Page 23 of Go Alone

Once he confirmed his dwelling was free of venomous snakes, he crawled into the space. He flicked his battery-powered lantern on and used the light to pull the loose panel back into place. That done, he lifted the rock covering the small hole he dug for the specific purpose of hiding his notebook and retrieved it.

He kept none of the Lawgiver’s letters. He felt it prudent to have nothing on or near him directly from Cox, just in case. He needed some reference to his task, though, and the notebook provided that. He’d copied Cox’s list, placing his own names on top.

He crossed Deborah Holt’s name out and regarded the next name for a long moment. The close air of the crawlspace, musty with decades of mold and mushrooms, filled his nostrils. He’d nearly chosen to take soil from this place, but at the last instant, he decided it was too risky. He needed this connected to him in no possible way, and the potting soil he purchased at Sutherlands did the job.

He replaced the notebook, lowered the rock on top of the hole, spread his bedroll along the damp earth, and lay on top of it. The light from the lantern revealed fossilized tracks above, memorials of the travels of worms and burrowing insects. He followed these wriggling paths until his eyelids drooped, then shut the lantern off and let the darkness carry him to sleep.

CHAPTER TEN

Kate wiped her forehead and settled onto the chair at the head of the kitchen table. The cipher for this message was similar to the first one, except this time, the key was reversed, starting at Z and shifting backward instead of A and shifting forwards. It took her two hours to figure that out. As was so often the case with these ciphers, it seemed simple once she finally cracked it.

Not always the case, though. Cox's personal cipher, the last time he escaped, involved arranging objects that ended up pointing to the church where he wanted Kate to meet her.

Actually, on second thought, it was simple. He literally placed signs that said, go here, Kate.

She wiped more sweat from her brow and grimaced as something tweaked in her lower back. Really hope back pain isn’t going to start being a thing.

The front door opened, and Anita stepped into the house. Her expression was a bit too surly to be stoic. “Neighbors didn’t see anything, I’m guessing,” Kate said.

“No, they did,” Anita replied. “They all reported a man sleeping in Jeffrey Park just behind this neighborhood. Same description. About forty, rough looking, wore a hat, about six feet tall and soft around the middle.”

“That’s good,” Kate said. “So why the long face?”

“No one talked to him. No one got a name, and no one knows why he was here. Well, I guess they can figure it out now, but no one thought…”

She sighed and settled into the chair across from Kate. “I’m just frustrated. I was going to say they’re big city people and big city people don’t think to notice things that aren’t normal, but then again, Trout Jenkins spied that man in front of Howard Greer’s house and thought nothing of it until Howard turned up dead.”

“We can give the description to Columbus Police,” Kate said, “along with the blue van.”

“Yeah, I did that,” Anita agreed, “and maybe it will help, but this is the Midwest. You know how many six-foot-tall forty-year-old white guys with hats and soft middles live around here?”

Kate laughed, not so much humor as a release of tension.

Anita patted her breast pocket, cursed softly, and lowered her hand to her knee. Kate recognized the motion. “When did you quit?”

“Nine years ago. James—that’s my husband—noticed me huffing and puffing up the stairs to our bedroom and told me he didn’t want the woman he loved dying before her hair turned gray.”

“That’s… sweet?”

Anita shrugged. “Got me to quit. Still want ‘em from time to time but not badly enough to go by one.” She looked at Kate. “Where’s Marcus?”

“Back at the Holt house. He went back about twenty minutes ago to see if he could find something about her background.”

“He thinks she had a dark past like Howard Greer?”

Kate nodded. “The ex-husband says she falsified income documents and got the bank to foreclose on the previous owners of this house. I guess he also alluded that they were keeping Deborah from something she wanted. He’s trying to figure out what that was and if anyone else might have gotten in her way.”

Anita nodded. She patted at her chest again and cursed again, less softly.

“Something else bothering you?” Kate guessed.

Anita sighed. “I keep going back to Linus Varne. Something’s fishy there. It just doesn’t make sense that no one has records of him but Greer’s little doctored blurb from the city planner’s office.”

“I’ll look into the FBI’s records and see if I can find anything,” Kate offered.

Anita brightened a little. “Yeah, do that. I know I might be tripping over a useless detail, but I really think that’s where this cookie is gonna crumble.”

Marcus returned then. His dark frown made it clear he didn’t find what he was looking for either.