shaking her head so hard that she was probably going to give herself whiplash.
Claire asked, “Where?”
Nolan gave her the address.
“I’ll be there in two hours.” Claire ended the call. She put the receiver back in the cradle. When she took her hand away, she saw that her palm had left a sweaty mark.
Lydia asked, “You’re going to give him the files?”
“No. I’m not going downtown.” Claire stood up. “I’m going to Athens.”
“What?” Lydia stood up, too. She followed Claire into the mudroom. “You just told Nolan you were—”
“Fuck Nolan.” Claire picked up her purse. She slid her feet into her tennis shoes. She didn’t know why, but she had to see Lexie Fuller. She wasn’t going to talk to her or drop a bomb on her life, but Claire needed to see the other woman with her own two eyes.
She said, “Listen, Lydia, I really appreciate—”
“Shut up. I’m coming with you.” Lydia disappeared into the house.
Claire checked the mailbox on the video keypad by the door. The Auburn USB drive was still there. It was 9:13 on a Sunday morning. Was it a good or bad thing that Adam Quinn was sleeping in? Or had he left the drive for someone else to pick up? Was Jacob Mayhew on his way? Would Fred Nolan consider Claire’s absence in two hours a form of willfully misleading a federal agent? Would she return home tonight to her own bed, or would she be spending the next few years of her life in prison?
Lydia returned with her purse. She had her iPhone in one hand and the burner in the other. “I’m driving.”
Claire didn’t argue because Lydia was older and she always got to drive. She opened the mudroom door and left it unlocked. At this point, Claire welcomed the burglars to return. She would’ve left cookies out for them if she’d had the time.
Claire unplugged the Tesla. The keyfob was on the bench where she’d left it. She threw it into her purse and got into the car. Lydia climbed in behind the wheel. She reached down and adjusted the seat. She moved the mirrors. She frowned at the glowing seventeen-inch touchscreen that ran down the middle of the dashboard.
“This is electric, right?” Lydia sounded annoyed. She’d always been angry around new things. “Athens is an hour away.”
“Really? I’ve never noticed that the eleventy billion times I’ve driven this very same car to Mom’s house and back.” At least she had before the ankle monitor limited her movements. “Can we just go?”
Lydia still looked annoyed. “Where does the key go?”
“Tap the brake to turn it on.”
Lydia tapped the brake. “Is it on? I can’t even hear it.”
“Are you three hundred years old?” Claire demanded. “Jesus Christ, it’s still a car. Even Grandma Ginny could figure it out.”
“That was really mean.” She put the gear in reverse. The video screen switched to the rear camera view. Lydia huffed in disgust as she inched back the car and turned it around.
The gate was still open at the bottom of the driveway. Claire felt like ten years had passed since she sat in the back of the limousine with her mother and grandmother. She tried to remember how she’d felt. The purity of her grief had been such a luxury.
There was another woman in Watkinsville who might be feeling those same pure emotions of grief. Paul had been gone for almost a week. She would’ve called hospitals and police stations and the highway patrol and whoever else would listen. And she would be told by everyone who did even the slightest bit of research that Buckminster Fuller, the father of the geodesic dome, had died in 1983.
Claire wondered what story Paul had given the woman to explain his absences. Traveling salesman. Government agent. Roughneck working an oil rig. Pilot.
Paul had trained for his pilot’s license in college. He was rated for light jets, which meant that whenever they hired a charter, he was always up in the cockpit talking tailwinds and altimeters with the pilots. Claire used to feel sorry for the poor men who were trying to keep the plane in the sky.
Should she feel sorry for Lexie Fuller? And did she have a right to keep the other woman in the dark about Paul? Claire of all people knew the kind of hell that knowing the truth would rain down. Could she do that to another human being?
Or maybe Lexie already knew about Claire. Maybe the young little bitch was completely fine with