“Why do you need to find them?’

  “Because I’m pretty sure they’re the ones who kidnapped Carol Blum, the woman who was with me when we visited you.”

  “Oh my God. I feel like I’ve been dropped into some damn spy movie or something.”

  “Only this is real life. So you’ll be home this evening?”

  “Yes. I really don’t go nowhere anymore.”

  “By the way, we found Desiree. She’s in prison.”

  “What! What for?”

  “Keeping another little girl prisoner.”

  “Christ Almighty. Hope she never gets out.”

  “I’ve got some things to finish up and then we’ll head out. We can probably be there around seven this evening.”

  “Are these really bad people? They seemed very nice.”

  “I’ll see you around seven.”

  Chapter 66

  PINE WAS DRIVING THE PORSCHE SUV the police had recovered, and her sister was riding shotgun.

  In the backseat was Special Agent Neil Bertrand. He was there because Drew McAllister had insisted Pine allow him to accompany them. She had introduced Bertrand to her sister. The tall, lanky agent seemed intrigued by Mercy Pine. He had no doubt learned some of her history, but he asked no questions and rendered no judgments, for which Pine was appreciative.

  The day was turning stormy with the clouds moving in and hovering dome-like over them as they passed through Chattanooga, Tennessee, on the wide asphalt strip of I-75. The wind started to buffet the SUV, and Pine gripped the wheel with both hands. The traffic was heavy; tractor-trailer rigs blew past her on both sides carrying the commerce of the country to where it needed to go.

  “You really think Wanda Atkins will be able to help you find Blum?” asked Bertrand.

  “I’m convinced the people who were there are the same ones who have Carol. And it’s not like we have an abundance of leads.” She glanced at him in the mirror. “Do you have a better idea?”

  “No,” he admitted.

  “How long have you been assigned to the WFO?”

  “Two years. Before that I was at an RA in Fort Smith, Arkansas.”

  “Very different from an agent’s life in DC,” noted Pine.

  “Yes it is.”

  “Which do you prefer?” asked Pine.

  “I liked Arkansas. Got to know the people. The work wasn’t as challenging as I would have hoped, though they do have drug rings and bank robberies and white supremacist groups in that area.”

  “Just like pretty much everywhere else,” said Pine.

  “The WFO has a lot more bureaucracy. But it’s an important stepping-stone in an agent’s career. I know you were assigned there at some point.”

  “I was. Then I got out. I like to work on my own. Shattered Rock, Arizona, is my stomping ground and I couldn’t be happier. And I can’t wait to get back.”

  The import of her words struck Pine and she glanced at Mercy, who was staring out the window and didn’t appear to be listening.

  “McAllister said you could have moved up at the Bureau if you wanted to. Gotten a supervisory job at one of the field offices.”

  “Yeah, move right up to a desk overseeing other agents’ work instead of doing that work. No thanks. Not why I signed up.”

  “I get that. It is a trade-off.”

  “And every agent has to make up their mind about what they want.” She looked at him again. “And I can see you’re not there yet.”

  He smiled. “Nope, not yet.”

  “Well, you’ll get there, don’t worry.”

  * * *

  It was dark when they got to Huntsville, and the storm they had been riding into most of the way was about to unleash its fury on the town. Clouds swirled into black and gray masses with threads of crackling lightning embellishing their underbellies, like pulsating veins in the brain.

  “Gonna be a doozy,” said Bertrand, staring out the window. “Glad we didn’t fly here.”

  “I’ve never been on a plane,” said Mercy suddenly. “What’s it like?”

  Bertrand glanced uncertainly at Pine before answering. “Um, usually smooth and very fast, of course. Just don’t eat the food, at least in coach class, not that they give you any food these days. Starvation seems to be the goal at thirty-five thousand feet. And they pack you in like sardines. And with your height, the seats will be a little snug. I’m six three, so I always try to book the aisle or a bulkhead. That way I can at least stretch my legs out halfway, or deep vein thrombosis here I come.”

