“You’re saying Forrest Knox was present when Revels and Davis were tortured and killed?”

“And for Viola’s rape, yes. I think he was there when they raped Viola in her house, too. The night Viola died, she told me one of her rapists that first time had been only a boy.”

“My God.” Caitlin squeezed Tom’s hands so hard he jerked them back in pain. “And this is the man you want to make a deal with?”

“I’ve made deals with worse.” He looked down.

A rush of butterflies in Caitlin’s stomach told her she was nearing the heart of the whole complex mystery. “Tom . . . who are you talking about?”

He shook his head, said nothing.

“Are you talking about Carlos Marcello?”

“Cait, please leave it alone.”

“I wish I could. But you know I can’t.” Her mind was racing now, filling in missing connections in the likely sequence of events. Vague memories of what Brody had said about Viola’s survival were coming back to her. “What happened after Ray rescued Viola? Just freeing her physically wouldn’t have saved her.”

“No.”

“Even after you got her to Chicago, the Eagles would have found her. Why didn’t she contact the FBI then? Or even years later? They’d killed her brother. She could have put them in the gas chamber.”

Tom looked at her with something like pity. “You still don’t get it. The woman Ray brought out of that machine shop wasn’t the same woman who’d been dragged in. She’d seen firsthand what those men would do. She knew there was no protection from them. But the maternal instinct is as powerful as any in this world. She did what she had to do to raise her son. Our son.”

Caitlin sensed that they’d come to the final knot. “The Eagles found her in Chicago,” she thought aloud. “They warned her they’d kill her if she ever came back to Natchez. But they didn’t kill her there. Why not, Tom?”

Tom braced himself on the coffee table, then stood, his creaking knees protesting. After steadying himself, he walked over toward the counter, then looked back at her.

“Don’t you know?” he asked in a voice thick with self-disgust.

She did. “You cut a deal with Carlos Marcello. The only man with the power to restrain Brody Royal and the Double Eagles.”

Tom nodded. “Ray had once worked for Carlos, when he was a cop in the NOPD. Ray and I had done each other a few favors back then. I hated being indebted to him, but once Viola’s life was on the line, I had no choice.”

“Tom . . . what did you do for Marcello in return for protecting Viola?”

He blew out a long rush of air. “I sold my soul. A little of it, anyway. Mob men need doctors like anybody else, and Natchez is only three hours from New Orleans. I didn’t supply them with narcotics or anything. But I treated some gunshot wounds, stab wounds, that kind of thing. And I didn’t keep any records of it. By the late seventies, when Penn was graduating from high school, Marcello’s power was starting to wane, and the relationship faded away.”

Caitlin took some time to process this. She wasn’t sure Tom had told her everything, but one thing seemed clear: Tom Cage was a good man who’d gotten himself into a bad situation, and he’d done what was necessary to protect both his family and the mistress he’d loved—a mistress who had desperately needed protection. “Tom . . . I don’t know what to say. I’m so sorry, for you and for Viola.”

Tom seemed lost in his own world. As Caitlin studied him, she suddenly realized why he was willing to bet everything on a deal with a devil like Forrest Knox. Tom had made a similar bargain in the past, and it had achieved the desired result. But this time, she somehow knew, such a deal would not work. The world had changed since the 1960s, and not all for the better. An old-time godfather might have honored such a bargain in his day, but Forrest Knox wouldn’t hesitate to betray or kill anyone who was a threat to him. Tom had said it himself.

An idea suddenly struck her. She got to her feet and walked to within an arm’s length of him. “Tom, if you had that kind of contact with Marcello—and you knew the Knoxes so well, as their doctor—maybe that’s enough to buy you protective custody from the FBI. They seem to think Marcello was behind the assassination.”

Tom blinked like a man snapping out of a trance. “I don’t know anything about the Kennedy assassination.”

“Maybe not, but they don’t know that! Just play what you do know for all it’s worth, get to safety, and then straighten out everything else.”

“That won’t help Walt. Until I can protect him, I’m not going to do anything. I can’t make a separate peace.”

Christ, Caitlin thought, cursing his integrity for the thousandth time in her life. “Tom, you can’t make a bargain with Forrest Knox. You told me yourself he’s insane.”

“If Forrest is his father’s son, he has a practical side.”

“But you have nothing to bargain with!”

“That’s not strictly true.” He stared at her for several seconds, then walked back to the couch and sat down. The intensity of his gaze triggered deep misgivings within her. “Will you sit down for a second?”

Caitlin walked reluctantly back to the coffee table and sat down.

“You’re in a unique position to help me resolve this nightmare,” Tom said. “There’s a solution to this dilemma that can achieve both safety for our family and justice for the dead. A way that I can make a deal with Forrest—and honor it—but still have him go to prison, preferably to death row. Also without you stopping your investigation, by the way.”

Despite his last statement, she still felt profoundly uneasy. “I’m listening.”

“It’s simple. Instead of printing the results of your investigative work on a daily basis, you could feed it to the FBI. Let this Agent Kaiser take Forrest down. It’s his job to take that risk, after all. If you’re willing to do it that way, I can promise Knox that you won’t be tearing him apart in the Examiner. Along with Penn and Dennis laying off the Double Eagles, that should be enough to get Forrest to cancel the APB, and possibly even blame one of the dead Eagles for Viola’s death. The FBI can use whatever you’ve uncovered to destroy the Knoxes, but our family won’t be blamed. Walt and I can safely return home, and you and Penn will live to get married and raise children.”

Caitlin was stunned speechless. She got up and took five steps away from the sofa, her cheeks filling with blood. “You’re asking me to compromise every principle I hold dear.”

Tom’s eyebrows went up again. “Am I? I don’t think so. I’m just asking you to forgo the glory of breaking the case—and only for a little while, really. You could still write a book about the case, after Forrest was in prison. Or dead.”

The blood drained from her cheeks. She felt as though he’d slapped her face.

“I’m sorry to put it so bluntly,” Tom said gently. “I know your work is your passion. It means more to you than almost anything else. Maybe more than everything.” He smiled sadly again. “Only you know the answer to that.”

Caitlin wanted to argue, but she couldn’t find her voice. Her throat felt like something had lodged in it, blocking the air. But the worst thing was that Tom had read her innermost desires as accurately as a gifted physician diagnosing a disease. She brushed back her bangs and looked around the room like someone seeing the world for the first time.

“I can see the idea doesn’t appeal to you,” Tom said. “But before you decide, let me make the existential argument. Because despite what happened at Brody Royal’s house last night, you don’t seem to grasp the reality of the danger. Think about your baby, Caitlin. Think about Penn and Annie. Think about Peggy and me. Is anything more important than that?”

“The truth,” she said in a taut voice, but the word sounded hollow even to her.

Tom took another deep, labored breath. “Most times I’d agree with you. But please believe me: if you go after the Knoxes as you intend to, they will kill you. Penn will lose his second wife, Annie her second mother.”