“You don’t think it’s weird?” Lea said, asking the same question in its third variation. “Weird that he’s making us leave the house like this?”

“He’s not making us do anything.” Kalani kept her eyes on the road as she steered around a bend in the highway. She did likewise in the straights when it was unnecessary. For some reason it had become increasingly difficult to look at her sister’s face.

“It’s weird,” Lea said in a pathetic little voice. “I wanted to stay.”

“You don’t think it’s weird that Tucker’s still missing?”

“What’s that have to do with anything?”

“That’s why Matthias is here,” Kalani said. “That’s why he wants us to leave the house so he can . . . check on stuff.”

“Check on what?

Kalani wondered again about the electronics they’d found in the cellar, wondering who put it there and why. She didn’t even know what it was. She wondered how much her sister knew.

“Kalani, what is he checking on?”

She wasn’t even sure, herself. “Well, you know how when someone disappears, it’s like a crime scene?” Kalani paused for an answer but there was none. “So he’s investigating it like a crime scene.”

“The house?”

“I wasn’t supposed to tell you that.”

Lea sighed. “What is he investigating?”

“The crime scene.”

“It’s not a crime scene,” Lea said, still pathetic-sounding.

“I don’t think you realize how serious this is, this whole Tucker thing.”

“I know it’s serious.”

Kalani laughed. “Do you?”

“I just don’t like that guy. That Matthias guy . . .”

“Yeah,” Kalani said, struggling with the urge to tune out her sister’s voice.

“And he’s some sort of investigator? He’s probably just going through our panty drawers.”

“Lea . . .”

“What?”

Kalani slowed the car to meet the lower speed limit at Claxtonburg’s town line. “You’re not having second thoughts, are you?”

“Well, it’s too late for that,” Lea said. “We took the deal.”

The deal had been laid out to them back in D.C. by some good and kindly federal agents, everyone positive and friendly and safe. The agents would smile at them despite the suspicions that Kalani knew lingered just beneath the surface. She and her sister were vital instruments to their plan, pieces to the puzzle. To the authorities, she and her sister represented the necessary leverage for putting the Blackwoods case over the edge. Their testimony would put an end for good to an illicit smuggling ring and a private security company that had grown to a paramilitary status. A mob status, even. A racket. A for-profit army willing to do any dirty deed, including harassment and death threats to several DARC Ops associates who had been the first to disturb the hornets’ nest.

Macy, who knew too much from her time working with one of them when he was a police chief back in St. Louis. And Annica, who knew too much after taking on their story as part of her journalistic mission. When DARC joined that mission, the hornets’ nest had officially been shaken, the whole thing coming to a head in Hawaii. Now everyone was in some degree of danger. Especially after taking the bargain to cooperate and testify, Kalani and her sister were possibly at the top of the list of enemies for the remaining and free and still deadly members of Blackwoods.

“We’re rats now,” Lea said, breaking the brief silence.

“You weren’t worried about that before,” Kalani said. “When they had us in that interrogation room. When our lawyers begged us to take the deal. And when you begged me to take it with you.”

“I begged you?”

“I could have gone my own way,” Kalani said. “They had nothing on me. Instead I get locked in with you with this testimony.”

“They had nothing on me,” Lea snapped back. “If it really went to trial. That’s what my lawyers said.”

“That was no lawyer,” Kalani said.

It was still a point of contention, whether or not Lea’s original attorney was a plant for Blackwoods. Jackson and his team had done more than hint at the horrible possibility. It was after their pleading with Kalani to convince Lea of it that they finally got rid of him. But like the ongoing disputes about dishes and domestic duties, and living as sisters once again after a decade, the topic was just another sore spot that would come up through the most importune nagging. Lately it had been coming up more and more, alongside with all the other suspicious events. Disappearance. Found devices. Kalani wondered about them, trying to bite her tongue as she drove, as she worried more about the timing of it all. As she wondered about who was getting to Lea . . .

“I feel the whole thing was a setup,” Lea said.

“Can I ask you something?”

“If I say no—”

Kalani interrupted. “Do you still talk to the captain?”

No reaction. “Well, I’m going to pretend you didn’t ask me that.”

“I didn’t want to ask you that,” Kalani said. “I hate that I have to ask you that, but it’s there.”

“What’s there?”

“The . . . idea of it. It’s not too far-fetched.”

“I’ve told you everything, Lani.” Lea’s voice had gone softer, using her childhood nickname. She pled once again with, “Come on.”

“I wouldn’t be mad,” Kalani said, “if you lied to me about it. I know it’s complicated, and it would get me in trouble if I knew. It’s like one of those things that you have to lie about to keep each other safe.”

“It’s not like that.”

“Yes, it is. I’ve had to lie about things for that. I won’t be mad, Lea, I won’t.”

