Caitlin shoved her chair away from the desk and cursed under her breath. She hated playing catch-up. She was on the cusp of a story with national implications, yet she was almost powerless to move forward. She had no way to replicate Henry’s years of dogged investigation of the Double Eagle group. And while she did have Henry working for her, at least in theory, he was beyond her reach and might well die before morning.
She was sure of only one thing: Penn knew a lot more about Henry’s work than he’d told her so far. Last night he’d spent at least ninety minutes at the Beacon offices. Given Henry’s respect for Dr. Cage, the reporter had probably told Penn most of what he knew.
Knowing it wasn’t the best move she could make, Caitlin lifted her landline and dialed Penn’s cell phone. He was probably asleep by now, but she couldn’t restrain herself. If she waited until morning, she’d be even farther behind on the story.
“Caitlin?” he said, sounding surprisingly alert.
“Yeah. Look, I’m sorry I was such a bitch before.”
“It’s okay. This has been a crazy day.”
“Is Annie asleep?”
He hesitated. “Not yet.”
“You sound funny. What’s the matter?”
“Nothing.” Penn swallowed something. Probably water beside his bed.
She let the silence drag for a couple of seconds. “I spoke to Lou Ann Whittington, the receptionist who saved Henry’s life. She told me that Henry had decided to accept my offer. That’s why he was moving his files.”
“Good for you. I figured that might be it, but that’s not what she told Sheriff Dennis.”
“Henry asked her not to tell anyone until he did. Penn, listen … I can understand you not wanting to break the promise you made to Henry last night. But the whole landscape has changed since then. Henry had decided to come work for me, but now he might not even survive the night. I want to help him, to carry on his work. But I can’t do that unless I know where to start.”
“I gave you quite a bit last night, and more today.”
“Yes, but Henry must have told you more than that. A lot more. His girlfriend has the idea that you two were working together. And you know what I can do if you give me something to work with. I’ve got people here just waiting to dive into this story.”
“Nothing you can do between now and tomorrow morning is going to affect Henry’s chances of survival—or Dad’s, for that matter. So why don’t you work with what you have? In the morning we’ll check on Henry and reassess where we are.”
She closed her eyes and forced herself not to argue. “What if he dies tonight?”
“If Henry dies, I’ll tell you everything I know.”
She knew this was all she could reasonably hope for, yet she couldn’t help pushing the limit. “Penn, with the right information, I might even crack Viola’s murder by tomorrow. I could go a long way toward the solution, anyway. You know that.”
When he answered, she heard a warning note in his voice. “Babe, let’s just leave it where we are tonight. Okay?”
She grimaced and started to snap at him, but Penn sounded seriously stressed, so in the end she just said, “All right. I’ll make do.”
“Get Jamie to follow you home, okay? And make him wait until you get inside.”
“Truthfully, I’m probably going to stay here all night.”
“Even better. Don’t leave the building until daylight, all right?”
“Okay.” She started to say good-bye, but instinct told her something important remained unsaid. “Has something happened? Is everything okay? I mean, apart from the obvious?”
“Everything’s fine. We’ll talk face-to-face in the morning. Meanwhile, you don’t leave that newspaper building. I’m going to have Chief Logan put a cop outside.”
“Penn—”
“We’ll talk in the morning,” he said sharply. “I love you.”
And then he was gone.
Caitlin hung up and stared at the telephone. Something was wrong. Or maybe she’d just pushed Penn too hard. She rubbed her eyes to clear the sleep from them. The problem with loving a great guy was that when you needed to bend the rules, he didn’t always have the proper flexibility. Yet Penn had stretched his ethics last night, and even more today. She was thinking about driving over to Ferriday to sit in the waiting room on Henry’s floor (hopefully out of Sherry’s sight) when Jamie thrust her door open again.
“Guess what?” he said, his eyes bright with excitement.
“Tell me. I’m desperate here.”
“They just had a fire at the Concordia Beacon. We caught it on the police radio.”
“What?”
“It started in a file room. A flash fire took out a bunch of storage boxes and stuff, then spread to the rest of the building. But get this: their computers melted.”
Caitlin blinked in confusion. “So? Isn’t that what computers do during a fire?”
“Sometimes.” Jamie smiled strangely. “But when the firemen got to the Beacon fire, they could still get inside the building. Yet the computers looked like someone had turned a blowtorch on them.”
This detail raised the hair on the back of her neck. “Oh, man. This is crazy.”
“How do you want to handle it?”
Caitlin looked at the phone on her desk and thought about calling Penn back. Instead, she got up, grabbed her coat off her chair, and waved Jamie out the door.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“We’re going to Ferriday.”
“You and me?”
“You’re a quick study, aren’t you? Get your fucking coat.”
CHAPTER 55
“DO YOU HAVe the security code?” Walt asked, as the Roadtrek nosed along the road bordering Lake St. John. The oxbow lake looked black in December, and the mostly bare trees didn’t offer any sense of warmth or invitation.
“Written on my hand,” Tom replied, scanning the mailboxes that lined the road.
“Which one’s your partner’s?”
“You were here two months ago. You don’t remember?”
“It was dark. Just like now.”