Once he had be­en li­mi­ted by the ran­ge of a bic­y­c­le, but af­ter he had a car, he co­uld tra­vel fur­t­her to ma­ke his de­li­ve­ri­es. His ro­ute that day had ta­ken him to a ne­ig­h­bo­ring co­unty and a lib­rary he’d ne­ver be­en in be­fo­re.

  Bu­ilt cir­ca 1950, the lib­rary was a squ­at, ugly red brick ho­ma­ge to uti­li­ta­ri­an ar­c­hi­tec­tu­re. On the in­si­de it was hus­hed and stuffy, but warm eno­ugh to ma­ke his cold, red fin­gers sting. And fil­led with the won­der­ful dusty mus­ti­ness of a tho­usand bo­oks in one pla­ce. His wet sne­akers squ­e­aked on the gray vinyl flo­or as he ma­de his way to the pe­ri­odi­cals.

  The li­fe- si­ze por­t­ra­it hung on the back wall of the pe­ri­odi­cal ro­om. The man in it, clad in a dark su­it with the wi­de la­pels of a bygo­ne era, was a few ye­ars ol­der than Ca­leb, and had dark blond ha­ir and blue eyes. Ot­her than that, he lo­oked just li­ke Ca­leb.

  “I had stop­ped be­li­eving my mot­her a long ti­me be­fo­re. I knew he wasn’t go­ing to co­me for us. We we­re on our own, and he wo­uldn’t be pro­ud if I ma­de go­od gra­des. I fi­gu­red that Te­ague Cal­ho­un was just part of the fan­tasy she’d con­s­t­ruc­ted-the way she ma­de up our na­me.”

  “Wa­it a mi­nu­te.” Em­mie cra­ned her neck to lo­ok in­to his fa­ce. “She ma­de up yo­ur last na­me?”

  “Yep. She sa­id it was French, me­aning ‘with ho­nor or pra­ise­worthy.’ I co­uldn’t ha­ve my fat­her’s last na­me li­ke ot­her kids did, but my birth was ho­no­rab­le just the sa­me.”

  “That’s re­al­ly cre­ati­ve. Did you en­co­un­ter a lot of te­asing abo­ut be­ing il­le­gi­ti­ma­te from the ot­her kids?”

  “Not a lot. I wasn’t the only one in the tra­iler park.”

  “And you grew up po­or.” Em­mie was chec­king her as­sum­p­ti­ons and as­sem­b­ling da­ta.

  “Mo­vie stars not­wit­h­s­tan­ding, chil­d­ren of un­mar­ri­ed mot­hers ge­ne­ral­ly do,” Ca­leb an­s­we­red with dry un­der­s­ta­te­ment.

  “And she na­med you Ca­leb, af­ter the Is­ra­eli­te spy in Exo­dus who was al­lo­wed to re­ach the Pro­mi­sed Land, al­t­ho­ugh the ol­der ge­ne­ra­ti­on was not. They wo­uld die in the Wil­der­ness.”

  “How did you know?”

  “I’m the child of mis­si­ona­ri­es, re­mem­ber? And the gran­d­c­hild of the pre­si­dent of the wo­men’s so­ci­ety of our church. I was fed Bib­le sto­ri­es with my ce­re­al.”

  Emmie was si­lent for a whi­le. Do-Lord had al­re­ady told her mo­re than he re­ve­aled to most, and he’d se­en how much in­for­ma­ti­on she co­uld ex­t­ract from a few facts. He didn’t think she’d let the su­bj­ect drop tho­ugh, and her next qu­es­ti­on pro­ved it. “So when you saw the por­t­ra­it of what wo­uld be yo­ur gran­d­fat­her, you re­ali­zed yo­ur mot­her’s sto­ri­es might be true. What did you do?”

  “Well, I was in a lib­rary. What wo­uld you do?”

  Emmie’s eyes lit with scho­larly fer­vor. “Re­se­arch!”

  “I re­ad old new­s­pa­pers-an­y­t­hing a Cal­ho­un did was new­s­worthy in that co­un­ty-and le­ar­ned Te­ague Cal­ho­un had set­tled in North Ca­ro­li­na af­ter at­ten­ding the uni­ver­sity he­re.”

  “Did you want to me­et him?”

  This was the part he had to be ca­re­ful with. Em­mie had al­re­ady de­mon­s­t­ra­ted she re­mem­be­red and ma­de in­fe­ren­ces from ever­y­t­hing he sa­id. She didn’t se­em to li­ke Cal­ho­un much, but he was an old fa­mily fri­end, clo­se eno­ugh to be cal­led “Uncle Te­ague.” She wo­uldn’t want to be part of brin­ging Cal­ho­un down.