  “Sounds great, can’t wait to try it,” cracked Mercy.

  Bertrand smiled as they pulled into the Atkinses’ driveway.

  As they walked past the toppled lamppost Pine caught Mercy smiling maliciously at her handiwork and couldn’t help but smile as well.

  A few drops of rain fell and they hurried onto the porch.

  Pine knocked and then knocked again when no one answered.

  “Place is dark,” said Bertrand, glancing at his watch. “It’s seven on the dot—they should be expecting us, right?”

  “Yes, they should,” said Pine, pulling her Glock. Bertrand and Mercy did the same with their weapons.

  Pine looked through one of the door’s sidelights and saw nothing helpful in return. The rain started to fall harder, and streaks of lightning ranged across the sky with claps of thunder dutifully following.

  Pine pounded on the door. “Wanda, open up. Are you okay?” She tried the door but it was locked.

  Pine glanced at Bertrand. His gaze was darting in all directions, and he looked ready for whatever came their way. She looked at Mercy, who seemed puzzled but calm.

  Pine took a step back, planted her back foot firmly on the wooden decking of the porch, and lashed out with a kick aimed right at the door’s hardware. It buckled but didn’t break.

  Mercy put her shoulder to it, and that did the trick. The portal popped open and swung back hard on its hinges, banging into the wall.

  “Mrs. Atkins? Wanda?” called out Pine.

  She stepped through the opening, and the other two followed.

  Bertrand was the last one through; he groped with his hand for a light switch.

  “Wait!” cautioned Pine. In the glare of illumination from the storm she surveyed the front room. There was no wheelchair and no Len. There was nobody. No lights were on. It was like the house had been abandoned. “They could have had an emergency,” said Pine. “Maybe with Len. He’d had a stroke.”

  “Do they have a car?” asked Bertrand.

  “I suppose so. Wanda said she didn’t really go anywhere anymore, but there is a garage. The vehicle might be in there.”

  “But if there was an emergency, surely they would have called an ambulance,” noted Bertrand. “They might be at the hospital.”

  “Maybe.” She pointed Bertrand toward the kitchen. “We’ll take the bedrooms and bathrooms,” she whispered. “You take the kitchen and then the garage.”

  Bertrand nodded and headed off.

  Chapter 67

  THE POWDER ROOM OFF THE FOYER was empty. But when Pine and Mercy reached the doorway of the main floor bedroom, Pine hissed, “Shit!”

  Wanda Atkins was lying motionless on the bed. Len was in his wheelchair, but hanging off to the side in a way that suggested a total lack of consciousness.

  “What’s wrong with them?” muttered Mercy.

  Pine edged forward and touched Len’s wrist with her index finger, holding it there, feeling for a pulse. She next checked his neck pulse, then ran a hand over his face.

  Cold. She raised one of his arms. It was supple. He was dead, but clearly not long enough for rigor mortis to set in. That made sense because she had talked to Wanda only about six hours ago. She took out her light and ran it over him. She saw no obvious wounds or other marks and nothing that could tell her how the man had died. She looked over at Wanda to see Mercy standing next to the bed. Pine joined her.

  “She looks like she’s sleeping,” said Mercy.

  Pine dispelled that notion when she hit Wanda’s eyes with her light and got nothing in return, except the unrelenting stare of the deceased. Still, she checked for a pulse and found none. The woman was cold. She ran her light over her looking for ligature marks, a wound, frothing on the lips to indicate poison.

  “She’s dead?” asked Mercy.

  Pine nodded and then flinched as she sniffed the air. “Do you smell smoke?”

  Both sisters turned to the doorway.

  “Bertrand!” Pine cried out.

  When he didn’t answer, Pine gripped her sister’s hand as she gazed at the large oxygen tank in the corner, and remembered the others in the front room.

  “Bertrand!”

  She edged out of the room, with Mercy right behind.

