able to tell her what he had done, and she could deal with finding out who wanted Senator Kerns dead.
Chapter 1
Present Day
“Almost home,” Jake said softly as he looked at his wife snuggled into the leather seat of the BMW and leaning against the passenger side doorframe with a soft blanket thrown over her. She had been dozing the last hour as they made the run across the Bay Bridge and fought their way down the peninsula toward San Jose.
“Finally,” she said, the sleep still apparent in her voice.
She pushed herself upright, rearranging the blanket. Jake couldn’t understand why she was cold. He had the temperature adjusted to a comfortable setting, but Karin always wanted a blanket when she napped in the car. She looked into the back to check on Janna. Now thirteen months old, their daughter slept without a care as the soft hum of the tires on the wet road lulled her to sleep.
“Did it rain hard while I was out?” Karin asked, looking out the windows at the lights of the houses along the freeway. The drops on the windows made them smeary and indistinct. It was a little after five in the afternoon, but being that it was February, dusk was already settling in.
“A couple of short downpours as we approached Vallejo,” Jake said. “Nothing serious. Mostly just the constant drizzle.”
The rain had started as snow when they pulled out of South Lake Tahoe just after lunch. There had been a lot of snow this year, as if Mother Nature was trying to make up for the past few years when there had been hardly any. The snow had stayed with them as they made their way over to Highway 80, and gradually changed to rain as they descended down out of the mountains towards Sacramento. Karin didn’t like driving in the snow and rain, but Jake found the rain kind of peaceful. The weather was the main reason that they hadn’t taken the plane and flown up from San Jose. Karin was uncomfortable in a small plane, looking down at all that white snow. Jake felt it safer, avoiding the icy roads, but he knew when to surrender, and hadn’t even suggested the plane this trip.
“I hope they can visit us next month,” Karin said wistfully.
She was referring to Nate and Brenda, his bride of just shy of two months. They had been married at Christmas, in a small ceremony that Jake and Karin had flown up to Reno to attend. Karin and Brenda had hit if off the first time they had met, and the bond had only grown stronger with time. While Karin liked her job in California, she missed some of their old friends from Nevada.
“It didn’t seem like four days,” Karin added when Jake didn’t say anything.
“No, it didn’t,” Jake agreed. They had spent the time mostly around the casinos and shops, but had made a circle of the lake one day when it was clear and sunny. It had been cold, but they kept Janna bundled up when they got out of the car, and she had stared at everything with the same detached wonderment with which she took in everything. Jake could only wonder at what might be going on in that growing awareness inside her head.
“Nate sounded pretty certain they would make it,” Jake said, finally responding to Karin’s earlier question. His mind had been sorting through the conversations of the past several days. “Nate talked to Zack last week and he didn’t sound like he and Cheryl would be coming.”
“I’ll call Cheryl when we get home. Maybe I can persuade her. It would be really great to have us all together again. It’s been nearly two years since we went camping together.”
They fell silent for a while, watching the now very familiar freeway signs as they passed, marking the approach toward home. They probably should have gotten an earlier start, but Karin had been reluctant to end the short vacation, and they’d lingered over lunch. Now they were tired and anxious to reach their house.
“She did good, didn’t she?” Karin said with a smile.
Jake knew she was referring to Janna. They’d had doubts at how well she’d react to the four to five hour drive from San Jose to the Lake, but she’d been a model passenger, both coming and going. She had amused herself with one of her toys for a time, and then had drifted off to sleep for the majority of the trip.