He looks her in the eye, expression doleful. “Maybe I don’t want to be spared all this.”

She leans in, kisses him on the cheek. He’s clearing his throat, preparing to say something else maudlin but kind, she’s sure. But just then she reaches across him and pulls Jason Briffel’s disposable cell from the armrest. His eyes widen and his jaw gapes when he realizes she’s just swiped his last possible bargaining chip.

“Six o’clock,” he calls after her. “First part of what I said still stands. If you’re not back by six, I—”

“Six o’clock,” she calls back.

When Luke starts the Jeep’s engine, Marty fires up his truck a second later. For a minute or two, it seems as if the men’s vehicles are conducting a little battle of the bands over her; then Marty peels off down the street, making the biggest show of not following her that he can.

“How’d it go?” Luke asks when she climbs inside his Jeep.

“Not well,” she answers.

He nods and backs out of the driveway.

“Well, I appreciate it,” he says a few minutes later as if no time has passed between her comment and his response, a sure sign he’s measuring his words carefully. Would he be measuring them this carefully if his brother hadn’t decided to make a surprise appearance during their reunion?

“What’s that?” he asks, eyes on the phone resting in her lap.

“It’s a phone.”

“I know that.”

“I’m expecting a call on it. At some point . . . I think.”

“OK.”

Up ahead, Marty takes a sharp left into the middle of town. She can’t help but watch his truck as they fly past. Maybe she’s afraid he’s going to double back and land on their tail, or maybe she feels a stab of guilt at having left his protection against his wishes, especially after he dropped everything for her.

“He’s a good guy, isn’t he?” Luke asks.

She’s startled he’s read her thoughts, until she realizes it’s not that hard for him to tell what she’s looking at. No doubt her expression’s far from serene.

“He is,” she says. “But it sounds like you didn’t think so yesterday.”

“We had a . . . thing.”

“What kind of thing?”

“What’s it matter? It’s the reason you and I got to talk today, and that means it’s ultimately a good thing, right?”

“Is it?”

He blushes. It looks good on him. Again. But she’s always been attracted to any small sign of vulnerability in a man who works hard to look strong. Her kryptonite would be a calendar of nothing but shirtless firemen cooing over kittens. But she’s got more experience with calendars of men than actual men, which is why the thought of playfully drawing attention to the bands of pink on his right cheek and jaw makes her both dizzy and nauseated at the same time.

“Well,” he finally says, “you’re the reason my brother decided to break radio silence after a year, so I guess that’s good for me, right?”

“Yeah, that’s gotta sting a little.”

“More than a little, but I appreciate your understanding.”

“Sure. So which way are you gonna go?”

“The 101.”

“I wish you wouldn’t,” she says.

“Really?”

“Can you take Bennett Road around the fort? That should get us there, right?”

“And it’ll add about forty-five minutes to the trip.”

“The library’s open till five, right?”

As he slows and shifts lanes to avoid leaving the valley, he gives her a long, stony look. Scans her from head to toe, it seems. Only then does she remember she’s got the URL for the chat room where they’re supposed to meet Bailey written on a Post-it note in her pocket, and unless Luke memorized the thing when she wrote it down, the note’s the only connection he has to his brother. She didn’t set it up that way, but it’s how things are. For now.

A few minutes later, they’re heading south on Bennett Road, past horse farms and spreading oaks and golden fields.

“You couldn’t have traveled back-road and surface streets the whole way here,” he says.

“Says who? You don’t know where I was coming from. But, you know, nice try trying to get me to tell you.”

His tongue makes a lump under his upper lip, and it’s clear he’s trying not to smile.

“You really afraid of freeways right now?” he asks after a brief silence.

“I’m limiting my use. Not the same thing. You know, it’s like the option on the GPS. Avoid freeway usage, or whatever.”

“I’ve heard of it. But most people don’t use it to run from the cops.”

“I’m not, either.” I think.

“Good thing, ’cause you’re riding with one.”

“Yeah, and he didn’t stop to ask me what kind of trouble I was in before he got in the car with me,” she says.

“I did, though.”

“Did not.”

“Did. I asked what kind, and you said big,” he says.

“And that was good enough for you?” she asks.

“I’m here, aren’t I?”

She looks at him until he feels the force of her stare and glances in her direction.

“What?” he asks.

“Are you just gonna keep asking me random, rhetorical questions until I give you the information you want?”

“They’re not random. And only one was rhetorical.”

“The last one.”

“Right. The last one.”

She looks out the window, amazed suddenly to be back in this familiar valley. It’s like the past couple of days have blown the newer layers of sand and grit from her life, leaving only the rocky fundamentals underneath. Or some crazy rearrangement of them.

Her grandmother’s on-again, off-again boyfriend is now her temperamental bodyguard. Her former bully blushes in her presence when she teases him. While chauffeuring her places.

Maybe this is what growing up feels like for people whose lives aren’t marred by serial killers and stalkers. Things shift underfoot only slightly. Some people remain but change roles.

And maybe this is exactly what Dylan wanted, she thinks. For me to go home again, back to Altamira. Why?

“Charley?”

“Yeah.”

“You don’t have to tell me who’s after you, but tell me this.”

He waits until she turns her attention to him.

“Is it who you’re going to ask my brother to find?”

“Something like that, yeah.”

Luke nods. If he’s about to say anything else, it’s cut off by the chirping sound that suddenly fills the Jeep.

Jason’s phone is ringing.

“Pull over,” she says.

23

“Charlotte?”

She walks slowly toward the shade offered by the nearest oak tree. Her heart’s pounding from the sound of Dylan’s voice. It’s filled her with all the feelings his drug relieved her of the night before, and the night before that. Made her feel weak, flushed, and powerless.

Will a simple conversation with Dylan be enough to set her recent dose of Zypraxon, almost an hour old by now, loose in her system?

As if any conversation between her and Dylan will ever be simple again.

They never were.

Once inside the tree’s umbrella of shade, she turns. Sees Luke standing in front of his Jeep. Steadily he looks back and forth in both directions along the empty two-lane blacktop, his hand resting against his gun hip protectively. Protecting her, it seems. That’s a comfort, at least.

“Charlotte?” Dylan says.

“I’m here.”

“Looks like you’re building some sort of team. Are you sure you can trust them?”

She scans the empty fields, the mountains on either side of the valley. They’re in the middle of someone’s definition of nowhere, but he can see her.

“Trust is important,” she manages.

“In certain situations, yes.”

“But not in ours?”

“I’m here for you, Charley. I’ve always been here for you.”

“Always?”

“From the beginning of our relationship, I mean.”

“You call this a relationship?” she asks.

“Of course it is. Not all relationships are sexual.”

“I’m asking about your relationship to the concept of trust,” she says.

“Ah, I see.”

“Do you? Do you see me right now? Is that how you know I’m not alone?”

“I thought Altamira would be your last choice, to be frank. But I guess it makes sense. So what did it come down to? The choice between San Francisco or your old hometown, or the choice between Kayla and Marty?”

This is a safe guess based on what he knows about her, the fact that she’d call Kayla or Marty for help. Maybe she’s overreacting.

“So where are you headed now? An overnight in Cambria? Maybe a nice little bed-and-breakfast close to the beach with your handsome new friend? You might want to give him permission to relieve himself. He’s looking a little shifty, if you get my drift.”

Sure enough, Luke is pacing slowly on the road side of the Jeep. He must be wondering what the hell he’s gotten himself into. But from a distance he probably looks exactly like someone who needs to pee.

Jesus Christ . . .