Last to Die

TWENTY-EIGHT

SUMMER FOG CLOAKED THE HIGHWAY TO PROVIDENCE, AND JANE craned forward, peering from behind the wheel at cars and trucks that glided ahead of them like ghosts in the mist. Today she and Frost were chasing yet another ghost, she thought, as the wiper swept the gray film from her windshield. The ghost of Nicholas Clock, Teddy’s father. Born in Virginia, graduate of West Point with a degree in economics, avid outdoorsman and sailor. Married with three children. Worked as a financial consultant at Jarvis and McCrane, a job that required frequent travel abroad. No arrests, no traffic tickets, no outstanding debts.

At least that was what Nicholas Clock looked like on paper. Solid citizen. Family man.

The mist swirled on the road ahead of them. There was nothing solid, nothing real. Nicholas Clock, like Olivia Yablonski, was a ghost, flitting quietly from country to country. And what did that mean, exactly, financial consultant? It was one of those vague job descriptions that conjured up businessmen in suits carrying briefcases, speaking the language of dollar signs. Ask a man what he does, and those two words, financial consultant, could make your eyes glaze over.

The same way medical supply sales rep could.

Beside her in the passenger seat, Frost answered his ringing cell phone. Jane glanced at him when he said, a moment later: “You’re kidding me. How the hell did that happen?”

“What?” she said.

He waved her off, kept his focus on the phone call. “So you never finished the analysis? There’s nothing else you can tell us?”

“Who is that?” she asked.

At last he hung up and turned to her, a stunned expression on his face. “You know that GPS tracker we pulled off the rental car? It’s vanished.”

“That was the lab calling?”

“They said it disappeared from the lab sometime last night. They got only a preliminary look at it. There was no manufacturer’s stamp, totally untraceable. State-of-the-art equipment.”

“Jesus. Obviously too state-of-the-art to stay in Boston PD’s hands.”

Frost shook his head. “Now I’m getting seriously freaked out.”

She stared at the spectral swirls of mist on the highway. “I’ll tell you who else is freaked out,” she said, her hands tightening on the steering wheel. “Gabriel. Last night he was ready to tie me up and throw me in the closet.” She paused. “I sent Regina to stay with my mom this week. Just to be safe.”

“Can I hide with your mom, too?”

She laughed. “That’s what I like about you. You’re not afraid to admit you’re afraid.”

“So you’re not scared? Is that what you’re saying?”

She drove for a moment without answering, the wipers sweeping back and forth as she peered at a highway as misty as the future. She thought about planes falling from the sky, bullets shattering skulls, and sharks feeding on bodies. “Even if we are freaked out,” she said, “what choice do we have? When you’re already in neck-deep, the way out is to forge ahead and get to the end of this.”

By the time they reached the outskirts of Providence, the mist had thickened to drizzle. The address for Jarvis and McCrane was in the southeast corner of town, near the industrial waterfront, a bleak neighborhood of abandoned buildings and deserted streets. When they arrived at the address, Jane was already prepared for what they would find.

The two-story brick warehouse was flanked by vacant parking lots. She eyed faded swoops of graffiti and boarded-over first-floor windows and knew that this building had been vacant for months, if not years.

Frost surveyed the broken glass on the sidewalk. “Nicholas Clock financed a seventy-five-foot yacht working here?”

“Obviously this was not his primary place of business.” She pushed open her door. “Let’s take a look, anyway.”

They stepped out of the car, into a drizzle that made Jane zip her jacket and turn up her collar. The clouds hung so low, it seemed as if the sky itself was pressing down, trapping them in gloom. They crossed the street, broken glass crunching beneath their shoes, and found the entrance locked.

Frost backed up and surveyed the upper windows, most of them shattered. “I don’t see any sign for Jarvis and McCrane.”

“I checked the tax records. They are the listed owners for this property.”

“Does this look like a real business to you?”

“Let’s go around back.”

They rounded the corner, past broken crates and an overflowing Dumpster. At the rear of the building, she found an empty parking lot where weeds were forcing their way up through cracks in the pavement.

