They made better time once they moved into a forest that was mostly pine, with little tangled ground cover they had to work their way around.
Hannah said, “I’m thirsty.”
Shaw was too. He knew a dozen rules for finding and drinking water in the wilderness — such as, look for animal tracks around ponds because if it’s safe for other creatures it’s probably safe for you, and never drink from clear ponds because there’s a reason nothing’s living in them — but said, “We’ll wait. Don’t have time to find a safe source.” The day was moderate of temperature and the air humid. There’d be no danger of dehydration before they finished the trek. Thirst was an irritation, not a danger.
Never let discomfort trick you into taking a risk...
And few things were more devastating and dangerous than waterborne illnesses.
After forty minutes, they broke from the trees and found themselves on a riverbank over a wide, slow-moving river. There’d be a bridge nearby but Shaw hoped they could ford; he wanted to avoid any roads the Twins and Merritt might be on.
It didn’t seem that deep. The surface color told Shaw this.
The sound of a clearing throat startled them, and they turned to see, on the other side of a dense growth of brush, a gaunt and sallow-faced young man. He was hunched over, looking at the phone he held in his left hand and frowning in concentration. His right gripped a short spade, with which he’d just dug a small hole in the mossy earth. He wore sweats, a stocking cap not unlike Hannah’s.
He was suddenly aware of the trio and, as he gasped, his eyes first widened, then pinched into a frown.
“Hey,” Shaw said amiably.
No response.
Shaw looked down. “Sorry.”
Now confused.
“Lost a cat or dog? You’re burying it.”
“Uhm. Yeah. That’s right.”
But of course the truth was that what he’d dug was a meth or opioid dead drop. He was screenshotting the GPS coordinates of the location and would later text them to a buyer once the money was received. Shaw had heard that Bitcoin was all the rage for even the most backwoods of transactions.
He guessed it was a family business, given his youth. How many kin were nearby?
Parker frowned. “That’s sad.”
Hannah offered, “Yeah, sorry, dude.” Shaw could see from the tension in the girl’s shoulders she understood exactly what was going on.
Parker said, “Our camper, it burned up. We lost everything. Can we borrow your phone?”
Mistake.
He’d think they were either undercover narcs or, more likely, competitors, trying to get his cell away from him. Shaw’s plan had been to act casual and get close to the kid, then take him down and grab the phone from his hand. Parker had killed their advantage.
No one moved.
The quiet was broken by crow caws, the wind switchbacking through the dry, clicking autumn leaves, a jet’s faint engines, miles aloft.
The boy stirred. Thinking hard.
At least he wasn’t armed, or he would’ve drawn.
Another moment passed.
Then, fast, he lifted the device to his ear, commanding Siri or whoever the goddess of his phone was to “Call Dad!”
Hell...
Shaw charged forward. The boy was shouting, “It’s Bee. I’m at the place. There’re people. I need help!” He dropped the phone and took the shovel in both hands and started to swing. His face was desperate and terrified.
Shaw easily dodged and kept moving forward, driving the young man back.
After one fierce swing — Bee nearly stumbled — Shaw twisted the tool from his hands and the boy turned and took off in a panicked run.
There’d be company soon, but Shaw concentrated on the phone. He lifted and disconnected the call. Before it locked, he fished Deputy Kristi Donahue’s card from his pocket and dialed.
As it rang, he pointed north again and the three started moving quickly toward the river.
The call went to voice mail and he left a message about their general position and that they were heading north toward Millton, just west of 84. They were being pursued by the men from the Sunny Acres attack.
He’d decided that no one in this county likely owed anything to the Hero of Beacon Hill and was starting to dial 911 when he heard, almost simultaneously, the gunshot and the snap of the slug that hissed a foot over his head.
71
Jon Merritt was wrong.
There is one similarity between Dr. Evans and an outside-the-prison shrink.
They each have a large clock on the wall. The business of therapizing must fit tidily into the magic interval. It’s fifty minutes on the outside. Here, forty-five.
Every time he sits across from the doctor, safe in his personness, he thinks of the clock on the Carnegie Building, sitting just over the surface of the Kenoah.
The clock that stopped running and transformed its hands to angel wings.
The Water Clock...
“Let’s talk about your drinking, Jon.”
So he’s not picking up where they left off last week. He doesn’t remember — or care about — the insight Jon had started to tell him. But Jon the Charmer says amiably, “Sure, Doctor.”
Dr. Evans says, “You’re doing well in the program.”
There is an active twelve-step here. The majority of inmates have substance issues.
“Okay.” Merritt attends, he talks. He lies. It’s all good.
“You said that drinking makes you angry, Jon. Is that fair?”
Merritt doesn’t like the doctor using his given name. He’s heard about transference — a connection between doctor and patient. That’s the last thing he wants.
When you have a secret like the Truth, you don’t want to connect with anybody. Confessions sometimes happen.
But he nods agreeably. “Oh, that’s true.”
Watch the word...
“You mean you get mad at them.”
“I guess. At them, at everybody.” He shakes his head. “I don’t want to. It just happens.”
Then the doctor does the looking-off thing once again.
The light filters through the barred and thick-glass windows.
Dr. Evans returns. “When did you start drinking?”
“A kid. My dad’s bar. It wasn’t a bar. He called it that. Just a shelf in the kitchen.”
“He let you have some?”
“God no. Too stingy for that. I snuck it.”
“And replaced it with water, so he never noticed?”
“No.”
Tuna Doc lifts an eyebrow. “So maybe he knew. Maybe you wanted him to know.”
This sounds shrinky. Jon doesn’t want to keep going with it. But he says, “That’s good, Doctor. I think you might be right.”
And for half an hour, they run through the timeline of alcohoclass="underline" When Merritt felt the problem got to be a problem, embarrassing or dangerous incidents caused by intoxication, putting people at risk, missed opportunities to turn his life around, what does he miss about drinking the most, now that he’s been in prison?
Jon the Charmer is a talented narrator.
Then Dr. Evans sails in a different direction. “You said your father was better when he drank. What did you mean by that?”