“You could look at the floor of that trunk all day, not see it,” Howie said. “Whoever built it did a good job.”

She got her fingers under the edge, pulled. The section swung up on small hinges.

“It didn’t roll out of the Honda factory that way,” he said. “I can guarantee you that.”

She looked into the space beneath. Bare metal. Empty.

“Anything in it when you opened it?”

“No. Just the way it is now.”

“There were guns in the trunk when he pulled the car over,” she said. “In plain sight.”

“That’s right.”

“But nothing in here?”

“Nope.”

She put her fingertips on the compartment lid, pressed it down so it clicked into place, flush with the trunk floor.

“Something, isn’t it?” he said.

“It is.”

“Doesn’t make any sense, does it?”

“No.”

“Didn’t to the sheriff either.”

“I wouldn’t guess it did. Any fingerprints on it?”

“Wiped clean.”

“Find anything else?”

“That’s it.”

“Thanks, Howie.”

“If the sheriff asks if you’ve been around, what do I say?”

“Tell him the truth.”

Behind her, Danny was laughing, in a tug-o’-war with Reno over the pull toy. The dog was winning, Danny giving ground inch by inch. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d heard him laugh like that.

“Come on, honey,” she said. “We need to go.”

He released the toy and the dog fell backward, sprang up, and brought it to him again. He took her hand, rubbed the dog’s head a final time. Howie walked them back to the Blazer.

“What’s that?” he said.

“What?”

He knelt behind the rear bumper. “This.”

She walked around. There was a soiled strip of silver tape on the bottom right side of the bumper.

“I don’t know,” she said.

He clawed at it with a fingernail, got it loose. It peeled off in a single piece, left shiny chrome beneath it.

He looked up at her. She shrugged.

“First I’ve seen it,” she said. “I don’t know where it came from.”

He rolled it into a ball.

“Nothing, I guess,” he said. “Take care of yourself, Sara. Let me know if there’s anything else I can do for you.”

“Thanks, Howie.”

She helped Danny get belted in, started the engine. Howie waved to them from the bay door, the dog at his feet.

“ ’Bye, Reno,” Danny called out, though the windows were closed.

He was quiet as they headed home. The sun was setting, the air growing cooler, a cold front moving in. Wisps of fog were beginning to rise from the ground. She thought about the empty compartment. Billy sitting beside her that morning, saying he’d told her everything.

If the guns were in the trunk, what had been in the compartment? They’d gone over the car with a drug dog, gotten no hits, no traces of residue. More guns? Money?

She’d been on the scene minutes after the shooting, Willis’s body still warm. If Billy had taken something from the car, he couldn’t have gone far with it. Too much of a risk to put it in his cruiser. He’d have hidden it nearby. Tossed it into the cane or the swamp, gone back to get it later.

You’re holding on to your denial with both hands, aren’t you? How much more do you need to know?

From the backseat, “Mom?”

“What, honey?”

“Did you find what you were looking for?”

She turned to him. He held the tyrannosaurus in his lap, didn’t look up.

“Yes,” she said and looked back at the road. “I guess I did.”

She was getting ready for bed when the phone rang. Barefoot in sweats, she went into the kitchen, picked up the cordless on the second ring, took it into the living room.

“Hello?”

Silence, then a woman’s voice.

“You know who this is, right?”

Sara gave that a moment.

“Yes. I think so.”

“I’m not even sure why I’m doing this, but I guess I was thinking about that little boy you have. He didn’t have anything to do with any of this.”

“No, he didn’t.”

“There’s some things going on… it’s not the way I wanted it, but it might be too late to stop it.”

“What-”

“Those people, they don’t care about Derek, about me, or about our boys. They’re down there for their own reasons.”

“I’m not sure I understand.”

“You don’t need to. I’m just telling you, look out for yourself. And for that little one, too.”

“What do you mean?”

There was no answer. Just a click and hiss, and the line was dead.

TWENTY-TWO

Morgan moved through the woods in the dark. He pushed branches aside, stepped over fallen logs. Soon he could see the lights of the house below. He reached the edge of the trees, looked out across the dead cornfield.

The Camaro and truck were both in the carport, the Camaro’s trunk open. Figures moved past the lighted windows of the house.

The cornfield was a dark mass below him. He’d have to make his way through it, try to come up on the house from behind. And stay quiet while he was doing it, try not to break an ankle in a hole, or step into a nest of snakes.

He was halfway down the slope when the front door opened. Flynn looked out, scanned the yard, then disappeared back inside. When he came out again, he was carrying a suitcase and a long-barreled revolver. He walked to the Camaro, eyes on the yard, the cornfield. He set the suitcase in the trunk, went back in.

A few minutes later, he came out with a smaller case. He put it in the trunk, shut the lid, looked around, the gun still in his hand. Went back inside. Morgan waited.

Five minutes later, Flynn and the woman came out together. They spoke briefly, and she got behind the wheel of the Camaro. Flynn stepped away, looked down the driveway, then cut his eyes back to the cornfield, the woods beyond. His gaze seemed to pass over Morgan, move on.

She started the engine, headlights flashing on, illuminating the truck. Flynn watched as she swung the Camaro around, pointed it back down the driveway, the exhaust rumbling loud.

Morgan waited for Flynn to go inside, then walked back through the woods to the car.

Wisps of fog gathered in the Toyota’s headlights, grew thicker as he drove. The night air was cooling. Far ahead he could see the Camaro’s taillights, the glitter of the reflecting tape on the bumper.

They were on the county road, heading away from town, little traffic in either direction. He slowed to keep distance between them. The Beretta was on the passenger seat, beneath the half-folded road map.

Ahead on the right was an empty drive-in theater, the screen white and torn, the speaker poles beheaded. He’d passed it on the way here. Now, as he watched, a car came from behind the darkened cashier’s shack and bumped onto the road, lights off. It sped after the Camaro.

Morgan killed his own lights, gave the Toyota gas. Gradually he closed the distance. As he got closer, he saw it was a brown Volvo, wondered if it was the same car he’d seen at Delva’s. It settled in behind the Camaro by several car lengths, not speeding up or trying to pass.

He floored the gas pedal, powered down the passenger window. The rear of the Volvo loomed large in front of him. Feet from the bumper, he hit the headlights, then the high beams. The inside of the Volvo was flooded with light. Five dark faces turned toward him. Two in the front, three in the back. Dreads, bandanas.

He jerked the Toyota into the left lane, raised the Beretta one-handed, fired twice through the open window, the gun jumping with the recoil. He heard glass explode, and the Volvo swerved away, brakes screeching. It angled hard onto the shoulder, kicking up dirt, facing back the way it had come.

Morgan set the gun on the seat, gripped the wheel with both hands. He pulled back into the right lane and came up fast on the Camaro’s tail. In the glare of his high beams, he could see the woman’s face looking back at him in the rearview.