The rear door latch had been pried open.

She nudged the door with her shoe and it creaked ajar, revealing a cavernous darkness within. She paused at the threshold, feeling the first prickles of alarm.

“Ho-kay,” Frost whispered, his voice so close it startled her. “So now we have to search the scary building.”

“This is why I brought you along. So you wouldn’t miss all the fun.”

They glanced at each other and simultaneously drew their weapons. This was not their jurisdiction, not their own state, but neither one dared to venture unarmed into that gloom. She clicked on her flashlight and swept the darkness. Saw a concrete floor, a crumpled newspaper. Felt her heart kick into a faster tempo as she stepped across the threshold.

It felt even chillier inside, as if these brick walls had trapped years of dankness where anything could be incubating. Waiting. She heard Frost close behind her as they moved deeper into the building, their flashlight beams skittering past pillars and broken crates. Frost accidentally kicked a beer can, and the rattle of aluminum over concrete was as startling as gunfire. They both froze as the echoes faded to silence.

“Sorry,” whispered Frost.

Jane heaved out a breath. “Well, now the cockroaches all know we’re here. But it doesn’t look like there’s anyone else …” She stopped and her head snapped up toward the ceiling.

Above them, the floorboards groaned.

Suddenly her heart was thumping faster as she listened for more movement above. Frost was right behind her as she made her way toward a metal staircase. At the bottom of the steps she paused, peering up at the second floor, where gray light seeped through a window. That sound they’d heard could mean nothing. Just the building settling. Wooden floorboards contracting.

She started up the metal staircase, and each step sent off a faint clang that made the darkness hum and announced: Here we come.

Near the top of the steps she crouched, palms sweating, and slowly lifted her head to peer over the second-floor landing.

Something hurtled toward her from the shadows.

She flinched as it whistled past her cheek. Heard glass shatter on the wall behind her as she saw a crab-like figure retreat into the gloom.

“I see him, I see him!” she yelled to Frost as she scrambled up onto the landing. “Police!” she called out, her gaze fixed on the dark shape hulking in the corner. He was folded into himself, his black face obscured in shadow. “Show me your hands,” she ordered.

“I got here first,” a voice growled. “Go away.” The figure raised an arm, and Jane saw another bottle in his hand.

“Drop it now!” she commanded.

“They said I could stay here! They gave me permission!”

“Put down the bottle. We just want to talk!”

“About what?”

“This place. This building.”

“It’s mine. They gave it to me.”

“Who did?”

“The men in the black car. Said they didn’t need it anymore, and I could stay here.”

“Okay.” Jane lowered her weapon. “Why don’t we start over? First, what’s your name, sir?”

“Denzel.”

“Last name?”

“Washington.”

“Denzel Washington. Really.” She sighed. “I guess that’s as good a name as any. So Denzel, how about we both put away our weapons and relax.” She slid the gun into her holster and held up both hands. “Fair?”

“What about him?” Denzel said, pointing to Frost.

“Soon as you put down the bottle, sir,” Frost said.

After a moment, Denzel set the bottle down between his feet with an emphatic thud. “Only take me an instant to throw it,” he said “So you better behave.”

“How long have you been living here?” said Jane.

Denzel struck a match and leaned over to light a candle. By the glowing flame, she saw a trash-strewn floor, the splintered remains of a broken chair. He planted himself beside the candle, a disheveled African American man in ragtag clothes. “Few months,” he said.

“How many?”

“Seven, eight. I guess.”

“Anyone else ever come by to check out the place?”

“Just the rats.”

“You live all alone here?”

“Why do you want to know?”

“Denzel,” Jane said, and felt ridiculous just saying that name. “We’re trying to find out who really owns this building.”

“I told you. Me.”

“Not Jarvis and McCrane?”

“Who’s that?”

“What about Nicholas Clock? You ever heard that name? Ever met the man?”

Denzel suddenly turned and barked at Frost: “What are you doing over there? You trying to steal my stuff?”

