Pilkington raises his eyes to the scudding clouds, squinting into the glare. The air has a damp feral odor with a breeze blowing out of the west. Two vehicles stand on the narrow access road to his house, parked in the scant shade of a dead tree with branches like bleached white bones on a dry lakebed.
“We’re going to do it properly this time,” he says, chewing on the sodden end of an unlit cigar. “Nobody cuts and runs.”
He glances at Frank Senogles, who is checking a rifle, raising the telescopic sight to his right eye, closing his left. Valdez shuts the trunk of the car and unzips a black rifle case. There are two other men wearing black cargo pants with pockets stitched on the thighs. Mercenaries with made-up names, Jake and Stav, they won’t speak unless they have something to say. They’ll do their job as long as they’re paid. Jake has long hair tied back in a ponytail, but he’s receding at the front, as if the tide were going out leaving his eyebrows behind. Stav is shorter and swarthier, with a buzz cut and a nervous habit of wiping his mouth with the back of his wrist. He has scars down his neck like a burn victim.
Pilkington can’t help staring at the buckled skin.
“You got a problem with my face?” asks Stav.
Pilkington looks away, mumbling an apology. He doesn’t like to be pushed. He doesn’t like losing control of things. This isn’t his world. His father had gone to prison for securities and wire fraud and had emerged with an unexpected respect for criminals and miscreants. In that violent world, people valued power more than money. Violence was an end not just a means. Wield a bigger stick. Hit harder. Hit sooner. Hit more often.
Pilkington slaps his gloved hands together as though rallying a little league team. “All for one and one for all, eh?”
Nobody answers.
Senogles glances angrily at Valdez. “Well, I think the guy who created the problem should fix the problem.”
“I shot the guy in the head,” counters Valdez. “What else was I supposed to do?”
“Shoot him twice.”
“Stop your bickering,” says Pilkington.
“Palmer is like a fucking vampire,” says Valdez. “You can stab him in the heart, burn him, and bury him, but somebody keeps digging him back up and bringing him to life.”
“So the prick is hard to kill,” says Jake.
“He bleeds like anybody else,” replies Stav, who slips his arms into a black bulletproof vest and fastens the Velcro straps.
“What if the kid remembers?” asks Senogles.
“He won’t,” replies Valdez.
“Why else would Palmer take him? He must want the kid to back up his story.”
“Max wasn’t even four years old—nobody is going to believe him.”
Senogles isn’t convinced. “What about DNA tests, eh? What if Palmer can prove he wasn’t part of the robbery?”
“He can’t.”
Valdez removes and reattaches an ammunition clip to an automatic pistol. Senogles looks at Pilkington, wanting reassurance.
“Max won’t say anything. He’s a good boy,” says the older man.
“He’s a loose fucking end.”
Valdez interrupts. “Nobody touches him, OK? I want that agreed.”
“I’m not agreeing to anything,” counters Senogles. “And I’m not going to prison because you adopted some spic kid.”
Valdez body-slams the agent against the truck, which rocks from the impact. His forearm is forced against his throat.
“He’s my fucking son! Nobody touches him.”
Senogles matches his stare, neither man blinking or backing down.
“OK, let’s relax,” says Pilkington. “We got a job to do.”
Valdez and Senogles eyeball each other for another few seconds before Valdez loosens his grip and they shove each other apart.
“OK, Frank, talk us through this,” says Pilkington.
Senogles unrolls a satellite map on the hood of a Ford Explorer.
“We think the house is here, on Canal Drive. There’s only one road in or out. Once we seal it off he’ll be trapped unless he has a boat.”
“Does Palmer know we’re coming?” asks Pilkington.
“Unlikely.”
“Is he armed?”
“We’re going to assume so.”
“What’s our cover story?” asks Pilkington.
Senogles answers. “The family got a ransom demand and Sheriff Valdez took matters into his own hands because he was concerned for Max’s safety.” He turns to the others. “I was never here, understand? If we get stopped, the sheriff does the talking. No cell phones, no pagers, no GPS trackers, no transponders, no identification—keep your weapons hidden.”
“I need my cell in case Max calls,” says Valdez.
“OK, just your phone.”
Inside Valdez’s head is nothing but conflict and doubt. Every killer has to live with images he cannot expunge from his dreams—murder scenes that are indelibly inked onto his subconscious. For three nights he had been visited by the images of Cassie Brennan and her daughter Scarlett. He didn’t know either of them when he shot them dead. He thought Audie was in the bathroom but it was the little girl. Once she was dead he had to kill the mother. It was the only choice.
And now he can’t tell anyone, not his wife or his colleagues or his priest or his bartender. Audie Palmer is to blame. It has nothing to do with the money—that was spent long ago. This is about Max, the boy who had saved his marriage, the boy who had made his family complete. Yes, they could have tried again, and there were adoption agencies and surrogate services, but Max had been delivered to them by chance, the happiest of accidents and the answer to his prayers.
Now Audie Palmer has him. The big question is why. If he had wanted to kill Max he could have done it that first day outside the house. No, he’d never kill the boy—that’s the whole point—but what if he tells Max what happened or helps him remember? What if he turns Max against the people who raised him?
If only Audie Palmer had died when he was supposed to.