Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 150, Nos. 5 & 6. Whole Nos. 914 & 915, November/December 2017

Small Signs by Charlaine Harris

As this issue goes to press, Midnight, Texas, the third TV series based on Charlaine Harris’s fiction, has begun airing on NBC! From 2008 through 2014, True Blood, adapted from the author’s Southern Vampire Mysteries, was broadcast on HBO, and recently the Hallmark Channel presented a sixth two-hour movie derived from the Harris novels starring librarian Aurora Teagarden.

David Angola was leaning against Anne DeWitt’s car in the Travis High School parking lot. The bright early-fall sun shone on his newly shaved dark head. It was four-thirty on a Friday afternoon, and the lot was almost empty.

Anne did not get the surprise David had (perhaps) intended. She always looked out the window of her office after she’d collected her take-home paperwork.

Anne hadn’t stayed alive as long as she had by being careless.

After a few moments of inner debate, she decided to go home as usual. She might as well find out what David wanted. Anne was utterly alert as she walked toward him, her hand on the knife in her jacket pocket. She was very good with sharp instruments.

“I come in peace,” he called, smiling, holding out his hands to show they were empty. His white teeth flashed in a broad smile.

The last time Anne had seen David they’d been friends, or at least as close to friends as they could be. But that had been years ago. She stopped ten feet away. “Who’s minding Camp West while you’re gone?” she said.

“Chloe,” he said.

“Don’t remember her.”

“Chloe Montgomery,” he said. “Short blond hair? Six feet tall?”

“The one who went to Japan to study martial arts?”

David nodded.

“I didn’t like her, but you obviously have a different opinion.” Anne was only marking time with the conversation until she got a feel for the situation. She had no idea why David was here. Ignorance did not sit well with her.

“Not up to me,” David said.

Anne absorbed that. “How could she not be your choice? Last I knew, you were still calling the shots.”

For the past eight years, David Angola had been the head of Camp West, a very clandestine California training facility specializing in survival under harsh conditions... and harsh interrogation.

Anne had been his opposite number at Camp East, located in the Allegheny Mountains. Since the training was so rigorous, at least every other year a student didn’t survive. This was the cost of doing business. However, a senator’s daughter had died at Camp East. Anne had been fired.

“I was calling the shots until there were some discrepancies in the accounts.” David looked away as he said that.

“You got fired over a decimal point?” Anne could scarcely believe it.

“Let’s call it a leave of absence while the situation’s being investigated,” he said easily. But his whole posture read “tense” to Anne, and that contrasted with his camouflage as an average citizen. David always blended in. Though Anne remembered his taste as leaning toward silk T-shirts and designer jeans, today he wore a golf shirt and khakis under a tan windbreaker. Half the men in North Carolina were wearing some version of the same costume.

Anne considered her next question. “So, you came here to do what?”

“I couldn’t be in town and not lay eyes on you, darlin’. I like the new nose, but the dark hair suited you better.”

Anne shrugged. Her hair was an unremarkable chestnut. Her nose was shorter and thinner. Her eyebrows had been reshaped. She looked attractive enough. The point was that she did not look like Twyla Burnside. “You’ve seen me. Now what?”

“I mainly want to see my man,” David said easily. “I thought it was only good sense to check in with you first.”

Anne was not surprised that David had come to see his former second-in-command, Holt Halsey. David had sent Holt to keep an eye on Anne when she’d gotten some death threats... at least, that was the explanation Holt had given Anne. She’d taken it with a pinch of salt.

“So go see him.” Anne glanced down at her watch. “Holt should have locked up the gym by now. He’s probably on his way home. I’m sure you have his address.” Aside from that one quick glance, she’d kept her eyes on David. His hands were empty, but that meant nothing to someone as skilled as he was. They’d both been instructors before they’d gotten promoted.

David straightened up and took a step toward his car, a rental. “I hated to see you get the axe. Cassie’s not a patch on you.”

“Water under the bridge,” Anne said stiffly.

“Holt had a similar issue,” David said casually. Apparently, he was fishing to find out if Anne knew why Holt had left Camp West.

Anne didn’t, and she’d never asked. “What is this really about, David?”

“I’m at loose ends. I haven’t taken a vacation in two years. I’m always at the camp. But until they find out who actually took the money, they don’t want me around. I didn’t have anything to do. So I came to see Greg. Holt.”

That wasn’t totally ridiculous. “I think he’ll be glad to see you,” Anne said. “When will you know the verdict?”

