressed a lot. Or I just call it sad. I get sad.”

“Does it help?”

“I pretend it does.” A sigh. He continued, “Abby was moving out of her place and in with me. That was going to be her last night there. And he...” The man’s voice faded. He took a breath. “And he broke in and did those terrible things to her. I was devastated. That doesn’t even begin to describe it. Everything was over with. My whole life. The only thing I could do was what I’d been trained to be: a detective.” He nearly growled and the ferocity startled her. “And find that son of a bitch and make him pay. Not arrest him. Make him pay. Hurt him. And keep hurting him for a long time.”

“So, you started investigating.”

He explained he wasn’t supposed to, the victim being a family member and when the brass found out his boss put him on a leave of absence.

“But you didn’t stop.”

“Hell, no,” he said in an unwavering voice. “One thing about me, I have a reputation for closing my cases. I never stop. Ever. I have this one trick that helps me. I’d pick one thing about the victim. Something concrete. Maybe a game they liked to play. Super Mario. Or an article of clothing they liked. Cashmere sweaters. Waterskiing, birdwatching. I keep in my mind that one thing — that they’d never experience again. I get obsessed with it. That’s what drives me to find the perp.”

“And with Abigail?”

“Three. I was obsessed with the number three. She had a necklace her mother gave her. It was engraved with three words in Latin: Citius, Altius, Fortius. It means ‘Faster, Higher, Stronger.’ It’s the Olympic motto. She called it the Rule of Threes. She lived her life by it. Since Monday, that’s all I could think of. Threes. Triangles, triads. It was like fuel.” He gave a faint smile. “I know I sound crazy but sometimes you have to be, in this business. Just as crazy as the suspect, maybe more.”

He added, “Then there was the second killing. In Lone Ridge Park. I left my apartment that morning and I was hunting for him. I heard about it. I went there right away to check out the investigators. If they looked like they were any good, I could follow them and maybe get to the killer first. I saw that woman who took over for the sheriff.”

“With the funny first name.”

“Constant. She looked like she knew what she was doing. I knew she was going to look for witnesses. I still had my secure police band radio from work and I listened in to the transmissions.”

Well, what a story this was. Tamara said, “You heard our family mentioned.”

He nodded. “If Agent Marlowe could find you and I could find you, BRK could find you. And I’d be ready for him.” He showed her a gun in his pocket. “I have duct tape and a knife.” A nod toward his backpack. “He wasn’t going to die fast. I’d go to jail. I didn’t care.”

Tamara offered a ragged laugh. “And you used us as bait. You came to our house!”

“I did. A couple of times. And I followed your brother this morning — he went to the community college sports annex. He was hoping BRK would go after another victim there.”

She nodded slowly. “That’s Erik. He was saying he’d read Tom Sawyer and was going to be like him. When he gets something into his head you can’t stop him.” A wisp of a smile. “Like you, Detective.”

Joseph Raye gave no reaction. “That didn’t work out. So then I started to follow Daniel. And that’s when I thought I saw him. BRK.”

“Really?”

He grew eerily animated, eyes wide. “I think I did. That’s why I wanted to talk to you.”

Tamara found her heart beating more rapidly. “Where? Who is he?”

Joseph Ray continued, “He was a big guy, scruffy, late thirties. Balding. I spotted him watching your boyfriend. It was at Crabtree Mall. I tried to follow him but he was gone before I could get close. He probably thought Danny was a witness too. I got a picture of the guy. I wanted to show it to you. See if you recognize him.” He began to flip through his phone’s album.

“Oh, there he is now, Danny.” She looked over the man’s shoulder.

Joseph Ray turned. He frowned, seeing an empty walk.

And Tamara Hope glanced around, saw nobody present and extracted from her book bag an eighteen-inch galvanized steel pipe. Firmly gripping the end with a paper towel, she brought it down on the back of Joseph Ray’s head. Hard. Once more.

She looked at her phone, which was humming again. Yet another text from Constant Marlowe.

Get to police or campus security now. Daniel is BRK.

She stuffed the phone in her pocket thinking: No, he isn’t. Now just leave me the fuck alone.

Joseph Ray Whelan was still moving, moaning and starting to crawl.

More solid blows to the back of his head subdued him.

And then, control slipped away and she brought the pipe down again and again.

Finally, breathing hard, she closed her eyes momentarily, relishing the feeling.

Then reality flowed in and she thought: Get going. Now.

She checked for a pulse. He was gone.

Looking around once more — the scene was invisible to the sidewalk and street — she returned to the backpack. Donning clear latex gloves, she replaced the pipe in the plastic bag it’d been kept in. She walked into the grass then kicked her own shoes off and extracted from the backpack another plastic bag containing a pair of size ten and a half Cross-Fit Plus runners. She stepped into these — they were already laced — and walked around the scene.

Stepping into Joseph Ray’s blood spatter, Tamara then strode away from the body toward the sidewalk. Crossing it, she then continued onto the parking strip of grass in front of the gardens as if making for a car.

Enough. It was deserted here, but students or professors or locals might appear at any minute. She pulled off the Cross-Fits and walked back to the body in her stocking feet.

The shoes, now in the plastic, went back into the book bag. Then more touches: transferring a few black hairs onto the body and adding some drops from a bottle of Eye-Protect, liquid tears. Things she’d collected from Danny’s house. (No condoms and their contents, of course, not with Joseph Ray. BRK would not kill him for sex, but because he was a risk... and an asshole.)

She went through his pockets and removed the gun he’d showed her.

Into the backpack, which she then zipped up.

She knew time was short but she was drawn to the corpse. She crouched down and studied the face. Distorted from fluid and cracked bone.

Her hand hovered over her phone. Take a picture? Oh, how she wanted to.

Her first kill...

But it would raise questions, if someone found it.

No. Be smart.

Tamara found a rock from the nearby bed and slammed it into her forehead and then scraped it downward, until the wound bled. The stone went back in place with the bloody side up.

Nothing like an injury for victim sympathy.

And the scar would be a memento of this afternoon.

All good? she asked herself.

Yep.

Tamara Hope sent a lengthy text, then sat down on the curb and began to scream her lungs out.

Chapter 37

Glen Hope sped along Route 27 to the outskirts of Clark Valley, through the early autumn’s afternoon. The sky was as haze-free as he’d ever seen it. Polished glass. A perfect view of a host of massive cumulonimbus clouds, many shades of white, rising to the heavens. He’d traveled a lot and nowhere in the country could you see clouds like this except in the flatlands of the Midwest.

He pulled into the lot at Stone Autos.

No better deal in the state we guarantey it...

Glen wondered if anyone in town had ever noted the misspelling.

He drove through the rows of spotless cars, offering themselves up at great savings, according to the windshield signs. Then he steered toward a building at the end of the property. It was the “special garage,” where Dean Stone told everyone the dealership worked on antique automobiles. Though not a lot of work got done there, at least no mechanical work, since very few people in CV owned antique automobiles, and Stone’s mechanics wouldn’t know how to work on one anyway.

He parked and walked to the door and knocked. Stone opened it. A salesman, like Glen, he wore a snazzy suit and crisp shirt — always present your best front. He represented small town entrepreneurism at its finest: Like Glen, he was an officer in the Bowman County Commerce Club and could be found flipping pancakes at church breakfasts and hamburgers at state fairs and hobnobbing with representatives from the General Assembly in Springfield on tax and regulatory matters coming up for votes.

But scratch the surface and he was still the narcissistic sociopath who’d run with crews in St. Louis.

Inside were no antique cars or specialized tools or, for that matter, many tools at all. The walls were lined with stolen merch; fencing and money laundering were Stone’s second source of income.

He wasn’t by himself here. Also present were two men in jeans and work shirts and dark windbreakers. One big, round with fat; the other was much smaller. The large one, with combed-over hair, sported a bandage on his nose.

Fred Keller was the one who’d been smacked around by that girl cop, Constant Marlowe, when he’d tried to beat the hell out of her. His sidekick was Robert — never, ever Bob — Moss. They worked in a garage in East St. Louis, but, like Stone, made most of their money freelancing — occasionally hurting or killing those their customers wanted hurt or killed.

There was one other occupant. Danny Morgenstern, who lay on a mattress in the corner, as filthy and stained a piece of furniture as ever there was. He was bound and gagged and only partially conscious. He came to briefly when he saw Tamara’s father, and his eyes registered: I’m being saved!

But of course he was wrong.

“What’s he on?”

“Oxy and vodka.”

“Good.” It was easy to administer drugs involuntarily. You dissolved them in the liquor, poured it into the mouth of a person on their back and pinched the nose. To breathe, they had to swallow. A clever idea, learned from a true crime episode on kidnapping.

“No roofies?”

Date rape drugs, readily available in college towns, were always suspicious in postmortems.

“No.”

“Good.”

“So,” Stone said, “where are we?”

Glen answered, “There’s somebody else involved. I’d been wondering. Came by our house, looking around. Fiancé of the first girl. Looking for BRK. Wanted to kill him. He’s gone now.”

“Gone? He left?”

“Dead. Tam did it herself.”

“Shit,” Moss muttered, as if just finding out that the world was populated with strong — and occasionally deadly — women.

“I’d hoped to wait a day or two. Kind of control the Danny narrative. But we don’t have any choice. We finish up now.”

Stone was nodding. “Be good to get this whole thing done. How’re you doing?”

Glen shrugged. “Been a chore, man. A chore.”

“We’ll get it all taken care of.” He clapped Glen on the shoulder. “You do good work here, my friend. Whatever you need, just say the word.”

“You know the forest preserve in North Hills?”

Stone did and told the other two where it was located.