  “My mot­her di­ed not long af­ter that. I was on my own then. I got out of the­re, and I didn’t lo­ok back.”

  “How did yo­ur mot­her die?”

  “Myo­car­di­tis.”

  Emmie ma­de a sympat­he­tic so­und. “You we­re so yo­ung, and she must ha­ve be­en yo­ung too.”

  “Thir­ty- fo­ur. She was se­ven­te­en when I was born.”

  They we­re both si­lent for a mi­nu­te, con­tem­p­la­ting a li­fe cut short, a boy-man cut ad­rift.

  “I’d see so­met­hing abo­ut Cal­ho­un in the news every now and then. I’d be a lit­tle cu­ri­o­us. But the li­fe of a SE­AL is in­ten­se, all-ab­sor­bing.”

  “And then you met him fa­ce-to-fa­ce in Af­g­ha­nis­tan.”

  Did she for­get not­hing?

  “Fa­ce- to-fa­ce wo­uld be stret­c­hing it. He was 225 yards away. I co­uld see him, but I’m pretty su­re he ne­ver saw me.”

  “And now you’re cu­ri­o­us. Do you want him to ac­k­now­led­ge the re­la­ti­on­s­hip?”

  “I got along wit­ho­ut him my en­ti­re li­fe. I don’t ne­ed him now. And li­ke I sa­id, if it be­ca­me pub­lic know­led­ge, it wo­uldn’t do eit­her of us any go­od.”

  “The me­dia wo­uld ha­ve a fi­eld day. I un­der­s­tand why it wo­uld be di­sas­t­ro­us for the se­na­tor-the con­ser­va­ti­ve, fa­mily va­lu­es can­di­da­te with an il­le­gi­ti­ma­te son, whom he aban­do­ned. And-oh, my go­od­ness- yo­ur pic­tu­re wo­uld be splas­hed from one si­de of the glo­be to the ot­her! You wo­uldn’t be ab­le to-what do you call it-ope­ra­te.”

  “SE­ALs who­se iden­ti­ti­es ha­ve be­en splas­hed all over the me­dia are not much use in a co­vert ope­ra­ti­on,” he told her with dry un­der­s­ta­te­ment. In fact, he might as well pin a tar­get on his back. SE­ALs went to so­me lengths to ma­in­ta­in the psycho­lo­gi­cal ad­van­ta­ge of se­eming in­vi­sib­le and in­vul­ne­rab­le. As a re­sult, ter­ro­rist or­ga­ni­za­ti­ons all over the world wo­uld lo­ve to cla­im the co­up of as­sas­si­na­ting one. “Spin doc­tors might be ab­le to sa­ve Cal­ho­un’s ca­re­er, but mi­ne wo­uld be over.”

  Emmie nod­ded and then fell si­lent. Whi­le she tho­ught over what he had sa­id, he kept his bre­at­hing slow and re­gu­lar, des­pi­te the tig­h­t­ness in his di­ap­h­ragm. Whet­her he had sa­id eno­ugh or too much he co­uldn’t tell. The tall, li­mes­to­ne Cal­ho­un ho­use, with it’s im­po­sing se­mi­cir­cu­lar porch up­held by so­aring two-story pil­lars, ca­me in­to vi­ew. The stre­ets aro­und it we­re, as Em­mie had pre­dic­ted, clog­ged with par­ked cars.

  She tug­ged on the hand she still held and tur­ned her wi­de blue eyes to him. “When Mo­ses sent Ca­leb to Ca­na­an to spy, the Is­ra­eli­tes ne­eded to know if it was a land flo­wing with milk and ho­ney, or if the sto­ri­es of its abun­dan­ce we­re fab­ri­ca­ted. May­be it wasn’t the Pro­mi­sed Land. May­be, as so­me sa­id, they didn’t ne­ed it. They’d got­ten along wit­ho­ut it for forty ye­ars. You, Ca­leb, don’t know whet­her yo­ur mot­her’s sto­ri­es abo­ut Cal­ho­un and his Pro­mi­sed Land we­re her ima­gi­na­ti­on.” She squ­e­ezed his hand. “Let’s go find out.”

  Chapter 21

  Sa­tis­fac­ti­on bur­ned hot and de­ep in Do-Lord’s chest as he ga­zed aro­und the wi­de entry hall of the im­po­sing three-story man­si­on over­lo­oking the Ca­pe Fe­ar Ri­ver.

