They looked up a steep hillside on the left, moist, loose gravel dotted with thick brush, and looked down to their right into an almost-vertical gully that led up to the ten-thousand-foot peaks of Rose Knob and its neighbor mountains on the ridge. “A waterfall!” Nina pointed. “It’s really rugged here.”

So where would Danny go from here, with two presumably reluctant children and camping gear in tow?

Paul put a finger to the topo map. “There’s the nearest jeep trail, back to the highway, and then no more than two miles before you turn back this way. I’m guessing, but I think he’ll want to stay around here, on familiar ground, but he can’t hike far with gear and those kids, he really can’t. Your car’s four-wheel drive. Let’s get going.”

The day before, just about noon in Carmel Valley, Danny had had no trouble luring Callie into the black Jeep. He knew just where she’d be waiting for her bus home at the school-he used to drive her there for Jolene now and then-and she climbed right in when he said Jolene had sent him.

He cruised with her right down Carmel Valley Road, every nerve on edge, and turned down Esquiline to see if he could find one of Darryl’s kids. And he saw Mikey, his good little buddy, throwing stones off Rosie’s Bridge.

“You’re supposed to be dead,” Mikey said. The kid’s hair was so short it made his ears stick out at right angles. His mouth was hanging open in puzzlement and curiosity about the big open vehicle Danny was driving, but he didn’t seem all shocked that the ghost of Siesta Court was back haunting him. He just instantly figured out, hey, it was all some bullshit adult mistake. Danny liked that.

“I got lucky at Vegas. Bought me this Jeep. Wanna drive it?”

No problem. They went back and got on the Los Laureles Grade toward Salinas, Mikey driving like a little champ, just barely hitting the pedals. Danny had let him tool around some nights in his own old car back in the days before it all went wrong. When Danny finally kicked Mikey out of the driver’s seat, Callie begged to drive.

He let her sit in his lap and spin the Jeep around an empty parking lot in North Salinas a few times, then took over. “We gotta get started. We want to make Tahoe today.”

“I can’t go to Tahoe,” Mikey said. “My parents will worry.”

“That’s a long way,” Callie said, “isn’t it?”

“Oh, not so far. Don’t worry. Your parents know all about this. They’re meeting us up there. Yeah, the whole neighborhood’s clearing out because of the fires, taking a Fourth of July holiday. We’re gonna have a big party. I had extra room for the trip so they sent me to pick up you guys, that’s all.”

“What about clothes?” Callie asked. “What about summer school?”

“Well, this fire thing scared ’em, and they all needed a break. I heard-yeah, Callie, your grandma said she called your teacher, didn’t your teacher tell you?”

“No. I guess she forgot.”

“You ever been to Tahoe?”

Mikey said, “It’s cool. Maybe we can swim in the lake.”

“That’s it. There are little lakes high up in the mountains. A place called Ginny Lake like a blue jewel-right, like a jewel…”

They were loving the adventure, and all the good sense in the world went bye-bye temporarily. He played the radio stations they liked, and for a while, they pretended to shoot out the window with cocked fingers aimed at enemies all around. He knew they stood out and the Jeep was a gas hog, so as soon as he could, he switched it for an old Ford Explorer at a rest stop while the kids and the owners were in the bathroom. Luckily, the kids came out first and off they drove. The SUV had leather bucket seats, bottled water, all the conveniences.

Danny felt like laughing, though the money front was pretty dire. He’d killed Donnelly over seventy-five bucks in Donnelly’s wallet. He’d been sure Donnelly would have a lot of cash somewhere at his place, but before he could find out anything Donnelly came at him and-and-

And Donnelly lost. Dumb speed freak, he only weighed about a hundred fifty, what made him think he could take Danny?

“We need something that’ll take the bumps up in Tahoe,” he said. “My friend switched with me for a few days. You ever fished before?” Neither one had fished, and they were both eager to try it. So they accepted what he said the way kids sometimes did, whatever, shrugs, after a few more easy lies.

In Dixon, they stopped for shakes and burgers at the Carl’s Jr. They fought over what channel to listen to on the radio, but after a while, the carbs and fat did their dirty work, putting both the kids out for the rest of the count. By the time they woke up, it was morning. He had already stopped at his mom’s for his fishing gear, some sleeping bags, and traveling money, and they were at the Gerdes cabin, hungry again.

“Best way to catch fish in most of the lakes up here is with Power Bait,” Danny said. “Orange. For some reason, that works.” Maybe the fish up here were deprived of the bright colors fish in warmer waters saw every day. They saw the orange bait as something unique and maybe especially tasty, like candy.

They were sitting by what was really nothing more than a dammed-up part of a stream, but it was big enough to excite Mikey, and Danny needed something to get the kids off his back until he could dope them both up good for the night. He was running on adrenaline, scared, thinking how the whole state would be alarmed by now, thinking about the turning lights on the tops of the sheriffs’ cars. But the kids couldn’t see his fright.

Having them around comforted him. He had always liked stories about mountain men, off in the woods surviving on the land, but always knew he couldn’t stay out for long because he couldn’t stand being alone. Sitting on the damp new ground cover, looking at the mule ears pushing up from the ground the snow had finally left, he could rest for a second. Mikey swished his little pole through the water and Callie wandered around, and Danny wished like hell that none of it had happened.

He should have thought up a better cover story. Like, a kidnapper was after them and their parents wanted them to hide out with Danny for a few days, that would have been so much better. But he never seemed to have time to plan right. He’d get the germ of an idea about how to handle something and the next thing he knew, it blew up into something awful.

They had spent the morning hours finding and setting up a camp. He liked this location, with the tents butted up against the rocky caverns that kept hibernating bears cozy in winter. He got on his dead phone twice and pretended to check in with George and Darryl. “Yeah, we gotta stick it out tonight all by ourselves, something came up,” he had told them.

He’d give old George a real call pretty soon, when it was convenient. Good old George, called him a loser, then begged him to do his dirty work, then stiffed him.

“But we don’t have anything orange,” Mikey was saying, peering into the small fishing kit.

“We got worms, though.” Danny brought out the night crawlers he had picked up in town, and showed Mikey how to thread one up the shank of a hook, leaving some dangling over. “Use a number six hook for this bait, and blow ’em up with a worm blower.” He showed the kids how. “Another trick is using sugar cubes on a bigger hook,” he said. “That’s the method in clear lakes like Emigrant and Margaret. You fix ’em on the line with rubber bands. You got to cast real carefully, but when they melt in the water, the rubber band comes loose and the worm looks real natural. Or you can always try grasshoppers.”

“I’m hungry,” Callie said.

“That’s why we’re catching fish, Callie. To eat. This is Outdoor Camp,” Danny said.

“I’m cold.” She hugged her little sweater tight.

“You can’t be cold. It’s eighty degrees!”