“Where are you?”
“Under the car.”
“Where are you stopped?”
“Burning Tree Trailhead. The parking lot. There’s no one else here.”
“Okay, turn your head a little right. It’s—”
“I got it.”
The black whatever-the-hell was larger than she’d thought, about the size of her palm, and as she moved her light around, it was like something out of a 007 movie.
“Is there any chance I take it off and it explodes?” she said.
There was a pause. “Yeah, that might happen. I don’t know.”
Lydia cursed. “Remind me not to ask you for my risks of cancer.”
“Nah, you’re good with the cancer. You eat right, exercise. Although what are your genetics like?”
“I’m a total mutt,” she muttered as she got a grip on the device. “Okay, am I counting down or just doing it?”
“Just do it.”
“Great time to live the Nike slogan.”
Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath—
“Shit!” she said as she ripped it free.
“Lydia? Lydia!”
“Oh, God, it’s blinking.” She turned the thing over in her hand. “What the hell is it?”
“Throw it! Throw it as far as you can—just fucking throw that thing into the woods.”
In a scramble that left her banging her head as she came out from under the car, she jumped up, hauled back, and put every ounce of strength into a Lamar Jackson, pitching the device into the trees.
“Lydia?” came Daniel’s voice. “Did you—”
“Yes, I threw it.”
“Get out of there.”
She didn’t waste a second: In the car. Not even a seatbelt. Slamming in reverse and skidding on the dirt as she k-turned and took off.
“You okay?” Daniel said.
With a shaking hand, she put the phone up to her ear even though he was still on speaker. “I’m not. No. I’m not. Where are you?”
“Still in the woods.”
“Are you safe?”
There was a pause, during which all she heard was the sound of him running and breathing. “You don’t have to save me, Lydia. I told you, I’m always fine.”
Out on the county road, she just drove in whatever direction her car was pointed in. Every time she blinked, she caught snapshots that dismantled her composure further: the bathroom at Peter Wynne’s, the soldier walking under the deer stand … and then what Daniel had done to protect them both.
The newscasters had called Eastwind already. She just knew it. Who else could they go to?
“Lydia?”
“I don’t know where I’m going,” she mumbled.
“Then just keep driving.”
“How can you say that?”
“Because that’s all you need to do. Don’t hit anything and just let yourself go.”
She blinked. Blinked again.
When something hit her windshield, she jumped. It was just rain, though, a dappling of fat drops that landed like miniature fists on the glass.
“It’s raining,” she said into the phone that was still on speaker.
Lydia had some thought that she was scared to end the call, as if their connection over the phone was what was keeping him safe, keeping him alive. Keeping her the same.
“What are we going to do?” she whispered as she started the wipers.
“You’re just driving right now, Lydia. That’s all you need to think about. You’ve got to give that adrenaline a chance to work its way out of you before you make any sense.”
“Peter is dead.”
There was another pause, with nothing but Daniel’s footfalls coming through the connection. “Yeah, he probably is.”
“Do you think that man in the uniform did it?”
“I don’t know. Can you tell me why anyone would want to hurt your boss?”
Lydia thought about those papers that had been burned up in the fireplace. “No, but I’m going to find out.”
As Daniel jogged along through the trees, he kept the phone up to his ear. On the other end, he could hear the whirring of Lydia’s car and what he thought was the slap of windshield wipers.
Right on schedule, he thought as he glanced up to the rain.
The oaks and maples were all bare-limbed, providing no cover, and pines had never made good umbrellas. This was all good news for him.
“Lydia?” he said as he slowed to a walk.
“Hmm?”
Glancing behind himself, he got a whole lot of coast-was-clear. With any luck, that would last—because backup for that now-dead boy-in-black would be a problem.
“What did they do to you?” he asked. “What happened.”
He wasn’t surprised that Lydia took her time answering. And then she shocked him by telling him what he knew in his gut was the truth.
“Someone came and looked in all my windows Saturday night. That was when they must have put that tracker under my car. And then … they took a picture of me as