  He was in.

  At the ba­se of the tall steps le­ading to the im­po­sing, tan-co­lo­red li­mes­to­ne man­si­on, a man who­se che­ap pol­yes­ter jac­ket sho­uted rent-a-cop had ta­ken the card and chec­ked the­ir na­mes aga­inst a list. And then he and Em­mie had wa­ited in front of the wi­de front do­or with its or­na­tely et­c­hed glass si­de pa­nels and lar­ge Chris­t­mas wre­ath un­til anot­her blue-pol­yes­ter flunky, at so­me sig­nal from wit­hin, had us­he­red them in­si­de. So­me­body he­re was se­ri­o­us abo­ut crowd con­t­rol.

  “Well,” Em­mie had whis­pe­red with he­avy irony, ec­ho­ing his tho­ught, “I gu­ess we know we’re be­ing ad­mit­ted in­to the pre­sen­ce of a Very Im­por­tant Per­son.”

  Insi­de the wi­de red-car­pe­ted entry hall, a dis­c­re­et vel­vet ro­pe just li­ke tho­se in mu­se­ums de­ni­ed ac­cess to the sta­ir­ca­se, whi­le even mo­re dis­c­re­et ca­me­ras tuc­ked in­to the cof­fe­red ce­iling pro­vi­ded the re­al se­cu­rity. He’d al­re­ady no­ted mo­ti­on sen­sors on every dow­n­s­ta­irs win­dow-but not tho­se up­s­ta­irs. It was ama­zing how many pe­op­le as­su­med that just be­ca­use win­dows we­re twenty fe­et off the gro­und, they co­uldn’t be en­te­red.

  A mi­ni­on with a frin­ge of gray ha­ir sur­ro­un­ding a shiny pink pa­te, this one bet­ter dres­sed than the rent-a-cops, nod­ded to Em­mie as if he knew her, then shep­her­ded him and Em­mie in­to the li­ne of pe­op­le wa­iting to en­ter the lar­ge re­cep­ti­on ro­om se­pa­ra­ted from the entry by mo­re tall whi­te co­lumns.

  The long re­cep­ti­on ro­om, which co­uldn’t be mis­ta­ken for a li­ving ro­om, des­pi­te the gro­ups of so­fas and cof­fee tab­les, ran the en­ti­re so­uth wing of the ho­use. A grand pi­ano set in the cen­ter of the ro­om al­most lo­oked small. At one end Se­na­tor Cal­ho­un and his wi­fe sto­od in front of a lar­ge fi­rep­la­ce ban­ked with po­in­set­ti­as to gre­et the­ir gu­ests and ha­ve pho­tos ma­de with them.

  “Who­ever de­sig­ned this pla­ce had no prob­lem mi­xing styles of ar­c­hi­tec­tu­re,” Em­mie ob­ser­ved as she po­in­ted to whi­te co­lumns bor­de­ring a small al­co­ve whe­re a co­at­rack had be­en pla­ced. “See, the­se are Ionic, but tho­se are Co­rin­t­hi­an.”

  Do- Lord flic­ked a glan­ce at the co­lumns, then went back to stud­ying the la­yo­ut of the ro­oms vi­sib­le on eit­her si­de of the hall. This was his pur­po­se. To ha­ve a lo­ok-see at how the ho­use was ar­ran­ged and sco­pe out the se­cu­rity. On the north si­de of the hall he co­uld see a small yel­low par­lor that lo­oked out on the front of the ho­use and be­hind it a pa­ne­led di­ning ro­om with a tab­le that wo­uld se­at six­te­en easily. He men­tal­ly pla­ced them on the flo­or plan he was cre­ating in his mind. Ot­her ro­oms, not ac­ces­sib­le to the pub­lic, must lie be­yond them.

  He was ha­ving tro­ub­le con­cen­t­ra­ting on his in­tel­li­gen­ce gat­he­ring tho­ugh. The­re we­re too many pe­op­le too clo­se to him and Em­mie. Too many sto­od bet­we­en them and any exit. Too many pla­ces a sho­oter co­uld be hi­ding. A sho­oter at the top of the sta­irs that half-en­cir­c­led the hall in three easy flights wo­uld be in­vi­sib­le and co­uld kill ever­yo­ne in one burst of auto­ma­tic fi­re.