Glen continued, “There’s a jogging path on the west side. We’ll meet you there in an hour. One of you drive Danny’s car. Take surface roads. The police’re looking for it. And I’ll need somebody to drive to, I don’t know, someplace on the highway to Missouri. Use his credit card.” A nod to Danny. Like he’s on the run, headed out of state.”

Stone thumped the boy’s wallet with a knuckle. “I’ll do it.”

“Any questions?” Glen looked at all three.

No one had any. But Stone said, “It’s a good plan.”

Glen nodded and stepped outside, walking to his car and thinking, Yes, it is good.

And credit where credit was due, it was mostly the creation of his daughter and himself, who, together, made up the fictional persona of BRK, the serial killer terrorizing Bowman County.

Chapter 38

Constant Marlowe found the young woman sitting on a bench outside the arboretum, crying. Her face was pale and her eyes an ill red.

A bandage covered a portion of her forehead. A dark bruise spread from underneath.

What a day the young woman had had... Her second attack in four or five hours.

The responders — campus police and officers from the town of New France — had escorted her from the scene of the murder and deposited her here. A young patrolwoman, her auburn hair in a tight bun, stood nearby. BRK — Daniel Morgenstern — might be long gone, or might be hovering nearby to finish what he’d started.

Marlowe had been issued a Motorola. It crackled now. The transmitter was Odell Davis. He was reporting that he and Mattie Charlotte could find no witnesses who’d seen anyone resembling Danny leaving the botanical gardens on the Ellis campus around the time of the murder. And no light-shaded Toyotas, with a “J” as the first letter of the tag, speeding away.

“Roger,” she replied.

Zo Eventide, ten feet away, was on her phone. She disconnected the call. “County and state’ve reported in. No sign of his car.”

Marlowe nodded. She sat beside Tamara.

“You okay?”

She closed her eyes briefly.

“Not really. I mean, Danny?... I can’t believe it.” She cried in soft gasps.

“Any idea at all where he might’ve gone?”

“No.”

“Did he own any other cars, or just the Toyota?”

“I don’t think so. Just the Celica.”

The women were not far from the crime scene itself, where Frank Tremain, robed like a surgeon, was walking in slow circles, bending down, collecting bits of evidence and taking his pictures. It was still daylight but he used a flash.

Joseph Ray’s deformed face wasn’t visible to Marlowe and Tamara, though the corpse’s back was, and the agent had asked if the girl wanted to move away but she hadn’t, as if she didn’t have the energy to stand. She was numb.

“Any friends he was particularly close to?”

“Not really. He was kind of a loner.” She shook her head, adding, “It all happened so fast.”

“Tell me.”

A sniff. She wiped her eyes with a sleeve. “Mr. Whelan was the fiancé of the first victim, Abigail.”

Explaining certain mysteries.

Marlowe nodded for Tamara to go on. The young woman now looked away from the corpse. “He told me he was trying to find who’d killed her. His police department wouldn’t let him. But he was all, ‘I’m doing it anyway.’” The young woman shook her head. “He’d been following me and watching our house because he thought BRK would try to kill us. You know, what you were saying, because he’d think we were witnesses, even though we weren’t?”

So he was the one the neighbors had seen parked near the Hopes’ house the other day and looking into their backyard. Marlowe said, “You were bait, in other words.”

“We were bait. He had some radio thing where he could hear what you were saying. That’s how he found out about us, where we lived in CV. And where I was, in New France, with Danny.”

Marlowe sighed. That answered the question. She hadn’t thought of anyone having access to a secure police comms frequency.

“And here, today? How’d it happen?”

She controlled herself. “I was just standing there, talking to Mr. Whelan and there’s this noise from the bushes and Danny comes out with a pipe and...” A whisper. “Hits him. Over and over. The sound... I’ll never forget that sound. And I’m like frozen for a few seconds then I run. But I fall.” She rubbed a long finger, tipped in pink polish, against her forehead. “And I think I’m screwed, but I’m screaming and that scares him off, I guess.” More sobbing. Then she controlled herself. “One thing. Mr. Whelan had a gun. Danny might’ve found it. I don’t know. I didn’t see.”

Marlowe walked to the edge of the roped off scene and gave the news to Tremain.

The sheriff muttered, “No weapons on him. So. Shit. We got a psycho with a piece.”

Marlowe returned to the young woman and sat again. “How well did you know him, Tamara?”

“Not all that well. We met a month ago.”

“He ever show you a... call it a ‘dark side’?”

She thought for a minute. “He got quiet some. Kind of like staring off. And he liked violent video games. You know, then, sometimes, we’re like on the street and I’d catch him looking at other girls.”

“Girls like the victims? Trim? Dark hair?”

“I don’t know. Yeah, maybe. I guess so.”

Phenotype-fixated sociopath, Marlowe thought. “Do you know where he was on Monday night?”

She squinted. “Just out. I know that. But not where he was...” Her face registered confusion. “He followed us. Mom and Dad and me, he followed us to the park, Lone Ridge. And killed that girl right there! While we were having lunch!” She closed her eyes and shivered. “Why’d he do that?”

“I’m not sure. A psych profile might tell us.”

Tamara gave Marlowe the names of his courses that semester, taught by professors she’d want to interview. Marlowe jotted notes and put the pad away.

“You should go home. Your mother and father and brother are getting out of town until we find him. You go with them.”

“Yeah, sure.”

“You want somebody to take you home?”

“No. I’m good to drive. I’d feel better having my car.”

Marlowe said, “And if you want to pick up something from your rental here, it’s all right. The county has a deputy there.”

Tamara thought for a moment, then shook her head. “That’s okay.” She nodded down to her backpack. “I’ve got everything I need right here.”

Chapter 39

Monday, last.

Glen Hope is standing in the living room of Abigail Bills’s single family house in Stevensville, a lower-middle-class section of Bowman County.

The place is filled with packed-up boxes and thick clothes bags. She’d had the place on the market and was about to move.

Glen is staring down at her partially clad body in front of him.

There’s a knock on the door. He jumps slightly at the sound. He picks up the pipe that broke her skull and walks to the door, peers out through a curtain.

It’s his daughter.

He takes a deep breath and lets her inside.

Her eyes narrow as she sees the body.

Father and daughter regard each other.

“I’m sorry, honey. I needed you, not your mom.”

She nods. Her face is angelic, if there’s such a thing as an angelic cheerleader. It’s also completely calm. Tamara has had issues over the years, a genetic thing, the doctors say. Antisocial behavior, borderline personality. Fights at school. Tam is one of the reasons the Hopes have moved a lot, trying to outrun the girl’s reputation.

“We have to make this go away, honey. You understand? Can you help me?”

She nods and can’t seem to take her eyes from the body.

He looks down too. And he whispers, “Lost control. Just...”

Tamara nods. As if she’s telling him it’s all right.

Eerie how fascinated she is with the body. While the corpse doesn’t repulse Glen, neither does it draw him in.

He says, “Here’s what I’m thinking... You know that show we watch? Crime: American Style.”

Of course she does. It’s a family favorite. They can binge that show for hours, popcorn on the couch, sodas on the coffee table.

He asks her, “Remember that episode, ‘The Fall Guy.’”

“We liked that one.”

“That’s what we need. Give the police somebody else to blame.”

He is not really uneasy talking about this with his daughter. She’s a mature young woman. Besides, chronological age doesn’t mean much. Her brother Jason was in the service for two years and was under the command of lieutenants and even captains who were Tam’s age or just a little older. Men and women easily prepared to send their troops into combat to kill or be killed. Some of the famous kings and warriors in history were in their late teens and early twenties.

Then he’s silent, though his eyes are on his daughter.

She understands what he’s asking. Tam says, “Danny.”

The Fall Guy...

They’re hardly a devoted couple. They have been seeing each other for only a month. He is largely a cipher to Glen and Liz. While Tam is studying — and will ace — her medical school boards, unambitious Danny is aiming to be a PE teacher. Why are they together? Good in bed probably, though a father doesn’t like to consider such things. Also a woman like Tam needs a man she can bend like warm plastic.

Does he fit the profile of a rapist? Well, he’s a jock college boy — which, some would say, alone qualifies him. And he is into violent video games.

But there’s another reason that will make him perfect. Tamara happens to voice it now.

“I have access to all his stuff. Evidence. You know, to plant.”

Which is what the husband did in the Crime: American Style episode, murdering his wife and then implicating a man she was having an affair with. The husband used evidence from the lover’s home, car and boat to create a solid case against him. The police merely had to connect the obvious dots.

“We’ll have to do it now. Right away.”

She asks, “What should I get?”

“Some things that’re unique. Hairs from a brush. But not with the bulbs attached. We don’t want DNA — not yet. Does he take any medicine?”

“He’s got eye problems. He uses drops.”

“Good. And shoes.”

“He’ll notice that they’re missing.”

“Stop and get some in his size. Don’t buy them. Steal them.”

“A lot of kids lift stuff from Alberts. In the mall. There’s no security camera. I’ll get a pair there. An unusual print.”

That was part of the TV show.

They are both staring at the body, each in a different place on the roller coaster.

There’s more, of course.

Glen finally says, “It needs to happen again.”

She leans forward. Abigail’s skull is broken and turns her face somewhat monstrous. Tam studies this. Like a Picasso portrait. The image, it seems, brings her great comfort. “Happen again?”

“Her house is on the market and I’m a broker. She wasn’t listed with me, but the police could make some connection.” It was reading through her listing for this house and googling her profile — with her picture — that led to her fate tonight. “We’ll leave some evidence here. But then more at a second attack.” He waits. She has no reaction other than a brief nod.

“Who?”

