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  “What’s going on?” Wes asked.

  “Sorry,” she said. Her arms were crossed and she rocked slightly left and right. “I know this hasn’t been a great night for you, but I tried knocking on Anna’s door and she didn’t answer. And there was no way I was going to try Danny’s.”

  “What’s going on?”

  “Can I come in?”

  Wes hesitated. “Hold on.” He closed the door and glanced back at Anna. “She wants to come in.”

  “Why?”

  Wes shrugged. “She looks upset.”

  Anna sighed, then scrambled out of the bed, grabbed her clothes, and headed into the bathroom. Wes waited until she was out of sight before he opened the door and let Alison in.

  “Thanks,” she said.

  Wes shut the door behind her. “You want to sit down?”

  She shook her head.

  “Okay,” he said, then waited.

  She fidgeted for a moment, biting the inside of her cheek.

  “You want to tell me what’s going on?” he asked.

  More fidgeting. She was starting to open her mouth when the bathroom door swung open, and Anna, now dressed, sheepishly emerged.

  “Hi,” she said.

  Alison stared at her as if she wasn’t sure Anna was really there. Then her shoulders sagged a little. “Sorry. I … um … I didn’t mean to disturb … I’ll just … I’ll—”

  “No, it’s all right.” Wes hesitated, then added, “I’m sorry. I should have told you before.”

  “You don’t have to tell me anything.”

  He could tell she wanted to leave, but she didn’t move.

  “Anna and I have been going out for several months.”

  She bit the inside of her lip again, then said, “Great,” without any enthusiasm. “Good for you guys.”

  Wes reached out to touch her arm, but she pulled away.

  “Don’t,” she said. “I … I …”

  “Alison, why don’t you tell us what’s going on?” Anna said.

  Alison shot her a dirty look, but then quickly closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and seemed to relax a little. “Sorry, I’m just worried.”

  “About what?”

  “Tony. He’s not back yet.”

  “How do you know?” Wes asked.

  “I knocked on his door to tell him about the break-in, but he didn’t answer. That was hours ago and he’s still not back.”

  “You’ve been awake this whole time?” Wes asked.

  She gaped at him as if the answer should be obvious. “I’m freaked out, and when I get freaked out, I can’t sleep. You know that.”

  “Could he have decided to go back to L.A.?” Wes asked.

  Alison shook her head. “How would he get there? He didn’t have a car. Besides, he would have told one of us.”

  “Maybe he hooked up with someone like Danny did,” Anna suggested, “and went home with them.”

  Alison was quiet for a moment. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

  “God, let’s hope he didn’t hook up with someone like Danny did,” Wes said. “She’d be old enough to be his mother.”

  A smile from Anna, but Alison’s expression didn’t change.

  “He’ll probably show up sometime tomorrow hungover and smiling,” Anna said.

  Alison took another deep breath. “You’re probably right. That’s got to be what happened. Nothing like a little overreacting, huh?”

  “Totally understandable,” Wes reassured her.

  She took a step toward the door. “I’ll get out of your hair.”

  “You want me to walk you back to your room?” Wes asked, realizing a second after it was out of his mouth that it was the wrong thing to say.

  But before Alison could jump on him, Anna said, “I’ll do it.”

  Alison pulled open the door, then turned back. “Just tell me, am I the last one to know about you two?”

  Wes shook his head. “Not even close. Dione’s the only one on the crew who knows.”

  A wan smile and a nod, then Alison stepped outside, Anna following behind her.

  Several minutes later Anna let herself back in.

  “Well done,” she said. “I see your people skills are in top form.”

  “I know. I could have handled that a little better.”

  “Yeah. I can think of about two dozen ways right off the top of my head.”

  “Sorry.”

  The smirk that had been on her face held for a moment longer, then melted. She walked over and put her arms around him. “At least she knows now.”

  “Yeah,” he said, trying to smile. “So what did you two talk about?”

  “She’s my friend. I just wanted to make sure she’s going to be okay.”

  “And is she?”

  He could feel her shoulders go up and down. “Hope so.”

  As they climbed back into bed she asked, “So what were you dreaming about?”

  “Huh?”

  “You sounded like you were having a bad dream when Alison knocked on the door.”

  “Was I?” he said. The dirt. The plane. Anna in danger. “I don’t remember.”

  “THEY TOOK WHAT?”

  Wes had waited until after breakfast Sunday morning to call Dione with the news.

  “We got lucky,” he said.

  “Tell me how we possibly got lucky.”

  “We don’t have to reshoot.”

  Dione said nothing for a moment. “Don’t jerk me around, Wes. Are you serious?”

  “Serious,” he said. “We lost the backup. But I hadn’t removed the original footage from the cards in the cameras yet. We will need a new backup drive, but we won’t have to shoot anything again. The only thing we’re missing is the footage on the card the Navy took. And we should be getting that back sometime this week.” Well, he did have one thing from that card, the loop of the pilot that he’d saved to the thumb drive in his pocket. But he wasn’t going to tell her that. “Of course, without the laptop I can’t start editing.”

  “I can live with that,” she said, brightening.