  Emmie saw ar­c­hi­tec­tu­re, and he saw sni­per hi­des. Do-Lord re­cog­ni­zed his sta­te as hyper­vi­gi­lan­ce, com­mon to com­bat ve­te­rans re­tur­ning from dep­loy­ment, whe­re the enemy co­uld be an­yo­ne, an­y­w­he­re, and the most or­di­nary mo­ments co­uld erupt in smo­ke and scre­ams and spat­te­red blo­od. He’d be­en in the crow­ded lobby of a ho­tel on­ce, flir­ting with a pretty wo­man whi­le wa­iting in li­ne to check in when a ter­ro­rist had dri­ven a truck thro­ugh the pla­te glass do­ors of the en­t­ran­ce. Only se­conds be­fo­re, the­re had be­en a busy low-ke­yed bab­ble over­la­id by mu­sic from a pi­ano- just li­ke now.

  Do- Lord ca­ught Em­mie lo­oking at him out of the cor­ner of her eye aga­in. He was awa­re he hadn’t res­pon­ded to the last few to­pics she’d thrown out, and she’d fal­len si­lent-as si­lent as he was. He wasn’t ha­ving a flas­h­back, not the clas­sic kind. He was com­p­le­tely awa­re that he was he­re in the se­na­tor’s ho­use, the pretty girl be­si­de him was Em­mie, and the­re pro­bably was no dan­ger.

  Still, he had to get Em­mie out of he­re. He co­uld lo­ok af­ter him­self. If he was by him­self he wo­uld han­d­le any thre­at, but ke­eping Em­mie sa­fe in a crowd this den­se was prac­ti­cal­ly im­pos­sib­le.

  Gu­ests we­re be­ing al­lo­wed in­to the re­cep­ti­on ro­om in gro­ups of fo­ur or fi­ve, and then her­ded in­to the li­ne to sha­ke the gre­at man’s hand. To hell with that. When the flun­kie’s at­ten­ti­on was on a gro­up to be es­cor­ted, he lo­oped an arm over Em­mie’s sho­ul­ders. He gu­ided her thro­ugh the pe­op­le bun­c­hed to­get­her in the entry hall and in­to the re­cep­ti­on ro­om. He didn’t stop un­til they we­re at the back of the ro­om ne­ar the long Pal­la­di­an win­dows that ope­ned on­to a co­ve­red ve­ran­da.

  With a wall at his back and the win­dows pro­vi­ding easy eg­ress, he felt mar­gi­nal­ly bet­ter. He wan­ted Em­mie whe­re he co­uld get her out.

  “What’s go­ing on?” In­tel­li­gen­ce, cu­ri­osity, and so­met­hing that lo­oked li­ke con­cern ma­de Em­mie’s wi­de blue ga­ze even mo­re di­rect than usu­al. “I tho­ught you wan­ted to see Te­ague Cal­ho­un. Why did you ta­ke us out of the li­ne?”

  He wan­ted to tell her the truth. All of it. Al­re­ady she knew mo­re abo­ut him than an­yo­ne-even his best fri­end. The tho­ro­ugh bac­k­g­ro­und checks re­qu­ired for his se­cu­rity cle­aran­ce hadn’t tur­ned up any of what he had told her. The­re was so­met­hing abo­ut her-a cle­an­ness, an in­no­cen­ce.

  “I don’t li­ke to be in the mid­dle of crowds,” he sa­id.

  “Do you ha­ve cla­us­t­rop­ho­bia?”

  “No.” He might ha­ve sa­id mo­re, but hyper­vi­gi­lan­ce ma­de him mo­re con­s­ci­o­us of mo­ve­ment in his pe­rip­he­ral vi­si­on. A flic­ker of so­met­hing out the win­dow ca­ught his at­ten­ti­on.

  “Did an­y­t­hing hap­pen to you in a crowd?”

  “Not one thing, no,” he an­s­we­red ab­sently, trying to spot wha­te­ver had drawn his at­ten­ti­on. He tur­ned his he­ad to see wha­te­ver it was mo­re cle­arly.

  Holy shit. What had ca­ught his eye was a ro­pe twit­c­hing aga­inst the si­de of the ho­use. At­tac­hed to the ro­pe, a small fi­gu­re dan­g­led be­ne­ath a se­cond flo­or win­dow.

  Ca­su­al­ly, be­fo­re Em­mie co­uld ask him what he was lo­oking at, he tuc­ked an arm aro­und her sho­ul­ders and tur­ned her to­ward the do­or to the ve­ran­da. “Let’s walk out­si­de for a mi­nu­te, okay?”

  “Of co­ur­se,” Em­mie ag­re­ed. Ca­leb’s be­ha­vi­or had be­en dif­fe­rent in a way she co­uldn’t put her fin­ger on from the mo­ment they had en­te­red the Cal­ho­un ho­use. “Tell me, did you ha­ve this prob­lem with the crowds at Pic­kett’s wed­ding?”