“Soon, I hope. There’s an independent audit going on. It’ll prove I’m innocent. You know me. I always had a lot of trouble with the budgeting part of my job. Holt did most of the work. Makes it more of a joke, that Oversight thinks I’m sophisticated enough to embezzle.”

“That’s Oversight’s job, to be suspicious.” Embezzling. No wonder David had taken a trip across country. You didn’t want to be in Oversight’s crosshairs if the news was bad.

“Okay, I’m on my way,” he said, slapping the hood of his white Nissan.

“Have a good visit,” Anne said.

“Sure thing.” David straightened and sauntered to his rental car. “Holt’s place is close?”

“About six miles south. It’s a small complex on the left, all townhomes. Crow Creek Village. He’s number eight.”

“Has he taken to North Carolina?”

“You can ask him,” she said, smiling pleasantly. Would this conversation never end?

He nodded. “Good to see you... Anne.”

Anne watched until David’s car was out of sight. Then she allowed herself to relax. She pulled her cell phone from her purse and tapped a number on speed dial.

“Anne,” Holt said. “I was—”

“David Angola is here,” she said. “He was waiting for me when I came out of the school.”

Holt was silent for a moment. “Why?”

“He says they asked him to leave the camp while the books are being audited. Money’s missing. He’s on his way to see you.”

“Okay.” Holt didn’t sound especially alarmed or excited.

They hung up simultaneously.

Anne wondered if Holt was worried about this unexpected visit. Or maybe he was simply happy his former boss was in town.

Maybe he’d even known David was coming, but Anne thought not. I’ve fallen into bad habits. I felt secure. I quit questioning things I should have questioned. Anne was more shaken than she wanted to admit to herself when she entertained the thought Holt might have been playing a long game.

The short drive home was anything but pleasant.

Anne’s home was on an attractive cul-de-sac surrounded by a thin circle of woodland. She’d never had a house before, and she’d looked at many places before she’d picked this two-story red brick with white trim. It was somewhat beyond her salary, but Anne let it be understood that the insurance payout from her husband’s death had formed the down payment.

Anne noted with satisfaction that the yard crew had come in her absence. The flower beds had been readied for winter. She’d tried working outside — it seemed so domestic, so in character for her new persona — but it had bored her profoundly.

Sooner or later the surrounding area would all be developed. But for now, the woods baffled the sound from the nearby state road. The little neighborhood was both peaceful and cordial. None of the homeowners were out in their front yards, though at the end of the cul-de-sac, a couple of teenage boys were shooting hoops on their driveway.

The grinding noise of the garage door opening seemed very loud. Anne eased in, parking neatly in half of the space. She’d begun leaving the other side open for Holt’s truck.

There was a movement in the corner of her eye. Anne’s head whipped around. Someone had slipped in with the car and run to the front of the garage, quick as a cat. The intruder was a small, hard woman in her forties with harshly dyed black hair.

Anne thought of pinning the woman to the garage wall. But the intruder was smart enough to stand off to the side, out of the path of the car, and also out of the reach of a flung-open door.

This was Anne’s day for encountering dangerous people.

The woman pantomimed rolling down a window, and Anne pressed the button.

“Hello, Cassie,” Anne said. “What a surprise.”

“Lower the garage door. Turn the engine off. Get out slowly. We’re going inside to talk.”

There was a gun in Anne’s center console, but by the time she’d extracted it, Cassie would have shot her. At least the knife was still in Anne’s pocket.

“Hurry up!” Cassie was impatient.

Anne pressed the button to lower the garage door. Following Cassie’s repeated instructions, she put the car in park and turned it off. She could not throw her knife at the best angle to wound Cassie. There was no point delaying; she opened the car door and stood.

“It’s been a long time.” Cassie looked rough. Anne’s former subordinate had never worn makeup, and she certainly hadn’t gotten that dye job in any salon.

“Not long enough,” Cassie said. She pushed her hood completely off her head. Dark hoodie, dark sweatpants. Completely forgettable.

“If you don’t want to talk to me, why are you here? Why the ambush?”

“We need to have a conversation. I figured you’d shoot first and ask questions later,” Cassie said. “All things considered.”

“Considering you threw me under the bus?”

When Senator Miriam Epperson’s daughter had died in the mountain-survival test, Cassie had laid the blame directly on Anne’s shoulders. At the time, Anne had thought that strategy was understandable, even reasonable. It didn’t matter that Cassie had been the one who’d kept telling Dorcas Epperson to suck it up when the girl claimed she was ill. Anne clearly understood that the buck would stop with her, because she was in charge of Camp East. There was no need for both of them to go down.