“There’s nothing here to steal, man,” said Frost. “I’m just looking around. See a lot of iron shavings here on the floor. This must have been some old toolmaking factory …”

“Look, Denzel, we’re not here to hassle you,” said Jane. “We just want to know about the business that was here two, three years ago.”

“Wasn’t nothing here.”

“You knew the building back then?”

“This is my neighborhood. I got eyes.”

“You know a man named Nicholas Clock? Six foot two, blond hair, well built? About forty-five and good looking.”

“Why you asking me about good-looking guys?”

“I’m just asking if you’ve seen Nicholas Clock around. This address was listed as his place of business.”

Denzel snorted. “Must have been real successful.” His head swiveled toward Frost and he snapped: “You really don’t pay attention, do you? I told you to stop looking around my place.”

“What the fuck,” Frost said, staring out the broken window. “Someone’s in our car!”

“What?” Jane crossed to the window and looked down at her Subaru. Saw the passenger door was ajar. She reached for her weapon and snapped, “Let’s go!”

“No, you won’t,” Denzel said as a gun barrel suddenly pressed against the back of Jane’s head. “You are going to drop your weapons. Both of you.” His voice, no longer a careless drawl, was now cold and crisp.

Jane let her Glock fall to the floor.

“You, too, Detective Frost,” the man ordered.

He knows our names.

The second gun thudded to the floor. Denzel grabbed Jane’s jacket and shoved her down to her knees. The gun was still pressed to her skull, shoved so hard against her scalp that it felt like a drill bit about to punch a hole through bone. Who would find their bodies in this blighted building? It could be days, even weeks before anyone noticed her abandoned car. Before anyone thought to trace its owner.

Frost thumped down to his knees beside her. She heard the beeps of a cell phone being dialed, then Denzel said: “We’ve got a problem. You want me to finish it?”

She glanced sideways at Frost and saw terror in his eyes. If they were going to fight back, this was their last chance. Two of them against an armed man. One of them would almost certainly take a bullet, but the other might make it. Do it now, while he’s on the phone and distracted. Muscles tensing, she took a breath, maybe her last. Twist, grab, deflect …

Footsteps clanged on the stairway and the gun barrel suddenly lifted from her scalp as Denzel stepped away, beyond her reach. Beyond any hope of wrestling the weapon from him.

The footsteps ascended to the top of the stairs and moved toward them, heels clipping sharply against the wooden floor.

“Well, this is a problem,” said a shockingly familiar voice. A woman’s voice. “You can both get up, Detectives. I guess it’s time to drop all pretenses.”

Jane rose to her feet and turned to face Carole Mickey. But this was not the lacquered blonde who’d claimed to be Olivia Yablonski’s colleague at Leidecker Hospital Supplies. This woman wore sleek blue jeans and black boots, and instead of a matronly blond helmet shellacked with hairspray, her blond hair was gathered in a tight ponytail that emphasized a model’s jutting cheekbones. Once, she would have been a stunning beauty, but middle age was now etched in that face, in the creases fanning out from her eyes.

“I take it there’s no such company as Leidecker Hospital Supplies,” said Jane.

“Of course there is,” said Carole. “You saw our catalog. We carry the latest in wheelchairs and shower seats.”

“Sold by sales reps who never seem to be in the office. Do they actually exist, or are they all like Olivia Yablonski, running operations around the world for the CIA?”

Carole and Denzel glanced at each other.

“That’s a very big leap of logic, Detective,” Carole finally said, but that two-beat pause told Jane she’d hit the target.

“And your name isn’t really Carole, is it?” said Jane. “Because I know his isn’t Denzel.”

“Those names will do for now.”

Denzel said, “They asked me about Nicholas Clock.”

“Naturally. They’re not idiots.” Carole picked up the fallen weapons and offered them back to Jane and Frost. “That’s why I’ve decided it’s time we worked together. Don’t you think?”

Jane took back her Glock and considered, just for an instant, turning the gun on Carole and telling her to screw that working together crap. These people had drawn a gun on her, had forced her and Frost to kneel with the full expectation of death. That was not something you easily kissed and made up over. But she choked back her temper and shoved the gun in her holster. “How did you just happen to be here?”