“You’re assuming I lied to you,” Lea said. “Stop it.”

“I’m assuming you’re in a horrible position.”

“Where are you going?”

Kalani was driving through the middle of Claxtonburg, slowly, almost idling through the sleepy main strip. She’d had initially told Lea about taking “a drive,” but she also needed to get yet another minor repair done on her car. She’d just recently noticed the brake light had stopped working. So there was at least that one bit of sabotage, a plan for her to come back to the repair shop. Though she suspected it had more to do with the shop’s underhanded way at creating a repeat customer than it did for any plot to quietly assassinate her.

Lea returned to her often-used whining. “You came all this way for a brake light?”

“We needed time to talk. We still do.”

“Well, I guess we do now,” Lea said with a huff, her hands falling and slapping into her lap. “You think I’m still talking to the captain and that I’m helping the Blackwoods guys. And you—”

“Come on, stop.”

“And you think I helped kidnap Tucker, or that I killed him and buried him in the cellar. Don’t think I didn’t watch you guys, you and Matthias checking around in there. You thought I . . .” It had taken a few seconds, but Lea finally noticed the reaction to her last little diatribe: Kalani’s gaping mouth. Lea cocked her head and said, “What?”

“What did you say about kidnapping?” Kalani asked her. “Why did you say that?”

“I said I killed him, too.”

“Sure, but helping him get kidnapped is actually realistic.”

Kalani pulled to a stop along the curb of the car mechanic’s shop. While listening to her sister delve deeper into hysterics, she scanned across the license plates of the all the cars parked in the lot. Too many of them. Too many black cars.

She was almost happy when Lea’s voice broke her concentration. “What are you doing?”

Kalani slid her foot off the brake, turned back into traffic, and revved back up to speed.

“Where are you going?” Lea said, her voice filling up with frustration. “Kalani?”

“It’s too busy.”

“The shop? No, it’s not.”

Kalani wondered about the cars, half of them from out of state. She supposed Claxtonburg was near the interstate, but was it really that common of a tourist spot? She tried thinking back to those historical photo plaques that lined the sidewalks. Was there anything really notable about the place other than its bygone history of a healthy, prosperous town? Or was it just a meeting place for scoundrels? People on the run like Kalani and Lea, and maybe the people trying to run them down.

“What the hell, Kalani? Say something.”

“Say what? It’s packed.”

“No, it’s not,” Lea said, with perhaps a little too much fervor. Kalani had never noted her sister ever caring so much about seeing through with a simple car repair. “It’s not,” she said again. “Come on, loop around and let’s take a look at it again.”

Kalani was headed in the opposite direction, away from the center of town, pedestrians and buildings getting increasingly sparse on either side of the road until she could see the speed limit sign.

“What the hell,” snapped Lea. “What a waste of time.”

“It’s not, no matter where we end up. We’re just going for a drive, to talk. To figure this out.”

“To figure what out?”

The car was still cruising away from that single stoplight, the forest closing back in on either side as her speed picked up.

“You wanted some more time to interrogate me, huh?” Lea said. “Fine. Go ahead.”

“Do you use the phone much? At the house?” She finally glanced over at Lea to check her reaction: a stonewall.

“We’re not supposed to,” Lea mumbled.

“Since when does that matter to you? Come on, have you used it or not?”

“Not really.”

“You have?”

“Who would I even call?” Lea said, her voice rising and setting off a whole new round of hysterics.

Kalani looked away, not only for the road, but for an escape from the tension in her sister’s face. Starting at her neck and rising up, like a pulse, was a gradual but steady tide of anger. Lea could have a temper sometimes. A red zone brought up by too many “stupid” questions.

“Oh, right,” Lea said. “Of course, you would assume I called the captain. I’d give him directions to the house, hatch the scheme to get rid of poor little Tucker?”

The car had slowed again, and pulled over into a strip of gravel next to the road.

“What, now you’re upset?” Lea snapped.

By the sound of her sister’s voice, Kalani knew that she was more than upset. There was a certain venom that was to be expected when calling her a liar—or worse, a traitor—but this was different. It was a cool, calculated energy. An anger with the preciseness of a laser-guided missile. It rattled Kalani a little.

She looked to her sister with softened eyes. “Lea, if we could go back in time . . .” She waited for Lea’s eyes to finish rolling and continued. “If we were back in D.C., back in that little room at Jackson’s office . . .”

“Jesus,” Lea sighed out. “Yeah, back there. Okay. If I was back there, knowing what I know now?”

“What do you know now?”

“That I don’t think these guys are actually here to protect us at all. These DARC guys.”

“They’re not the prosecutors. They’re not the Feds.”

“So what’s the point in playing ball with them?”

“Because they fucking rescued you!”

