Page 132 of Hard Heart

Jez wasn’t even sure where that was, but when she punched the name into her satnav, she found it was an unincorporated community in Fauquier County.

“Okay, got it. So you want me to get eyes on whoever has the suitcase?”

“Can you? Hopefully, it’s just a simple case of luggage theft, but…”

“But you’re worried.”

“There’s too much weirdness going on.”

“Call Priest. He can speak with Demelza, and Demelza has contacts in other agencies. She’ll find somebody in the Airports Authority PD who can help.”

“How long will that take?”

“A while,” Jez admitted. The biggest problem would be getting the cops to take the problem seriously.

“I’ll call Priest, then I’m going to buy a ticket to wherever and clear security. If I can get through to the arrivals area, I’ll look for her myself.”

“If you need bail money, I can help with that.”

“Gee, thanks. Spider’s gonna come with me.”

“Send me a rough location for the suitcase. Echo can’t ping an AirTag the way she can ping a phone, so someone will have to talk me in when I get closer.”

“I’ll sit Sera in the car with Dice.”

The target vehicle appeared to be sticking to the speed limit. Jez wasn’t. Echo had accessed the GPS tracking system for the local police department so she could warn of any upcoming issues, but the roads were quiet, and as daylight turned to dusk, Jez found herself rolling through small-town Virginia. The atmosphere turned subtly uneasy, as if the landscape were watching her and judging.

“Four miles and closing,” Dice said through Jez’s earpiece.

Ari and Spider had purchased tickets to Miami International, and now they were hurrying through hallways in search of Flora’s phone and hopefully Flora herself. What the fuck had happened? Could Eight have killed her and stashed her body in a supply closet? Anything was possible, but that scenario was unlikely. He needed a bargaining chip. Could he have snatched her from airside? Jez found herself walking through the logistics, and although she hated to admit it, that was possible.

If they had an inside person, it would be easy enough to move Flora to a private room. They could tell her there was a problem with her visa, or an issue with her luggage, ask her to fill out a form, anything. Without an insider, it would be trickier, but Eight was a planner. He could have grabbed her just before the arrivals hall. The scanners would introduce too much risk to stash a body in a suitcase or march someone through customs with a weapon jammed in the small of their back.

“Ari, check the bathrooms after customs.”

“Will do.”

They were running an open channel, so she could speak with the team at the airport. Ari and Spider in the terminal, Dice and Sera in the parking garage.

“Where the fuck is this suitcase going?”

“Hell if I know,” Dice said. “Turn left in half a mile.”

The road wound through low hills and trees that crowded closer than they did in daylight, their shapes losing detail and becoming mass and shadow. Fields that once felt open now looked grim, flat stretches of darkening land with no clear end, the fence posts sticking up like grave markers.

The sky dimmed unevenly, a thin band of dull orange sinking fast beneath heavy blue-grey clouds. Farmhouses appeared without warning and vanished just as quickly, their lights sparse and distant, offering no real comfort. Even inside the car, the air smelled colder, metallic, damp.

Quiet roads turned more or less dead. Every so often, headlights flared too bright before disappearing, or taillights blinked in the gloom as Jez sped past at ninety, but she was mostly on her own. For a moment, she kept pace with a guy in a Porsche, the only other person out there driving like a lunatic, and who was probably having more fun than she was. The sense of time stretched; miles felt longer. Trees arched overhead in places, creating brief tunnels of shadow where the light seemed thinner, less dependable. In hindsight, the dusk felt less like a transition and more like a warning she was meant to notice.

“This is less ‘Flora lost her suitcase’ and more ‘Old McDonald had a farm.’ Give me a clue.”

“There’s another town in a couple of miles. Oh, wait, they’re turning again.”

“What’s next? A⁠—”

The car came out of nowhere.

Well, obviously it came out of somewhere, an overgrown driveway hidden by bushes, but there was no warning.