Nash was jittery and pale, talking a mile a minute. He had Jenner drive down the unpaved road through the lower field to the dock, then held the gun on him while he helped Deb into the boat shed. Nash put a tarp on the ground beneath her; the room wasn’t cold, and the tarp served no practical purpose other than to keep the floor clean, but Jenner saw it as a gesture. What would Nash do?

They laid her on the floor, and then Nash hovered, watching Jenner. He was struggling to appear in control; Jenner realized the man was too frightened to go back outside.

He eased Deb flat onto her back, her knees bent. Nash edged away from them, absorbed in his own anguish. He stood at the waterfront window, peering through the security grill out over the mangrove swamp.

Deb seemed to be okay. The bleeding had slowed, and she was breathing normally. Jenner took her wrist and slipped his fingers over her pulse; it was fast but not weak.

There was a creak at the door as Nash stepped outside. He closed the door behind him; Jenner heard the latch fall into place, then the quiet click of a padlock bolting the latch shut.

He whispered to her, “How do you feel?”

She whispered back, “Like someone shot me.”

“Wow!” He smiled. “Screw park-ranger school—you shoulda gone to medical school!”

She didn’t smile back. “Am I going to be okay, Jenner?”

Her hand was cool in his. He said, a little too brightly, “You’re fine. The bullet went all the way through, through your side. You’ve lost some blood, but you look pretty good to me.”

“Jenner, don’t bullshit me, okay?” Deb pulled her hand back. “I don’t want you to fucking kumbayah me—if I’m going to die, I want to know.”

He smiled. “You’re going to be fine. If the bullet hit anything important inside you, you’d be a whole lot quieter by now.”

Her expression was dubious, so he said, “Really. I’m telling the truth.”

“And what about the money? Tell me the truth about that. Why did Nash shoot me?”

He told her about the meth, about the lab on Craine’s farm. He told her Craine offered him money to walk away, that the money was the only proof he had that Craine was deeply involved in the drugs. That he’d called in the DEA, and that they should be there soon. As he talked, her hand crept into his.

He looked around their cell. The shed was maybe fifteen feet by twenty. One window faced northeast toward the farmhouse, the other to the southwest, over the swamp. The room was lit by a dim yellow bulb, and smelled of pine pitch and gasoline. Orange plastic jerricans were lined up along one wall, next to a pair of canoe paddles and a double-tipped kayak paddle; there was no kayak or canoe in the shed.

A rough wooden table held a couple of fishing tackle boxes and a large wicker-and-canvas catch basket. Next to the bench, several tall, old-fashioned fishing rods leaned against the wall. Jenner knew nothing about fishing, but these were beautiful, each apparently fashioned from a single long stick of flexible bamboo, with circular wire guide loops tied neatly to the rod with black thread and varnished into place. Handmade, expensive.

As his eyes adjusted to the dim light, Jenner noticed a low, heavy bench against the opposite wall. O-rings had been bolted to the scuffed legs, and the floor in front was scraped and battered. There were brown stains spattered on the floor and on the wall behind; he doubted they were fish blood.

There was a scrape as the door opened again.

Brodie nodded at Jenner, then at Deb. He glanced around the shed as if he were a prospective renter, then turned to the two of them again.

“Kind of too bad, isn’t it?”

Jenner shrugged. “I’d have liked it better if things had gone differently.”

“You think Nash has the balls to kill you?” Brodie grinned. “I’m not so sure.”

Jenner was silent.

“Well, we’ll see.” Brodie motioned toward the bench with the bloodstains. “Tony does.”

“Who’s Tony?”

“The tall guy with black hair up there on the porch, the one with the big knife.” He paused, then grinned a little wider. “I figure he’ll end up being the one who takes care of you—after all, he took care of the last ME.”

Jenner stiffened. “Ah.”

“‘Ah?’ That’s it? What are you, some kind of tough guy? I tell you he killed your buddy, and all you say is ‘Ah’?” He shook his head. “If it’s any consolation, because of Roburn, I had to get rid of a couple of my men.”

“What happened?”

Brodie hesitated a second, then shrugged. “I sent two guys to Port Fontaine to transport a body. The body wasn’t ready, so the funeral director sent them away for a couple hours. Those fucking idiots went and smoked meth. They got really high, and then went back for the body way late.

“Because they were out there dicking around, the body was still there when Roburn showed up at the funeral home with some paperwork. Later, Reggie Jones noticed the body had been fucked with—someone had opened it and snagged a sample from one of the bricks.

“Reggie put two plus two together and realized it had to be the medical examiner. So I sent Tony to visit the guy…and the rest you know.”

He shook his head. “Your pal figured we had cops working for us, so he didn’t know who to turn to. He was probably trying to figure out his next step when Tony showed up on his doorstep—he didn’t see that one coming. He thought he had time—you know how that is, right, doc? When you think you have time, but then it turns out you don’t?”

Jenner didn’t reply.

Brodie grinned.

“He was a tough old fuck—didn’t say a word, no matter how Tony carved him up. We tore that place apart but never did find what he took.” He chuckled. “All this over a couple bucks worth of product!”

Brodie glanced at his watch.

“Anyway, just came down to see if that cocksucker had stepped up.” He looked down at them both, then said, “I guess not. But, whatever—things will get taken care of down here pretty soon, by Nash or by Tony.”

He slipped out through the door. Jenner heard him call to Nash, then his voice faded.

Jenner waited a couple of minutes, then went to the window. Nash was alone on the dock, talking on his cell. In the drizzle, the water in the center channel looked gray and cold, cast in dirty lead. Jenner glanced at his watch; it was just a question of time before Nash would be dumping their dead bodies into the dark water. He imagined his body hitting the water, sliding under, being swallowed by the black.

Deb was looking up at him. He caught her eye and smiled, then walked over to look out the back window. Brodie was walking back up the slope to the farmhouse, where several men sat on the porch, smoking and talking. The door to the first bunkhouse swung open, and two men filed out into the rain. They peeled off hairnets and surgical face masks with obvious relief, and stood in the drizzle in their white jumpsuits, happy to be in the wet, fresh air.

Jenner turned and looked down at Deb. Then he noticed a small first-aid kit on the table. He picked through it, found a couple of grubby Band-Aids and a sealed two-inch by two-inch gauze pad; there was no tape.

He squatted next to her and said, “Okay, let’s see about patching you up.”

Up at the farmhouse, someone pointed, and all heads turned to the road, where a dark Volvo station wagon was approaching.