"So it's possible someone else might still be listening in on whatever I say."
"For the time being, yes," Easy answered. "Possible but not likely."
Easy went back outside. Ali packed up her computer, and Dave helped carry that and her luggage out to her car. "Do you want me to come with you?" he asked.
"No. You go get Mom. I'm sure she's worried sick. Just make sure that no one follows you when you bring her to the house. Although," she added ruefully, patting the pocket of her jeans where she had stowed the GPS device Easy Washington had given her, "I now know that it's sometimes harder to know you're being followed than one would think."
"I'll be careful," Dave said. "Besides, I don't think the media routinely passes out GPS tracking devices."
"Let's hope," Ali said.
He opened the car door to let her inside and touched her shoulder tentatively as she did so. "Be careful," he said.
"I will."
By then it was late enough that, other than a long parade of slow-moving semis, traffic into the city was relatively light. Among all those trucks, the Cayenne might as well have been invisible.
Propped up by cup after cup of coffee, Ali was tired but nonetheless wide awake as she drove. As the miles sped by, she couldn't help thinking about Paul. Did the fact that he had been working with the authorities at the time of his death mean he was, in fact, some kind of hero?
During that fateful phone call from Roseanne, he had evidently told her that he would go to the authorities but only after both his wedding and honeymoon. That delaymost likely done out of deference for Aprilhad given the Joaquins the ammunition they needed and the opportunity to take him out. The irony was that they had killed Paul because they suspected he might possibly go to the cops when in fact he had already done so. That wasn't lost on Ali, either. She knew those were facets of the story she would need to address when it came time to write Easy Washington's promised exclusive for cutlooseblog.com.
Most of the time what appeared in cutloose consisted of opinionAli's opinions and those of her readers. After months of using the blog to revile Paul Grayson for his two-timing treatment of her, it was difficult for Ali to think of him in any context other than worm. She wondered if she'd somehow be able to muster the necessary distance and evenhandedness to write the rest of the story and do justice to it. For that, Ali would have to revert to her old self and to her original training as a journalistwith one minor exception. Well, a major exception, actually. Most of the time reporters were expected to relate what happened without actually being involved. In this situation, Ali could hardly claim to be a disinterested bystander.
Lost in those complicated thoughts and driving on automatic pilot, Ali steered the Cayenne up the familiar steep curves of Robert Lane. When she arrived at the entrance, she was surprised to see that the broken gate had been repaired. It was standing open, but the broken post had been mended and the wrought-iron gate itself had been reattached to the hinges. Once inside the gate she rolled down her window and attempted to use the free-standing keypad to punch in what she remembered as the old gate-closing code. To her surprise, the gate swung shut.
She had decided on her way into town that it would probably be best if, for the time being, she and her mother stayed in the pool house. There were two bedrooms there and it would be better for her to stay in what had been Chris's apartment for the past several years rather than venturing into the house where April and Paul had been living together in her absence. Eventually Ali would have to deal with April's things and with Paul's, too, but not right now. Not tonight. Not with so much of what had happened to those people still far too fresh.
So, after rolling the window back up, Ali headed for the pool house with its attached carport. Even if it was locked, she knew Chris had always left an extra key in the utility cabinet at the front of the carport. As she drove through the yard, the motion-activated security lights came on. Passing the garage, she was surprised to see the garage doors standing open. Before she could react, though, a figure emerged from the garage doorwaya figure carrying a gun. Her first thought was simply, No! Not again!
She knew it was Jake Maxwell before she even saw his face. And when he used the barrel of the gun to rap sharply on the window next to her head, she knew exactly what he wanted and did it at once. She put on the brakes and stopped.
Even though she couldn't hear him very well through the closed window and over the sound of the engine, it was easy enough to read his lips. "Roll down the window!" he ordered.
With a weapon trained at her head and with her own Glock packed away in some crime scene investigator's evidence storage locker, Ali had no choice but to comply. She rolled down her window.
"What are you doing here?" she asked.
Jake ignored the question. "I need your car," he said, "and I need it now. Get out."
There was a splotch of grease on the front of Jake's otherwise white shirt and grease on his shirtsleeves as well. He had been doing something in the garage, something mechanical. Or at least he'd been trying to. His face was drenched in sweat. He looked desperate. And scared.
In that moment Ali recognized something about the man that she had never known before. Jake Maxwell was a coward. Whatever crimes he may have participated in, it was unlikely he had ever done his own dirty work.
"No," she said simply. "I won't."
Jake was almost beside himself. "I've got a gun. What do you mean you won't?"
Just like in the restaurant, Ali was making calculations in her head. She had probably left the Claim Jumper several minutes before Dave had, although she wasn't sure by how much. And she had most likely driven faster than he had. When it came to power, his little Nissan didn't compare with the Cayenne's V-8. Maybe he had fudged the speed limit coming into townAli certainly hadbut she doubted it. And once he got to the city, he would be going first to the Motel 6 to collect Edie. How much longer would that take him? Half an hour? Forty-five minutes? Could she stall Jake that long? Ali realized that her best bet was to engage him in conversation.
"What's going on, Jake?" she said as calmly as she could manage. "Why the gun? We've known each other for a long time. You don't mean this. You wouldn't hurt me."
"I'll hurt you if I have to," he insisted. "I need your car! Get out."
"Can't we talk about this?" she asked.
"There's nothing to talk about," Jake said. "The cops are after me. So are some other people. Either way, I'm a dead man. Give me your car."
Ali knew now that Jake was as frightened of the Joaquins as Roseanne had been.
"Surely it can't be as bad as all this," Ali said. "Get in. I'll take you wherever you need to go."
Much to Ali's amazement and without an additional word, he walked around the front of the car. There were a few short seconds when she might have jammed her foot on the gas pedal and run him down. That would have ended the confrontation there and then, but somethingbasic humanity, maybe?held her back. She was betting the farm that he wouldn't gun her down in cold blood because she was someone he knew. The problem was, that was her situation as well. Ali couldn't kill Jake for the exact same reasonshe knew him. They had once been friendsat least she had always thought they were.
Ali punched the "unlock" button on the car and let him inside.
"Where to?" she asked.
"Mexico," he said. "And not down the I-5, either. They'll be checking the border there. Head for Julian. Know where that is?"