  “Bertrand!”

  They hustled forward and entered the kitchen.

  Pine hit the room with her light. And stopped when it held on Bertrand sitting slumped in a chair.

  She raced to him and almost fell. She shone her light on the floor and, with a sickening feeling, saw the fresh pools of blood there. She eased over to the agent, then took a step back when she saw the four-inch incision someone had made across his neck. She looked at his white shirt now turned red; the blood flow had reached all the way to his belt.

  She pointed her gun around the space. Pine knew they had ambushed him as soon as he came into the kitchen, slit his throat so he couldn’t cry out, and dumped him to die seconds later in this chair. His eyes stared wide and unseeing at the pebbled ceiling, his jaw was slack, and his skin was already turning pale from no blood running through the veins.

  She looked at the back door. It was open. The killer’s exit? The storm was raging out there now, and copious amounts of wind were being driven through the opening. If they could catch the bastard who had done this…

  She looked back at Bertrand. She had lost an agent. The first time ever. Her fault.

  “Lee!”

  Pine jerked her head at Mercy, who was pointing at the cabinets. After finding Bertrand, Pine had forgotten about the smell of smoke. Now that dilemma was presenting itself front and center.

  The cabinets were flaming up, the fire racing across the lacquered wood like someone had dumped gas on paper and struck a match. Pine had never seen a conflagration build that quickly.

  She whirled around, forgetting about the fire just for a moment, and with good reason. It had been replaced by something even deadlier to them. For in her mind, Pine once more saw all the large oxygen tanks strewn around the house.

  This was no longer a residence in the suburbs.

  This was a bomb. Just about to detonate.

  She grabbed her sister’s arm and pulled her along. “This whole place is going to blow.”

  They reached the front porch and ran the short distance through the driving rain to the Porsche. Any second Pine expected to be hurled off her feet from the blast wave of a house disappearing and taking her and her sister along with it.

  We’ll just be ash. Cremated together.

  She flung open the driver’s-side door and Mercy did the same on the other side.

  An instant later everything turned black, for both of them.

  Chapter 68

  PINE OPENED HER EYES FOR A MOMENT and then closed them. She did so again, fighting against the feeling of cement lodged between her eyelids and her face. It was like being in a nightmare and struggling to open your eyes to see the terrible things coming for you.

  Finally, they stayed open and she was staring at a low ceiling of whitewashed brick. A brick ceiling was quite unusual. She slowly sat up and stared over at her sister. Mercy was sitting upright on a bunk, her back against the wall.

  Pine looked around and took in the barred and chicken-wired window and barred door. “Where are we?”

  Mercy shrugged. “We look to be in jail.”

  Pine stood on wobbly legs, put a hand against the wall to steady herself, then stretched out her back. “Okay, I feel like I was hit by a tank.”

  “Same here, but I don’t remember what happened after I opened the car door.”

  Pine nodded and glanced out the window at the foreboding terrain outside. She also saw the high fence topped by concertina wire. “What the hell is this place?”

  “Saw a guy with an AK walking by out there earlier.”

  Pine checked her pocket for her phone. It was gone, along with both her pistols.

  “Yeah, they took my gun, too,” said Mercy.

  Pine sat down on her bunk, rubbed her eyes, and said in a bleak voice, “They killed Neil Bertrand. And the Atkinses are dead, too. And we’re here.”

  “Yep,” said Mercy. “I think we got played. They were obviously waiting for us there.”

  “But how could they know we were going to visit Wanda?”

  “Don’t know. I wonder if the house burned up or blew up first,” said Mercy.

  “Whoever took us was waiting for us in the Porsche. When I opened the door, I thought I saw something, but then everything went black. They might have hit us with some gas or something.”

  Mercy nodded but said nothing.

  They both perked up when they heard footsteps. It was a man dressed in jeans and a flannel shirt. He was carrying two trays. He put one down, and waited. Then another man appeared, dressed similarly. He was carrying a riot shotgun, Pine noted, like they used in prisons. It was designed to kill over a wide, shallow field of bodies.

