I glance at Dalton.

Gregory catches the look and says wryly, “Yes, I suspect I’m not your favorite person right now, which is why I’m here. I insisted Phil bring me to see what can be done to make Oliver’s stay less taxing.”

“Yeah?” Dalton says. “You know what would make it less taxing? If it never happened.”

Phil makes a noise in his throat, one manicured hand rising in the gesture you’d give a child, telling him to calm down before he embarrasses you in front of company.

Dalton continues. “I don’t know what the hell your understanding of the situation up here was, Mr. Wallace, but we were not equipped to deal with a prisoner of any variety. This town is for victims. It is safety. It is sanctuary. It is not a fucking maximum-security prison.”

“What Sheriff Dalton is saying—” Phil begins.

“Oh, I believe he’s saying it just fine,” Wallace says, and while he’s smiling, the steel in his voice warns Phil to silence. “Please continue, Sheriff.”

“We were not equipped for this,” Dalton says. “We were not warned in time to become equipped. Your stepson was dropped off with a fucking bag of coffee. Here’s a serial killer. Please take care of him for us. Oh, and enjoy the coffee.”

“I don’t think this is productive,” Phil says.

Dalton turns on him. “You want to talk about productive? How about giving me a damned method to communicate with you when everything goes to hell up here?”

Phil straightens, bringing himself to Dalton’s height and looking him square in the eye. “You have a method, Sheriff. Valerie is—”

“Dead.”

A moment’s pause. Then Phil says, “What?”

“Val is dead.” Dalton waves at Wallace. “His stepson took her hostage. Killed her. Dumped her in a river. Casey almost died trying to retrieve her body ’cause a proper burial seems the least we can do. Oliver Brady also murdered Brent, one of our key scouts and local contacts. Gutshot him and left him to die. Then he massacred three settlers, including an old woman trying to escape. Her granddaughter managed to avoid the carnage, though not without witnessing her grandmother’s bloody corpse. We escorted the kid home, but we didn’t dare take her inside the settlement and explain what happened, or we might not have walked out alive, considering the killer was one of ours.” Dalton pauses. “That’s our day so far. And yours?”

Phil’s face hardens. “Your insubordination—”

“Fuck my insubordination. Go tell the council I was rude to you, Phil. See which of us they declare the more valuable asset.”

I turn to Wallace. “I’m sorry we don’t have your stepson. Despite the fact we weren’t prepared, we do accept responsibility for his escape. I’m also sorry if you were misled about the appropriateness of this solution to your problem.”

Wallace rubs his chin. He looks sick, and it takes him a moment to regroup.

“The blame, I’m afraid, is as much mine as anyone’s, Detective,” Wallace says. “I failed to properly warn you about exactly the sort of monster you were dealing with. I erred on the side of caution, fearing the truth would limit my options drastically. And in doing so—” He inhales sharply and then shakes his head. “Let’s get someplace quiet, where we can come up with a solution.”

* * *

We ride the horses to town, letting Phil and Wallace walk the short distance. When we’re out of earshot, Dalton mutters, “Fuck,” and I agree, and that’s all we say, all that can be said. This wrinkle is the absolute last thing we need to deal with.

When we enter Rockton, Anders and Isabel are striding toward us.

“Did we hear another plane?” Anders says. He notices the two men behind us. “What the hell?”

I jump off Cricket and call Storm over. Dalton wordlessly reaches for my reins, and I hand them over.

“The younger guy is Phil,” I say when Dalton leaves for the stable.

“Our Phil?” Anders says.

“Yep.”

“Huh. Not what I expected.”

“But a not unpleasant surprise,” Isabel murmurs as she gives Phil the kind of look I haven’t seen her give any guy since Mick died.

“The other one might be more your style,” Anders says.

She gives him a look. “More my age you mean?”

“Nah. I know you like them young.”

He gets a glower for that. Wallace is looking about Rockton, his gaze here and there, taking everything in. I can almost see his thought processes—looking for electricity lines, noting the piles of lumber, checking the construction of the buildings and the layout of town and nodding throughout, as if intrigued and impressed. Phil glances about in mild horror, and I can read his thoughts even better. Dear God, I had no idea it was this bad.

“And the older gentleman?” Isabel says, her voice lowered as the men approach. “Judging by his attire, clearly a man of means. An investor, I presume.”

“You could say that. He’s Gregory Wallace. Oliver Brady’s stepfather.”

“Oh, hell,” Anders mutters.

“Yep.”

The men draw close enough for me to say, “Phil? Mr. Wallace? This is our deputy, Will Anders, and one of our local entrepreneurs, Isabel Radcliffe.”

Isabel’s eyebrows lift at the introduction. I mouth, Brothel owner?, asking if she’d prefer that introduction, and she rolls her eyes and extends her hand. Phil accepts it with a perfunctory shake, having seen and dismissed her in a heartbeat. Wallace’s gaze lingers, and he smiles, as if she is much more than he expected out here.