  From the ve­ran­da, steps led down to a sla­te-pa­ved pa­tio in back of the ho­use. Re­ali­zing he wasn’t lis­te­ning to her, Em­mie fol­lo­wed the di­rec­ti­on of Ca­leb’s ga­ze. “Oh, my God! That’s Vic­to­ria Cal­ho­un!” she told Ca­leb. “Vicky, what on earth are you do­ing?”

  “Go­ing out the win­dow,” rep­li­ed the je­ans-clad fi­gu­re. “I do it all the ti­me. But I can’t…” Vicky swal­lo­wed a small sob. “To­day, I can’t ma­ke the swing over to the porch.” She so­un­ded mo­re up­set over her unac­cus­to­med fa­ilu­re than pa­nic­ked. The small bat­h­ro­om win­dow was ac­tu­al­ly only ten fe­et or so abo­ve the ve­ran­da ro­of and may­be fo­ur fe­et to the si­de. Em­mie co­uld see that an­yo­ne with clim­bing skil­ls-and in­t­re­pid eno­ugh-wo­uld think it pos­sib­le to re­ach. Un­for­tu­na­tely, di­rectly be­low the lit­tle girl was a three-story drop to the flag­s­to­ne-pa­ved pa­tio.

  “Vicky, what’s the ro­pe an­c­ho­red to?” Ca­leb’s vo­ice was pit­c­hed to carry wit­ho­ut be­ing lo­ud. He re­ma­ined calm-as if a dan­g­ling child me­ri­ted only mild cu­ri­osity.

  “The ra­di­ator in my bat­h­ro­om. I go out that win­dow be­ca­use it’s clo­ser to the porch.”

  “Okay, go­od. That’s re­al go­od,” he told the child as he strip­ped off sho­es and socks. “The win­dow on yo­ur left-is that yo­ur bed­ro­om win­dow?” She was ac­tu­al­ly clo­ser to it than to the porch, and sin­ce it was lar­ger and lon­ger than the bat­h­ro­om win­dow, she was al­most le­vel with it.

  Ca­leb thrust his sho­es and socks in­to Em­mie’s hands. “Go up­s­ta­irs and open her bed­ro­om win­dow. I’m go­ing to climb up and mo­ve her over to it.”

  “You’re go­ing to sca­le that?”

  “Um- hmm.” The wall wasn’t flat or smo­oth. From a dis­tan­ce the li­mes­to­ne fa?ade of the ho­use al­most lo­oked li­ke bas­ket we­ave. The sto­nes had be­en car­ved in­to ro­ughly con­vex sur­fa­ces, which of­fe­red han­d­holds and fo­ot­holds. Co­ming down aided by a ro­pe wo­uld be easy. Go­ing up wit­ho­ut a ro­pe or equ­ip­ment wo­uld be har­der, but he co­uld do it. Do-Lord strip­ped his sport co­at off and han­ded that to Em­mie as well. “Go!”

  Emmie co­uldn’t be­li­eve he in­ten­ded to climb up a wall. Still, des­pi­te her cu­ri­osity abo­ut how he wo­uld do it, she re­ac­ted in­s­tantly to the no­te of com­mand in his vo­ice.

  With his jac­ket dra­ped over the sho­es she ra­ced back to the ve­ran­da do­or. The warmth and bab­ble of the crow­ded ro­om when she slip­ped in­si­de was shoc­king for its she­er nor­malcy. Bri­efly, she won­de­red if she sho­uld find one of the se­cu­rity gu­ards and tell them what was go­ing on. But she had a con­vic­ti­on that if Ca­leb had wan­ted her to do that, he wo­uld ha­ve told her to.

  She ma­de her way ac­ross the ro­om, trying not to catch the eye of se­ve­ral pe­op­le she re­cog­ni­zed. Be­ing in­vi­sib­le had its uses, she was thin­king smugly, when her path was bloc­ked by a man in a three-pi­ece su­it.

  The cut of the de­ep navy pin­s­t­ri­pe su­it was go­od, the to­uc­hes of ma­ro­on in the tie dis­c­re­et, and if the out­fit se­emed a lit­tle stuffy and ma­de him lo­ok ol­der than his ye­ars, well, Blo­unt had al­ways had am­bi­ti­ons to switch to the ad­mi­nis­t­ra­ti­on si­de of the uni­ver­sity. Lo­oked li­ke he had de­ci­ded to dress the part of a se­ni­or de­an.