“We find somebody who looks like her.”

Short, trim, dark hair, a face pretty before it became monstrous.

“I’ll get over to his place now.” Tamara looks over to Glen’s eyes. “Is there any... particular evidence you want me to collect?”

She’s speaking of evidence only an intimate partner would have access to.

Father-daughter...

Approaching awkward.

But it needs to be discussed.

“Yes,” he tells her. “We’ll need some of that. Not now. The last time.”

Which brings up:

“Honey, you know how it has to end?”

She is silent. Staring. She really can’t get enough of the body, it seems.

He continues, “Remember the show, what happened.”

“Oh, that’s right.”

In the Crime: American Style episode, the husband killed only his wife, not the fall guy lover. In the end, he didn’t get away with the crime because the lover was able to rebut enough of the setup so that the police turned their attention to the husband, who was ultimately convicted.

One detective said, “If the lover, the fall guy, he’d been killed? Like a fake suicide or something? We probably never would’ve put it together.”

“You know what that means, about Danny. You all right with that?”

Her cool blue eyes glance into his before returning to the body. “He’s just a friend. Family’s everything.”

And they’d put the plan in motion.

That Monday night, she’d gotten the items from Danny’s apartment they’d talked about, stolen the shoes. Cross-Fit Plus, with, yes, a very distinct tread. And they’d staged the crime scene at Abigail’s.

Then Glen and Tamara had started looking for a second victim, a woman in her twenties who resembled Abigail, when they’d come upon one only a few days later.

Glen and Liz had been taking Tam to school, cruising east along Route 27, when his daughter had spotted a young woman stretching before she started her run in Lone Ridge Park. She was next to a bold yellow Camaro sports car.

“Hey, pretty, hm?” Tamara had asked. “That ass.”

He’d turned and noted, Yeah, it was indeed. He’d hit the turn signal.

Liz, in the front passenger seat, continued her needlepoint stitching. She knew everything — including what was about to happen in Lone Ridge. She approved.

Family’s everything...

And BRK claimed victim number two, leaving behind yet more evidence implicating Danny Morgenstern. Glen had worn his street shoes into the Lone Ridge woods and, just before attacking Kelly, had slipped into the Cross-Fit Plus shoes to leave the incriminating prints. Tamara had planted the other evidence for the police to find: Danny’s hair and eye drops. (And had spent a few moments — eerie moments — crouched over the corpse, staring.)

The Hopes had driven on to deliver their daughter to school.

That left the final step: leaving a condom wrapper containing traces of Danny’s DNA in the park after he and Tamara had made love. Glen had remembered a Nature Channel program about scavenger animals, so he and his daughter had looked for a suitable place to hide the wrapper for them to “find,” as amateur detectives. Tam herself had thought up the idea of claiming she’d been attacked by BRK while in the park to solidify the family’s innocence — and to leave yet more evidence implicating the boy. A friend of Glen’s from the Commerce Club and his wife assisted, by reporting the near collision with a light sedan whose tag began with a “J.”

Which would lead straight to Danny Morgenstern.

Then — tonight — they would finally stage a third attack during which Danny and his victim would both die.

And the Family Hope would be home free.

But then, after the Lone Ridge murder, a wrinkle.

Constant Marlowe.

Because his wife and daughter had been with him at Lone Ridge, the agent believed the Hopes’ only possible involvement with the rape and murder was as witnesses. But it was clear to Glen that the woman was sharp and relentless and seemed capable of piercing through their fall guy facade.

So he’d pulled in some favors.

Glen Hope was an important member of Clark Valley and key in the Bowman County Commerce Club. He provided a vital service to the community.

Which meant that it was important his ass didn’t end up in prison. He’d had a discussion with Bryan Coughlin, Dean Stone and Arnie Cahill of the BCCC board. They had an interest in making sure he continued to provide that service.

It was decided that Stone, who had ties to the underworld in ESL and St. Louis proper, would enlist some muscle to put Marlowe in the hospital. Keller and Moss were going to beat her up, while Stone himself would cover them with his hunting rifle. It was an attack that ultimately failed, though it had been at least partially successful — they’d made Marlowe believe the attack was because of the Native American treaty issue in Bowman County, having nothing to do with saving Glen from arrest and incarceration.

There had been another glimmer — when Glen, Coughlin and Stone had convinced one of the duller members in the Eagle Brotherhood that Constant Marlowe was single-handedly going to take all the town’s property and give it to the Native people as part of some global conspiracy against “true Americans.” She and another deputy went for a dunking and, damnit, survived.

Another brief hiccup — Abigail’s fiancé showing up and trolling for BRK by spying on the Hopes. But Tam had taken care of him, bless her.

And Marlowe and the central-casting sheriff, Tremain, seemed none the wiser.

So now it was time for act three.

Chapter 40

A difficult call, but one that Constant Marlowe had to make.

Mrs. Morgenstern was crying.

“No, no, no... He couldn’t do it. No...”

Marlowe didn’t go into the evidence they had against her son. She said, “What’s important now is that we find him. And bring him in before anybody gets hurt.”

The woman had a coughing spell. A smoker’s. “He’s never been in trouble before. Any kind. If you met him, you’d—”

“Mrs. Morgenstern, he hasn’t been convicted. Right now we just need to find him.”

“It’s all a misunderstanding.”

Marlowe sympathized but her patience was dissolving. “We need to move forward, Mrs. Morgenstern. Now. If you could help us. The sooner we find him, the sooner he’ll be safe.”

Implying that if more time went by it would be likelier that some officer would stop him with a machine gun rather than with words.

The woman choked back a few more tears. Finally: “All right. What do you need, Deputy... I forgot.”

“Marlowe. Is there anywhere in the area he might go to hide out?”

“Hide out,” she whispered. This concept alone seemed to horrify her.

“A vacation house of yours?” She lived in Alton, Illinois, an hour and some change away.

“Vacation house? I can’t afford one. How can I afford one?”

Marlowe’s research had shown that the woman was a widow. Her husband had died five years ago and she was an administrative assistant at a small appliance company in a small town. Marlowe’s heart went out to her, picturing the long silent evenings and, perhaps, holidays as well, both her husband and child taken from her.

A scenario that had to be going through her frantic mind too.

After a pause it seemed she reminded herself she was being asked to help. “I’m sorry. In answer to your question, there’s nowhere in that area I know of he might go. He just had his rental house there. He didn’t want to live in the dorm. He was a shy boy and...”

Her voice faded. She was perhaps thinking that describing him as a quiet loner might cast him as guilty.

“He just stayed in his house, went to class, and drove home some weekends.”

“No trouble as a juvenile?”

She’d found nothing on him in NCIC but juvie records are usually sealed.

“My Danny? No.” Anger was now becoming her essential emotion.

“Ever prone to violence or tantrums?”

“You’ve got the wrong person.”

Not according to DNA.

And Cross-Fit Plus shoes.

And an eyewitness.

None of which she said.

Mrs. Morgenstern urged, “You should ask his girlfriend.”

“Tamara? I have. She doesn’t know.”

The woman clicked her tongue. “I met her for the first time about three weeks ago. An orientation at Ellis. Parents and students. She was the nicest thing. A little flighty. But pretty as a country western star. He’d just met her but already he was talking about going steady. I worried that he maybe was more infatuated with her than she was with him. You know how that happens.”

The comment buzzed past Marlowe like a fly, but did evoke a brief image of Evan Quill.

The woman sighed. “I mean here I am, moaning. I’m sure that girl’s beside herself too. I hope she’s holding up okay. I should give her a call. The poor thing.”

After Marlowe disconnected, she looked across the warstoreroom at Odell Davis, also on the phone. He was calling Daniel’s friends and classmates and professors. The shake of the man’s head answered her question.

A look at Mattie Charlotte, who had a list of her own. She said, “Nothing.”

Marlowe’s eyes went to the map of Bowman County, which now seemed like an endless landscape of hiding places and escape routes.

It was coming together.

Glen was in the living room, wearing dark slacks and a black polo shirt.

Keller and Moss were en route to the forest preserve, with Daniel in the back of Keller’s Tahoe, and the boy’s car being driven by Moss.

Dean Stone was in Devon, about thirty miles west, armed not with his .308 hunting rifle, but with a weapon that would prove equally deadly to the young man: Daniel’s Visa card.

Tamara was in her room, dressing for her part in the evening’s theater. As was Liz.

Glen walked to his son’s room, knocked and pushed the door open. The boy was sitting in bed, that book he was obsessed with — Tom Sawyer — propped up before him as he made margin notes.

Glen said, “Hey. We’re going now.”

And the boy asked the question his father had anticipated. “Can I come?”

“No, I need you here.”

Frustration ganged in the boy’s face. “Please? Last time you said I could.”

“I’m sorry, son.” He didn’t explain that he was trying to insulate his youngest child as much as possible.

“Tam’s going.”

“I need her. She has to come. And I need you here... for a reason. It’s important. The cop outside?”

He glanced toward the street where their babysitter was parked.

Erik nodded.

“I need you to tell me when he drives away.”

“Why?”

“It’ll mean they’ve bought our trick. I won’t have any other way of knowing. It’s real important.”

The boy seemed to buy the reason. Which was true.

And after fist bumps between father and son the boy’s spirits revived and he sat down at the computer to keep an eye on the BRK gossip on Reddit and Discord and YouTube and to annihilate aliens or enemy soldiers or whatever one annihilated in games.

Glen returned to the living room, where Tamara was in her pink jogging outfit.

Liz was dressed in jeans and a white blouse. She was coming too. His wife might prove helpful for what lay ahead.

“Are we ready?”

