None of the agents could hear what she said; none of them stepped inside the house. When she came back, Sherlock said, “Did you call your lawyer?”

“No,” she said. “I called someone of far more help than that pitiful excuse.”

Savich didn’t care at the moment whether she’d phoned someone or used telepathy, so long as what she’d done would get Blessed and Grace away from Titusville, away from Ethan, Joanna, and Autumn.

“Nice touch,” he said to her, “using the phone like that.”

She turned on him, head thrown back, and snarled at him through her teeth, “I’m going to boil you alive, you miserable shit.”

Sherlock walked right up to her, got in her face. “Really, ma’am, that isn’t at all polite. Now you’re going to get cuffed.” She unhooked the handcuffs from her belt and slapped the old lady’s hands together.

Shepherd Backman lifted her face to the heavens and shrieked. That mad, guttural howl raised gooseflesh on their necks. Agent Ruley and Agent Todd stood still, watching the old woman, their SIGs drawn. Neither man could think of a thing to say.

49

TITUS HITCH WILDERNESS

TITUSVILLE, VIRGINIA

Autumn sat straight up. “Mama? You can tell me, is Blessed here?”

Joanna palmed her gun into Ethan’s hand and moved quickly to kneel down beside her daughter. She touched her hair. “Blessed isn’t here; everything’s okay, sweetheart. You’re safe.”

Autumn looked from one to the other of them, her eyes too adult, too filled with an understanding she shouldn’t have. “You’re going with Ethan to go after them, aren’t you, Mama?”

Joanna looked into her daughter’s beautiful blue eyes. Her eyes? Ethan thought so. She stroked out some of the tangles in her hair. She needed a brush. “Ethan wants to go alone, but you and I both know that’s too dangerous. One look and he’d be under. I want to be at his back, to keep him safe.”

“Your mother is staying here with you, Autumn.”

Autumn looked up at Ethan, again with too much awareness in her eyes. She said slowly, “Mama’s right, Ethan. I’ll be okay here. You take Mama and sneak up on them. I won’t be afraid, I promise.”

“It would be too dangerous for her,” he said. “Joanna, you have to stay here and protect Autumn.”

Autumn gave him a look that clearly said, What a stupid thing to come out of your mouth, and here you are, an adult.

Ethan said, “I don’t like it.”

“You can’t keep me from following you, so we might as well go together,” Joanna said, voice honey-smooth because she knew she’d won. How could she possibly consider taking a risk of dying as winning? He watched her hug Autumn hard against her, heard her say against her hair, “You stay here and wait for us, all right? We’ll be back. I promise you.”

“Be careful,” Autumn said, and looked toward where her sneakers were lined up next to her silver sleeping bag.

Once outside the cave, Ethan and Joanna made sure the bushes covered the entrance without any trace they’d been there. Ethan said, “Even if Blessed accidentally comes along, even if he tracks her near here, he won’t know where she is, precisely, because he can’t see the cave entrance in the dark.”

Joanna prayed that was true. She knew he’d said that to convince both of them. She said, “It’s too dark for you to track them. How are we going to find them?”

He said, “Tell me how experienced you are in the woods, Joanna. At night.”

“At night it’s pretty much been limited to leaving my tent to go to the bathroom. But I’m very good. I don’t clomp around and trip over plants and bushes. I’m a shadow, a ghost.”

He grinned.

“Seriously, I can keep up with you, Ethan. Where are we headed?”

“I told you I know this wilderness. I know they’re after her, but even if they can somehow track her to this area, I don’t think they’ll even try to come for her tonight. It’s too dark, they don’t know the terrain, and any light they used would give them away. If all that’s true, and they’re not all that far away, I have a good idea where they would have stopped for the night.” Without another word, Ethan started toward a cliff they’d skirted to reach the cave entrance.

“Be careful, Joanna. Now that it’s dark, it’s far more dangerous going down than coming up. From now on, don’t talk.” He picked up a dry branch as they made their way down the narrow winding path. When Ethan came upon a loose mess of rocks, he poked the branch at it, alerting Joanna. Neither of them stumbled. Ethan had excellent night vision, and Joanna kept close, copying his steps.