“Gregory, please,” he says, taking her hand and then Anders’s. “Detective? If I might speak to you alone, I believe Phil would like to talk to the sheriff.”

Phil gives him a clear What the hell? look, but Wallace only smiles and says, “I believe you and the sheriff have a few things to discuss. Or he has a few things to discuss with you. Detective . . .”

“Casey,” I say.

He nods. “Casey and I will be at the police station.”

* * *

I leave Storm with Anders. As Wallace and I enter the station, he says, “You are correct that I didn’t know where I was sending Oliver. I understood the basics, of course. A remote, northern community. Hidden. Untraceable. Designed to conceal and contain those who need concealment and containment. That seemed enough. I made the mistake of presuming this was for people like my stepson.”

“It’s not.”

“I see that now. I should have asked more questions. An associate told me this was the perfect solution, and I suppose, given what I was willing to pay, Phil’s employers had every incentive to agree with me.”

“Like Eric said, we just weren’t equipped for it.” I stoke the fire to start a kettle. “Our police force is just myself, Eric, and Will. We’re all experienced law enforcement but none of us has done correctional work. We have a volunteer militia. We have one cell.” I cross the room and open the door to show him, and then shutting it before Roy can speak. “We couldn’t leave Oliver in that for six months, so we were quickly building him a fortified unit. He escaped just before it was completed.”

“Can you take me through—?” The door opens and Dalton comes in, Phil following. Wallace says, “That was quick. Casey was just about to tell me what happened. I’m sure you’ll want to hear this, Phil. Please, continue, Detective.”

I tell the story.

“The poisoning was real,” I say. “Oliver had inside help. He was, as you might expect, protesting his innocence. That’s very easy to do when no one here can look up his alleged crimes on the internet. He claimed to have been accused of a shooting spree in San Jose.”

Phil’s head jerks up, as if he’s remembering I’d asked about the shooting.

I continue, “It was far too easy to plant doubt under the circumstances. Yet the alternative was to keep him permanently gagged, which raised suspicions among the residents—they wondered if he had something he wanted to say. We tried to walk a middle line—no gag but limited access. That failed. He found an ally, who got him the poisoned food. We had to take him to the clinic to pump his stomach. We had him restrained while recuperating, but his accomplice provided him with a knife.”

“And set the fire,” Wallace says. “As a distraction.”

“Helluva good one in a town made of wood,” Dalton says.

Wallace nods. “As his accomplice knew. I am so sorry this happened. The loss of your town leader . . .” He shakes his head. “ ‘Sorry’ doesn’t begin to cover this.”

“What was Val doing with the prisoner?” Phil asks.

“She hoped Oliver would see her as a potential ally, possibly even someone he could charm. She was trying to take a more active role in the community.”

“Which was her first mistake,” Phil says. “The leader of this town cannot become involved in such a way. It blurs lines.”

Wallace looks at him. “Are you implying that by trying to help her town, she made a fatal error?”

Phil has the grace to color. “Of course not, sir. I misspoke. Val made a questionable choice but what happened was not her fault.”

“It was Oliver’s,” Wallace says. “He is responsible for his actions, something he was never able to grasp, and that is our . . .” He shakes it off. “No blame. Not now. For now, we need to find him before anyone else dies. And then . . .” A pause as he glances away, his voice lowering. “And then we will have to make sure this never happens again, that he never poses a risk to anyone else again.”

Wallace squares his shoulders. “That’s for later, and whatever needs to be done, it will not involve anyone in this town. I am truly sorry that this happened. I will make it up to you. I know the town was counting on the added income.”

“Income?” Dalton snorts. “That’s their concern.” He jerks his thumb at Phil. “We don’t give a shit. Not like we were going to see more than a fraction of it anyway.”

Phil bristles. “Of course you were. Beyond basic administrative costs—”

“Don’t,” Wallace says. “I have worked with enough foreign governments to understand the concept of ‘basic administrative costs.’ Roughly ninety percent, in my experience.” He looks at Dalton. “When we get Oliver, you’ll tell me what you need for this town. Supplies, infrastructure improvements, and any wish-list items that will make life here easier. I’ll pay your administrators a reasonable fee for their work, and I will personally take care of everything on your list. Plus I’ll pay you and your detective and deputy a bonus.”

“Fuck, no,” Dalton says.

“He means the bonus isn’t necessary,” I say. “We’ll take the rest, but we don’t need added incentive to find your stepson. What he’s done is enough.”

Wallace dips his chin. “I apologize if I implied otherwise.” He looks at Phil. “You can run along now. Fly back to the city, and leave me here with these people to find my stepson.”

Phil’s jaw sets. “I will be staying and helping.”

“Yeah,” Dalton says. “Because if you leave, you have to tell the council how badly you all fucked up. Then they’d just order your ass back here anyway.”

“If you’re staying, stay,” Wallace says. “But you damned well better make yourself useful. Now, let’s talk about how to get Oliver back.”