“What did you tell her?”
“I told her what went down at the dealership. But not where you’re going.”
“She didn’t like that.”
“No. Like Bob predicted, she accused me of aiding a fugitive.”
“Did she say whether the guy I shot was dead?”
“She didn’t get into it with me,” Susanne said. “But she did say someone was taken to Milford Hospital.”
If the guy was able to talk, he might tell Jennings Sydney was in Stowe. Then she’d send out the troops to intercept me.
“How do you think they know Syd is up there?” Susanne asked.
“I don’t know.” Bob was making motions to hand the phone to him. “Hang on, Bob wants to talk to you.” I gave him the cell.
“Hey,” he said. “You remember one of Evan’s friends had a summer job up in Stowe? Ask him about that. Ask him who it was, where the place was.” He said to me, “If Sydney heard about it, maybe she might have gone there to hide out for a while.”
Then he got very quiet. He said, “It’s okay…. I do…. You know I do…. Okay.” He stayed on the phone a moment more, then handed the phone to me.
“Hey,” I said.
“If I hear anything more, I’ll call,” she said.
“Okay,” I said, and flipped the phone shut. Tentatively, I asked Bob, “Everything okay?”
Bob said nothing for a moment, then, “She just… she was just thanking me for going with you.” Long pause. He glanced over at me, the gauges casting soft light across his face. “She thinks she made a mistake, leaving you.”
“I doubt that,” I said.
“It’s true,” he said. “And now, with all this shit with Evan, I wouldn’t blame her if she moved out and tried to patch things up with you.”
I watched as the dotted lines came zooming toward the Mustang and then slipped away. “I know you love her,” I said. “I saw it when Susanne collapsed that day.”
We went another mile or so before Bob said, “I know you think that I think I’m better than you. But I have to compete with your ghost every day.”
My cell rang. I flipped it open.
“Yeah,” I said.
“Mr. Blake.”
“Detective Jennings,” I said.
“Do you know where I am right now?”
“I’m guessing the hospital, or the dealership.”
“The dealership,” she said. “At least what’s left of it. The whole place is ablaze. Your wife tells me that once this fire is out, we’re going to find three dead people inside. We’ve got a man in the hospital in serious condition. Shot in the shoulder and the knee. But I gather I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know.”
“I know Susanne’s told you that two of the men in the building tried to kill me. So did the one you found outside, the one you took to the hospital. A man named Gary executed Andy Hertz. Shot him point-blank in the head. Same way he shot Kate Wood.”
“We need to talk about that.”
“Soon,” I said.
“How did the other two men in that building die, Mr. Blake? Did you kill them?”
“You’re kind of fading in and out,” I lied.
“Wherever you are, turn around and come in right now.”
“I can’t do that. Maybe, if I had any faith that you and Detective Marjorie weren’t trying to pin everything on me, I’d feel differently. The fact is, there’s been a goddamn human-trafficking operation going on at that hotel right under your noses. Why don’t you work on that till I get back?”
“Human trafficking? Is that what your daughter’s gotten mixed up in?”
“She was working there all the time,” I said. “Everybody there was told to lie. And they did a pretty convincing job of it.”
“Mr. Blake, please, come in. We’ll take over looking for Syd and—”
“You need to go through that hotel,” I pressed. “Room by room.” I felt a lump in my throat. “You need to see if there’s any sign of Patty.”
“You think she’s hiding there?”
“I think… I think she’s dead.”
Jennings waited.
“Gary said she was dead,” I said.
Jennings was silent. “Detective?” I said.
“I’m here,” she said.
“You got anything to say?”
Another pause, then, “We obtained Patty’s cell phone records.”
“I’ve been calling her cell,” I said. “She’s not answering.”
“There’ve been several calls, over the last few weeks, to her phone from a number in Vermont. From Stowe, specifically.”
I tried to keep my voice even. “Whose phone?”
“Pay phones. A couple of different numbers, actually. Someone made the calls using prepaid phone cards.”
“What about the other way?” I asked. “Were there any calls from Patty’s phone to Stowe?”
“No,” Jennings said.
“Well, I suppose it could have been anyone,” I said. “A boyfriend, a relative.”
“Mr. Blake, is that where you’re headed? To Stowe?”
“No,” I said. “I have to go, Detective.” And I flipped the phone shut. Seconds later, it started to ring. Jennings calling back.
“You’re not going to answer that?” Bob asked.