The two women nodded. As they walked to the door, Glen said to his wife, “Have an idea. Do a needlepoint of Lone Ridge. The jogging trail. Just for us. Not for sale.”

She smiled. “Like a souvenir.”

“Like a souvenir.”

Chapter 41

Staring at it all.

The listings on the murder board, the photographs, the maps, notes about the guns, the condoms, the autopsies.

A hundred items, leading in a hundred, and therefore zero, directions.

Also present were Frank Tremain and Zo Eventide. The sheriff’s phone hummed and he took a call. Marlowe didn’t pay attention to what was being said.

She was looking at the threads.

One of her mentors in the DCI office had said a case is like a piece of fabric, made up of threads — evidence, witness statements, scraps of intuition and inspiration.

Some bolts of fabric were threadbare, nearly transparent. Others were solid as Kevlar.

Where was the BRK case’s shroud of cloth?

Impossible to say.

And then:

“Have a hit.”

The two women looked Tremain’s way. He continued, “Daniel checked into a motel in Devon an hour ago.”

Marlowe was listening, though it was hard to turn her attention from the board.

308 ammunition.

Cross-Fit Plus.

Eye-Protect.

She turned to Tremain. “Devon? I don’t know it. Bowman County?”

“Frederick.”

The next county south. Home of Kit, the biker fireman.

“They have tactical?”

“Not really. Tommy Huber — their sheriff — he needs people to take down a meth lab, whatever, his traffic patrol boys and gals slap on chest plates and helmets and, bang, they’re SWAT.”

“Have him get as many there as he can spare. Stage them around the motel, out of sight. And get some of your people down there too. Now.” Her eyes returned to the board. “And sheriff?”

“Hm?”

Marlowe said, “Have them move fast, real fast.”

“They took the bait,” Glen Hope announced to his wife and daughter.

Erik had just texted that the police car in front of the house had left.

So they believed that Daniel had checked into the motel in Devon and, presumably, half the Bowman County Sheriff’s Office was en route.

Leaving the family free to proceed with act three, the death of BRK.

They were in a sprawling forest preserve north of Clark Valley, standing beside Glen’s SUV. It was a good killing field. Glen and Tamara had picked it because the preserve was home to only a few early morning and after-work joggers, including females running by themselves. They would not have a lot of time to orchestrate the murder of the woman who turned out to be BRK’s final victim, but they wouldn’t need much, probably three minutes for the whole scenario to take place.

Keller and Moss were here too, behind a thick stand of bushes, holding Daniel down. He was drugged still but would have had some idea of what was coming and struggled. Moss wasn’t very muscular but beefy Keller kept the boy easily under control. Liz looked at the heavyset Keller distastefully, maybe because he had spent a few too many seconds lapping at her daughter’s tight jogging suit.

“Where’s Daniel’s car?” Glen asked.

Moss pointed to a stand of brush near a Public Works gardening shed.

Glen said to the men, “You ready?”

Nods of yes.

The plan was simple. The first woman jogger who was alone, no one else in sight, Tamara would follow. When they were close to this spot she would use the pipe to subdue her. Then the two men would drag Daniel out and shoot him with Joseph Ray Whelan’s gun, as if there’d been a struggle and the jogger had gotten the weapon away from him. A few more blows and she’d be dead too. Glen had originally thought that he’d be doing the blunt object thing but Tamara had proved herself more than competent — and comfortable — at the art.

Keller would be sure to press the gun against the woman’s hands to transfer gunshot residue.

Crime: American Style was really quite the instructive, as well as enjoyable, show.

Then everyone would leave, fast; the gunshots would result in any number of 911 calls.

Danny then saw Tamara and began moaning and twisting, but his hands were securely bound behind him — with padded cuffs to avoid ligature marks. He was doped up but his eyes conveyed a clear message to his girlfriend: Judas.

Tamara’s mind was clearly elsewhere. She nodded to her parents and jogged back to the beginning of the trail, about a hundred yards away. The only difference between her and any other jogger was that she wore gloves and a windbreaker, though the day was not that chilly. The gloves were for obvious reasons and the jacket was to keep the pipe out of sight.

One male runner went by, lost in his earbuds.

Two women together.

Twenty long, long minutes later, an opportunity.

The woman wore a bright-blue jogging outfit — close fitting, Glen noted — as well as a baseball cap, and she was some distance still but it seemed her hair was not black, BRK’s preference, but dark enough.

Glen waved to his daughter, who nodded back.

Tamara stepped into the path and began to follow the jogger, matching the pace of the woman who was about to die.

Chapter 42

Tamara Hope felt a lovely anticipation of the sort she’d never truly experienced.

Jogging slowly behind the victim, she kneaded the iron pipe, protected from her skin cells and hairs by a plastic bag.

Breaking the skull bones of Joseph Ray had freed her.

Feeling the resistance of the domed pate, hearing the crack. That act had changed much within her.

It had freed her. It eased her. It consumed her.

Probably like true love.

She’d had a long journey to this place.

Troubled, anxious, angry, sometimes drowning in the tide of those dark Hope genes.

Getting into “scraps” as a preteen, but they were really beat-them-bloody fights. She’d just been too slight to do much damage. That changed in her teens. Hardly a bodybuilder, but she was strong enough to do some harm, thanks largely to training for girls’ wrestling — until she was banned, for aggressive behavior. (Her comment to the coach — along the lines of “It’s wrestling. Aren’t you supposed to be fucking aggressive?” — didn’t help get her reinstated.)

So the schoolyard fights gave her some relief, though the older she got the more difficult it was to get away with them. And so she’d stifled.

She remembered seeing her father standing over the bodies of Abigail Bills and Kelly, thinking: Wish it was me who did that.

And studying the corpses from every angle, memorizing them.

But then today, with Joseph Ray Whelan...

Ah, standing over the dead Mad Man, lying still as a sawdust-filled doll. Perfect hair perfect no longer.

Heavy and eerily limp.

The crack on his skull.

Virtually a sexual shudder that ran through her when metal met bone.

She’d often wondered what her reaction would be, taking a life.

She’d believed she could do it.

But she’d never believed how much the act would fulfill her. She felt too an odd sense — what was it? — pride? Maybe that was it. Pride that she was part of the BRK story.

Myths are only fiction until you bring them to life.

Thirty feet from the victim.

Tamara could not get to the jogger fast enough for a repeat performance.

And, yes, the considerate woman was obliging, slowing briefly to change her playlist or adjust the volume.

She was closing the distance.

Twenty feet.

Looking about. Not a soul on the path.

She could hear in her memory the crack of bone once more.

And needed to hear, to feel it again.

Sex...

Opioids...

Fifteen feet.

Tamara’s hand withdrew the pipe. Glancing at the long, heavy piece of metal, flecked with blood, red as old barn paint, and bits of tissue, dried and crisp.

Her father wouldn’t let her hit Kelly at Lone Ridge. They hadn’t had much time — someone might have shown up in the park. He’d wanted BRK’s assault over with quickly. He’d just charged out of the woods and slammed the pipe onto the skull of the girl. Three, four times. Then, breathing hard, he’d set the pipe down and undone his belt.

Aware that Tamara was nearby, staring.

There was a moment where neither of them moved. Then a mutual decision was reached and she headed back to the picnic table, where her mother was setting out cookies for dessert, while Glen finished BRK’s job with the body.

Ten feet.

Eight feet.

A great swelling in her heart, as the moment for the kill loomed. She was breathing deeply and fast, only partially from the running.

It had taken three swipes to bring down Joseph Ray Whelan.

She was now so energized, so hungry that she knew she could kill this woman with a single blow.

Then six feet.

Now was the time.

She drew back the pipe.

Just as the woman stopped abruptly.

Tamara did too.

The jogger turned.

Tamara gasped, overcome by an urge to sob. No! How...?

There wasn’t any logical explanation. And so Tamara Hope did the only thing that was possible — she followed through, swinging the pipe hard toward Agent Constant Marlowe.

Who easily dodged.

Tamara expected the woman to pull her gun, but, no. Instead, she stepped forward fast on the balls of her feet and swung her left fist firmly into Tamara’s gut, doubling her over, starting the retching. Pain exploded throughout her body.

And then the woman delivered a follow-through: her right fist into Tamara’s face.

The woman’s knuckles, as hard as the pipe, connected with cheek.

There was a loud snap, audible even over the sound of Tamara’s squealing, and the evening was filled with the crack of bone after all.

The operation had been put together so quickly that Sheriff Tremain had not been able to assemble a proper tactical response here at the North Hills Forest Preserve.

Marlowe had taken down Tamara Hope fine, but on the other side of the brush, the scene was not as good.

She pushed through the greenery to see that Glen Hope was in cuffs and on his belly, as was Slim, the second man in the alley attack.

But the big one, Bigot, had his left arm around Liz Hope’s chest and held a Glock to her temple. Deputies were shouting for him to let her go. He was shouting for them to drop their guns.

Marlowe was at first curious what Liz Hope was doing here; after the boy, Erik, whom Dad obviously wanted to shelter from the darker side of the family, Liz seemed the least guilty of the Hopes. But then Marlowe realized that the mother had come along as the designated hostage.

As Tremain and the three other deputies crouched, Marlowe held her weapon at her side and walked closer to Liz and the Bigot, who still wore the bandage from their earlier encounter.

“You!” he shouted. “Bitch! Drop your weapon. Or I’ll kill her! I will!”

And Marlowe, who’d seen this scenario before, wanted to say: Do you not see how what you’re doing makes no sense? First, Liz Hope is one of the bad guys, so go ahead and shoot her. Second, on a broader level, how can it possibly be logical to threaten to kill the person you’re using as a shield? Wouldn’t it be smarter to point your gun my way and try to shoot me?