Understanding Cassie’s motivation did not mean Anne had forgotten.

“It was my chance to take charge,” Cassie said. “Let’s go in the house. Get out your keys, then zip your purse.”

“So why aren’t you at the farm on this fine day? Snow training will begin in a few weeks,” Anne said. She unlocked the back door and punched in the alarm code. She walked into the kitchen slowly, her hands held out from her side.

From behind her, Cassie said, “Have you seen David Angola lately?” Anne had expected that question. She kept walking across the kitchen and into the living room. She bypassed the couch and went to the armchair, her normal seat. She turned to face Cassie. “I’d be more surprised to see David than I am to see you, but I’d be happier. He’s still running Farm West?”

“He was,” Cassie said. She was savagely angry. “We’re both on probation until... never mind. I figured he’d head here, since you’re such a favorite of his. I just found out Greg is here too. He was always David’s man, to the bone.”

“Surely that’s a melodramatic way to look at it?” And inaccurate. Holt was his own man. At least Anne had believed so.

Now she was leaving margin for error.

“I don’t know why both of you are living new lives here,” Cassie said. “In the same town. In North Carolina, for God’s sake. No two people have ever been placed together.”

“Most people get dead,” Anne said. “The point of being here is that my location is secret.”

“It took some doing to find out,” Cassie said. “But by the usual means, I discovered it.” She smiled, very unpleasantly.

“Coercion? Torture? Sex?” Anne added the last option deliberately. Cassie didn’t answer, but she smiled in a smug way. Sex it was.

That’s a leak that needs to be plugged, Anne noted. She should have taken care of it the first time someone from her past had shown up in her house and tried to kill her. At the time, Anne had dismissed it as a one-off, a past enemy with super tracking ability and a lot of funds. Now she knew there was someone who was talking. A weak person, but one who had access to records...

“Gary Pomeroy in tech support,” Anne said, making an informed guess. Cassie’s eyes flickered. Bingo.

“Doesn’t make any difference, does it?” Cassie now stood in front of the couch, still on guard, a careful distance away. She gestured with the gun. “Strip. Throw each garment over to me.”

Anne was angry, though it didn’t show on her face. No one can tell me to strip in my own house, she thought. But what she said was, “What are we going to talk about?” She stepped out of her pumps and unzipped her pants.

“Where Angola hid the money,” Cassie said.

“You’ll have to tell me what you’re talking about,” Anne said. “I’m totally out of the loop.” Anne’s jacket came off (her knife in its pocket), then her blouse. When she was down to her bra and underpants, she turned in a circle to prove there was nothing concealed under them. “So, what money?”

Her eyes fixed on Anne, Cassie ran the fingers of her left hand over every garment, tossing the jacket behind the couch when she felt the knife. “Someone in accounting sent up a flare,” she said. “After that, the accountants settled in. Like flies on a carcass.” Cassie waved her gun toward an easy chair. After Anne sat, she tossed Anne’s pants and blouse back within her reach. While Anne got dressed, keeping her movements slow and steady, Cassie sat on the couch, still too wary and too far away for a successful attack.

“Both camps got audited?” Anne said, buttoning up her blouse.

“Yes, the whole program. Our accounts got frozen. Everyone was buzzing. Bottom line, in the past few years over half a million dollars vanished.”

Anne was surprised at the modesty of the amount. It wasn’t cheap to run clandestine training facilities staffed with expert instructors, much less to keep a fully staffed and equipped infirmary. “The money was missing from the budget? Or from the enemy fund?”

“The fund.” Both farms contributed to a common pool of money confiscated — or stolen outright — from criminals of all sorts, or from people simply deemed enemies. The existence of this fund was known only to the upper managers and to Oversight... and, because it couldn’t be helped, a high-clearance branch of the tech team responsible for data handling also had access to the figures.

Cassie continued, “It would have been too obvious if it had only disappeared from David’s allocation. It came from the undivided fund. Oversight’s pretending they suspect David. I know they really think I did it. I’m suffering for it. Even when I’m cleared, and I will be, and get reinstated... they’ve halved the number of trainees for next year because of the deficit. I’ll have to let two instructors go.”

This was not a novel situation. A money crunch had happened at least two times during Anne’s tenure. “Consolidating the camps would save a lot of money,” Anne said, because that had been the rumor every time a pinch had been felt. She’d scored a direct hit, from the way Cassie’s face changed. Cassie was the younger administrator; she’d be the one to go if the camps combined.

