“We better stop him.” Linx said.
“Let me call him,” Cait tapped Brian’s contact on her phone. It rang and rang then rolled to voice mail. “He’s not answering.”
Cait dragged the dogs across the street, heading toward the diner. Linx and her dog streaked next to them.
Brian was still staring at the laptop, typing away.
“We can’t contact the senator,” Cait said, breathless. “He put these dogs in the pound.”
“They were at a kill shelter,” Linx said. “They were on their last day before they ran away.”
“Right, so you better not have contacted him.” Cait tapped her husband.
“Don’t worry,” Brian said, still staring at the screen. “I have a better plan. I found Glen and told him I have the dogs. He’s running away from military school and coming to live with us.”
“Wait a second,” Cait said as her heart chilled. “How old is this Glen?”
“Twelve.”
“Twelve? And you’re encouraging him to run away from school?” Cait put her hands on her hips, unable to believe her husband’s lack of common sense.
“I’m not encouraging him. He hates it there, and he’s running away on his own. He wants to live with us.”
“But how does he even know us?” Cait’s jaw dropped wide and her head bobbed with confusion.
“He’s TrickyGlen the Thief in Realm of Rogues.” Brian’s eyes sparkled and he made fast gestures with his hands, as if casting magic spells or controlling a joystick.
“Realm of Rogues?” Cait repeated, blinking and feeling faint. “But if he’s twelve, you shouldn’t be talking to him.”
“Don’t worry,” Brian said. “He registered himself as twenty-one in the virtual world.”
“I’ve heard about the senator’s kid,” Linx said. “He’s got a screw loose, and his father sent him away after his mother died.”
“That’s a horrible thing to do to a child.” Cait clapped her hand over her mouth. “Poor kid.”
“It’s horrible, I agree,” Linx continued. “But rumor has it no one could handle him other than his mother. He’s autistic or something strange, and he embarrasses his father at all his political functions.”
“His father should get him special teachers rather than sending him away.” Cait grew more alarmed the more she heard. “What would military school do for him?”
“Nothing. They probably punish him all the time. We hate the senator around here,” Linx said. “He doesn’t care about the farmers and ranchers, and all he does is take money from big businesses.”
“Okay, well, all that aside,” Cait exclaimed. “He sounds like a horrible parent.”
“He is,” Brian said. “That’s why it’s time for me to take Glen back.”
“Take Glen back? What are you talking about?” Cait grabbed Brian by the arm.
Brian shrugged from her grasp. “Glen is my son. If the senator doesn’t want him, I do.”
“Your son?” Cait and Linx both shouted at the same time, drawing attention from the other patrons sitting outside the diner.
“Alana said I couldn’t tell anyone.” Brian screwed his brows down into a frown. “But Alana’s dead, and I don’t have to do what she says.”
“But… Are you making this up? Is this one of your fantasies?” Cait knew she was grasping at straws as she sank onto a nearby chair.
“Can’t you see the resemblance?” Brian pushed the laptop in front of her, showing her a picture of the senator with his family.
The pieces clicked into place. Red hair. The crush Brian had on Mrs. Thornton. The obsession with playing video games. The bequest of the antique fire engine.
Black dots swam in Cait’s field of vision, and she saw two Brian’s, an old one and a young one, two black dogs. And then nothing.
