Cait nodded slowly. “What now?”

“Now,” Brodie said grimly, “we find some way of getting our car out of that fucking pond.”

EIGHT

“I am guilty of criminal stupidity.”

Sarah turned her head quickly to look at Tucker, startled by the grim anger in his voice. “Why? You couldn’t know they’d find us back there so quickly—”

“That’s just it. I should have known. I should have realized.”

“Realized what?”

“How they could find us. Wasn’t there a sign back there for a rest stop coming up?”

“I think so. But—”

Tucker shook his head. “Let’s see if I’m right about this. Ah…” He took the exit for the rest stop, and minutes later he was pulling into a parking space slightly apart from several other cars. “There should be a flashlight in the glove compartment; could you get it for me, please?”

She did, and handed it across. “Tucker—”

“It’ll just take me a minute to check something. Stay here, Sarah.”

He left the car running, and she watched in puzzlement as he got out and promptly dropped to the pavement to check underneath the car. He hadn’t been there more than a couple of minutes when another motorist paused on his way past and called sympathetically, “Hit something?”

Tucker’s response was cheerful, “Yeah, a hell of a pothole back there. No damage, though.” He climbed to his feet and brushed at his jeans.

“Your lucky day,” the man responded, and continued on his way.

Tucker slid into the car and closed the door. “No damage at all,” he muttered, his face grim once more as he reached across Sarah to return the flashlight to the glove compartment.

“What is it?”

“A bug,” he said bitterly. “A damned electronic device used to track things. In this case—us. They didn’t have any trouble finding us because they knew exactly where we were.”

It shouldn’t have surprised Sarah since they had already agreed that their enemy had to be both smart and organized. But it did surprise her. And it gave her a creepy feeling, even worse than being watched. Someone knew every place they had been, every stop they had made. It was as if a ghostly companion had come along in the backseat, smiling derisively because they’d thought they were alone.

“Did you remove it?” she asked him, trying to keep her voice steady.

“No.” He looked at her intently. “Let’s make it work for us.”

“How?”

“By leading them on a wild-goose chase while we head in another direction. How do you feel about a quick but roundabout trip to Chicago?”

Her first impulse was to say that was the wrong direction, but she thought she had some idea of what he had in mind. “Then we’d double back?”

“Later. After we get rid of this car.”

Sarah thought about that, then said, “Wouldn’t it be easier to just put the bug somewhere else—maybe on a bus or something? You shouldn’t have to lose your car because of this.”

He shook his head. “This bug has a magnetic seal, and I’m betting they’d know it if we tried to switch it to another vehicle. But if we switch vehicles, they won’t know. And by the time they find out, we should be well on our way back…to wherever it is we’re going. And I was about ready to trade this car in anyway. We need something more rugged, maybe a Jeep or some other four-wheel-drive utility. Our romp through the woods proved that.”

“We couldn’t just switch vehicles here?”

“We could. But if we want to throw them off the track for any time at all, we should head in a direction other than north for a while. Besides, I have a friend in Chicago in the car business who’ll let me trade this car and conveniently lose the paperwork for at least a few days, which might give us a little more time.”

Paperwork could be traced, Sarah knew. And the DMV could almost certainly be accessed with a computer and the right codes, so they had to assume the enemy could do just that. At least that. But she still felt profoundly uneasy. So much time and distance would be lost. “If you have to wait until Monday to trade the car…”

Tucker started to reach for her hand but stopped himself before he touched her—and both of them were aware of that reluctance. “Chicago’s only ten or twelve hours from here, Sarah. We won’t lose much time. We can take a more direct route east as soon as the trade’s made, and be heading north again by Monday night.”

“With only a few days of September left.”

“It’s a risk, I know. We could just tear the bug off and leave it in the trash can out there. But if we do that, there’s a good chance they’d still be able to find us. This car is fairly visible, and they know we’re driving it. They could guess we’d still be heading north. If they have the right connections in law enforcement or just the right equipment, they could track this car’s GPS. Or they could even have all the major highways covered somehow, have people on the lookout for us. But even more, we can’t be sure they didn’t plant something else in this car. Something I wouldn’t recognize as dangerous to us. And that’s a chance we can’t take.”

Slowly, Sarah nodded. But in her mind was the panicked awareness of delay and time lost.

It was almost October.

Murphy’s third burner cell phone of the week rang, and she answered it with a frown. “Yeah?”

“What the hell happened?”

She didn’t allow his anger to spark her own. “I was doing my job. Did you enjoy your swim?”

“Goddammit, Murphy. Did you put them on alert?”

“Duran was coming.”

“Why the hell didn’t you warn me? Five minutes earlier and I wouldn’t have ended up looking like a jackass.”

“You’ll have to forgive me. I was more concerned with them than you.”

He drew a breath and let it out slowly. But the words were still snapped out when he said, “This is what happens when the right hand doesn’t know what the left one is doing. I’ve warned you, Murphy.”

“I work alone.”

“And I have no problem with that. But when I’m working the other side of the street, I expect you to alert me before you act.”

“Noted.” Her voice was level.

“Are you on them now?” He had the wisdom not to sound triumphant.

“Not exactly.”

“Murphy—”

“You worry too much, Brodie.”

“Do you understand how much time we have left?” His voice was tight. “Are you aware that it’s probably just a matter of days now?”

“I am aware of that, yes.” It was her turn to draw a breath in an attempt to hold on to patience.

“Then do your job.”

He hung up on her.

Murphy closed the burner phone and removed the battery for good measure, tossing it into a trash can as she passed while the phone itself was drop-kicked into the gutter. “But that’s what I’m doing, Brodie,” she murmured to herself. “My job.”

She pulled yet another disposable phone from the leather pouch hanging against her hip, turned it on, and punched in a familiar number. As soon as the call was answered, she spoke briskly.

“I kept him from making contact. And he’s pissed.”

“Never mind him. He’ll get over it.”

“Easy for you to say,” Murphy muttered. “He has a mean right hook. I’ve seen him use it. I’d rather not be on the receiving end, thanks all the same.”

“With a little luck, you won’t be anywhere near Brodie for a while, so relax.”

“Yeah, right. And in the meantime?”

“Chicago.”

Sarah didn’t say much after they turned back onto the highway, grappling with the growing certainty of just how far-reaching and complex this situation obviously was. And how terrifying.

The lake had seemed like a safe place, a place where they could rest and regroup, make plans. Then that warning had come, presumably from a friend or ally and, again in the middle of the night, they had run for their lives.