“Not going to happen,” Cassie said.

Anne knew denial when she saw it. “What do you think I can do about this?”

“David and I are both on suspension until the money is tracked down. I’m sure David will come to see Greg. They’re thick as thieves. Maybe literally.”

“I’ve been here for three years, Holt for two,” Anne said. “It’s hard to see how either of us could be responsible.” But it’s not impossible, she thought. “What do you plan to do if you find David?”

Cassie didn’t answer. “I’ll find him. Are you telling me the truth? You haven’t seen him?”

“That’s what I said.” Why would Cassie expect Anne to tell the truth?

“What’s Greg’s new name?”

“Holt Halsey. Baseball coach.” Anne could see no need to keep the secret. She planned to make sure Cassie never told anyone.

“As soon as it’s dark we’re going to pay Coach Halsey a little visit,” Cassie said. She sat back on the couch and fell silent. But she stayed vigilant.

Anne had plenty to think about. She’d grown into her new identity. She’d become proficient in making her school the best it could be... though sometimes through very unconventional methods. She found it intolerable to believe she was on the brink of losing it all.

Anne was mapping out possible scenarios, imagining various contingencies, and (most important) planning an unannounced visit to Gary Pomeroy as soon as she could spare the time.

Assuming she had any left. Cassie was an emotional wreck, but she was also dangerous and capable.

It would be dark in less than an hour. Anne figured Cassie planned her move — whatever it was — for after dark. But that left an hour she’d have to spend in Cassie’s company. “Want to play cards?” Anne asked. “More to the point, do you want me to touch up your roots? Jesus, girl, go to a salon.”

“Shut up, Twyla.”

“Did you fly into Raleigh-Durham? Surely you didn’t drive all the way?” It was remotely possible Cassie had driven her personal vehicle all the way from Pennsylvania.

Cassie looked at her in stony silence.

It had been worth a try. Anne did not speak again, but she wasn’t idle. She had a lot to plan. A lot to lose. There were weapons here in her living room if she could reach them. She counted steps to each one. Each time she came up just a little short.

“That your family?” Cassie said, and Anne’s mind snapped to the present. Cassie waved her gun at the set of pictures on a narrow table against the wall. The table looked like a family heirloom, maybe passed down from the fifties.

“Yes,” Anne said.

“Your mom and dad?”

“Someone’s mom and dad.”

“Where’d they find the guy posing as your husband? He looks familiar.” Cassie was looking at a picture of Anne and her husband, standing in the fall woods, a golden retriever on a leash. His arm was around Anne’s shoulders. Both were smiling; maybe the dog was too.

“He’s in the acting pool.” Actors came in very handy in training exercises.

“Was the dog from the acting pool too?” Cassie tilted her head toward the framed picture.

“Waffle,” Anne said. “The cook’s dog.”

“How’d your husband die?”

“Skiing accident.” That had been Anne’s choice.

“Who’s the girl?”

Anne had a studio portrait of a young woman on the credenza in her office, so she’d picked an informal shot of the same woman to place in her home. The woman looked not unlike Anne, and she was wearing nurse’s scrubs and holding a plaque. (She’d been named nurse of the year.) “That’s my sister, Teresa,” Anne said. “She lives in San Diego.”

Cassie looked at Anne with a mixture of incredulity and distaste. She said, “At my job I can be who I am. I don’t have to fake a family. And no one underestimates me. How can you stand being here with civilians? Being less?”

“But I’m not less,” Anne said. Anne had never thought of herself as a ‘civilian,’ the instructors’ term for noncombatants. Anne was still a fighter and strategist. Her regime at the school was sure, focused, and covertly ruthless; very much Anne, no matter what name she was using. She could have told Cassie about the gradual improvement in the school grade-point average, the better win-to-loss ratio of the school teams. (Except girls’ volleyball, Anne remembered; she had to do something about Melissa Horvath, the volleyball coach.)

Anne locked away her concerns with Melissa Horvath. She might not be around to correct the volleyball coach. She couldn’t discount the danger of her situation.

Cassie was obviously pleased to have her former boss at her mercy. That came as no surprise to Anne; Cassie had always wanted to be top dog (or top bitch). She’d never been good at hiding that. She’d waited for the death of Dorcas Epperson, one cold night in a marsh. Then she’d seized her opportunity.

“Did you take care of Epperson?” Anne asked. It was a new possibility, one she hadn’t considered before.