“We knew you were headed this way. We’ve been keeping an eye on you.”

“This is like the Leidecker company,” said Frost. “Another fake business, this one used as Nicholas Clock’s cover.”

“And this is where they’d come looking for him,” said Carole.

“But Clock’s dead. He died aboard his yacht.”

“They don’t know that. For weeks, we’ve been leaking rumors that Clock is alive, that his appearance has been altered by plastic surgery.”

“Who’s looking for him?” asked Jane.

Carole and Denzel exchanged looks. After a moment, she seemed to come to a decision and said to Denzel: “I need you outside to watch the street. Leave us.”

With a brisk nod, he left the room, and they heard his footsteps clanging down the stairs. Carole watched from the window and didn’t say a word until she spotted her associate outside.

She turned to Jane and Frost. “Boxes within boxes. That’s how the Company controls information. He knows what’s in his own little box, but nothing outside it. So now I’m going to give you a box, which belongs to just you two. Not to be shared. You understand?”

“And who knows it all?” asked Jane. “Who owns all the boxes?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

“That’s not part of your box.”

“So we get no idea of where you stand in this hierarchy.”

“I know enough to run this operation. Enough to know that having you two mucking around in this threatens everything I’ve worked for.”

“The CIA’s not authorized to run operations on US soil,” pointed out Frost. “This is illegal.”

“It’s also necessary.”

“Why isn’t the FBI handling this?”

“This was not their mess. It was ours. We are simply cleaning up what should have been finished years ago.”

“In Rome,” Jane said, quietly.

Carole didn’t answer, but her sudden stillness confirmed what Jane believed. Rome was where it started. Where the lives of Nicholas and Olivia and Erskine had intersected in some catastrophic event that was still casting ripples in the lives of their children.

“How did you know?” Carole finally said.

“Sixteen years ago, they were all there in Rome. Erskine, working as a foreign service officer. Olivia, working as a so-called sales rep.” Jane paused, made an educated guess. “And Nicholas, traveling as a consultant for Jarvis and McCrane. A company that exists only on paper.”

She saw confirmation in Carole’s face. The woman stared out the window and sighed. “They were so cocky. So goddamn sure of themselves. We’d pulled it off before, so what could possibly go wrong?”

We. “You were there, too,” said Jane. “In Rome.”

Carole paced away from the window, her boots clicking across the wood. “It was a straightforward operation. Only Olivia was new to the team. The rest of us had worked together before. We knew Rome well, especially Erskine. That was his home base, and he had all the local assets lined up. People in place. All we had to do was swoop in, snatch our target, and get him out of the country.”

“You mean … a kidnapping?”

“You sound so judgmental.”

“About kidnapping? Yeah, I tend to be.”

“You wouldn’t be, if you knew the subject in question.”

“You mean your victim.”

“A criminal who’s responsible, both directly and indirectly, for the deaths of hundreds of people. We’re talking Americans, Detective. Our fellow citizens, killed in multiple countries. Not just military personnel, but also innocents abroad. Tourists, businessmen, families. Some monsters simply need to be exterminated, for the good of society. Surely you both understand that, considering your jobs. It is, after all, what you do. Hunt down monsters.”

“But we do it within the law,” said Frost.

“The law has no teeth.”

“The law tells us when we’re over the line.”

Carole snorted. “Let me guess, Detective Frost. You were a Boy Scout.”

Jane glanced at her partner. “Well, that was right on the money.”

“We do what needs to be done,” said Carole. “Everyone knows that extreme measures are sometimes necessary, but no one wants to admit it. No one wants to own it.” She moved toward Jane, close enough to be intimidating. “If you want a safer world, you need someone to do your dirty work. That someone would be us. We were there to take a monster out of circulation.”

“You’re talking about extraordinary rendition,” said Frost.

“That makes it sound so clinical. But yes, that’s what it’s called. Sixteen years ago, our mission was to scoop him up, whisk him to a private airstrip, and fly him to a detention facility in a cooperative country.”