  The first man unlocked the door and slid the two trays through.

  Pine looked at each man; they did not look back at her.

  She said, “Can you at least tell us where we are?”

  The first man locked the door and they both left without speaking or ever looking at them. It was like they had left food for two invisible people.

  Pine picked up one tray and handed it to Mercy while she took the other. They sat on their bunks and ate the food and drank the glasses of water provided.

  When they were finished the same two men came back and retrieved the trays. This exact timing made Pine believe they were under surveillance.

  Five minutes later another man appeared.

  Peter Buckley had on jeans, a white collared shirt, a tan vest, a brown corduroy jacket with olive-green elbow patches, and a pair of all-weather boots.

  He pulled up a chair and sat down, facing them from the other side of the bars.

  He looked first at Pine and then settled his gaze on Mercy.

  “You’re the guy I saw at the house, with the lawyer,” said Mercy.

  Buckley said nothing, he just kept staring at them.

  Pine let this scrutiny go on for a bit before saying, “Well, we’re here.”

  Buckley looked at her. He didn’t smile, he didn’t chuckle, he didn’t look grim or angry or triumphant. He simply appeared curious.

  “Yes, you are.”

  When he spoke Pine’s suspicions were confirmed. He was the man who had spoken to her when she’d been kidnapped.

  “You killed an FBI agent. And two other people,” said Pine.

  “No, the Atkinses had a heart attack or a stroke when my men broke into the house. They never touched them.”

  “And Agent Bertrand?”

  “He was supposed to have been anesthetized, as you two were. Unfortunately, things went awry. They’re not sure how the fire started, but there’s not much left of the house. The important thing is that you are both here.”

  “How did you know we’d be at the Atkinses?” asked Pine.

  “We hid a tracking device in the Porsche after my colleague took Ms. Blum. And we had the Atkinses’ line tapped. We heard your conversation.”

  Pine closed her eyes for a moment, inwardly seething at this oversight on her part.

  “And do you also have Carol Blum?” she asked after she reopened her eyes.

  Buckley nodded. “She is an important part of this.”

  “And what exactly is this?”

  Buckley turned back to Mercy. “You killed my brother.”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “What I meant to say was you didn’t know you had, but you did.”

  “That’s as clear as mud.”

  “His name was Ken. You stopped him from hurting Rosa. He pulled a knife and then a gun on you. You beat him up.”

  Mercy sucked in a breath and looked over at Pine. “He wasn’t dead. I checked his pulse. And even though he hit his head, he wasn’t a quad. I checked that, too.”

  Buckley said, “He later died of a brain aneurysm, probably from his head hitting the ground.”

  Mercy eyed him more closely. “I saw you at that house and thought you looked familiar. It’s because you look like Ken around the eyes and jaw.”

  “You said he deserved it,” Pine pointed out. “It was kill or be killed. And she didn’t even know he was dead. So what exactly are you trying to do here?”

  Buckley crossed one leg over another. “It’s payback, but it’s complicated payback. Not really connected to the incident with Ken and your sister.”

  Now Pine sucked in a breath.

  Buckley smiled at her discomfort. “Yes, we know all about that. What you two represent is symbolic, really.”

  “Again, clear as mud, as my sister said before.”

  “The government caused my father’s death, and turned my mother and my sisters against the rest of the family. I was the only one to really make anything of myself. The payback is against the government. Since I, of course, can’t do it directly, I am going to do it indirectly, using you two.”

  “So you’re going to kill us as revenge on the government? Doesn’t that strike you as a little bit insane?”

  “Not at all. It’s incredibly logical and has a certain symmetry. And Ken was my brother. Regardless of whether it was justified or not, your sister killed him. In my world, that requires payback. So I’m killing two birds with one stone, at least figuratively.”

  “So we both die then?”

  “Not necessarily.”