“No,” Cassie said, outraged.

Anne thought, She means it. She wanted to get rid of me, but she didn’t plan the death that brought me down. Idiot.

Anne’s cell phone rang.

“You can get it,” Cassie said after a moment. “No cry for help, or you’re dead.”

Anne nodded. Moving slowly, she rose to go to the kitchen counter. She pulled her phone from her purse. There was a gun hidden not two feet away, and this might be as close as Anne would get to a weapon. But Cassie had stood and was facing Anne, on the watch.

“Hello,” Anne said. She’d seen the caller ID; she knew who it was.

“Are we still on for tonight?” Holt’s voice was cautious.

Anne had been expecting this call since the clock had read five-thirty.

Anne was never late.

“I’m so sorry, I have to cancel,” she said evenly. “I’ve had an unexpected visitor. I don’t get to see her often, so we plan to spend the evening catching up.”

After a moment’s silence, Holt said, “Okay. I’m sorry to miss our dinner.”

“Is it Holt?” Cassie mouthed.

Anne nodded.

“Tell him to come,” Cassie hissed.

“Why don’t you come over here?” Anne said obediently. “I’ve got plenty of salad, and some rolls. I’d love you to meet my friend.” Anne really enjoyed Cassie’s face when she said that.

“You sure you have enough lamb?” Holt asked. Anne never ate lamb.

“I’ve got enough lamb for all of us.”

“I’ll be right over,” he said. “I’m really looking forward to it.”

“Me too,” Anne said sincerely. She ended the conversation. “He’s coming over,” she told Cassie.

“You two are on dinner terms?”

“Every now and then.” At least three nights a week, sometimes more.

“Are you bed buddies?”

“My business.”

Cassie could not control her face as well as Anne could. She reddened. Anne had a very faint memory of an instructor telling her that Cassie’d made a play for Holt when they were both at some planning session. That play had been spectacularly unsuccessful.

Even if Anne had not heard the rumor (she was surprised she remembered it, she hadn’t known Holt well at all), Cassie had clearly signaled that she had a history with him, at least in her own mind.

Since Anne had worked closely with Cassie, she’d quickly become aware her subordinate was very touchy about her looks, doubtful of her own sex appeal. It was a point of vulnerability. Anne began to wonder if this search for David Angola had more than one layer. Interesting, but not important.

After ten minutes, there was a knock at the door. When Cassie nodded, Anne answered it.

Holt was clutching a bag of groceries to his chest with his left hand. His right hand was concealed. He’d come armed.

“You’ll never guess who’s here,” Anne said, standing to one side to give him a clear shot if he wanted to take it. “You remember Cassie Boynton?”

Holt smiled and stepped inside. “I did not expect to see you, Cassie,” he said. “It’s been a long time. What are you doing in this neck of the woods?” Anne quietly shut the door behind Holt.

Cassie held up her gun. “I’m looking for some answers,” she said. “Are you going to try to stop me?”

“I am,” said David, behind her. He’d used Holt’s key to come in the back door.

Cassie whirled, but David wasn’t where she thought he’d be. He’d moved as soon as he’d spoken. Anne, who’d begun moving with “me,” leaped behind Cassie and took her in a chokehold. Cassie clawed at Anne’s arm with her free hand, and tried to bring the gun to bear with her other.

Holt made Cassie release her gun by slamming her hand with the butt of his own. Anne heard a bone crack.

And just that quickly, it was over without a shot fired.

Anne had broken a finger once (or twice) so she knew how painful it was. Cassie did not scream. Fairly impressive.

“You’re unarmed,” David said. “You’re under our control. If this was a training situation, what would you tell yourself?”

Cassie did not speak. Her rage filled the room like a red cloud.

“You’d say, ‘Bang, you’re dead,’ ” David told her. “Did you follow me all this way to try to kill me? Are you trying to prove I stole the money?”

“You did,” Cassie said. Though they were all liars by trade, Cassie believed what she said.

David’s dark face was impassive as he said, “I never took a cent.”

“I didn’t either.” Suddenly Cassie launched herself backward, drawing up her knees to explode forward in a kick that hit David’s chest. He staggered back. Since Cassie’s whole weight was suddenly hanging from Holt’s arm, his hold broke.

With a beautiful precision, Anne pivoted on her left foot and kicked Cassie in the temple with her right. Cassie’s head rocked back, her eyes went strange, and she crumpled.

David had regained his feet by then and he was striving to catch his breath. He held his gun on Cassie, but after a few seconds he was sure she was out. His arm fell to his side, and he sat heavily.