But, of course, no banter.

So Marlowe lifted her own gun, shot Bigot three times in and around the right eye and turned to a more important mission: seeing how Daniel Morgenstern was faring after what had surely been a traumatic captivity.

The vehicles were still arriving, cruisers with roof lights flashing, unmarkeds with pulsing grilles.

Glen Hope and his wife and daughter were cuffed. The couple was in the back of a squad car, Tamara in the ambulance. Marlowe had broken the young woman’s cheekbone, nose and several ribs.

With only two blows.

Not bad, she thought, pleased.

Tremain was on the phone with the State Police; a commander was en route to take charge of the incident.

As she looked over the remnants of the battlefield, Marlowe was reflecting that it had been a dead-heat race to put together the takedown.

Two hours earlier Marlowe was looking at the murder board in the warstoreroom and, considering all that had happened over the past few days, and she had decided to consider an odd possibility.

What if Daniel was innocent?

It was merely speculation. She had no proof, though a few things about the case gave her pause.

She had put the matter to Tremain and Eventide.

“All ears,” the sheriff had said.

“First, if Daniel were BRK would he really use his credit card for a motel, knowing we’d made him? And in Frederick County? He’d be in Missouri by now.” A pause as she’d frowned briefly in concentration. “And let’s talk about Lone Ridge on Wednesday...”

Tremain completed her very thought: “What the hell would Daniel be doing in the park sexually assaulting somebody at the same time his girlfriend just happened to be there chowing down a picnic lunch?”

Marlowe nodded. “I thought maybe he was obsessed with her... and following them. But talking to his mother? No history of that behavior.” Then she was glancing at the sheriff. “And your evidence. Take the eye drops. How would they get on the bodies? What? They dripped out of his eyes? Not likely. And at all three scenes?” She added, “Now, hairs. How often do they fall out?”

“And without the bulb attached?” Eventide said. “Which would’ve given us DNA from the start.”

Marlowe cautioned, “Remember I’m not saying he’s innocent, just raising questions.”

“Raise away,” Tremain said.

“The Cross-Fit shoes. Stolen from the mall probably, but the store didn’t know when. Their last inventory was a month ago. Could have been lifted a few days later. But also they could have been boosted after Abigail’s murder. Somebody used them to create distinctive prints at the scenes.”

Tremain spat and grumbled, “I’m curious about this ‘somebody.’ They related to your They with a capital ‘T’?”

“We’ll get to that,” Marlowe said. “Let’s keep knocking down our own case.”

“Always amusin’,” the sheriff said, fitting more chaw into his mouth.

“Danny’s house? Pictures of murdered women? They look nice and incriminating — snuff porn. But hard copies? Who prints out stuff like that? You look at them on your phone or computer.”

“Well, Agent Marlowe, going with your speculation, if Daniel’s innocent, that means that the ‘somebody’ has to be Tamara Hope. Because if she says Danny killed Joseph Ray right in front of her, then ergo she’s lying.”

He knew Latin too?

She said, “That’s our ‘somebody.’”

Eventide said, “But this afternoon, back at Lone Ridge. Why attack her?... Ah, it was fake.”

“Exactly. And it happened, conveniently, when Glen was on the phone with your office.” A glance to Tremain. “The point was to make sure we’d find the foil condom wrapper with Daniel’s DNA on it. And to make her look all the more innocent.”

“Which’d make her father a ‘somebody’ too.” Tremain then added, “And those witnesses there? On Route 27 today? Also convenient they just happened to be there and happened to see a car that turned out to be Danny’s.”

“Who are they?”

“Arnie and Joan Cahill. He’s a lawyer in town.”

“What do you know about them?”

“Not much. Never in trouble. He’s a decent guy. Volunteers for the church fundraisers, secretary of the Commerce Club...”

“Wait,” Marlowe said. “Glen Hope’s in that, isn’t he?”

“Vice president. With those other men you met at his house, Bryan Coughlin and Dean Stone.”

“Stone. Auto dealership, right?”

“That’s right.” Tremain was nodding. “Grease. But our twins canvassed his garage...” The sheriff shook his head. “But he knows other dealers. Probably some in ESL — who’d maybe have mechanics who freelance — trying fruitlessly to beat up cops come to town to look into the BRK case.” A glance at Marlowe.

She said, “Here’s a possibility. Hope and his daughter and the execs in Commerce Club cover up Abigail Bills’s death by creating BRK.”

Eventide offered, “How’d it all get started?”

Marlowe replied, “Hope’s on his computer, checking real estate listings. He sees Abigail’s listed her house. He googles her. Likes the pictures. Pays her a visit. Things get out of control.”

Eventide said, “And he taps his daughter to give up her boyfriend as the killer. Low.”

“Explains why those two don’t kill me in the alleyway,” Marlowe said. “They want me out of commission and to deliver the message they’re putting me in the hospital because they think I’m involved in the reservation treaty issue. Once that message’s delivered, Hope and the others put up the Nazi’s nephew, Jimmy, to actually take Zo and me out.”

Marlowe fell silent. Then whispered, “‘Where?’ Always wondered how BRK got to Kelly in Lone Ridge Park. There’s the answer. He didn’t hike into the park from anywhere. He was already there. Probably spotted her from Route 27.”

She scoffed. “And body language. The one category of subject that can trick you is sociopaths. To them there’s no such thing as deception. Their kinesics are the same when they’re telling the truth or lying.”

Marlowe looked at the printout of everyone who’d bought the .308 ammo of the sort that had been used to snipe her way. Tremain noticed. “Nobody on the list’s involved in this party.”

“Isn’t there?” Marlowe asked, focusing on two of the names. She looked up an address on her phone and displayed it. Then tapped one of the names on the ammunition chart. “There’s your connection.”

“Ah. Well. How do we handle it?”

Marlowe said, “Get surveillance on the Hopes now and pull the babysitter off their house. We’ll see where they go. Maybe out for pizza. Maybe to where they’re holding Danny.”

And where they’d gone was to North Hills Forest Preserve, the surveillance deputies had discovered.

Observing them from a distance, it had been pretty easy to deduce their plan. The officers had seen the two men who had attacked Marlowe in the alley lead a drugged Daniel Morgenstern from the back of an SUV registered to Bigot, Frederick Keller, known hired muscle from East St. Louis. And they had seen Tamara Hope, as well, dressed in a jogging outfit. One of the surveilling deputies had seen her slip the murder weapon pipe into her waistband.

So Marlowe borrowed a jogging outfit from one of the women deputies who lived nearby.

And she went for a pleasant after-work run, along a path made fragrant by the scents of pine and of loam and, though it was underrepresented in the park, of aromatic magnolia.

Chapter 43

Now it was cleanup time at the forest preserve.

Marlowe was concentrating on the interrogation of the surviving member of the alley-attack duo.

Slim — Robert Moss — grunted. “I’m not saying a word without my lawyer.”

This was in response to Marlowe’s question, “Where is he?” She was bending down, her face close to that of the man, who sat stuffed in the back of a squad car.

“I’m not—”

Zo Eventide said, “It was Stone who used Danny’s credit card to draw us off. Where is he?”

The motel clerk said it was an “older guy in a suit and was kind of an asshole” about producing other ID, but there were no video cameras to pull an image from. Who else could it be, though, than the man who’d hired Ross and Keller, auto dealer Stone?

Marlowe clenched her fist.

Tremain approached. “My vote is no on that.”

Unclenching.

“Don’t need to prep him for dental work. We found Stone. Got him on the highway from Devon. He’ll be here any minute.”

Marlowe stepped away from Moss, who must’ve realized the negotiation was over before he’d even started to horse trade. “Wait!”

She slammed the door.

Tremain continued, “I had some of my folks pay a visit to Stone’s dealership. Found a hundred thousand worth of stolen merch he was moving to fences around the area. Smart plan. Car dealers’re always shipping vehicles to other dealerships. Guess they’d load up a trunk with merch and deliver it, then send a wire transfer, or cash, on a delivery. Ah, here he is now.”

The solid man, in a suit that evoked the word “dapper” in Marlowe’s mind, was accompanied by two BCSO deputies. He wasn’t cuffed. He frowned. “This is bullshit.”

Marlowe: “Remember me? We met before. At Glen Hope’s house.”

He pretended to try to remember, then nodded and started on a rant. “I haven’t done anything. If anybody says I have, they’re lying. I can prove my whereabouts at... well, almost all the time the past couple of days. And I was on my way to doing a deal, a big deal I’m closing today, in Chippewa Hills. A fleet deal.”

Answering any number of questions she hadn’t asked.

Right out of the Guilty Party Playbook.

“Do you know a Frederick Keller and Robert Moss?”

“I do not.”

Marlowe noted his body language too was radiating guilt as well as deception.

Eventide said, “Mr. Moss is in that car there and it looks like he knows you.”

Moss was glaring at Stone and mouthing something.

Stone looked away.

It was time to put more of Frank Tremain’s crime scene work to use. Marlowe scrolled through the photos on her phone until she came to the images of the murder boards.

Now she put the ammo research that Data Analysis had done for her to work.

“The bullet that was fired at me in the alley two days ago was a particular type of .308 Winchester. Thirty-nine men bought those rounds in the past two months. Your name wasn’t on that list.”

“Of course not.”

“But two women also bought that kind of ammo. One of them lives at 347 Cedar Hills in Clark Valley. Her name is Annette Holmes.”

Silence.

“That’s your address too, isn’t it — 347 Cedar Hills Way?”

“I...”

“It’s not a hard question.”

“Well, yeah, sort of.”

“You live at that address or not?”

