The threat was like a hot needle piercing Cavanaugh's chest. Still dazed by the blow to his face, he tried to think quickly, to distract Grace from fixating on Jamie. "My team and I taught Prescott how to disappear. Then he killed everybody but me." What Cavanaugh said was only partly true. He deliberately didn't mention that a rocket from Grace's team had blown up Chad and Tracy. Maybe he could keep Grace from realizing that he hated her side almost as much as he hated Prescott. "I risked my life for that son of a bitch. He killed the people who'd pledged to protect him. My friends. Tried to kill me… I want him as much as you do."
"Then tell us where to find him," Grace said.
On the floor, Cavanaugh raised his left arm, trying to shield his eyes from the glare of the lights. More blood dripped from his mouth. "You think if I knew where to find him, I'd have come to his lab?"
"You just told me you helped teach Prescott how to disappear!" Grace's voice boomed.
"Everything but the final step: his new identity." Cavanaugh's swollen mouth made it difficult for him to talk. "We'd arranged for him to go to a forger who'd supply him with a new name and documents for it. Prescott got there ahead of me, took the documents, and killed the forger. There's no way to find out the name and background the forger created for him." "Where did Prescott intend to live?" "I have no idea. We hadn't decided that yet." "Edgar," Grace said.
This time, it was a kick to Cavanaugh's side that made him groan. Trying to absorb the impact, he rolled, but not far-a corner blocked his way.
As the reverberation of the impact ended, Cavanaugh heard I Jamie's nervous breathing. "We told him to pick a spot where he'd never been, where he'd be least expected to go, a place he'd never spoken to anybody about."
"You're not making a very good case for yourself," Grace said. "Why should we let you live if there's no way you can help us?" "I understand him."
"You understand him?" Grace mocked. "He worked for us for ten years, and nobody here understood him."
"Except that he's paranoid," Cavanaugh said. "And he's arrogant."
"You're not telling me anything I don't know. I think Edgar needs to have that heart-to-heart with your friend to get you to be more generous with your information."
Cavanaugh heard Jamie stop breathing. "Grace, I'll tell you the most important thing you need to know about him," he said. "Quit calling me that! If you're trying to pretend you're delirious, it isn't going to-"
"Prescott believes he's smarter than everybody else," Cavanaugh said. "So what?"
"I'm betting he thinks he knows how to disappear better than I taught him. I'm betting he thinks he can break the rules and be clever enough to get away with it." The idea, which had suddenly occurred to Cavanaugh, began to seem more than just a stalling tactic.
"Be specific."
Cavanaugh squinted past the nearly blinding flashlights toward where Grace's voice came from the darkness on his left. "We asked Prescott if he had a place in mind where he wanted to start his new life. He told us no, which we said was good"-Cavanaugh wiped blood from his mouth-"because people who have a place in mind often make inadvertent comments about it." He took a painful breath. "Later, somebody might remember those comments and tell the wrong people." He shifted where he lay on the concrete floor, feeling its chill creeping into him. "I've been trying to remember if Prescott made any inadvertent slips like that."
"And did he?" "He liked wine." "That's not a bulletin, either."
"He liked fine cooking. He could analyze it the way a chef would." Thinking of Prescott's praise for Chad's beef Stroganoff, Cavanaugh felt a mounting fury about Chad's death, about how it wouldn't have happened if not for Grace's team and the fire Prescott had started. Hating Grace, he hid his emotions by concentrating on the pain Edgar had inflicted on him: his aching stomach muscles and his mangled lips. "He said the only exercise he enjoyed was golf."
"So Prescott went to Napa Valley or the New York wine district or the Bordeaux region of France, where he eats gourmet meals when he's not playing golf-is that the news flash you're giving me?" Grace asked. "If you don't start telling me something useful, Edgar and your friend are going to start dancing. While he's at it, he'll step on your toes a little more."
"Let me finish." Cavanaugh's swollen lips throbbed. "When I met him at the warehouse, he had some books and videotapes on a shelf. Not many. But he'd been in that hidey-hole for three weeks. It stands to reason that the few things he had with him were extremely important to him, enough to keep him amused for that length of time." Cavanaugh paused, hoping to sink the hook. "Or to satisfy his fantasies."
"Fantasies?"
"About the ideal life he was planning. About the dreamed-of place he was going to see with his brand-new identity." "What were the books and the videos?" "That's the problem. I've been trying to remember, but I can't think of the titles." Again, Cavanaugh was partly lying. He definitely remembered Prescott's fascination with the poet Robinson Jeffers. He was trying to give Grace enough information to retain her interest while he bought time, in the hopes that he could find a way to get Jamie and himself out of there. "He had a porno book. Another book about geology. I saw an odd mix of videos. A Clint Eastwood thriller. A teenage romance starring Troy Donahue."
"Titles," Grace said. "I told you-I can't remember." "You will," Grace said.
She snapped her fingers. Footsteps scraping, the group backed away. Gripping the wall to get support to stand, Cavanaugh felt Jamie help him to his feet. He shambled from the room and watched the group climb the concrete steps toward sunlight that hurt his eyes.
At the top, Grace had a cell phone to her ear. "Somebody bring Dr. Rattigan… I don't care what he's doing. Get him here now."
The group disappeared into daylight.
With a drone, the concrete door descended, blocking the sun. Three feet. Two feet. Cavanaugh cherished the final sliver of light. Then, with a hollow thump as the door closed, he and Jamie were enveloped by darkness.
4
The gloom and the isolation were so total that the air felt denser and smelled staler. He heard Jamie breathing next to him.
"Who's Dr. Rattigan?" Her voice was unsteady. The complete lack of light caused the echo to seem louder.
Cavanaugh's injuries, plus his fear-weakened muscles, made it hard for him to keep his balance in the darkness. "My guess is somebody with a satchelful of syringes and chemicals to help me remember."
"How hard did he hit you?"
"My smile isn't as winning as it used to be." The joke wasn't much, but Cavanaugh had to try to do something to lift Jamie's spirit. "What about you? Are-"
"I need to… I'm sorry, but I have to…"
Cavanaugh heard Jamie feel her way along a wall and into a room. An urgent tug on a buckle was followed by a zipper being pulled down, slacks being dropped, urine hissing on the floor.
"Sorry," she said. "Sorry."
"For what it's worth…" If he hadn't been determined to rouse her spirits, he wouldn't have admitted that his own pants were wet. "When Edgar kicked me, my bladder let go."
And that's something else he and Grace will pay for, Cavanaugh thought.
Fabric made a brushing sound as Jamie readjusted her clothes. "I don't know if I ever told you. When I was a kid, some friends-if I can call them that-locked me in a closet. I don't like the dark."
"I'm not crazy about it, either."
"I have trouble in places that make me feel closed in."
"Maybe I can make the space seem larger." The luminous dial on Cavanaugh's watch showed the rising motion of his hand as he remembered something in the upper pocket of his jacket.
Scrape.