  “Tell me that again when I give you the bill for a new computer.”

  “Sorry,” she said. “I’m being a jackass. Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine. Just pissed.”

  “Understandable. Did the motel give you a new room?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “They’re comping my stay. Anna’s room, too.”

  “Why Anna’s?”

  He winced. He’d forgotten Dione had already been gone when that happened. “Someone broke into her room Friday night. Didn’t take anything, but it was enough for the motel to move her into the room next to mine.”

  “Jesus, Wes. What the hell’s going on up there?”

  Wes didn’t know what to say.

  “Was it the same people who broke into yours?” she asked.

  “The police don’t know yet.”

  “Anything else you want to tell me?”

  Well, there was the chase. But he decided to save that bit of news until she got back. “No. That’s it for now.”

  “I would hope so,” she said, then paused. “Okay, here’s what we’re going to do. Check if there’s anyplace there where you can get a new drive. If you can’t find one, text me and I’ll get one before I head back up.”

  “Okay.”

  “And, Wes, no more excitement, all right?”

  “I’ll do what I can.”

  Once he hung up, he went over to Anna’s room.

  “How’d she take it?” Anna asked.

  “Not well at first, but better after I told her we hadn’t really lost anything. She wants me to try and find a new drive. Want to come along?”

  “I think I might just stay here and take a nap.”

  Neither of them had slept well. “Sure. We can grab lunch before Lars comes by.”

  “Sounds good,” she said.

  “Have you heard from Alison?”

  “I called her while you were talking to Dione. She says To
ny must have really hit the jackpot, because he’s not back yet.”

  “He’s not?”

  “Said she tried calling his cell, but it went straight to voicemail.”

  “I’m sure he’s okay.”

  “Yeah. Me, too.”

  But the silence that followed belied their confidence.

  “If he comes back while I’m gone, call me,” Wes said.

  “I will.”

  He pulled the Escape keys out of his pocket and set them on the dresser. “In case you need to go somewhere.”

  “What are you going to take?”

  “The Triumph,” he said.

  “Uh, excuse me. But do I need to remind you what the nice detective said last night?”

  Detective Andrews. Driving without a proper license. Damn. He’d forgotten about that.

  “You take the SUV,” Anna said, picking up the keys and handing them back. “I won’t need to go anywhere.” The corner of her mouth began to turn upward. “But if I do, I can just ask Danny’s friend for a lift.”

  Wes laughed and opened the door. He then turned to Anna and gave her a kiss right there in the doorway where anyone in the parking lot could have seen.

  She arched an eyebrow.

  “What?” he asked, a portrait of innocence.

  This time she initiated the kiss.

  THE ESCAPE WAS PARKED RIGHT BESIDE THE Triumph.

  Wes climbed into the driver’s seat of the SUV and started to close the door. That’s when he spotted something tucked between the motorcycle’s gas tank and handlebars.

  He got back out and stepped over to the bike. The object was a yellowed piece of paper that looked like it came from an old newspaper. There were enough random gusts of wind in the desert that finding a piece of trash lodged in his bike wasn’t particularly surprising.

  But he realized as he pulled it out that if it had been trash, it would have been battered and torn by the wind and the terrain. There were no tears in this piece of paper, no places where it was punctured by branches or rocks or God knew what.

  There was something more telling, too. The paper wasn’t a crinkled ball or even a scrap. It was a neatly folded, three-by-three-inch square.

  Wes flipped it around, looking at both sides, then, worried that it might fall apart along the creases, carefully teased it open. He was pleased with himself that he was able to keep it from falling apart. But this sense of satisfaction lasted only until he focused on the article inside.

  At the top was a school photo of a thick-necked kid of probably sixteen or seventeen. Though it was black-and-white, it was easy to tell the kid had blond hair. It was also easy to tell, despite the smile on his lips, that he was a jerk.

  Or perhaps that was only Wes’s interpretation, since he had known the boy.

  Jack Rice.

  The kids at Murray Junior High used to have a nickname for him. The Tormentor.

  In the teenage years, brawn still ruled over brains, and since Jack had a lot of the former and very little of the latter, he was one of the kings. A Class A asshole, through and through.

  Wes had stopped riding the bus to school in seventh grade because Jack used to get into the seat behind him and slam his fists into Wes’s back. Wes much preferred taking the extra time to walk the three miles instead of suffering from the pain of one of Jack’s blows for the rest of the day.

  There was a headline below the photo:

  LOCAL BOY NAMED TO ALL-DISTRICT JV TEAM

  Wes didn’t read the article. He knew it wasn’t important.

  But he also knew there was no chance this was trash, either.

  This article had been left for him.

  “HE JUST LEFT.” THE MAN WAS BACK IN HIS sedan, parked near where he’d been the night before.

  He reached for his binoculars, then trained them on the woman’s room.

  “No, she stayed behind.”

  He focused on the room’s window, but the curtains were pulled, so he could see nothing.

  “Not the motorcycle. The SUV.” He listened, then rolled his eyes. “Relax. He still found it.”

  He set the binoculars back down.

  “No, he didn’t seem happy at all.”