“I didn’t ask for that,” Lea said. “What they did was ruin my life. They ruined the captain, and swept me up in it. What they did was deliver me on a platter to the Feds, so I had to play ball to survive. That’s what I did, and what I’m trying to do now: play ball. Keep quiet, smile. But it’s getting harder.” The cool and calculated ferocity had remained, as did her steely glare as it aimed ahead through the windshield. Kalani was a little happy it was off of her. But she watched how her sister’s hands had curled into little half-fists, the tips of her fingers rubbing back and forth against her palm. Was she shaking? She kept talking. “Don’t you feel it, too? Don’t you feel like you’re being used?”

“I feel like I’m in danger,” Kalani said.

“You are.”

“From whom?”

“Everyone,” Lea said. “That’s the problem. We’re in the middle. We’re like that piece of meat over the alligator pen at Panaewa. You remember what happened to that, right?”

Kalani remembered the way she could almost feel the concussive blast of the alligator’s jaw as it snapped shut through the piece of meat. And she remembered the other sound that followed: a wail from the crowd, from her. “The only predator I’m scared of is Blackwoods, and the Khans.”

“And the captain?”

“Sure. They’ve all got good reason not to like me.”

“Well, the Feds don’t like you, either,” Lea said. “Remember that.”

“They’re protecting us.”

“How? Putting us up here in the middle of nowhere like sitting ducks?”

“DARC handles the security, if you haven’t noticed.”

“Oh, security. That’s what Tucker was doing?”

“Was, yes.”

“And that’s what Matthias is trying to do now? Snooping around in the cellar? What was he looking for?”

Kalani couldn’t keep her eyes from narrowing. “What do you have to hide?”

Her sister laughed. “I knew it.”

“What is it?”

“Tucker,” she said. “We buried him in the cellar. You didn’t notice?”

“What is it, Lea?”

Lea took a deep breath. And held it. She was holding in her damn secret.

“You’ve been so strange these last few days. I wouldn’t have thought you’d hold something back from me, especially now. It’s all we have, each other. You know that.”

Lea exhaled. “Yeah. I know that.”

“Maybe things were different before. Both of us made some pretty terrible decisions. Both of us.

“Yeah.”

“And maybe we weren’t the best of sisters, but we—”

“Forget it,” Lea interrupted. “Forget that.”

“Alright.”

“Let’s stick to the present. Okay? Let’s even forget about that meeting in D.C. Let’s just move on.”

“But it worries me that you’re so conflicted now,” Kalani said.

“Let’s just go back and get this car fixed. What do you say?”

She had nothing to say about that. She had already forgotten what had kept her away in the first place. And while nothing really was revealed, she felt there was at least a layer pulled back. At least Lea showed something. Some vulnerability. Something real. It was a hint of authenticity she hadn’t seen for days. Weeks, even.

Lea was trying on a smile. “And then after that, we’ll go get some frozen yogurt or something.”

“Frozen yogurt?” Kalani laughed. “I’ll think we’ll be lucky to find ice cream here.”

“At the very least, they might have something at that general store.”

Kalani couldn’t hide the growing tightness at her mouth, her lips that curled up into a smile. Ethan’s smile. She loved the idea, even though no new editions of the paper would be out for days. She could go look at the old ones. She could think about him again.

Halfway back to town, Kalani finally remembered the odd assortment of cars parked out front of the garage, and the bad vibe it gave her. Just about everything that wasn’t a nice copy of her Ethan paper had been giving her a bad vibe lately, so she tried to push it away from her mind. She had Lea with her. And although Lea wasn’t the most helpful when it came to security or protection, she was blood. And Kalani trusted her.

“So, it’s just that taillight?” Lea said. “I’m surprised you don’t know how to fix it yourself.”

“It’s more than the light. I think it’s something to do with the wires or something.”

“You got your wires crossed?” Lea said. She was chewing a stick of gum, easy and relaxed. A foot up on the dash, window down so the wind could thrash around her hair. The sun hit her just right, just like back in the good old halcyon days on the island. The girl with the ocean breeze in her hair. Both of them strolling down the beach and getting a mixture of wanted and unwanted male attention. Lea maybe more so. She was older, and always seemed more developed no matter what. That was probably the problem, how she got caught up in the whole mess to begin with, how she met the captain. That criminal bastard wouldn’t go after Plain Janes. Plain Jane security guards, especially.

How had their lives gone in such different paths, only to meet up there in downtown Claxtonburg? At the only stoplight.

A minute later, she pulled into the lot that was now free of any strange out-of-state black cars. Was that strange now? She was getting a little sick of how everything initially felt wrong. No, there was nothing strange about getting her wires fixed up. Nothing strange about her friendly greasy grifter car mechanic. She expected to see his face when she walked in. Instead, it was the manager-type she’d seen through office window. They were both standing in the waiting room, him doing something on his phone. He had turned to greet her with a crooked smile.