“I do. But I don’t know what Annette buys. If she’s the one who took a shot at you, that’s terrible. She’s been deceiving me for—”

Almost funny, if he wasn’t being so pathetic. “Now, Mr. Stone, I have no record of you owning a Winchester .308 rifle. Did you acquire it through a private sale, or maybe inherited it?”

“That bitch, she—”

Eventide flipped to a screen on her phone. Marlowe read and continued, “Now for the past six years you’ve applied for a deer license. So you must own some rifles.”

“I—”

“Is one of them a .308?”

No response, other than swallowing.

“If I were to find a .308 in your house, upon executing a warrant...”

Bluffing with official speak is always the best.

“...your lying will not go over very well.”

Tremain, Marlowe could see, was trying not to smile as he chewed away.

Marlowe said, “You help us, Mr. Stone, I’ll talk to the DA about the charges.”

Tremaine said, “We both will, Dean.”

He slumped. “Shit. Okay... I’ll cooperate. But only if you write it down. That I’m cooperating...”

She wrote down in her notebook: Stone is cooperating.

She showed him.

“Sign it.”

She signed it and slipped it into his shirt pocket. The completely meaningless document seemed to satisfy him.

He said, “Look, I was shooting to scare you is all. I’m a good shot. If I’d wanted to hit you I could have. I was just trying to save my boys’ hides. Fred and Robert. You were whupping them unfairly.”

“So Glen Hope came to you after he killed Abigail Bills and hired you to help him derail the investigation?”

“What?”

Did he need the question repeated? It was pretty clear. She did anyway.

“You don’t get it, do you?”

She shook her head.

“It wasn’t Glen killed Abigail. It was his son.”

Chapter 44

“The kid is out of control. If it walks and it’s in a skirt, or whatever, it’s fair game.”

He lifted his palms. “This whole thing, Glen did all of this to protect Erik.”

Marlowe glanced toward Eventide. They shared a frown and looked back at the car dealer.

“Glen told me, Monday night, he’d been on his computer looking at real estate listings to get sellers to drop their broker and sign with him. He saw that somebody else’d been online. He knew it was his son. The boy did that sometimes.” Stone grimaced. “He’s not right. Growing up in that family, what do you expect? But he’s worse. Bad to the bone. Erik cruised his dad’s site scanning for listings by single women, and’d then look them up on Google or Facebook. He’d find out when they were alone... and, well, you know what happened next. Apparently, he likes older women — older to him — with short, dark hair.”

Which described the victims.

As well as his mother, Liz, Marlowe reflected but chose to think no more about.

“Glen realized on Monday Erik was out and sped over to that woman’s place. Abigail’s. But Erik’d already... done it, you know. Glen sent him home and called Tamara to help him clean up. They had this plan to make her boyfriend, Daniel, the fall guy. The second victim? In the park, Kelly? That was Glen. But he only did it with her because he needed to plant more evidence and make Daniel look guilty.”

Marlowe looked to the sheriff and Eventide. “Quill, my prosecutor friend, he’s getting DNA from the two assaults earlier in the year. They probably match Erik’s. Where’s the boy now?”

Tremain muttered, “Home, far as I know. He wasn’t part of the plan, I didn’t think. I’ll get somebody on him now.”

“Fast.”

He nodded and called it in, ordering two cars to the Hope house stat.

Stone scoffed in disgust. “And while all this was going on, you know what the little shit did? This morning? Glen told me he got on his dirt bike and went hunting for another girl! He went to the community college sports annex. He might’ve raped and killed somebody else, if one of your deputies hadn’t found him.”

Marlowe recalled Odell Davis explaining that he’d found the boy — who explained he was in the park hunting for BRK.

Which they all took at face value, never suspecting what the kid was after was another victim.

Stone was saying, “That whole family, the Hopes — they look normal. But they’re like a sitcom turned on its head. You know the irony? Everybody calls them the ‘Good Family Hope,’ and they used to laugh about it. ‘Good’ like a crook or killer is good. Smart, you know? They—”

The first shots struck Stone in the chest and head and he dropped, dead before his skull slammed into the dirt.

Marlowe and the others went to cover.

Three, four... six shots. From an assault rifle, somewhere in the bushes nearby.

Officers and medical staff dove to the ground too. Those who were armed were prone or on their knees, looking for a target, weapons in hand.

Bullets were slamming into vehicles and kicking up dirt and cutting branches and leaves off trees and brush. Like everyone else with a gun, Marlowe was seeking a target but hesitating to return fire; you never shot blind, especially in a public park.

But she knew where Erik was headed: to the squad car where his parents sat cuffed in the back. He was on a fool’s mission to save them.

A brief pause while he would have reloaded.

Then pushing through the dense foliage again, shooting, shooting, shooting.

Deafening sounds of gunfire...

Scrabbling forward, Marlowe was aiming in the general direction of where he was.

He broke from the brush and slid behind the car before she could fire. Then he was at the driver’s door, pulling it open.

Still, she had no shot and couldn’t move forward because Erik would rise and fire her way. Had the driver left the damn keys in the squad car? They often did if there was a prisoner barrier separating the front from the back.

Erik started to climb into the vehicle.

And Marlowe aimed carefully, emptying her magazine — two rounds for each of the three tires she could see and one for the front fender, on the extremely rare odds that she might hit something vital in the engine and disable it.

A pause.

Marlowe reloaded but before she could draw a sure target, Erik gave a heartbreaking glance to his mother and father and vanished into the brush.

She heard the rattling engine of the dirt bike she’d seen outside the house fire up. It was followed by the whine of fast acceleration then the sound receded.

Officers ran after him but given the density of the woods, he was already gone from sight.

Marlowe walked to Zo Eventide, who was climbing to her feet. She asked the deputy, “Can you call it in to the State Police barracks?”

“I,” the woman said, “I don’t think so, no.”

Marlowe heard a man’s deep voice give a cry. “Princess!”

It was Tremain, running toward Eventide as she fell back and then dropping to his knees and pressing his hand against her torn neck, in a futile effort to stop the flow of pulsing blood.

She didn’t want to think of it as a postmortem.

Under the circumstances, the phrase left a bad taste.

Marlowe was in the warstoreroom, writing up a report of what had happened for the State Police, who would be taking over the investigation. Also: doing the officer-involved shooting form, about the death of Bigot, a.k.a. Fred Keller. Marlowe was not inexperienced with these and other forms required whenever an officer might be responsible for a suspect’s injury.

Often, she would bring in perps who had been hurt in the takedown — coincidentally it was also these suspects who would agree to give up the names and addresses of associates and their bosses in this criminal organization or that during preliminary interviews.

She was well aware that her unorthodox approach to justice might someday catch up with her. But so far, her techniques had not landed her in much hot water and had yielded many a vital conviction.

Tremain ambled into the warstoreroom. He ate an Oreo, from the package on the table next to Marlowe.

“What’re you finding?” he asked.

“Well, for one thing — we’re real good about running suspects’ backgrounds. But who looks behind the scenes at witnesses — especially when they aren’t witnesses at all? I’ve talked to two sheriffs in towns upstate and Indiana, where the Hopes used to live. And our Cybercrimes in Springfield got into their phones and emails. What’d Stone say? ‘A sitcom turned on its head’? That doesn’t even begin to tell the story.

“They were grifters. Lived in six towns in the past twelve or so years, Illinois and Indiana. They ran scams. Mostly sales scams. I saw his certificates and awards for salesmanship. But it wasn’t enough for him to be a legitimate businessman — not enough profit. He sold things that were defective or weren’t what they seemed to be. Just on the borderline of legality, it looks like: stocks, artwork, real estate, sports collectibles. They made a hundred thousand selling Soviet and German war bonds that they claimed the governments were just about to recognize and pay off.”

She tapped a printout. “This one, it looks like Liz pretended to be a satisfied buyer of some property in Palm Springs, vouching for Glen. They must be Academy Award actors. And they used the kids from a young age.”

“Lord no.”

“Credit cards and checks went missing from friends’ houses after the children had been playing there. But nothing could be traced back to the Hopes. And Tamara? There were some emails about men settling claims they’d touched her or come on to her.” Her face grew grim. “They had an older son you mentioned, Jason. The one I thought might’ve killed himself. He ran with some crews outside of Chicago. I think Glen must’ve leaned on him to do some work he didn’t want to do. Drugs, protection, human trafficking. I think he couldn’t take it.”

Tremain’s face grew grave. “Took his own life because his parents used him like that. Pitiful. And the family, never busted?”

“Glen and Liz, no. Couldn’t make a case against them for anything. Tamara, two assaults, but they were juvie so it’s sealed. And Erik?”

Marlowe told the sheriff about the attacks in Trenton Falls and Hampton, the ones Evan Quill had looked into. “Both within the last year — the year Erik turned sixteen and could drive. I’ll be getting the DNA and blood results soon. Then we’ll know for sure.” She glanced into Tremain’s eyes. “And then we get to Clark Valley.”

“Well, now, that expression, Agent Marlowe, tells me you’ve found out something you either have trouble believing, or you wish you hadn’t found. Or maybe both.”

He was not wrong. She said, “I told you their grifts were selling bogus things.”

“Yep.”

“Well, here they sold the real deal. His customers got just what they wanted.”

“And what was it? Something my office missed?” He scoffed. “Oxy. Or maybe meth, like on that TV show?”

“Glen Hope sold the service of keeping Bowman County as white as possible.”

Chapter 45

“Remember I was commenting about the diversity of Bowman?”

“Yes’m. Well, the lack thereof.”

“Say, a couple of color wants to move here and’s looking for a house? Glen Hope had the majority of the listings. He charged a two percent commission. Usually it’s six.”