“For interrogation? Torture?” said Jane.

“It’s a lot less than what he did to his victims. This man wasn’t driven by politics or religious convictions. He was in it for the money, and he’d made a fortune at it. Wire him enough cash, and he’d arrange to bomb a nightclub in Bali. Or take down a jumbo jet from Heathrow. His fortune made him untouchable—at least, through normal channels. We knew he’d never face justice in Italy. So we had to deliver justice another way. We had one chance, and only one chance, to snatch him. If we fucked up, if Icarus slipped away, he’d go underground. With his resources, we’d never get another shot at him.”

“Icarus?”

“Only a code name. His real name isn’t important.”

“I’m guessing it didn’t go well,” said Jane.

Carole went back to the window and peered out through cracked panes. “Oh, we accomplished the mission. Waited outside his favorite restaurant, where he dined with his wife and children and two bodyguards. When they came out, we were ready for them. One team boxed in the bodyguards’ vehicle. The other team pursued the car with Icarus and his family.” She turned to look at them. “Have you ever driven a mountain road there?”

“I’ve never been to Italy,” said Jane.

“And I’ll never be able to go back. Not after what happened.”

“You said you accomplished your mission.”

“Yes. In spectacularly bloody fashion. We were in pursuit. Four of us, in two cars, winding up killer curves. We almost had him when the truck came around the bend. Icarus hit the guardrail and skidded. The truck hit him broadside.” Carole shook her head. “It was a fucking mess. His wife and the older son crushed on impact. The younger son taking his last breaths.”

“And Icarus?” said Frost.

“Oh, he was alive. Not just alive but fighting us. Nicholas and Erskine got him restrained and threw him in one of our vehicles. Six hours later he was on a plane, handcuffed and sedated. He woke up behind bars. You know the first thing he said, when he saw me? You’re dead. All of you.”

“You did kill his family,” pointed out Jane.

“That was unfortunate. Collateral damage. But we accomplished our mission. The truck driver was too shaken up to give the Italian police any useful details about us. Erskine continued in his post at the embassy. Nicholas went back to his cover story as a financial consultant.”

“And Olivia went back to selling nonexistent bedpans.”

Carole laughed. “At least Olivia went home with a souvenir. She stayed on in Italy for a few weeks. Met a dorky tourist named Neil Yablonski. By candlelight, in a Rome restaurant, I guess even a dork looks good. A year later, she married him.”

“And you all went on with your lives.”

“That’s how it should have been.”

“What went wrong?”

“Icarus escaped.”

In the silence that followed, Jane put it all together. The reason why three families were massacred. “Vengeance,” she said.

Carole nodded. “For what we did to him, and to his family. Those thirteen years he spent in prison made him even more of a monster. It gave him time to nurse his hatred, to feed it, grow it, until it consumed him. The escape was an inside job, that’s the only way it could have happened. I’m sure he offered a king’s ransom to whoever helped him. After he slipped out of sight, we had no idea where he went, or even what he looked like. We never did locate all his secret accounts, so he still controlled a fortune. I’m sure he bought a new face. And new friends in high places.”

“You said he spent thirteen years in prison,” said Frost.

“Yes.”

“So he escaped three years ago.” He looked at Jane. “That must be why Nicholas Clock and his family packed up and left on the sailboat.”

Carole nodded. “After Icarus escaped, Nicholas got nervous. We all did, but he was the only one worried enough to pull up roots and actually ditch the Company. I didn’t think it would be easy for Icarus to track us down. Until the Italian government got involved.”

“Why?” said Jane.

“Blame it on politics, on WikiLeaks, whatever. Word got out to the press that the CIA had committed an act of extraordinary rendition on Italian soil. Suddenly the Italians were pissed. Violation of sovereignty. A CIA operation that killed three innocent civilians. Our names were redacted from all the reports, but money opens doors. Especially if it’s a lot of money.” She went back to the window and looked out, a lean silhouette framed in gray light. “Erskine and his wife were killed first. Shot, in a London alley. Days later Olivia and her husband were dead, too, after their plane went down. I tried to get word to Nicholas, but the message didn’t reach him in time. In the span of one week, all three of my colleagues were dead.”

