“Leave it, Magpie,” a voice said from above and behind her.

The use of her nickname made her catch her breath. It was a term of endearment that only her father and mother had used.

CHAPTER 56

WASHINGTON, D.C.

Gwen hated hospital gowns. They were always three times too large. Her feet were freezing cold. Why hadn’t she thought to bring socks? She was filling her mind with trivial things to keep it from remembering the biopsy needle sinking into her flesh. She had had the procedure explained to her three or four times now. They gave her a local anesthesia and used an ultrasound-guided needle instead of a freehand needle biopsy because the mass couldn’t be easily felt. There’d be no scars or bruising. It was much less invasive than an open surgical biopsy. She’d be able to return to work or go home right away.

She had been assured that it had “gone very well.” But they wanted her to “lie here for a short time.” All simple and fine, and yet the nurse seemed surprised that she was alone, that no one would be picking her up. But Gwen hadn’t told anyone. Only Julia Racine knew and Gwen had made her promise not to tell.

Her clothes, jewelry, cell phone, and shoes were placed neatly on the side table beside her bed. Her cell phone—which she had set to Vibrate—now rattled against the table surface. No one had told her she could not use her phone. She reached for it and felt an ache and tenderness where the needle had gone in three times, taking three tissue samples.

“This is Gwen.”

“Dr. Patterson, it’s Agent Alonzo. Do you have a minute to talk?”

“Of course,” she said as her eyes darted toward the door.

“I’m going over some information and I’m wondering if you can tell me about something Otis Dodd said.”

“Okay.”

“Do you remember if he told you how he knew about the body in the Iowa barn? The biker with the tattoo?”

“I’m sure he said Jack told him.”

“Do you remember if he said when Jack told him this?”

Gwen stopped to think. Otis had thrown the information out at her, right before he left. He’d done it in anger when he thought she didn’t believe him. Almost out of spite; perhaps he had not intended to tell her at all.

“I don’t think he said when exactly. He and Jack spent an evening at a bar, drinking.” Alonzo was quiet and before he responded she asked, “Do you finally know the man’s identity?”

“Yes, I believe so.”

She heard computer keys tapping.

“He’s Michael James Earling of St. Paul, Minnesota. Did Otis ever say if he talked to Jack after that evening of drinking?”

“No, he always referred to it as one evening, sort of a chance encounter with a stranger.” She tried to remember how Otis had worded it. “There was something he said about him and Jack being messed up. That they weren’t normal. He seemed pleased that they had that in common.”

Again, she waited and Agent Alonzo was silent.

“Why do you ask? What’s going on?”

“Otis has been in prison for almost a year. Michael James Earling disappeared only three weeks ago. The medical examiner says that’s a fair estimation of how long the body has been in the barn.”

The realization came over Gwen in a cold sweat.

“Otis couldn’t possibly know about a tattooed biker in the barn,” Alonzo said. “Not unless he was still in touch with Jack.”

CHAPTER 57

“Just slow and gentle like,” the man told her.

Maggie pulled and eased her body in front of Tully before she looked up at him. He was pointing what looked like a Glock, aiming it at her head. He still had the Booty Hunter cap on. But Jack wasn’t Buzz.

It took her a moment to recognize him.

“You had me in Iowa. Why bring me all the way down here?” she asked Howard Elliott.

She felt Tully stirring. Heard him groan.

“What would be the fun in that?”

“He’s still alive,” Otis said.

Maggie’s stomach clenched. She thought he meant Tully, but she could see Otis standing over Trooper Wiley’s and Warden Demarcus’s bodies. He had Wiley’s service revolver in his hand and it looked like a toy swallowed up by Otis’s huge fingers.

“The executor from the farm is Jack?” Tully mumbled. “Son of a bitch.”

“Looks like this one’s still alive, too.”

“So do I call you Howard?” Maggie asked, surprised at how calm and steady she was able to make her voice sound when the panic continued to crawl like ice through her veins.

“It’s John Howard,” Otis said, coming up beside his friend. “But he likes to be called Jack.” Otis’s grin hadn’t disappeared. His tongue poked out and licked his lips as he shot a glance over his shoulder. “He’s still alive.”

It was Demarcus Otis seemed concerned about. The warden was squirming on the ground. Maggie could see his arms wrapped around himself.

“It’s a stomach wound,” Jack told him without taking his eyes off Maggie. “He’ll die. It’ll just take a while. I thought you might want him to suffer a bit. But we have a problem here. I might have just winged this one.”

Tully shifted and Jack raised his Glock.

“I’m not going anywhere without him,” Maggie said, lifting her left hand and showing him the handcuffs.

“Now, why’d you want to go and do a thing like that?”

Otis laughed but it was a nervous, forced sound followed by his tongue darting out again and wetting his lips.

“You realize I can shoot that off.”

“Jack hates guns,” Otis said. “Ain’t that right?”

Otis stood a head taller than Jack and was about two times his size. He could easily pick up Jack and snap him in two, yet the giant fidgeted around him like a boy, looking to please a mentor.

“What’s that you’re always saying?” Otis continued. “Bullets ruin the meat.”

She noticed the hunting knife in a sheath attached to Jack’s belt and Maggie’s pulse started to race. Meat? Then she remembered that the bodies had been cut. Several decapitated. Ethan’s dismembered. Zach Lester’s intestines pulled out and strung across the branches of the tree above him.

“He better be able to walk,” Jack said, gesturing to Tully. Then to Otis, he said, “Get his gun out of his jacket.”

Jack’s eyes met Maggie’s and this time he was smiling like he suddenly found the situation amusing.

“Actually doubles are much more interesting,” he told her. “Maybe I’ll just cut him off of you, piece by piece.”

CHAPTER 58

Maggie could hear the storm growing closer. Back inside the forest the tall pines provided her only a sliver of a view. The sun had been playing hide and seek all afternoon. Now it was gone, replaced by a bruise-colored sky.

She had struggled to get Tully up on his feet. Jack wouldn’t allow her to check his wound. Although Tully stayed conscious he seemed to slide in and out at different levels. She had handcuffed her left wrist to his right. In order to help him walk she had to loop his right arm up over her shoulder and neck, then keep her left wrist held up to his at her right shoulder.

It was awkward. Maggie had to walk with her left arm stretched across her body. Since Tully was about six inches taller he had to lean down onto her. It felt like walking with a straitjacket and a backpack on at the same time. Every time Tully lifted or jerked his arm, he also wrenched hers. The handcuff bit into her flesh and her arm felt like it’d be yanked out of its socket.

And Jack, of course, found all of this amusing.

They hadn’t walked far when the river appeared. A fog hung over it like a displaced cloud had fallen out of the storm-brewing sky. A rowboat had been dragged halfway up the beach. Tall reeds made up the rest of the bank and they waved in the breeze, further indication of the change in weather.