Tremain asked, “He made up for the difference in volume?”

“No, he made up for it — more than made up for it — in kickbacks from the Bowman County Commerce Club. He made it next to impossible for those couples to get a house. He’d tell them the seller had pulled it from the market. And he’d start the listings at ridiculously high prices and keep it firm with buyers of color, but drop it drastically when a white buyer made a lowball offer. And Liz helped too: she quoted insurance that nobody could afford.”

“We’re in civil rights territory now. Didn’t anybody complain to Fair Housing?”

She tapped the papers. “Some did. But they got withdrawn. I’m thinking Stone or his people from East St. Louis paid them a visit. Anyway, people’d have to ask themselves was this really a place they wanted to live? And they’d look elsewhere.”

Exhaling a slow breath, the sheriff said, “That’s why the BCCC crew were helping him out, covering up what the son’d done. If Erik’d been caught, state and feds? They’d all start looking under the hood of the Hope family. And there goes everybody’s dream of Aryan purity.”

A uniformed deputy walked into the room and handed the sheriff an eight-by-ten envelope. He looked inside, set it down and thanked the man.

Marlowe said, “Gives a new meaning to the slogan on the welcome-to sign: ‘Your kind of town.’”

“Damn. Somebody just came up with that a few years ago. Think it was Coughlin. Pretty sick joke if it was intentional.”

Marlowe said, “And they had a related business. You know Liz’s needlepoints?”

“Yes, I do. She’s got some talent, according to my wife.”

“You know what they depicted?”

“Never looked.”

“Sites of Confederate victories, slave trade harbors, Native American massacres. The motel where Martin Luther King Jr. was shot — big market for those.” Her voice, usually placid even during her most vicious fights and criminal takedowns, was low with disgust.

“No!”

Marlowe scanned an email from someone in Texas to Liz. “Here’s an order for a needlepoint of a tree where a Black man was lynched.”

“Christ have mercy... You think they’re racist?”

“No. Glen and Liz’re like the best meth or opioid dealers — they don’t use their own product. But they’re responsible for even more destruction that way.” Marlowe looked toward him. “Now, the Eagle Brotherhood. I know you’ve been after your white — supremacist — whale for some time, Sheriff.”

“Ha. That’s funny.”

Marlowe waved at the papers. “Stead’s more than happy to keep the county quote ‘pure’ but the Brotherhood wasn’t part of the BRK killings.”

“That’s some pretty piss-poor irony,” he mumbled. “I got your hate crime, your homicide, your obstruction of justice, your assault and your kitchen sink cases against a bunch of cardigan sweater, country club racists. And all I can do is wrist slap the Nazis.”

“Anything more on Erik?” Marlowe asked.

“No. The boy just disappeared.”

She still burned that the boy had gotten away — and shot Zo Eventide in the process.

Marlowe waved at the pile of papers in front of her. “He probably has resources. Apparently, the parents’ keep-the-county-white business did well. I’m sure he’s got a go-bag with him.”

“But we got three of them, that’s the bulk.” He paused. “Ah, another expression of yours, Agent Marlowe. This one’s telling me that catching the bulk ain’t enough. No need to answer.”

And so she didn’t.

“Tough to rank them, but I’d say Erik’s the most dangerous of the lot. I’ll get him.”

“Don’t doubt it. Oh, gotcha a present.” From the envelope he pulled out a plastic frame containing a placard. He handed it to her.

Constant Marlowe gave a rare laugh.

FIND ’EM FIRST, FIGURE IT OUT LATER.

He ambled toward the door.

He’d been gone no more than a few minutes when her phone hummed with an incoming call.

It was a local number.

She took a breath and hit answer.

Chapter 46

The hospital, on Pawnee Street, was a somber structure whose facade had to be more than a hundred years old.

White limestone in need of a serious power washing. Windows in need of replacing.

Constant Marlowe skidded to a stop at the back entrance and, tossing her DCI Official Business sign on the dash, climbed from the car quickly. She collected what she needed from the trunk and hurried inside, lugging the large bag in both arms. The guard saw the bag. Her badge. Her gun. And nodded her through the metal detector, which started its urgent protest. He shut it off.

Walking down the dim corridor, she came to her destination, which was Room 35.

Just outside of it she found John Notawkah, on his phone. He glanced at her, ignored the package and hugged her hard. He disconnected his call.

Together they walked inside and saw Zo Eventide lying in bed, on her back, her eyes closed.

To Marlowe, she looked peaceful as could be.

Then, apparently hearing the bustle, she slowly lifted her lids.

“Constant.”

Her neck was heavily swathed and she was on an assortment of IV drips.

Erik’s bullet had not nicked the vital carotid or jugular but there are apparently plenty of vessels in that area that bleed like hell. Tremain’s pressure, though, kept her going until the Bowman County EMT, who’d done tours overseas, could perform field surgery, patching her up enough for transport to the real OR.

She asked Marlowe, “You find the little shit?”

“No. Not yet. I will.”

“I know you...” Eventide dipped out briefly as the morphine or whatever she was on kicked in. Then she returned.

Marlowe said, “I can’t stay. I picked up what you wanted.”

She lifted the bag and put it on the bedside table.

“What is that exactly?” John asked.

“Open it,” Eventide muttered.

John pulled down the sides of the bag and frowned at what he was looking at.

Anderson Products, Inc.

Fingerprint and Key Operated Pistol Safe

10-year Warranty

Both women looked at his blank expression for a moment, each in her own way enjoying his confusion.

Then enlightenment.

“Holy... You’re...”

Apparently before you go through surgery, they run any number of tests about your physical condition.

He bent down and hugged her as hard as he dared. Which really wasn’t very hard, so impressive were the bandages. “And everything’s okay. I mean, after the—” He waved toward the wound.

“Just fine,” she said, beaming.

Marlowe asked, “Do you know? Boy, girl?”

Eventide blinked. Then laughed hazily. “You really have no idea how this works, do you?”

“None whatsoever.”

“Well, you know how part of it works. When are you and Evan going to the inn?”

“Tomorrow. He had to go back home to respond to some motions. Just a formality. Driving back tonight.”

Eventide began to doze off again. “The inn... Ozark... Hills. Did I tell you...?”

The words were becoming increasingly slurred.

“Did I tell you what they... have there?”

“You did, yes.”

But the sentence didn’t register.

“A hot tub... and guess what it’s in the shape of... A heart. It’s in the shape of a heart.”

Chapter 47

Alone now, in the warstoreroom, Constant Marlowe found herself thinking of the prospect of several days of a not-spending-the-night girl spending the night.

It didn’t make her heart pound or fingers tap nervously.

She would enjoy Evan Quill’s company.

The verbal banter.

The meals. (Her culinary ambit included more than sandwich cookies.)

And the other kind of company, of course.

They’d be near the Mississippi. Maybe there was a riverboat tour they could take. One like those in the pictures upon the walls in her room in the Illinois Country Inn. She and Evan Quill would do the most touristy thing humanly possible.

A paddle wheeler.

Sure, that’d be fun.

Which is when her phone gave a brief ta-dum.

A message.

SHT. Hate to say it but the Owen case. Just changed the docket. Wouldn’t listen to our reply. Moved the trial date forward. Have to take it. Left the plat book in the hotel safe. Rain Check re: the inn? HOPE so...

Ah...

Marlowe debated how to reply. A simple, gaunt “K”?

Or something more civilized? A “Bummer, but I’ll keep checking the weather. Put the bastard away ASAP, then...”

But before she could make the decision and compose and send the message, she became aware of a shadow over her.

It was Frank Tremain.

“Something you should look at.” He set a manila folder down.

“What is it?”

A nod at the file. “You might want to think about spending another night or two here. Brunswick stew? Your hotel dining room? Best in the state. Despite the fact they don’t make it with squirrel. So... Do some reading,” he said, digging his tobacco pouch from his pocket and wandering out, turning toward the crime scene lab.

Marlowe made herself a cup of coffee and opened the folder. Inside was a document headed: INDIANA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS DISPOSITION REPORT.

Constant Marlowe began to read. She finished it and went through it again.

She then sat back, eyes on the ceiling. It needed a coat of paint.

A sudden thought: Had she replied to Evan Quill’s text canceling their days away?

She didn’t think so.

She’d do it now.

But then lost the train of thought as an idea occurred to her.

She walked into the lab and found the sheriff in white coat and goggles. He glanced her way and pulled the eyewear off.

She said, “Interesting story, what you dropped off.”

“Thought you’d like it.”

“Jimmy Long?” she asked.

“The Nazi youth who likes to play bumper trucks.”

“Could you live with a five-year sentence recommendation, with a good behavior bump?”

Tremain was typically savvy. “You need a favor from his uncle Adolf.”

“And he goes to Alton Medium Security.”

Tremain didn’t even hesitate. “The punk ran into you, not me. No skin off my nose or teeth or whatever skin comes offa in that expression. You recommend what you want.” The goggles went back on.

She returned to the warstoreroom.

At the far end were Odell Davis and Mattie Charlotte, transcribing the evidence notes from the murder boards into reports for the local prosecutor.

She rose and walked to the pair. She expected them to be typing in unison, but that was not the case. He was a touch typist, a hundred words a minute, it looked like. Charlotte was hunt and peck.

“Hey, Constant,” she said.

Davis nodded and smiled. His fingers kept it up, nearly invisible.

“You have GPS trackers?” Marlowe asked.

“We do. Don’t use ’em much.”

“Not a Miami Vice sorta place, Bowman County.”

“Where do you usually mount them on a vehicle?”

They regarded each other. Davis said, “I think the last time we used one, Kennesaw Biggs.”

