Mercer wants me to find her. Renner wants me to find her. Both of them want that damn package.
The irony isn’t lost on me.
Now I’m certain that she won’t be at my apartment. But I’m equally certain I can find her.
It takes me twenty minutes to get through the traffic. Her bike isn’t outside, supporting Renner’s theory. She’s hiding, not trusting me. It still doesn’t explain her phone, though. Unless she deliberately sabotaged it to stop anyone tracking her? That’sparanoid, but… it makes sense.
I pull my laptop out from the floorboard beneath my dresser, logging in to the FBI database. Enter Genesis Greer into the query, along with her brother, Caleb, and cross reference.
It takes less than a minute. Known connections.
Her parents are in Salt Lake City. Of course they are—Mormon upbringing. But now I have an address. And it’s a day’s ride from San Fran. This feels right.
So Raven went to hide rather than come to me. That is something we will have to discuss.
And Renner told her not to trust me. Turning up out of the blue won’t help with that.
I have to assume she won’t come quietly. But that’s fine too; Mercer told me totortureher.
How else am I going to get what I need out of her?
I take a shower, running through my plans, thinking what I’ll need. My bike ramp is already in the back of my pickup. A change of clothes. A few ropes. Sedatives… that’ll be a problem. But maybe Steven can help there, and I have his number. He seems to have a low moral threshold when paid enough.
It’s a day to Salt Lake City, but I’ll swing past Steven’s and travel while the roads are quiet. Stop for a few hours—sleep in the cab, maybe. I whistle a tune to myself in the shower.
I’mreallylooking forward to seeing Raven again.
Thirty-One
Raven
I’ve never been home on my bike before. Left on the back of one, while my family was asleep. But never ridden up on one.
My brother’s car is in the drive. That’s encouraging; he’s saner than my mother and will help balance the shock of my arrival.
Not as much of a shock if she knew I was walking in here to hide from Chinese enforcers, carrying approximately four million in illegal unprovenanced diamonds. I don’t think she’d care about the black box that Kurt’s risked everything for. She might care about my gun, but that I dumped somewhere in Nevada.
I knock, because I’m effectively a stranger in their house. That’s what three visits in six years means: no keys.
It’s seven in the evening, not yet dark. There are lights on in the house. Maybe they’ve finished dinner,or given how long it’s taking to answer, maybe they’re in the middle of it. My mother will blame me for that, too.
The door opens at last, and it’s not my mother, or even Caleb. It’s my father.
“Genesis!” His expression eases from surprise to delight, making me feel guilty all over again for not seeing him as often as I should.
“Hi, Dad.” This is more awkward than I thought it would be. “I was… uh…”In the area. Give or take eight hundred miles.
“Come in, come in!” He steps back, holding the door wide.
The rest of them are sitting at the table, half way through eating. My mother stands up slowly, smoothing down her impeccable dress, almost as if to saywhat the hell are you wearing?But probably without the swearing. Even in her head.
My brother’s there. He leans back in his chair, raising his glass of water, giving me a droll toast. KaeLynn’s here too, and for a horrible moment, I wonder if I’ve interrupted something significant. Like them announcing a betrothal or something. But she gets up too, her dress an attractive light summer thing, even if it is more conservative than I would ever wear.
“Oh mygosh, Genesis,” she says, staring wide eyed. “You lookawesome!”
That wasn’t the reaction I anticipated. I look like someone who’s spent eleven of the past twenty hours on the road, stopping for breaks only because itwasn’t safe not to.
“Can I take your… coat?” my father asks, stiffly formal, presented with the conundrum of an armored leather biking jacket.
