Jenner was a few miles south of Bel Arbre when he saw the blue light flashing behind him.

This is it, he thought.

As he pulled over, he felt under his seat for his Beretta; during the drive, the gun had slid farther back, out of reach. His fingers touched the diamond grid of the grip, felt the cool metal, solid and inert. He tried to coax it forward with his fingertips while sitting upright, but the weapon was too heavy to budge easily.

In the rearview mirror, Jenner saw a late-model Taurus with a blue dashboard light; he couldn’t see—or count—the occupants. Could they see him? Would they see him if he bent to extricate the pistol from under the seat?

He decided not to risk it. He put both of his hands up on the dashboard; he wasn’t going to give any motherfucker an excuse to “accidentally” shoot him. He imagined the cop shooting him in the head while he sat in his car, the whole thing caught on dashboard camera. Imagined Robin Meade playing the video on Headline News the next morning, warning viewers that the footage they were about to see might be disturbing to some. Imagined the blocky white numbers of the date/time stamp ticking away in the lower part of the video as the cop approached Jenner’s car and shot him dead.

Then it occurred to him that an unmarked car wouldn’t have a dashboard cam. He smiled grimly—his murder would go unwitnessed on national television.

The cop had parked fifteen yards behind him on the shoulder. The area was remote—traffic between Port Fontaine and Bel Arbre was light, and at this time of day, there’d be a good ten minutes between vehicles.

Jenner rolled down the windows, then killed the engine. The heat flowed into the car, with it the chatter of birds. The fields that stretched out to the swamp were like the ones that Adam Weiss had staggered out of: long rows of plants. But the harvest was over now, and these plants were bare, just straggly green stalks wilting in the heat.

Behind him, in the Taurus, Jenner could make out the driver—a single male, he was pretty sure now—talking on his cell or radio. The cop had shut the dashboard light off; he probably didn’t want to attract attention.

Finally, the man opened his door and climbed out to stand between the door and frame, looking Jenner’s car over slowly.

There was the blast of a horn; a truck loaded with vegetables covered in white plastic sheeting was behind the cop car, the road too narrow for it to pass without the cop shutting his door. As the cop waved to the driver and began to climb back inside, Jenner quickly bent forward and scrambled for his pistol, sweeping his fingers desperately between the under-seat metal struts.

It was hopeless—he must’ve adjusted the seat since stashing the handgun, because there was barely an inch gap. He straightened as the truck passed, four Latino workers peering at him over the backboard.

He put his hands back on the dash.

In the mirror, the man got out of the car again. He wore jeans and a T-shirt, but Jenner could see the weapon at his hip.

Jenner recognized Nash, the deputy who’d helped recover Marty Roburn’s body. He saw Nash’s hand dip to his waist, pop the back strap on the holster. As he came closer, Jenner could almost hear the infinitely quiet creak and click as the open strap flapped against the holster tab.

Nash approached from the driver’s side, pistol in hand; he was careful to stay slightly behind the driver’s compartment. Clever—Jenner couldn’t see Nash properly, and if he tried to pull a weapon on Nash, he’d have to make such an awkward turn that the deputy could drop him before Jenner could even face him. It was slick, probably some standard cop trick.

Or maybe just something he’d learned on TV.

“Hey, doc.”

“Nash.”

The deputy gave an awkward grin. “Sorry it has to be like this.”

“Me too. I thought you were a decent guy.”

Nash flushed, then the grin came back and he said, “Well, doc, I thought you were, too. And yet, here we are…”

They were both silent, then Jenner said, “So what happens now? Are you here to kill me?”

Nash shook his head quickly. “Oh gosh, no, doc! I’m a low man, you’re talking to a low man here—I do minor shit, and they pay me minor money. I still sleep at night.”

“So you’re not going to kill me.”

“Hell, no. Word has come down that too many dead people are bringing too much heat. You’re good to go—unless you decide to make trouble up in New York. Then they’ll do something—but it won’t be me. And they say that’s all up to you. Mr. Craine says they’ve already got your statement on video, so it’ll be a lot harder for you to change directions now.”

“So what’s this about?”

“Come on, doc! I think you know why I’m here: you have something that belongs to my employer, and he wants it back.”

“I do?”

He rolled his eyes. “The cash, doc! Mr. Craine wants his money back—sorry, but you don’t get to keep it.”

“Oh, the money,” Jenner said. “It’s in the trunk.”

“I’m going to need you to get out of the car, open the trunk, get the cash, and stick it in the Taurus, okay?”

“I could just pop the trunk for you, if you’d like.”

“You’re a funny guy, doc! ‘Pop the trunk’—I like that!” Nash grinned thinly. “I don’t care what they say about you—you’re all right!”

Nash wiped his forehead with the back of the fist that held the Glock. Jenner wondered if he was sweating as much as Nash.

Nash said, “Well, let’s keep our friendship going. You move the bags, and I watch you move them. And then you head back to New York, and I head to wherever I have to with the money. Okay?”

Jenner opened the door. Nash stepped back; he was smiling but wary.

“Okay, doc. Go easy now—they say you don’t have a gun, but if I had a million in cash, I’d sure as shit be packing a goddamn cannon…”

Jenner said, “I don’t have a gun.”

“Well, doc, I do. Now nice and easy, and in three minutes, you’re on your way, dreaming of bagels and Yankee Stadium…”

“We’re on the same page.”

He opened the trunk.

“Hold it!” Nash said. “Let me check it.”

Jenner stood on the grass while Nash, half-turned toward him, quickly searched the trunk, lifting the garbage bags, feeling their weight, patting down the carpet.

“Okay, doc. Go for it.”

Nash pointed his key fob back at the Taurus; there was a quiet clunk and the trunk opened slightly.

Jenner scooped his clothes aside; quickly tipping his cell phone into the trunk, he hit redial. Leaning in to block Nash’s view, he shoved the hotel laundry bag into one of the bags that held his clothes, then made a show of yanking the two bags of cash together; the original leather carry bag, now thoroughly dissected, he left underneath.

“Hey, a coupla things. First, I dumped the carrier bag Craine gave me and divided the money into different bags—I didn’t know if the original had some kind of tracker device on it.”

“A tracker device? Smart move, doc! I like that—don’t think I woulda thought of that. What else?”

“I don’t know how much money they told you they gave me, but I only counted $735,000. It was never a million.”

Nash’s eyes narrowed. “You sure about that? You don’t want to fuck around with these people. These are very bad people…”

“Look, I don’t know if Craine is playing some kind of game here, but that’s all the money he gave me. You can ask him.”

Nash relaxed and shrugged. “Okay—your funeral. You realize you’re almost out, right? Almost home? You don’t want to fuck this up now.”

Jenner looked at Nash’s Glock; Nash glanced down, and said, “Yeah, sorry, but I gotta be careful with you—I read what you did to that guy in New York. Please don’t make me use it.”

He grinned, then gestured with the Glock toward the Taurus. “Okay, let’s do this. Let’s get you back home quick, okay?”

There was the cheery toot of a horn, and they turned to see Deb Putnam’s Jeep pulling in behind Nash’s Taurus.

She leaned out of the window, beaming, and called out, “Hey Jenner, hey Tom! Is this boys only, or can girls play too?”