“Can I help you?” he said.

“I’m late for a 3:30? Taillight? Something to do with the wiring?”

“That’s Jimmy,” he said. “Jimmy’s out back.”

She had no idea what that meant but listened to his instructions to pull into bay two. It was so damn quiet in there. No one was working on any cars. No music, either. Just that guy on his phone, and “Jimmy out back.”

And Lea out front.

Kalani felt a sudden urge to see her sister. She left the waiting room in a hurry, finding her car still parked where she’d left it, tucked in the shade of an old row house. In the shade, too, between the building and the car, stood a middle-aged man, hunched a little, talking into the open window on Lea’s side. He was dressed in a golf shirt and khakis, like he’d just spent the day on the back nine. He lifted his bald head to peer at Kalani, and with no response turned back down to the car’s open window. He tapped on the roof of the car with his palm before walking off, walking right by Kalani, nodding.

“Who was that?” Kalani asked a moment later in the heat of the parked car. Heat despite the shade.

“Just some guy,” she said. “Looking for his dog.”

“Looking for what?”

“His dog. His lost dog.”

If the guy was looking for a dog, he had a perfect opportunity to ask Kalani about it. If he wasn’t, he also had the opportunity to do something terrible to her in the secluded parking lot. Neither happened.

“Well, what’s up?” Lea said. “Are they open?”

“Yeah,” Kalani said.

“So?”

She checked the mirrors, watching where the mystery man had gone. Watching for anyone else. No signs of movement. Just a nice and quiet afternoon in Claxtonburg.

“So let’s go,” Lea said. “Or do you just want to go home already? Have we had our talk?”

Kalani started the car and said nothing as she pulled up to the closed door of stall number two. She idled there for a moment before the rusted door began to slide up, shaking on its way and making a strange thudding sound. Kalani pulled in and hoped to God that the door wouldn’t close.

So what was she expecting? That her sister set her up?

Was she expecting Jimmy to come by wielding a wrench?

When Jimmy appeared, it was with a smile, wielding only a small cardboard box that contained the car part she’d needed. He waved it in front of Kalani as he walked to the front of the car. “Got your part,” he said cheerfully.

The girls were instructed to wait “out front,” which she supposed was her usual boring spot in the painfully sparse waiting room. At least that time she had someone to talk to. Though she was a little apprehensive about a public conversation with her sister. Especially in that type of public, in the quiet, music-free killing zone. She turned to Lea in the single chair. “Why don’t we go to the store early? Frozen yogurt or whatever. Do it while they work on the car.”

Lea rolled her eyes even wider than before. “I thought you said it was going to be a minute.”

“It is,” Kalani said. “And so will we.”

Lea darted her gaze back to the office, where the blinds were open. Where the manager was walking back and forth, pacing like he’d been coming down off something. He was on the phone, silent through the glass. His cold stares would sweep across the seating area and then burrow back into the business of his room. But he kept checking on them. Was he talking about them?

Kalani turned back to the scowl that had taken the place of her sister. “What’s your problem?”

“I’m just annoyed with this whole thing.”

“Why are you staring at him?”

“I’m not.”

“Let’s go outside,” Kalani said.

“What?”

“Let’s get some fresh air. What the hell are we doing in here? It stinks.”

“It stinks like a mechanic’s shop, like your car getting fixed.”

She waited for eye contact, and then widened her gaze. “Come on,” she said, almost pleading. “Please? Let’s go?”

Kalani made no attempt at that point to hide it. The creepy feeling had returned in the worst way, from the nervous kinetic energy of her bouncing knee, traveling up her body and no doubt marring her face somehow. Quivering perhaps. She felt over-caffeinated, with her heart stuck in a vice.

She sprang toward the door almost involuntarily. Was it claustrophobia? Sure. Not fear of being knocked off by these guys. Just an easily explainable claustrophobia. Why was her sister so surprised?

“I have to leave,” Kalani said. Lea replied, but the sound of the garage door closing blocked any chance she had of being heard. She spun around to look past the door out into the garage area, the small sliver of outside light closing to the dank dim of the interior.

“What are you doing?” Lea said. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

She needed air.

Kalani turned back to the door, the main entrance, jogging the last remaining steps to it and then trying a handle that wouldn’t turn. She tried again, harder that time, twisting both ways. Surely there was some way out, some special way of opening the door. Another trick door just like at the general store. Surely she was just freaking out, her muscles not operating properly. The neural synapses required for the simple act of opening a door suddenly turned to mush. But why? She had been in so many worse situations, times that called for the most precision of dexterity under the most immediate of threats. But that door . . . was locked.