“How do you know Tim wanted to take a girl for a ride?”

  Alex blushed and rubbed the condensation off her glass. “We were sort of seeing each other then. Nothing serious. We were only fifteen. Well, he was sixteen. I was always the youngest in the class.”

  “Because of your late birthday and the fact that you skipped a grade.” She looked at him in surprise. “Your mother told me, with a lot of pride in her voice. She said something like ‘not even Jenny managed to do that.’”

  Alex looked down and didn’t comment.

  “Did Bing know you and Tim were… dating?”

  “It’s a small town, Travis. Everyone knows your business. But why is this important?”

  “Benjamin Bing hasn’t been seen in Florida in about two weeks.”

  “So?” she said.

  “So that means he could be up here.”

  “Why would he be in Maine as opposed to Florida? In the winter?”

  “He could have been up here when Jenny was killed, when I was shot at, and when Earl was killed.”

  “Wait, you think Bing did those things?”

  “It’s possible.”

  “But what would be his motive? Why would he want to kill Jenny?”

  “Jenny was up here on unfinished business.”

  “But that was about what happened to me, so…” She paused, her eyes becoming rigid, her gaze fixed.

  For one awful moment Devine thought she was going to have another episode. And part of me hopes she does and names Benjamin Bing as her rapist.

  “You actually think Benjamin Bing attacked me?” said Alex incredulously.

  Devine looked around at the other patrons and said, “Let’s keep it between us, okay? No need to let others in on this.”

  “I’m… I’m sorry. I just can’t comprehend what you’re saying.”

  “Look, it wouldn’t be the first time a cop went bad. And he chases down and beats up your boyfriend? What are the odds? And then your rape kit goes missing? He would have had unfettered access to that. And then the Palmers? What if they saw him fleeing a minute before they found you?”

  “There’s no proof of that.”

  “Actually, there is. Or at least the Palmers seeing someone that night.” He went on to explain to Alex about Jenny having pulled the satellite footage showing the car, and Steve and Valerie Palmer crossing paths with another car right around the time of the attack on her.

  “But then why didn’t they report it?” she said, looking distraught.

  “They were having money problems. Maybe they were putting the squeeze on him. Frederic Bing Sr. was an early disciple of Warren Buffett. They could afford to pay so their good name would not be dragged through the mud. And Benjamin was the police chief. The Palmers might have been afraid to go up against him. And they had no real proof. But then Jenny comes up here looking for the truth and he gets wind of it? He has to nip that in the bud.”

  “That sounds very far-fetched. And what about Earl? You said someone killed him. What possible reason would Benjamin Bing have to kill Earl?”

  “Because he got Earl to pretend to find your sister’s body, and was probably afraid he would have a change of heart.”

  She looked gobsmacked. “How would he get Earl to lie about finding Jenny’s body?”

  “That one I haven’t figured out yet,” Devine conceded. “But you remember nothing else with Bing? Nothing that would show he might have been infatuated with you?”

  “No, that’s gross. He’s my father’s age.”

  “He was only forty-five when you were attacked.”

  “I wasn’t even sixteen!” she said heatedly, drawing stares from some of the customers.

  “I don’t want to believe he was interested in you that way.” He gripped her hand. “But if he was, Alex, it was his issue, not yours.”

  “But I’m the one suffering.”

  “Yes, you are,” said Devine. “But I will help you in any way I can, to get through this.”

  CHAPTER

  64

  HE DROVE HER BACK TO Jocelyn Point. They went out to the art studio where Alex had told him she needed to work on a painting for a client that was due to be shipped out soon. He watched her work away as the night fell more deeply around them. Her movements were fluid, her concentration complete. Devine had seen that level of intensity before.

  Me, in combat.

  “What’s that look for?”

  He came out of his musings to find her staring at him as she cleaned off a brush.

  “Admiration for your obvious skills,” he said.

  “You’re such a sweet talker,” she cracked.

  “It’s sincere, Alex.”

  She put down the brush and wiped off her hands. “I know, Travis. My bullshit meter is pretty sophisticated and it hasn’t made a peep while you’re around.”

  “But, like all women, you have so much more practice at it than men.”

  “You really are far more evolved than many of your brethren,” she said, smiling.

  “I try to see people for who they really are.”

  She drew a step closer. “And who am I, really?”

  He could tell, despite the flippant and flirty content and tone of their conversation, Alex was now quite serious. “I see a young woman maybe at a crossroads.”

  Her features tensed. “Go on.”

  “There’s a military term for being in the wrong place at the wrong time, though it’s now used throughout popular culture: No Man’s Land. But if you dig deeper, it gets more complicated.”

  “How so?” she said quickly.

  “Typically, to get to No Man’s Land, you had to take action. You had to move from where you were. So now you’re in a bad place, a place where you don’t think you should be and maybe your own survival is at stake.”

  Here Devine paused and contemplated stopping. He wasn’t sure why he had chosen to bring up this topic, and now that he was here, he, ironically, felt like he was in No Man’s Land. Yet the look on Alex’s face told him there was only one path to take with this conversation.