Holt had stepped away from Cassie in case David shot her.

“She sounded like she was telling the truth,” Holt said, after a moment of silence.

“She did, didn’t she?” David looked troubled. “I was so sure it was her.”

“She was sure it was you,” Anne said.

David appeared both confused and angry. “Do you believe I’m an embezzler? Twyla, Greg?”

Twyla said, “Anne,” at the same moment Greg said, “Holt.”

“Does it matter what we think?” Holt continued. “One of you will take the blame. I hope it’s her.”

Anne began to pick up the items that had scattered from the grocery sack. Among them was a knife. Anne smiled. She retrieved her own from her jacket. Then, just in case, she got her gun out of the drawer and put it in a handy spot. After all, everyone else in the room was armed.

She was waiting for the inevitable question. Holt obliged by saying, “What do you want to do with her, David?”

“The options are limited,” David said slowly. “We call Camp East and tell — who, Jay Pargeter, I guess? — to come get her. Or we wait until she wakes up, and we ask her some questions. Or we let her go. Or we kill her now.”

“We’re not part of the system anymore,” Anne told David, pointing from Holt to herself. “We shouldn’t take part in an interrogation.”

“You can’t let her go,” Holt said.

David looked down at Cassie unhappily. “If she was anyone else, I’d put her down. But she’s earned some respect. She’s done a good job since you left, Anne. Until now.”

Holt glanced at Anne and then said, “There’s another choice. You could take Cassie up to Camp East yourself.”

David looked at Holt with narrow eyes. “Why?”

“Enough people know where Anne is already,” Holt said. “Someone had to tell Cassie. If you call from here, at least ten more people will know. Anne, did Cassie say how she found you?”

“Gary Pomeroy in tech support. She also knew you were here, so she figured David might visit.”

“Son of a bitch,” David said, disgusted. “I’ll pay Gary back. Maybe officially. Maybe on my own time.”

“If you don’t, I will,” Anne said. “I don’t want to have to start all over again. It seems to be too easy to pry the information out of Gary. At least we’ll assume it was him.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” David tensed.

“You knew all along where I was. You sent Holt here.”

“You were getting death threats!”

“Like that’s new. I never believed that’s the only reason he came.”

David looked at Holt. “So you’ve never told her why you left?”

“We never talked about it,” Holt said calmly.

“We don’t talk about the past a lot,” Anne said, which was absolutely true.

“Well, Anne, you might be interested to know that Holt here, back when he was Greg Baer, was suspected in the disappearance — and probable murder — of a doctor in Grand Rapids, Michigan,” David said.

“And?” Anne was unconcerned.

“I got tipped off Greg was going to be arrested,” David said. “We couldn’t let the police come to the facility, obviously. They believe it’s a wilderness camp for adults, but if they had a closer look, that wouldn’t fly. I had to drive Greg into town to meet with them. They’d flown in from Michigan.”

“They took me to the local police station and put me through the wringer,” Holt said, smiling. “But considering where I work, it was nothing.”

David stared at him. “Man, they were going to arrest you!”

“Maybe.” Holt didn’t sound worried.

“Oversight voted to hide him, on my strong recommendation,” David told Anne, though he sounded as if he considered that was a mistake, just at the moment. “Otherwise his background might raise a red flag, though I swore to them that Greg wouldn’t talk about the program. His background fit the opening here. He had his ears modified and his tattoos removed. A nose job. I figured you wouldn’t recognize him right away. You two hadn’t actually met, as far as Greg could remember. You could get to know him as Holt.”

“You’re right, I didn’t recognize him.” He’d made her vaguely uneasy, though, and it had explained a lot when he let her know who he’d been.

David nodded, pleased. “Oversight charged me with arranging your identities. No one else knew.”

“Except Gary in tech support,” Holt said in disgust.

“Except him.”

“Thanks, then,” Anne said. She smiled brightly. Holt was going to have some talking to do after this. From his face, he knew that.

David looked from Holt to Anne. “All right, I’ll take Cassie with me. I’ll call Pennsylvania once I’ve gotten a couple of hours under my belt so no one can find out where I started. I disabled the GPS on the rental. It’s a seven-hour drive?”

“Yes,” Anne said. “Thereabouts. One of us could go with you, fly back. You might need help.”

“No, thanks,” David said. “I need to think. Someone took that money. It wasn’t me, and I believe it wasn’t Cassie. But we both might lose our jobs.”

