“You’re not listening. Guilt or innocence isn’t the issue. It’s time.”

“Sweetheart, Brynn, I’ve got experience with these things. I know the approach that cops respond to. Let me—”

“You can’t help with his, Dad, and, anyway, you have to go to work.”

“I can skip work.”

“I wouldn’t let you do that.”

“But—”

“You’re wasting your breath,” Mallett said.

Wes turned to him. “It’s my daughter and me talking here. I’ll ask you kindly not to interrupt.”

Mallett said, “She’s not turning herself in, and neither am I. And every second she spends arguing with you about it is squandering time better spent.” He came off the stool. “Yes or no on the car? If it’s no, we’re leaving.”

Wes looked between the two of them, saw the resolution in both their expressions, and realized that it was two against one, and he was the odd man out. He looked at Brynn with a frown of consternation. “I couldn’t talk you out of dating that wild Hendrix boy, either.”

“And I survived him.”

“Yeah, but look where you are now.” He gestured toward Mallett. “He’s a step or two down, you ask me. But”—he sighed—“you’ve got my car for as long as you need it.”

She didn’t hide her relief. “Depending on how things go, it could be several days before I can return it. How will you get to work?”

He pointed to the chessboard. “A greeter at the store is a friend of mine, lives in the neighborhood. We ride together every now and then. Pick up a pizza on the way home. Share it over a game of chess.”

“He won’t mind the inconvenience?”

“She.” Reading the surprise on Brynn’s face, he chuckled. “I’m a thief, not a monk.”

She reached across the table and touched his hand. “Thank you.”

He acknowledged her thanks with a nod, then heaved another sigh and slapped his thighs as he came to his feet. “What state do you want to be from?” At their quizzical expressions, he said, “We need to swap out the license plates.”

Turning, he walked toward the bedroom, saying over his shoulder, “If y’all are going on the lam, you’ve got a lot to learn.”

11:39 p.m.

Wes had always kept an “emergency kit” somewhere in the house. His present one was in the crawl space under the floorboards of his closet floor. In the old trunk, they found several license plates that hadn’t expired, a variety of new cell phones still in their boxes, a Ziploc bag stuffed with cash, which Brynn and Rye declined, and a prison-issue toiletry kit, which she claimed.

With Mallett’s help, Wes got all the floorboards back into place. Brynn excused herself and took the small dopp kit into the bathroom with her, and Wes and Mallett returned to the living area where they plugged in the phones to charge.

Wes sat down in his recliner. Rye took one of the chairs at the table, tilting it onto its back legs, propping himself at an angle against the wall.

“She looks done in,” Wes said.

“Both of us are sleep-deprived.”

“You’re welcome to stay here till morning, get some shut-eye.”

“You heard Rawlins. If they were to come back and find us here, you’d be in trouble with your parole officer. Besides, she needs to get on her way.”

“To?”

Mallett shook his head. “If Brynn didn’t tell you, why do you think I would? My loyalties lie with her.”

“Of course,” Wes said, nodding. But he questioned whether loyalty was the only foundation for their solidarity. Sparks flew every time the two looked at each other, and even when they were avoiding eye contact, there was a simmering awareness between them.

Wes idly scratched his armpit. “You two didn’t meet until last night?”

“That’s right.”

“Hmm.”

“What?”

“Nothing.” He situated himself more comfortably in the recliner. “Just, you got awfully wrapped up in her problem.”

“Too wrapped up.” Mallett was looking cornered and restless again. “But that ends soon. She gets gone, I’ll be out of it.”

“Brynn will go her way, you’ll go yours.”

“Yep. Just a day later than scheduled.”

“It’s been quite a day, though.”

“You can say that again.”

“You and Brynn gonna stay in touch?”

“No. Better for all concerned.”

“Especially you.”

Mallett’s green eyes narrowed a fraction. “You’re damn right.”

Wes gave him a critical once-over and snuffled. “You think you’re too good for my girl?”

“Other way around.”

“I hear ya.” Wes took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “She’s too good for me, too.”

“That’s plain enough.” Mallett looked around the shabby room. “She was desperate, or she wouldn’t have come here. She wants nothing to do with you.”

“She tell you that herself?”

“Didn’t have to.”

Wes gave Rye a sad smile and said softly, “Son, you’ve got it wrong.”

“How’s that?”

Wes reached over, picked up a bishop from off the chessboard, and rolled it between his palms. “Brynn had it tough growing up. All the odds were stacked against her, but she put her shoulder to it, and worked like the devil to achieve what she set out to do. When she became a doctor, got her position in the hospital, no daddy was ever prouder than me.”

He paused, studied the chess piece, noticed that the paint was wearing thin in spots. “I didn’t want to be an embarrassment to her, something in her life that had to be explained or made excuses for. I didn’t want her having to claim kin with an old con.” He tipped his chin down and looked at Rye from beneath his brows. “Was me, not Brynn, who stipulated that she have nothing to do with me.”

Mallett held his gaze as he slowly lowered the front legs of his chair to the floor.

Their stare held until Brynn came out of the bedroom.

Mallett looked at her and said quietly, “Time to go.”

12:04 a.m.

Once they were underway in Wes’s second-or third-hand compact, little was said for the first fifteen minutes.

Brynn stared out the passenger seat window, tracking rivulets of rain as they formed and streamed down the glass. Following the path of one with her fingertip, she broke the silence. “He seemed well, don’t you think?”

“I don’t know what he was like before.”

“Before, he was just as he was tonight. Unchanged except for a little more gray hair and an inch or two around his middle.”

“He’s been hitting the pizza with his lady friend.”

Brynn gave a wistful smile. “I’ve never known him to have girlfriends.”

“Hard to work them in between parole and his next stint.”

“I suppose. And then there was me,” she said. “I must’ve cramped his love life, too.”

Neither spoke as Rye passed an eighteen-wheeler throwing up enough spray to engulf the small car. Once the truck was behind them, he asked, “Why do you lead people to think it was you who turned your back on him?”

“I don’t do that.”

“Yes, you do. Or at least you don’t correct them when they assume that’s the case. How come?”

She turned her head and looked at him. “You don’t want to know anything about me or my life.”

“How many times are you going to throw that up to me?”

“Don’t snap at me. I’m only upholding the rule set by you.”

He didn’t say anything to that, but his jaw tightened, and so did his grip on the steering wheel. The rest of the trip was made in silence except for the rain beating a relentless cadence against the roof of the car.

When they reached the hotel, a neon sign above the entrance to the parking garage informed them that it was full. Rye, swearing under every breath, searched the open lot and pulled into the first available space he could find nearest the side door they’d used earlier.

In a stilted voice, she asked, “Before I go, do you mind if I come in, use the bathroom, get some snacks from the mini bar?”

“No. Sure.”

They bleakly gauged the distance they had to cover in pelting rain. Neither was inclined to leave the shelter of the car. They stayed as they were for a full minute, then Rye said, “It’s not going to get any drier.”

They made a dash for the door. Just as they reached it, a pair of headlights drew Rye’s attention to the corner of the building.

A police car.

12:26 a.m.

He swiped their room’s card key, shoved open the door, and pushed Brynn through. In their haste, she stumbled over his boots. “Rye? What?”

“Cop.”

They ran down the long hallway, Rye frequently checking behind them, fully expecting to see officers in pursuit. But they made it to the end of the hall and out of sight around the corner. He bypassed the elevator and hustled Brynn through the door to the fire stairs.

She ran up them ahead of him, but with his hand at the small of her back, urging her onward. Over her shoulder, she said, “Maybe we should hide somewhere on the ground level until we can get back to the car.”

“Can’t leave my bag.”