Page 101

My house was everything I needed it to be, but I hadn't been able to work there the way I used to work in Nashville. The office there had been mine. Quiet. Wonderful.

I needed my own space here.

I'd been putting off Harvey's standing offer to set me up in a suite in his building. It was generous. It was also not what I wanted. I wanted something like I'd had before, a door I unlocked myself, a room that smelled like the coffee I'd made in my own home, not some sterile office, and no obligation to anyone else's schedule.

I promised myself I'd find something. After this was over.

My phone rang, giving me permission to stop attempting to draw. I was grateful.

"Yeah?"

"Good morning to you, too." Code Drakos. “Who pissed in your Wheaties?”

"Sorry." I leaned back in my chair. "Dog."

"Really? I was being sarcastic. When did you get a dog? Never mind." He paused. "I've got Renzo and Ford on."

"I'm here," Renzo said.

"Go ahead." Ford's voice had his flat pre-coffee tone. He wasn’t going to be any fun.

Code started talking and it was good news. From an ATM camera along Route 9, then cross-referenced with a grocery store, they were able to get a license plate number for the SUV that had been at our construction site. The SUV was close to the state line, but Nash had already put out an APB, so he was caught and brought back here.

"How cooperative was he?" I asked.

"Very." I could hear the satisfaction in Code's voice. "Once the word arson was mentioned. And potential manslaughter, given that Gus was in the trailer."

Apparently, the driver had rolled over on the whole arrangement, the contact in Sacramento, the payment structure, the specific instructions he'd been given. Code had connected him directly to a director at Pacific Rim's home office.

"That's enough?" Ford asked.

"More than enough for the sheriff. Nash is making calls." Code paused. "The director isn't the top of the chain, but he's high enough that whatever legal exposure he's looking at will have a significant cooling effect on Pacific Rim's appetite for this particular project."

My stomach unclenched. The heartburn I’d been having for days disappeared.

"Harvey," Renzo said.

"Yeah." I had my phone to my ear as I reached for my jacket.

We thanked Code and got off the line.

We found Harvey behind his big desk, that for the first time seemed to make him look small.

I let Renzo take the first pass. He knew the man much better than I did.

"I've been thinking about Missy," Harvey said, before Renzo could start. "And Tina."

His wife. His daughter.

"I know," Renzo said.

"If something happened to either of them." Harvey stopped.

"Code has the driver," Ford said. He wasn't gentle about it, but he wasn't wrong to cut to it. "The man they sent to torch the trailer. He's given up a director at Pacific Rim by name. Nash is involved. This is going to have a legal tail on it that Pacific Rim cannot afford to ignore."

Harvey turned from the window. "You're sure?"

"Code traced the plates through ATM feeds and traffic cameras all the way to the arrest," I said. "There's nothing circumstantial about it. The driver confirmed the Sacramento connection in detail."