“Then we’ll catch up with her when she comes back. In the meantime, this amazing crack-shot ground team who didn’t notice her leave, how many are there?”

“Four.”

“They each have a vehicle?”

“Pretty basic, but yeah.”

“Send one to the 101 off-ramp now. Put another one at the intersection of their street with the mountain road.”

“What do you want them to do?” Scott asks.

“Notify us if she comes back, and never look me in the eye again.”

“What if she’s not coming back?” Fred asks.

“This isn’t a jailbreak. She just went somewhere and she didn’t want us to know. That’s all.”

“So she’s the one who hacked us?” Fred asks.

Cole says, “Somebody get me a satellite phone. Now.”

“How bad is it?” Charley asks.

The traffic heading south on the 101 is much lighter, probably because she’s leaving the necklace of communities south of Salinas in her wake.

“So he did tell you there was good security?” Bailey asks.

“He said nobody was safer anywhere.”

“That’s . . . not an accurate description. I’ve been scanning the personnel files of the people he’s got in town. Only one has military experience; the rest are just lackeys who file written reports about the gossip at the Copper Pot that are putting me to sleep right now. They’ve got a microdrone crew that’s in a mobile van, but I seriously doubt any of those nerds are skilled at hand-to-hand combat. And there’s something called the Med Ranch—”

“I know that. I’m supposed to go straight there if I have a stomachache or my arm suddenly falls off.”

“OK,” Bailey says.

“So they’re just watching us? They can’t do anything if something bad happens?”

“It doesn’t look like it, no. So, um, this security threat? The one he didn’t want me to know about? How bad is it?”

“Oh, that old thing? Yeah, your brother just found a domestic terrorist network that’s setting up shop in our backyard. That’s all. Oh, also, the woman who gave us the flash drive proving all of it has been missing for two days.”

“So like by backyard, do you mean, like, the backyard of your house, or are you referring to—”

“That’s just not funny right now, Bailey.”

“I’m not trying to be funny. OK. Well, I’m seeing emails from the local security director there that look like he’s reassigning people. Fast. It’s a lot of code words I don’t understand, but it’s also travel instructions and arrival times. But . . . none of these guys are going to be there until tomorrow. They’re coming from different parts of the world.”

In her mind’s eye, she sees Luke’s house—their house—an island of light amid the dark sloping lawns, in a neighborhood with wide, grassy lots. A peaceful, quiet neighborhood on the lower flank of a mountain. Or a lonely one, depending on your point of view. Only now can she appreciate the extent to which her mind ran wild with Cole’s comforting words—safer than anyone anywhere! She imagined cameras in the trees, snipers in the bushes, vans full of mercenaries always on the ready nearby. Scary if you’re plotting an escape, comforting if your boyfriend’s making trouble with possible terrorists. But apparently there’s nothing of the kind anywhere in town, and now she feels as if they’ve all spent the last twenty-four hours, Luke included, acting with reckless confidence against a vicious menace in their own backyard.

Because, after all, if Jordy Clements is who they think he is, he won’t see Luke as anything other than a small-town sheriff’s deputy with a big mouth. And it’s possible Jordy’s already made one troublemaker disappear.

There’s a half-empty bottle of water in one of the cup holders. Before she can stop to wonder if the lid’s been closed tightly enough to keep out bacteria, she uncaps it. Without looking, she reaches into the Ziploc bag and pulls out a pill as if it were just an aspirin. It’s on her tongue when she hears a strange chirping from Bailey’s end of the line. It sounds like a ringing phone, but not quite.

“Uh-oh,” Bailey says.

One swig of water, down the hatch.

Decision made.

No second thoughts.

She’d hoped the fear would evaporate, but it hasn’t. Now she’s full of the very real fear that comes with responsibility. If something goes bad in Altamira tonight, she’ll have to be the one to stop it.

“Guess who this is,” Bailey says.

“Cole?”

“Calling on our private line.”

“What happens if you don’t take it?”

“I don’t know. Maybe he kicks me out of his system.”

“Can he?”

“I could probably make my way back in. But I’d be at war with his digital services team, and that would take some time.”

“Can you find out if he’s actually doing anything to investigate Jordy Clements? Maybe he’s found something bad, and that’s why he’s reassigning people.”

“Who won’t be there until tomorrow morning,” Bailey says. “So Jordy’s a terrorist maybe?”

“The ringleader, maybe.”