they’re lost—”
“I’ll drive out to the ranch and see what’s going on,” Jack said. “We can put out an alert—”
Kara frowned. “Allyson doesn’t want law enforcement to get involved at this point.”
“Not her call. She’s the governor of Connecticut not Texas.”
Sam could sense the escalating tension between brother and sister. So, obviously, could Susanna. She licked her lips and touched her husband’s arm. “Kids this age do impulsive things, sometimes for reasons only they understand. The important thing right now is to find them.”
“They have to be all right,” Kara said, half under her breath. She withdrew a small stack of postcards and letters from her handbag. “The kids wrote to me from camp up north earlier this summer, then from the dude ranch. Lillian more than Henry. She got me to read the Harry Potter books.”
Sam had seen them stacked on Kara’s nightstand.
She shoved the stack of letters and cards at her brother. “Here. Go through these. Maybe there’s something I missed, some clue as to what they’re up to. If you find anything, tell me, and I’ll call Allyson.”
Jack took the cards and letters. “Do you think they’ll come to you?”
“How? They don’t know where I live, they have no transportation—”
“They have your address.”
“But they’re kids. ”
Jack and Sam exchanged glances. Kids were capable of a lot. Sam said, “Do they know how to get in touch with you?”
She nodded, not looking at him. “I gave them all my phone numbers when I dropped them off at the ranch.”
Ellen returned with the water, her dark eyes huge as she handed the glass to her aunt. “You don’t think someone snatched them, do you, Sam? The Stockwells are rich, and Henry and Lillian have been in the news because their mother’s a woman governor and so young—”
Kara gasped, though, Sam knew, it had to be something she’d considered on her drive south to San Antonio. “Ellen, no one…I’m sure they haven’t been kidnapped.”
Jack slung an arm over Ellen’s shoulders. She was strongly built, a rugby player with a big heart. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” her father said, the professional in him taking over. “Kids sneak off from camp from time to time. They didn’t like lunch, they’re homesick, they’re mad at some other kid. Henry and Lillian are probably emotionally volatile right now. It’s still not too late for them to turn up on their own tonight.”
Kara sipped her water and let her gaze drift to Sam, and she asked tensely, “Did Zoe West call you?”
Her brother’s eyes flashed with suspicion, and Sam knew the question was Kara’s way of giving him permission to do what he planned to do, anyway. He saw Susanna wince, confirming what he already suspected—that she knew that something had happened between Kara and Sam at the Gordon Temple opening.
“Who’s Zoe West?” Jack asked his sister. “Why would you know anyone who’d call Sam?”
Sam decided to get straight to the point. “Zoe West is a detective in Bluefield, Connecticut. She’s doing a little solo investigating of Governor Parisi’s death. She called me this afternoon.”
Jack’s arm dropped from Ellen’s shoulder, and he straightened, drawing himself up to his full height. Behind him, Susanna sat on an armchair and exhaled, as if she’d been waiting for this particular shoe to drop. Maggie stayed at her aunt’s side, Ellen next to her father. Jack kept his eyes on Sam.
“She was checking my story,” Kara said.
Jack turned to her, his eyes steel. “What story?”
“Allyson Stockwell called me at the Gordon Temple opening and told me about Big Mike’s death. I didn’t say anything to Sam about it, but he sensed something was wrong. We went out for coffee.” She un-twisted her hands, some of the renewed color going out of her cheeks. “This heat. I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to it again.”
Her brother didn’t let up. “Kara, why would Zoe West want to know where you were when you heard about Parisi?”
“She’s not convinced his death was an accident. If it was murder—well, whoever did it presumably would need to know he couldn’t swim.”
Jack hissed through clenched teeth, understanding the implication of what his sister was saying, just as Sam had when he’d heard it from the Bluefield detective. “Jesus Christ. You knew?”
Kara nodded. “He told me several years ago. It was his one secret.”
“Detective West doesn’t like the injured-bluebird theory,” Sam said.
Susanna rose, gesturing to her daughters. “Let’s try that new gadget that makes frothy milk. I think it’s café au lait all around.”
Mother and daughters retreated to the kitchen. Sam remained on his feet. Jack tossed the stack of cards and letters on the coffee table and swore once, viciously. Kara suddenly looked flushed and self-conscious, and Sam wondered if she was thinking, picturing, remembering everything about their hours together two weeks ago. He was, but he pushed the images out of his mind, not letting them distract him now that two children were missing.
He glanced at the top postcard, which was lying facedown, noted the graceful handwriting. Eleven-year-old Lillian Stockwell. Dear Aunt Kara, I saw a snake today. I hate snakes!
Anything could have happened to Allyson Lourdes Stockwell’s children. Anything. Sam knew it, and he knew Jack did, too. And Kara. They were all in professions that taught them that ugly reality, but they didn’t need knowledge or experience to tell them the obvious, only common sense. Two middle-schoolers were out there somewhere, thousands of miles from home. It didn’t matter if they’d left the ranch on their own. They needed to be found.
“All right,” Jack said heavily. “Tell me what’s wrong with this damn bluebird theory.”
Three
K ara couldn’t get out of her brother’s house fast enough. She ignored the heat and her spinning head, her queasy stomach, and ran down the walk to her car parked on the street. She’d just been interrogated by two Texas Rangers, one her older brother, one a man she’d slept with in a moment of sheer insanity. The more they talked and got into Ranger mode, the less comfortable they were with the events in Connecticut. A near-fatal July Fourth bonfire, an accidental drowning and now two missing middle-schoolers, all involving the political elite of a wealthy New England state—none of it sat well with either Lieutenant Jack Galway or Sergeant Sam Temple.
Their instructions to Kara were simple: stay out of it.
Jack found the injured-bluebird theory unpersuasive. Was the pool deck wet from rain, someone swimming, watering the flowers? What was Big Mike’s blood-alcohol level? Who else was at his rented house that day? Who owned the house? Kara had to explain Big Mike’s passion for the Eastern bluebird, a native species that had lost ground to the more aggressive starling and English sparrow non-native