  “So, you have three choices: stay where you are, go back, or go forward.”

  “And how do you know which is the right one?” she said, a tremble in her voice.

  “I wish I could tell you that there’s a foolproof way to figure that out, but there’s not. Sometimes it’s trial and error.”

  She slumped and looked beaten.

  “But sometimes there is a sign to tell you which way to go.”

  “What?” she said eagerly.

  He leaned against a table and said, “When I was pulling a tour of combat duty in Iraq I would rotate through this same large village, looking for enemy combatants, informants, people who just needed help or wanted to escape certain situations. I’d go there regularly and felt like I’d gotten to know some of the villagers pretty well. Established a rapport, to the extent you can during a war. One of my jobs was to memorize every detail I could during each visit so that on future trips I could see if anything looked off. It was critical because my life and my colleagues’ lives depended on it.”

  “I can understand that,” she said in a tone that was equal parts hollow and anticipatory.

  “It was sort of what you helped me do at Bertie’s art studio. I never would have seen that pulley without your help, but you had been there many times before and noticed it right off. Anyway, one morning we reached the village. I did my scope of the village as we were walking through it, looking for anything that looked out of the ordinary.”

  “Did you see anything?”

  “No, I didn’t. But PFC Laura Diaz did.”

  “What did she see?”

  “A female villager came out of one of the huts. She seemed fine. Calm, ordinary. She walked toward us. We had seen her before, many times. But as she grew closer, Diaz called out, ‘Bomb.’ We instinctively all scattered and took cover. A second later the bomb that was secreted on the woman detonated. If Diaz hadn’t warned us, we’d all be dead.”

  “What did she see that made her believe the woman had a bomb?”

  “I asked her that very thing. Diaz told me her mother worked at a hair salon back in a small town in Texas. As a child Diaz would often go to work with her mother. Her mom did hair, makeup, nails, the whole shebang. Her mother told Diaz that women wanted to look their best in important moments. Weddings, parties, funerals. At critical times, they wanted to get their hair, makeup, and nails done. So Diaz noticed that the villager was not wearing her dusty burqa or usual hijab. She had on a beautiful robe with intricate embroidery. Her hair had been immaculately braided and done up in a fancy style. And her nails had been filed, shaped, and painted when they never had before. The woman was sacrificing her life for her cause and she wanted to look her best. That observation by Diaz saved my life and those of a lot of others because I never would have seen it.

  “Now, you’re probably wondering what the hell that has to do with your situation, but here it is, for what it’s worth. I’ve sort of been Laura Diaz up here, observing you and others. Seeing things that maybe people in Putnam are too close to everything to see clearly. Your mother and others think you can be world-famous or rich or both, somewhere else. And you probably could. But I don’t think those things are important to you.”

  “So you’re saying I should stay here, in Putnam?”

  “No, I’m not. I’m actually saying that you have gifts that you need to share with the world. Something terrible happened to you here, Alex. Most people would want to get as far away from that as they could. Now, you didn’t. But I think you didn’t because you were too traumatized to embrace any part of the world. You became fearful of going out, of being around other people.” He looked out the window in the direction of the main house. “You go out but then you run back here, where you feel reasonably safe. But the thing is, your fear is no longer out there.” He tapped his head. “It’s in here. So you can’t outrun it. You can’t really hide from it, not even here.”

  “Then what do I do?” she said pleadingly. “How do I get out of No Man’s Land?”

  “You master it. You take back control of your life. You dictate the terms of how you will live and where you will live, not anyone else. And certainly not the person who hurt you.”

  “But what if he’s still out there?”

  “I’m sure he is still out there,” Devine said. “It’s my job to stop him. And I’m really good at my job, Alex.”

  He put his arms around her and held her tightly.

  “Do you really think I can… master this?”

  “I would not have suggested it if I didn’t believe you could. You’re a lot stronger than you think you are.”

  “I’m not as strong as Jenny was,” she replied.

  He moved her to arm’s length so he could stare into her eyes. “You don’t need to compare yourself to Jenny, not ever again. She loved you. She came up here to help you, to end this misery you were trapped in. And it cost your sister her life. The best way to honor that sacrifice is to cast off the devil that’s in you right now and move on with your life. It’s what Jenny would have wanted. And it’s what you should want, which is what really matters.”

  Alex, who had begun quietly sobbing, stopped, and her expression firmed. She looked up at him. “I do want that. And I want something else, Travis.”

  She kissed him.

  And Devine, hesitant at first, kissed her back.

  The two were so focused on one another that they never saw the person who had been watching them move slowly away from the window.

  CHAPTER

  65

  HOURS LATER DEVINE LET HIMSELF out the front door of Jocelyn Point and made sure it securely locked behind him. A light drizzle had started, which the wind kicked around him as he walked to the truck.

  He looked for Dak’s motorcycle but didn’t see it. He hadn’t heard anyone come into the house when he’d been up in Alex’s bedroom.

  He sat in the truck and stared out the windshield at the house. His first night here he had seen Alex standing naked in her bedroom window. He had seen it as an act of defiance, or at least her feeling of sanctity in her old family home.