Holt and Anne glanced at each other, quickly looked away. Yes, they needed to talk.

“Where’s your car?” Anne asked David.

“We drove over here in it,” Holt said. He was staring at Cassie, sizing up her shape and weight. He was a practical man.

“Good. We need to find her car.”

“Search,” Holt said briefly. Since it was possible Cassie was playing possum — though Anne didn’t think so — Anne stood a safe distance away with Holt’s gun aimed at the prone figure. Holt knelt to search her. In a practiced way, he rolled Cassie to one side, then the other. He pulled two sets of keys from her pockets and stood. “Rental,” he said, “and personal.”

“She’s got a cabin five miles from camp,” Anne said. “If she hasn’t moved.”

“She won’t stay out for much longer,” David said. “If I get stopped... I’m a black man. Just saying.” He was saying that not only might he get stopped no matter how carefully he kept to the speed limit, but also that he didn’t want to have to kill policemen. But it would be very, very awkward if he were arrested with a tied-up white woman who was screaming bloody murder.

“I have something to keep her out until you get there,” Anne said. “You sure you don’t want me to come? I could manage her. But I’d have to be back by Monday morning for school.”

“You have no idea how weird it is to hear you say that,” David said, smiling reluctantly. “I’ll take her solo, if she’s drugged. What do you have to keep her quiet?”

Anne ran up the stairs to her attic to open her carefully concealed stash of things she’d figured might prove handy. She was a “waste not, want not” kind of person.

“This should be two doses of thiopental,” Anne said when she returned. She handed the vials of freeze-dried powder to David, along with sterile water and two hypodermics.

“You keep that around? Geez, Anne. What else you got?” David withdrew 20cc of sterile water and injected it into the first vial of thiopental. He shook the solution vigorously and withdrew it into the syringe.

“Oh, this is a holdover from Camp East,” she said. “I picked it up in the infirmary after a trainee broke his leg. I thought it might come in handy someday. I stuck it in my go-kit and I didn’t clean it out... in the haste of my departure.” (In the middle of the night. With two armed and wary “escorts.” Not her favorite memory.)

“Thanks,” David said. He gave Cassie the first injection and prepared the next one, capping the syringe and pocketing it. “Is the other side of your garage free?”

“Yes, there’s a control button by the kitchen door. You can drive right in. Might as well leave the kitchen door open.”

In a few seconds — not long enough to have a conversation — Anne heard the garage door rumble up. She nodded to Holt, who squatted to take Cassie’s feet. Anne took her shoulders. Cassie’s body drooped between them like a hammock.

David had lowered the garage door and opened the trunk. “I’ve disabled the safety latch,” he said. “I’ll keep an eye on the clock and stop to give her the second shot. Four hours?”

Anne and Holt laboriously dumped Cassie into the trunk. It was lucky she wasn’t tall.

“Four hours should be right,” Holt said. “Sure you can stay awake?”

“Or I make you a to-go cup of coffee,” Anne said helpfully. She predicted David’s reaction.

Sure enough, he stared at her with ill-concealed suspicion. He said, “No, thanks.”

“Let us know when you get there.” Holt clapped David on the shoulder.

“I hope they find out who took the money,” Anne said.

That was as much goodbye as any of them wanted.

As soon as David backed out, Anne closed the garage door. She and Holt stood in the chilly space.

He was waiting for her to say something first.

“When you were Greg, you had a real family,” Anne said. It was not a guess.

He nodded. “Mom, Dad, brother. My father had stomach cancer. He was having a lot of pain. The roads were icy, and my brother was out of state. So Mom took him to the emergency-care clinic at three in the morning because it was lots closer than the hospital. I drove from my hotel to meet them there. The doctor on duty was either incompetent or sleepy or both. He gave Dad the wrong drug. Dad died. He would have died soon anyway, I know. And he was suffering. But it wasn’t his time, just yet. Mom was sure she’d get to take him home.”

“So you took care of the doctor.”

“Waited three weeks and then went into his house at night.” He smiled. “Snatched him right out of bed and vanished him.”

“Did the police really have evidence against you?”

“I’d said a few things to him that night. So they had a lot of suspicion. When they checked into my background, they had even more. And a neighbor saw a car like my rental backing out of his driveway that night.”

“Nothing decisive.”

“No, but enough to haul me in for questioning. And David didn’t let that happen.”

Anne said, “You did the right thing. So did David. Not that you need me to tell you that.”

He nodded. “Was that really thiopental you gave Cassie?” he said.