  IT TOOK WES SEVEN MINUTES TO GET FROM THE motel parking lot to the driveway of Lars’s house, his mission to find a hard drive all but forgotten. The truck that had been there the day before was gone, so Wes pulled in to its space and jammed the Escape into park.

  The article he’d found on the motorcycle was clutched tightly in his hand as he marched up to the front entrance. Skipping the bell, he pounded on the door with his empty fist.

  Nothing.

  He pounded again, then strained to hear anything from inside. Silence.

  He leaned over and rapped on the glass of the living room window.

  Still no answer. Wes walked around the side of the house, unlatched the gate, and entered the backyard. The pool area was deserted, and a look through the back windows confirmed that the house was as devoid of people on this side as it had been out front.

  “Can I help you?”

  Wes nearly jumped at the sound of the voice. He turned and found a middle-aged man standing near the corner of the house, a rake held at his side.

  “I … was just looking for Lars. He didn’t answer his door, and he’s supposed to be here.”

  “You a friend of his?”

  “Yeah,” Wes said, then added, “an old friend.”

  The man looked at him for a moment, then nodded toward the front of the house. “His truck’s gone, so he’s not home.”

  “Thought maybe he’d parked it in the garage,” Wes said.

  “Never does.”

  “Thanks.” Wes started for the gate. “Guess I’ll come back later.”

  “Good idea.”

  Once Wes was in the Escape, he pulled out his phone and tried calling Lars, but was sent straight to voicemail. Lars was either out of range or his phone was off—both real possibilities in this area of spotty signal strength.

  He could be working. Of course, if that were the case, would he have suggested they get together early that afternoon? Unlikely.

  Shopping, then? Maybe, but doubtful. Church? Not the old Lars.

  What the hell else was there to do on a Sunday morning?

  When the answer hit him, it was so obvious he wondered why he hadn’t thought of it right away.

  Football.

  Wes pulled out his phone and found an NFL schedule on the Web. Sure enough, the Pittsburgh Steelers were playing the early game. On the West Coast that meant game time was at 10 a.m.

  Though Lars had grown up in the desert, he’d been born in Pennsylvania. And since his dad was a huge Steelers fan, the same mania had naturally passed on to his son.

  If Lars wasn’t at home watching the game, he had to be watching it somewhere. A friend’s house? If so, Wes was going to be out of luck. There was another possibility, though.

  He started the engine and threw the SUV into reverse.

  He’d seen a few bars along China Lake Boulevard. If those didn’t pan out, there had to be others.

  The plot of land Checkers Bar and Grill was located on had been empty in Wes’s day, and might as well have been empty now. There were only three cars parked in the lot, and none were Lars’s truck. A few blocks away was The Pile On. It had a dozen vehicles parked out front. Even better, two were trucks that were similar to Lars’s.

  Wes parked and went inside.

  A mixture of cheers and groans greeted him as he passed through the door. But they weren’t for him. Instead, they were aimed at several televisions mounted above the bar, each showing a different game. Wes scanned the crowd.

  No Lars.

  The next few places—including a stop at Delta Sierra—produced the same results.

  It was in the fifth place, a sports bar off Ridgecrest Boulevard called Tommy T’s, built on the site of the old bowling alley, that he found his friend.

  Lars was sitting at a table with Ja
nice and Bob from the pool party, his eyes so focused on the Steelers game he didn’t even see Wes walk up. Pittsburgh had the ball and was barely ahead of Cincinnati, 14–12.

  “Close game,” Wes said.

  “Hey, Wes,” Janice said.

  Lars broke eye contact with the television and looked genuinely surprised to see his friend. “Wes? Hey, great. Pull up a chair, and we’ll make room for you.”

  Bob smiled and nodded. “How you doing?”

  Wes returned the nod. “I’m okay.” To Lars, he said, “Think we could talk for a minute?”

  “Sure,” his friend replied, his gaze already back on the TV. “Don’t worry. I’m listening.”

  “Privately.” Wes glanced at the other two. “No offense.”

  Both Janice and Bob waved it off like they understood.

  Lars, though, waited until the end of a play, grimaced, then glanced at Wes. “Halftime’s in about five minutes. Can it wait?”

  “No.”

  Lars looked back at the screen for a moment, then sighed and stood up. “Fine. But I swear, if something happens while I’m away, you’ll never hear the end of it.”

  Wes led them out of the bar and over to a spot near the back of the building where he thought they wouldn’t be disturbed.

  “So what couldn’t wait?” Lars asked.

  “This.” Wes handed him the article.

  Lars looked confused as he unfolded the paper. Then, as soon as he saw the picture, his eyes widened in surprise.

  “Not very subtle,” Wes said.

  “Subtle? What do you mean?”

  “You almost blew it. I took the car and not the bike, so almost didn’t see it.”

  “Are you trying to tell me someone left this for you?”

  “You should have just slipped it under the door to my room. That way there wouldn’t have been a chance I could have missed it.”

  “You think this is from me?”

  Wes could contain his anger no longer. “Of course it’s from you! Who the hell else could have left it?”

  “I have no idea. But I do know it wasn’t me.”