“How were you lucky enough to stay alive?” said Jane.

“Lucky?” Carole’s laugh was bitter. “That’s hardly the word I’d choose to describe my life. More like doomed. To keep looking over my shoulder. To always sleep with one eye open. For two years I’ve been living this way, and even though the Company does what it can to keep me safe, it will never feel like enough. And it won’t be enough to keep those three children alive.”

“Icarus would go that far? He’d kill children?”

“Who else would be hunting them? He killed Nicholas and Olivia and Erskine, all dead within a week of each other. Now he’s hunting their children, exterminating the family lines right down to the last survivor. Don’t you see, it’s all about making a point. It’s a message directed to anyone who dares oppose him in the future. Cross me, and I will massacre you and everyone you love.” She paced back toward Jane, and her face seemed etched even more deeply with exhaustion. “He will try again.”

The sound of a car passing on the street made Carole turn around to the window. She watched as the vehicle passed. Long after the sound of the engine had faded, she was still standing there, searching for, expecting, the coming attack.

Jane pulled out her cell phone. “I’m going to call the Maine State Police. Ask them to dispatch a team—”

“We can’t trust them. We can’t trust anyone.”

“Those children need protection now.”

“What I’ve told you is classified. You can’t share any of these details with law enforcement.”

“Or what, you’ll have to kill us?” Jane said, and snorted.

Carole moved toward her, no trace of humor in her face. “Make no mistake. If I have to, I will.”

“Then why are you telling us all this? If it’s so top secret?”

“Because you’re already deep in this. Because your interference could screw up everything.”

“Screw up what, exactly?”

“My best, maybe my only chance, to nail Icarus. That was my plan, anyway. Place all three children in one location, and he won’t be able to resist the target.”

Jane and Frost glanced at each other in astonishment. “You planned it this way?” she said. “You arranged to put those kids at Evensong?”

“It started as a precaution, not a plan. The Company believed they were safe in their various locations, but I had doubts. I was monitoring them. And when the first attack came, on the girl—”

“You were the Good Samaritan. The mystery blonde who magically showed up on the scene. And then vanished.”

“I stayed with Claire long enough to make sure she’d be safe. When the police arrived, I slipped out of sight. Arranged to move her straight to Evensong, where we already had one of our people in place.”

“Dr. Welliver.”

Carole nodded. “Anna retired from the Company years ago, after her husband was killed in Argentina. But we knew we could trust her. We also knew Evensong was remote enough and secure enough to keep the girl safe. Which is why we sent the next child to Evensong, too.”

“Will Yablonski.”

“It was sheer luck that he wasn’t in the house when that bomb went off. I arrived just in time to whisk him away.”

“So what went wrong with Teddy Clock? You knew what was coming. You knew he’d be targeted next.”

“That attack shouldn’t have happened. The house was secure, the system was armed. Something went terribly wrong.”

“You think?” Jane retorted.

“I had agents stationed outside the residence, around the clock. But that night, they were ordered to abandon their posts.”

“Who ordered them?”

“They claimed I called them off. Not true.”

“They lied?”

“Everyone has a price, Detective. You just have to keep bidding higher and higher until you reach it.” Carole began to pace a restless circle around the room. “Now I don’t know whom to trust, or how far up the chain this goes. All I know is, he’s behind it and he’s not finished. He wants those three children. And he wants me.” She stopped, swiveled to look at Jane. “I have to be the one to end this.”

“How? If you can’t trust your own people.”

“That’s why I’ve gone outside the Company. I’m doing this my way, with handpicked people I know I can count on.”

“And you’re telling us all this because you trust us?” Jane glanced at Frost. “That’s a change.”

“You two, at least, haven’t been corrupted by Icarus.”

“How do you know?”

Carole laughed. “Two homicide detectives, and one of you a Boy Scout.” She looked at Frost. “Oh, I did a background on you. I wasn’t joking when I called you one.” She looked at Jane. “And you have something of a reputation.”

