Melba shook her head almost hopelessly.

“Can you open up one of those phones for me, Mel?” Tom asked. “My arthritis is kicking up bad.”

“Sure.” She got out one of the plastic packages and began to explore its seams. “I need to tell you something, Doc.”

“What?” he asked, sensing trouble.

Melba looked up, her eyes filled with guilt. “Dr. Elliott and I went and talked to Penn.”

Tom’s chest ached suddenly, and his breath went shallow. “Why did you do that?”

“We were afraid something had happened to you. Dr. Drew had been calling his lake house all morning, and nobody picked up. We figured the best thing would be to send Penn over there.”

“Did you tell Penn where I am now?”

“No, no. I didn’t tell Dr. Elliott, either.” Melba was clearly in distress. “I promised Penn I would call him if you got back in touch with me, but . . . I couldn’t bring myself to do it.”

Tom placed a nitro tablet under his tongue. “Okay,” he said, trying to breathe deeply. “Okay.”

“I’m sorry,” Melba said. “This is hard, Doc. I’m scared for you. I knew I shouldn’t have left you before, and I was right. It’s a miracle you’re even standing here now.”

Tom gave her a reassuring smile. “You know I’m hard to kill, Mel. I’ve outlived at least two serious diseases already.”

“I’m not talking about disease.”

“I know. But . . . this is one of those times when we just have to hold our nerve. I know you don’t understand, but you’re better off not knowing more than you do. I’m asking a lot of you, I know. And you can go back home, now that you’ve brought me these supplies. I’ve already asked too much.”

Melba sat on the arm of the sofa, folded her arms, and looked at him like an angry sister. “You think I drove out here just to leave you with no help? In the shape you’re in? I know you know better than that.” The nurse sighed and looked around the opulent living room. “Lord, Quentin Avery’s got more money than anybody has a right to. You can’t make this kind of money doing the right thing.”

“Maybe not,” Tom conceded. “But he’s done more good for more people than most of us ever will. I figure he’s earned the right to sell out just a little at the end of his life.”

Melba gave Tom a chiding look. “That’s not how it works with right and wrong, Dr. Cage. And you know it.”

Tom looked back at her for a few seconds, wanting to explain himself. But in the end he turned away without speaking.

CAITLIN WOKE FROM A dead sleep on her office sofa with no idea what time it was. She’d switched off the ringers on her phones, but still her dreams had been troubled: she’d been frantically treading cold, black water as dark figures with yellow eyes floated around her in an obscene ballet. Cypress knees like gnarled wet knuckles jutted from the water, giving her the feeling that a great hand waited to snatch her below the surface, and when she looked up to escape this sight, she saw twisted limbs and feathery leaves hanging over her like the hair of some terrible witch.

“Caitlin?” said a voice.

Someone poked her shoulder, then shook her, and bright light burned away the dark world that had enveloped her.

Jamie Lewis stood beside the sofa, staring down at her. “Are you okay?” he asked, starting to kneel.

“Don’t get too close. I have bad breath.”

Lewis straightened up. “Gary Valentine’s on the landline for you. He said he had a private message for you.”

“Okay,” she said, rolling groggily off the sofa. Gary Valentine was the computer technician she’d dispatched to watch Drew and Melba after Penn told her that both had seen Tom and then lied about it.

“I told him we didn’t have time for games, but Gary still wouldn’t tell me what he wants.”

“Blame me, not him.” Caitlin got to her feet and gave Jamie a smile that triggered a shock of pain from the cheek burn. “Some things you don’t need to know. Hand me the cordless phone, would you?”

Jamie flipped her the bird, then picked up the phone and gave it to her. “Don’t do anything crazy, okay? You nearly died last night. Let’s not go for an encore.”

Caitlin motioned for him to get out.

From the door, Jamie said, “Oh, did you see my text about the state police thing?”

“No.”

“Man, you really were out. The Advocate is reporting that a fourteen-year-old male prostitute from New Orleans claims he was paid for sex by Colonel Mackiever on multiple occasions. Mackiever’s home has been under siege by the media. Some officials are already calling for his resignation.”

“Forrest Knox has got to be behind that. Stay on it, Jamie. Keep digging into Knox’s background. You’ll find something we can use against him.”

As Jamie went out, she thought about Forrest Knox. The man was obviously making an all-out effort to destroy his superior and consolidate his own power. And that would put him in the best possible position to help the Double Eagles survive the attack by Penn and Sheriff Dennis—not to mention protect himself from Mackiever or the FBI. Pushing these thoughts from her mind, she put down the cordless phone, took her Treo from her pocket, and called Gary Valentine.

“Hello?” she said, after the door had closed. “Gary?”

“Thank God,” said the tech’s excited voice. “I think I hit pay dirt.”

“What do you mean?”

“I followed one of the people you asked me to watch. She just went into a place that my gut tells me is what you’re looking for.”

Melba must have gone to Tom again. . . . “Where is she?”

“I probably shouldn’t say on the phone, right?”

Damn, Caitlin thought, realizing she must not be fully awake. “I think this line is safe, but can you give me a clue nobody else could decipher?”

“I’ve been thinking about that. She’s at a private residence. It’s a house that belongs to somebody I’m pretty sure you know. Here’s the clue: the owner’s initials are the same as those of the first two words of the TV show that Gabriel Vance used to rave about.”

Gabriel Vance was a gay reporter who’d worked at the Examiner until he moved to the New Orleans Times-Picayune. He’d done heroic coverage of Hurricane Katrina, but what popped into Caitlin’s mind almost without thought was Gabe’s favorite cable show: Queer as Folk.

“Have you got it?’” Gary asked.

Caitlin almost said “Q-A” aloud, but checked herself. Despite her exhaustion, it had taken her less than five seconds to arrive at Quentin Avery. “I think I have it,” she said. “I’ve never been there, though. Are you looking at it now?”

“You can’t see it from the road. I figured out the owner using Google. You ought to check Google Earth.”

Caitlin glanced at her watch, calculating how long it would take her to reach Quentin’s wooded compound in Jefferson County. Twenty minutes, minimum, and at least twice that to be sure she had no tail.

“I’ll be there in an hour. Forty minutes if I’m clean when I leave here.”

“I’ll be cruising up and down the nearest main road.”

“Thanks, Gary. And don’t tell a soul. Not Jamie, not anybody.”

“I know, boss.”

“Thanks.”

Caitlin hung up and opened the purse on her desk. The .38 Tom had given her years ago was inside it. For a few seconds she considered calling Penn, but in truth her decision was a foregone conclusion. Like Drew and Melba, she would not betray Tom’s location without his permission—not even to his son. Not until she’d heard what he had to say, anyway. Pulling on her jacket, she slung her purse over her shoulder and opened her door.

She nearly jumped out of her skin when she found Jordan Glass standing less than a foot away from her.

“Hey, hey!” Jordan said, catching hold of her arm. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“No, no,” Caitlin said, flustered. “I just wasn’t expecting anybody.”

“Obviously. Looks like you’re headed out, huh?”

Caitlin forced a smile and tried to think of a credible lie. Glass was wearing a black down jacket over a white Synchronicity tour T-shirt splashed with red, blue, and yellow—a relic of the mid-1980s. “I’m just headed home to get a shower,” Caitlin said lamely. “This is the first time things have slowed down at all.”