‘Lack of strong evidence,’ Travis says quietly. When she looksover, he’s staring straight at her. ‘And they didn’t know about the mountain house.’
‘That’s right.’
A long moment of quiet in the warm car. Then they both speak at once.
‘Linda Kittiko could be—’
‘We don’t know if that’s—’
‘Travis.’Emma tries to settle the shake in her voice. There’s a light tremor in all her limbs. ‘If she’s in there, we have to go get her. Right now. We can’t afford to wait.’
‘I agree with you,’ Travis says immediately.
Emma gapes. ‘What?’
‘I agree. If Carter’s got the wrong lead, and Linda Kittiko is being held in this house, the strike on the Crafton address could tip Kirke off.’
‘He’ll kill her, Travis.’ Emma feels a dizzying surge of vertigo.
‘I know.’
‘Okay, then.’ Emma forces herself to steady. She takes a bracing breath. Reaches for the Lincoln’s door handle, tugs on it –
‘Hold on,’ Travis says, and he leans across her and pulls the door closed before the interior light has barely had a chance to shine. ‘Hold on just a second.’
Emma wants to push his restraining hand away.‘What?’
‘We can’t go in there yet. There’s stuff we need to do. We probably shouldn’t go in there at all.’
‘But Linda—’
‘She may not be in there. But if she is, she isn’t going to thankus if we charge in and get killed before we can do any good.’ Travis frowns. ‘If Peter Kirke is in that house, we need to go prepared.’
Emma manages to control herself. ‘Okay, what do we need to do?’
‘Give me the phone pack.’
Travis makes two calls, one to Faye at police headquarters and one to the Pittsburgh FBI field office. He keeps his hand on Emma’s arm the whole time. She looks out the window, quivering with the need to move, to do something. Finally, Travis puts the phone pack away and turns to her.
‘Faye’s sending an urgent message through to Carter and Horner in Crafton. Someone on the team will get it to them. The field office is sending out an agent to our location, and he’ll be here in thirty minutes.’ He keeps going when Emma opens her mouth. ‘He’s coming from another assignment across town, he can’t get here any faster. Look, I agree we should go in, but at least now we know that in thirty minutes, we’ll have backup.’
Emma turns to face out the window again. Linda Kittiko, abused and terrified and possibly trapped in that pale brick house, may not have thirty minutes. ‘Now what do we do?’
‘We need to go in armed.’ Travis’s tone is grim. ‘When was the last time you shot a revolver?’
‘Three months ago, when I shot at Anthony Hoyt. I missed both times.’ Emma’s hands are shaking as she stares out at the location in the dim light of early evening. And she notices something else. ‘Travis, look at the garden. What do you see?’
He looks. ‘Flowers. The lawn’s too long. I don’t know, it’s getting dark, what is it?’
‘Chrysanthemums, dahlias, bud roses.’ Emma points, then curls her pointing hand into a fist in her lap so her shakes don’t betray her. ‘I can see some Christmas fern in there, too. They’re some of the flowers from the girls’ bouquets. I’m betting if it were full light, we’d see them all.’
Beside her, Travis exhales slow. ‘Okay, that’s it, then. That’s the house.’
Emma wets her dry lips. ‘Give me a gun.’
‘I have an FBI field kit. You can have that, I’ll take my own gun.’
‘Okay.’