“If I’d had something stronger I would have brought it down,” she admitted. “All I’d kept was the thiopental. Cassie might not survive the trip, anyway. She was out a lot longer than I’d thought she’d be, and I know she’s had more than one concussion over the years.”

Holt looked hopeful. “That would make things simpler.”

They went into the house. Anne opened a cabinet and brought out a whiskey bottle, raising it in silent query. Holt nodded. She poured and handed him a shot glass, filled one for herself. She leaned against the kitchen island on one side, while Holt sat on a stool on the other. They regarded each other.

“Cancer treatment is very expensive,” Anne said at last.

Holt regarded her steadily. “Dad had a long illness. That trip to the clinic was only one of many. The bills... you could hardly believe how much, and the insurance only covered a fraction of the cost. My mother and my brother were scared shitless. The debt would loom over them the rest of their lives. They think I have some hush-hush military job, and they know the military doesn’t pay well. They didn’t expect I could help much. They were really understanding about that. It burned me up inside.”

“So you siphoned off the money from the enemy fund.”

“Yeah. I did.”

So there it was.

“You did a good job covering your tracks. How’d you plan it?”

“It helped that David’s never been confident with numbers. He always sweated budget time, needed a lot of help from me. I remembered a genius accountant, a guy I’d roomed with in college,” Holt said. “Tom was doing the books for a lot of the wrong people. That was how I knew where he was. Tom was glad to help; he’s one of those people who loves to beat the system, any system.”

“Is Tom still around? Can they interrogate him?”

“He began doing bookkeeping for the wrong people. He disappeared a year ago.”

Anne eyed Holt narrowly. “Really?”

“Yes, really.” Holt managed a small smile. “Nothing to do with me. But convenient.”

“So what now?”

Holt’s smile vanished. He looked very grim. “When David showed up today, I felt like the bottom had fallen out. I hated that he was suspected of something I’d done, when he’d done nothing but back me up. As people like us go, he’s a good man.”

Anne had thought of suggesting they follow David and run his car off the road. She was glad she hadn’t said that out loud.

Anne had the feeling they were stepping on thin ice, new and fragile territory in their relationship. The two regarded each other in silence.

Finally, Anne said, “Do you think David suspects you?”

“No,” Holt said immediately. “He would have tried to take me out. An honor thing.”

“Your family does not know where the money came from. They couldn’t reveal anything accidentally?”

“I told them I’d invested money in an online shopping program, and it had taken off. They were too relieved to ask for any details.”

“You think Oversight will come back with questions about your dad’s bills being paid off?”

“If the bills had been paid in one lump sum, it would be suspicious. But I paid in irregular amounts spread out over two and a half years, some of it channeled through my family’s accounts. Less conspicuous.” His mouth twitched in a smile. “And I haven’t worked at Camp West in more than two years. I live on my coach’s salary.”

“And the money’s stopped disappearing. No one’s stealing from the enemy fund now.”

“They’ll still be looking. No one makes a fool out of Oversight.”

“But they might be glad to find a scapegoat.”

“What are you thinking, Anne?”

“I’m thinking we can find Cassie’s rental. We can drive it to Pennsylvania and get there ahead of David. Two drivers instead of one.”

Hoyt looked interested. “Then what?”

“Then we plant money in Cassie’s house, gold or bearer bonds. Untraceable stuff.”

“Anne, I don’t have anything like that. I don’t even have much cash stashed away. Not enough to make them believe she stole everything.”

“I have some backup funds,” Anne said. She looked away.

Holt leaned forward and took her hand. She couldn’t avoid his eyes. “You’d do that?”

“Yes,” she said stiffly. “I would.”

“No regret?”

“No regret.”

Holt struggled to find words of gratitude, but Anne held up her hand to keep him silent. “If they find unexplained money in Cassie’s house, David’s in the clear, Cassie will vanish, and they’ll consider the theft explained. It’s all good. I know where her house is, and we’ve got the keys.”

“Let’s get on the road,” Holt said.

Anne retrieved half of her escape fund from its secret hiding place — the same place the thiopental had been stored — and she was back down the stairs in less than two minutes.

“If we find the rental quickly,” she said, “it’ll be a sign that we’re doing the right thing.”

Anne and Holt knew where to start looking. Using the key fob to make the lights blink, they found it in four minutes, parked behind a house for sale on the other side of the street.

During the long drive north, they made some plans for spring break.

Those plans involved Gary Pomeroy.

© 2017 by Charlaine Harris