“I can’t tell you that. But they have another meeting spot, one we don’t have wired yet. You didn’t hear it from me, but if you go to the Bracken Motel near the old Horace Williams Airport around ten o’clock tonight, you might get lucky. Room one oh five. You’re looking for two guys, Larry and Brett. They’re the ones I heard on the wire.”
“Larry and Brett,” Alex repeats. “Thanks, Drake. I owe you.”
“Be careful, Alex. These good ol’ boys don’t fool around.”
Alex reaches into the nightstand drawer and grabs his gun. “Understood,” he says. “Neither do I.”
CHAPTER 70
Nana Mama
NANA MAMA SITS ON the sofa in the dimly lit living room. Her great-grandkids Jannie and Ali are asleep upstairs. So is Willow Sampson. A few hours earlier, Nana had filled them up with a supper of pork chops and garlicky greens, plus apple pie and ice cream for dessert. Comfort food at its finest.
God knows they all need comforting.
When Ali said, “This is one of Damon’s favorite meals,” Nana had had to turn away from the table. Couldn’t let the young ones see her crumble. She had to stay strong. For them. And especially for Damon.
Wherever he is.
Nana reaches up to a shelf over the sofa and pulls down a thick photo album. It’s been a long time since she looked at it. The edges are worn and some of the pages are loose. When she flips the book open, a snapshot falls onto her lap.
It’s a picture of her grandson and John Sampson back when they were young boys, sitting on the front steps of the house. John was such a regular visitor, he practically moved in. He and Alex were thick as thieves. Still are.
Nana runs her hands over the acetate sleeves, looking back through time. She sees Christina Parks, Alex’s mom, in a photo taken just a year before her death. And a smiling portrait of Alex’s father, Nana’s son Jason, long before he disappeared from their lives.
After he was gone, Nana Mama stepped up. She’d taken Alex and his brothers in, but the older boys moved on quickly. Alex was the youngest, not even ten years old when he moved in with her in Washington, DC. She’d raised Alex—and pretty much raised John Sampson too—then opened her home to Alex again later, this time to help the single father raise his children while chasing down killers and trying to figure out what made them tick. Even now that Alex had Bree, Nana finds that from time to time, she still has to remind him that family comes first.
With her, it always does.
Nana Mama has suffered plenty of tragedy and loss in her nine decades. But she cannot lose her eldest great-grandchild now. Not Damon. Simplycannot.
She flips to one of the last pages in the album and finds a picture of Damon at his high-school graduation. Smiling, beaming, so handsome.
She presses her palm to his picture and says a silent prayer—the same prayer she’s said for Damon’s father, Alex Cross, many, many times.
“Keep him safe, dear Lord, and in Thy mercy, bring him home.”
CHAPTER 71
Cross
ALEX CROSS DRIVES SLOWLY past a row of fast-food restaurants and laundromats. Not a great neighborhood. The Horace Williams Airport has been closed for years, but some of the run-down stores and shops still have aviation themes: Cockpit Lounge. SkyView Cleaners. Pilot Diner.
From what he can see, none of them are doing much business.
He passes a small oval park with a statue of a grim-looking Confederate soldier, musket on his shoulder. By coincidence, the stony Southerner is staring directly at the Bracken Motel.
Alex slows down and pulls his rental car to the curb across the street. This place was probably bustling when the airport was in operation. Not anymore. The overhead sign announcingBRACKEN MOTELhas a few holes in it, from either bullets or rocks. A placard on the end of the building saysDAILY, WEEKLY,MONTHLY RATES AVAILABLE.The parking lot’s asphalt is cracked and sproutingweeds. Two Jeeps and two pickup trucks are the only vehicles in the lot. The building is shabby and worn, with peeling paint.
Alex counts ten rooms. Room 105 should be the one right in the middle.
He continues driving until he spots a warehouse with a utility road leading behind it. He pulls in to the back of the building, parks facing out, and gets out of the car.
It’s hot outside—and quiet.
Alex walks toward the motel, his hand gently patting his right hip, where his holstered Glock is nestled under his jacket. He knows how reckless this is—confronting a criminal gang based on nothing but what Drake Cannonthoughthe heard. The conversation might not have been about Damon at all.
Alex had thought about calling Detective Gail Bailey in Chapel Hill but doesn’t want to get in trouble if this turns out to be a wild-goose chase. He’s wishing he had John Sampson along for some extra muscle, but John has his hands full in DC, especially with that third bomb going off this morning.