  He had just seen her naked again, in the most intimate situation two people could experience.

  Being with Alex at that moment in time had been the right thing to do, the thing he had wanted to do. They had taken it slow, with physical and emotional revelations by degrees, rather than all of a sudden. Their lovemaking had been assured but controlled. It was as though they somehow already knew the contours and rhythms of each other’s bodies and desires, the instinctual sensations that had delivered them to an ending point that had persisted long beyond the sexual climaxes. They had lain in each other’s arms talking quietly between kisses and caresses, for far longer than their physical lovemaking had endured.

  Devine hadn’t known the woman a full week, and yet he felt like he understood her better than he did his own brother and sister. Quantity of time together meant nothing if the desire wasn’t there to learn and relate to someone, the need to understand them. It had been there between him and Alex like nothing he’d really experienced before.

  As he fired up the truck his phone buzzed. It wasn’t a call.

  His surveillance monitor on the outbuilding had just gone off.

  Someone was there.

  He drove toward the outbuildings and then parked behind a stand of evergreen bushes, making sure his truck was out of sight. He was going to make the rest of the way to the building on foot. The noise of the waves crashing against the burly Maine substrata followed him with each footfall.

  He kept his exposure over open ground to a minimum, just like the Army had trained him. And then he’d gotten a PhD in that same subject out in the field of combat, where mistakes didn’t mean a failing grade but rather a burial plot and white grave marker at Arlington National.

  He surveyed all compass points in front of him. It didn’t take long to reach the vicinity of the building. Devine took up position behind a bulky overgrown hedge. Peering around it he observed a Toyota pickup parked in front of the building, its lights and motor on. The door to the building was open and a light was on inside. This gave Devine a clear sight line into the space, which he enhanced using his optics.

  A man was standing just inside the doorway with his back to Devine. Over his shoulder Devine could see large green plastic tubs set on tables, and he heard once more the hum of machinery, this time more distinctly with the door open.

  He crouched down when he heard another vehicle approaching. He recognized the throaty purr of the Harley before he saw it. Dak pulled up next to the truck, and climbed off his bike after shutting it down.

  Devine turned on the video recording feature on his phone and started filming.

  Dak said, “Hey, Hal.”

  The man turned around, and Devine could see he was in his thirties with a trim beard and glasses. He had on jean overalls and a ski cap pulled down over his ears. Their comingled breaths rose above them in the frigid air.

  “I thought you’d be here ahead of me,” said Hal.

  “I got tied up.”

  “Really? What gal did the tying?”

  They both laughed at this comment, and Dak slapped the man on the shoulder.

  “How’s it looking in there?” Dak said, inclining his head toward the tubs.

  “All systems go. I swear these critters could survive an atom bomb falling on them.”

  “Let’s hope one doesn’t hit, don’t think we could survive it,” said Dak with a chuckle.

  “How long you reckon?” asked Hal.

  “Two days they’ll be here. But we got the shipment to pick up tonight. And the more they grow, the more they weigh. And…” Dak rubbed his thumb and forefinger together.

  They locked up the building, climbed into the pickup, and set off.

  Devine ran back to his truck and followed.

  CHAPTER

  66

  AS SOON AS THEY WERE on the main road, Devine knew where they were going. The same spot along the shore. He was driving with his lights off, which wasn’t a problem even with the poor visibility. He just followed the taillights ahead of him to see the contours of the road.

  The truck pulled off and Devine did the same, albeit a couple of hundred yards short and behind a stand of trees growing near the road.

  He flitted along until he reached a good surveillance point in time to watch through his optics as Hal carried large plastic containers toward the water. Dak was hefting some other apparatus that Devine could not really make out.

  Devine headed forward and then cut toward the beach. He looked out to the water and, though it was foggy and gloomy, he could see a solitary boat’s running lights slicing through the darkness out on the Gulf of Maine.

  Devine crouched along a ledge of rocky shore, took out his optics, and surveyed the field in front of him. Once more, a smaller boat was lowered from the larger boat. It then traveled swiftly toward shore, breached the breakers, and came to a stop bow up in the sand. He could now see that the vessel was actually an RIB, or rigid inflatable boat, much like the kind he had used in the Army. There were two men on board. They jumped off the bow onto the sand, and greeted Dak and Hal with handshakes and backslaps. Then the four of them proceeded to unload the cargo; it was placed in the containers Hal had brought to the beach. Dak bent down and inserted the devices he had brought with him into each container.

  Dak handed one of the men an envelope, and they parted ways. Dak and Hal hefted the first container. It must have been heavy, since both men struggled with the weight of it. They reached the truck, loaded it in the back, and then went back twice more to get the other containers. They drove off as the RIB was swiftly making its way back to the larger boat.

  Devine had already gotten into his vehicle and was waiting. As they passed him Devine pulled out behind them. They drove straight back to Jocelyn Point, and to the same outbuilding.

  They carried the containers into the building and had set down the last one when Devine appeared in the doorway.