“Do I?” said Jane.

“If I use the word bitch, don’t take offense. It’s what they call women like us. Because we don’t compromise, we don’t go halfway. We kick that ball all the way to the end zone.” She gave a slight bow. “There is honor between bitches.”

“Geez, I’m flattered.”

“My point,” said Carole, “is that it’s time we work together. If you want to keep those children alive, then you need me, and I need you.”

“Do you have an actual plan in mind, or is this just one of those in principle alliances?”

“I wouldn’t be alive if I didn’t make plans. We’re going to make Icarus reveal himself.”

“How?”

“It involves the children.”

“Okay,” said Frost, “I’m not liking what I’m hearing.”

“You haven’t heard it.”

“You mentioned the kids. There’s no way we’ll agree to put them in any danger.”

“They’re already in danger, don’t you get it?” Carole snapped. “I’m the only reason Claire and Will are alive right now. Because I was there to save them.”

“And now you want to use them?” Frost looked at Jane. “You know that’s what she’s planning.”

“Give her a chance to talk,” said Jane, her gaze fixed on Carole. She knew nothing about this woman, not even her real name, and Jane had not decided if she could trust her. Honor among bitches only worked if you knew the other bitch. All Jane knew was what she saw: an athletic blonde in her forties, wearing expensive boots and an even more expensive wristwatch. A woman who had about her the faint air of desperation. If what Carole had told them was true, then she’d been a Company operative since her midtwenties. For the past two years, she’d been continually on the move, under different names, which would have been difficult if she’d had a family tagging along. She’s a lone wolf, thought Jane. A survivor, who’d do what was necessary to stay alive.

“I know you’re concerned about the children,” said Carole. “But if we don’t end this, they’ll never be safe. As long as they live, they represent failure to Icarus. He needs to show the world that he can’t be fucked with. That if you cross him, he will be relentless. Think about what their lives will be like if we don’t kill him. Every year, they’ll need new identities, new homes. Running, always running. I know what that’s like, and it’s no life for a kid. Certainly not for teenagers hungry for friends and stability. This is their best chance for a normal life, and they don’t even have to know about it.”

“How are you going to keep this from them?”

“They’re already where they need to be. A defensible location. A monitored access road. A school staffed by teachers who will defend them.”

“Wait. Are you telling us that Anthony Sansone knows about this?”

“He knows only that they’re in danger and they need protection. I asked Dr. Welliver to share that much with him, but not the specifics.”

“So he doesn’t know about this operation?”

Carole’s gaze slipped away. “Even Dr. Welliver didn’t know.”

“And now she’s dead. How did that happen?”

“I don’t know why she killed herself. But I already have an agent on the property and more are coming. These are the last surviving children of my colleagues, and I will keep them safe. I owe it to them.”

“Is this really about the kids?” asked Jane. “Or is it all about you?”

The truth was there, in Carole’s face, and in the wry arch of her eyebrow, the faint tilt of her head. “Yes, I want my life back. But it won’t happen until I take him down.”

“If you even recognize him when you see him.”

“Any armed intruder will be brought down. We can sort out the bodies later.”

“How do you know that Icarus himself will show up?”

“Because I understand him. These children are high-value targets for him. So am I. He wants the satisfaction of personally seeing us die. With all of us in one location, he won’t be able to resist the bait.”

She looked at her watch. “I’m wasting time here. I need to get to Maine.”

“What do you expect from us?” asked Jane.

“To stay out of it.”

“Teddy Clock is my responsibility. And lady, you are way out of your jurisdiction.”

“The last thing I need are clueless cops shooting at their own shadows.” She glanced down as her cell phone rang. Turning away, she answered it with a brusque: “Talk to me.”

Though Jane could not see the woman’s face, she saw her spine suddenly stiffen, her shoulders snap straight. “We’re on our way,” she said, and disconnected.

“What happened?” asked Jane.

“I had an agent in place. At the school.”

“Had?”

“His body has just been found.” Carole looked at Jane. “It seems we’ve come to the final act.”