“Meth cooker.”

“In the rear wheel well.”

“Right rear.”

Davis was nodding. “Right rear wheel well. Somebody distracted him when he was stopped for a light and we slapped it up in there.”

“What’s the range?”

“A mile,” Charlotte said and slowly stabbed out, W-I-T...

“And where would they be, the trackers?”

“Closet halfway between here and the lab. On the right.”

“And how do you read it when it’s tracking?”

Davis said, “App you download. Phone or iPad. Pretty nifty. But, you know...”

Charlotte filled in, “You’ll need a warrant. Damn.” She’d made a mistake and hit the backspace.

“That closet locked?”

The pair looked each other’s way once again and then returned to their respective keyboards.

“Don’t believe so,” Davis said.

“Thanks.”

“Oh, and one thing?” Charlotte offered.

Was she going to warn about the warrant and due process under the constitution?

Davis continued for her, “If one was going to use it, one would probably need new batteries.”

Charlotte said, “Not the fancy ones. Those little disks you can never find when you need one. Just double A’s all you need. I’ve got a pack with me.”

Davis said. “For our kids’ toys. Everything’s electronic nowadays. We tried to give them blocks and hula hoops, but—”

“Not a lick of interest,” Charlotte said and dug into her purse. She handed Marlowe the package of Energizers.

“Thanks.”

The pair returned to typing.

Constant Marlowe reminded herself she had to text Quill. She’d get around to it. But later.

Now she placed the prison disposition report, the batteries and a box of .380 ammunition in her backpack, zipped up and, slinging it over her shoulder, started into the corridor.

Leaving the Oreos for Frank Tremain.

Chapter 48

Saturday, September 23, 11:30 a.m.

The young man looked over the flatlands, mostly fields intended for vegetables when the season was right. Now, early fall, they were like a stubbly cheek, the ground smooth, the short stalks poking up low.

In the distance were some trees. Thanks to last night’s surprise frost, they’d lost all but the most resilient leaves.

The bus was making good time. It had left Lutherville, Indiana, five hours earlier and, though stopping six times so far to pick up and discharge passengers, it was ahead of schedule.

“You take this trip much?” asked the man sitting beside him and looked him over from blond close-cut hair to gray windbreaker to jeans to Converse shoes, everything all fresh. The windbreaker still bore the price tag.

The questioner’s skin was dark and his hair done in short dreads. His clothes were not new and were baggy all around.

“No.”

“I do. Gonna see my family.”

“Hm.”

Silence.

“You?”

“See family? Yes.”

“Cool.”

More silence.

The seatmate gave up and returned to his iPhone and a playlist.

The young man continued to stare out the window. They passed a sign.

Clark Valley

Your kind of town...

Founded 1789

Soon the vehicle, oddly smooth-riding for its size, was easing into the parking lot of a large service station on the outskirts of downtown. At some of the stops the bus had made, it had nosed diagonally into spaces meant just for the craft. Those were the bigger towns, with bus stations. But here, Clark Valley, Illinois, its berth was a curb.

The bus dipped slightly to the right and passengers disembarked.

“Nice talking to you, dude,” the seatmate said.

He didn’t seem sarcastic.

The young man nodded, then pulled his duffel bag off the overhead rack and walked outside. He had no Uber account, in fact, no credit card at all, but he did have $340.44.

They pay you in prison.

Though not much. That represented thirty months of work in the laundry and the cafeteria.

A dusty-looking cabbie was sitting in a dusty beige Malibu.

The young man climbed in the back. “One seven five five Maple Crest.”

The driver took off, remaining silent. Listening to talk radio.

Soon, they pulled up in front of the house. Nice. Pastel green, white trim. A white fence and, what was it called? Trellis.

“Wait. I’ll just be ten minutes.” And he gave the man two twenties to reassure him that his passenger wasn’t going to bail.

The young man walked to the garage and opened the door by punching in a code on a number pad.

The code was simple. 4-6-1-0.

The six was for June, Tamara’s birthday.

The 1–0 was for Erik, October.

And the four was his.

Jason Hope had been born in April.

From the garage, he stepped inside the house. He’d never been here. The family had moved from Indianapolis not long after he’d been arrested for armed robbery. His father had run a grift on the wrong man, who’d pulled a gun and demanded a refund — and an additional ten thousand to keep quiet about the scam and not go to the police.

The money was one thing. Worse, the asshole had hit Tam when she’d tried to stop him.

So Jason had taken his great-grandfather’s Smith & Wesson and gone to the man’s business and gotten the money back and more, after a pistol whipping.

Jason had made it home before the Indiana State Police got there. They couldn’t find the gun — his father had hidden it — but there was plenty of other evidence. The argument that he was merely recovering what had been previously stolen didn’t cut it. He got two to five years.

The gun was what had done it.

If he’d used his fists only, he might’ve gotten a suspended. Or maybe six months.

But a firearm.

His father had said on several occasions, the Smith & Wesson was why his son had been taken from him.

Because of him and the failed grift — and Tamara putting a girl in the hospital for no particularly good reason and Erik groping a girl — the family had decided to move.

He walked through the first floor. Nothing about the rooms was familiar, of course, though he recognized furniture and souvenirs and the pictures.

He took one. Of himself, Tam and Erik.

It dated to years before. You might say to a time when they were innocent, but given their parents? That’s not a word that ever applied to the Hope children, not since they were out of Pampers.

In the basement he went to where his father had directed him and found the backpack hidden in the ceiling. He opened it up. A typical go-bag. Inside were over a hundred fifty thousand in twenties and fifty K Canadian, a couple of burner phones, still in the wrappers, some minutes cards and a gun and ammunition. He put the pistol and bullets back. Last thing a con needed to be found with. Cash was suspicious but, in the end, not illegal.

Upstairs he found the bedroom that was Tamara’s. The decorations were of cheerleaders and teams and music groups and self-affirming posters. One of their mother’s needlepoints was prominent. He sat on the bed, then lay back, his head on her pillow for a few minutes. Smelling her smells.

Then he rose and walked outside, hitting the pad to lower the garage door.

He was half-surprised that the driver was still there.

He got inside, slammed the door.

The driver said, “Nice house. You live there?”

“No.”

The man grunted and, when there was nothing more forthcoming, started driving where directed.

In twenty minutes they were pulling into a used car dealership on Route 27.

The operation’s name and address were on a three-by-five card in the go-bag. His father had apparently spoken to the owner when they’d first moved to town, making just-in-case arrangements with the man.

He asked for him now and soon a bulky man in a snazzy blue suit appeared. The two of them walked behind the main building, where he paid the man eight thousand.

“This’d normally be fifteen. But ’causa what your father did for this town... you got this one below cost.”

Jason nodded thanks and signed where he’d been directed to sign.

Then, the duffel bag and backpack in the trunk, he was on the highway once more.

Thinking of what lay ahead for him.

Jason had wanted to stop at the West Central Detention facility and see his parents and sister. But that would have to wait. His father had told him — speaking elliptically because the calls were monitored in jail — that the cops might try to pick him up at the prison and follow him.

Which would be a problem.

Because Jason was on his way to his brother, who was a wanted man.

The kid had three interests in life. Reading, first.

Video gaming, second.

And, third, visiting women who did not want to be visited.

“Interests,” though, was too mild a word.

“Obsession” was more like it. Their mother and father worked hard to control at least the last one of those drives within Erik.

They had not been very successful, apparently.

The whole incident that had resulted in the downfall of the Family Hope would never have happened if the parents hadn’t tried to fix the boy.

Nature is nature.

Glen and Liz, better than anybody, should have known that.

They gave in to their nature... they should have helped Erik do the same, not tried to cure him. Forbidding him from making his nighttime visits, from looking up women online, only had the effect of making him more eager to pursue victims and in more extreme and careless ways.

Hire a damn hooker, for God’s sake. Do what you want, hurt her some, pay her and go on your way.

Seemed simple to Jason.

Jason would soon have a chance to talk to Erik about it. The boy was presently hiding out in a cave in Missouri — a state with, it turns out, more caves than any other, seven thousand or so.

He was inspired to go there because of a book he’d just read and reread for school, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain.

Jason would find him and the two remaining members of the Family Hope would head west. Maybe Colorado. Probably California.

Erik could indulge and Jason would pick up where their father had left off.

He liked the idea of selling purity, though that seemed to come with some problems. He’d stick to simpler grifts. Jason was good-looking and knew there were plenty of lonely hearts with checkbooks in this world. Those were the scams he’d run for his parents. Younger man, older woman.

“Knife through butter,” his father had once said.

The two of them would — keeping with the man’s metaphor — now cut quite a swath.

The Good Brothers Hope...

He braked as the old pickup truck in front of him skidded to a stop. The driver, a scrawny sixty-year-old in jeans and T-shirt, climbed out and glanced back, holding up a wait-a-second finger.

Jason nodded.

Something, it seemed, had fallen off a vehicle in front of the pickup. The man walked around the front, bent down and rolled a tire onto the shoulder. He returned to his truck.

Was it Jason’s imagination or did the man sport a swastika tattoo on his forearm?

He couldn’t be sure. Well, you could find skinhead assholes anywhere.

He glanced in the rearview mirror and saw a woman, in sunglasses and baseball cap. She’d apparently gotten out to see what was happening and was now climbing back into her sedan, an old one and an odd color, orange.

Soon they were moving again.

In a few miles the two pickups in front peeled off and, at the next crossroad, the orange sedan turned too.

Jason Hope had the highway to himself.

He noted a sign.

Missouri State Line 42 Miles

Content

Jeffery Deaver
The Rule of Threes

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48