you didn’t have to come tearing upstate after me.” She always kept him informed as to her whereabouts. Otherwise, he worried.
“I kind of wanted to see this place. Damn, it’s nice here.”
“I woke up this morning thinking I landed in the middle of a…” She paused. He’d think she’d lost it if she mentioned the enchanted world. “Special place.” Far in the distance, a floatplane landed, skimming like a dragonfly across the surface of the lake.
“Coming from where I do,” he said, “I tend to forget there are places like this in the world.”
A retired federal marshal with a troubled past, he lived alone in a tattered but quiet neighborhood of Newark. He was on disability and had dedicated his life to looking after people like Claire—witnesses who were hiding or running from something too big to cope with on their own. He had been an expert in identity reassignment and redocumentation, and when she’d gone to him in desperation, he’d given her a comprehensive security suite. This included a name borrowed from a deceased person, a new personal history and legitimate documentation. All new paper on her was official—birth certificate, driver’s license, social security card. Thanks to Mel, she had been reborn and given a chance at a new life.
Although she’d known him for years, she didn’t really know him. He was absolutely committed to helping people caught in the shadow world of anonymity. It was probably what made him tick. She had once asked him why he bothered with people like her. He said he’d been in charge of protecting a family of witnesses, and they’d all been killed.
Claire had stopped asking after that. She didn’t want to know more. If she got too close to him, he’d be in danger from the same monster who had sent her into hiding.
“Are you staying at the resort?” she asked.
“Right. Do you know what this place charges per night?” He shook his head. “I got a day use pass.”
“So where are you staying?”
“There’s a conservation department campground not far from here. It’s called Woodland Valley.”
She frowned. “You’re camping?”
“I’m camping.”
“Like, in a tent, with a sleeping bag?”
“Yeah, like that.”
She tried to picture him in the tent staked out in the wilderness. “So, um, how is that working out for you?”
“I didn’t come all this way to get laughed at.”
She caught a note of apprehension in his tone. “What?”
“I got a bit of news. You’re not going to like it.”
She braced herself. “Just tell me.”
“The Jordans applied to be foster parents once again.”
Despite the heat of the day, she felt a curdled chill that took her breath away. Her throat went dry; she had to swallow several times before she could bring herself to speak. “For God’s sake, two murders and a third kid missing, all of which happened on their watch—that doesn’t stand in their way?” she demanded. “No way will Social Services approve them.”
Mel was quiet. Too quiet, for too long.
“Right?” she demanded.
He stared out at the water. “I talked to about a half dozen people at Social Services.”
“And?”
“Apparently they dismissed me as a crackpot.”
“That was risky,” she said, “you pointing the finger at Vance Jordan. I’m the one who needs to blow the whistle on him, not you.” As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she realized the decision was already made. It had been percolating for a long time, the need to end her selfexile. Coming to a place like this had only firmed her resolve. “It’s time, Mel. Past time. I can’t do this anymore. I’m done waiting.”
“Claire—Clarissa. He’s got too many friends all along the chain of command, and the ones who aren’t his friends are scared of him. Exposing yourself now won’t accomplish anything.”
There was a good chance he was right, but the thought of Jordan with another foster child made her stomach churn. “I’ll figure out something,” she said. “On my own.”
“You want to talk about risk—”
“That’s why I want you to stay out of it. Look, I’m doing this for myself, okay? I have to stop running.” There might have been a time when she’d accepted her life underground, but that time was over. She simply couldn’t keep it up. Instead of getting easier, being in hiding was getting harder. She was dying inside, unraveling with need. Her mother had been alone in the world, and sometimes Claire was convinced that was what had made her live so recklessly and die so young.
Claire sometimes heard of protected witnesses who came out of hiding and got themselves killed. People thought they were foolish, but she understood why they couldn’t stay anonymous forever.
“I won’t let you,” he snapped. “Just wait, okay?” he said. “I’ll figure out the next step.”
She merely nodded, pretending to agree with him. Then they parted ways in secret, like illicit lovers. That was the way all their meetings went. It was best not to be spotted together. She knew he was furious with her for insisting on risking herself in the Jordan case, but he must have known she wouldn’t sit still and watch Vance Jordan become someone’s foster father again. There was a ninety-day period before approval was granted or revoked. Ninety days to figure out how to come forward with what she knew—and to make someone believe her.
The prospect excited Claire as much as it frightened her. Mel had always insisted the chances of success were slim and the risk of exposure too great. But she kept thinking about how her life could change if Vance Jordan were arrested.
In her job helping people at the end of their lives, she had learned much about the importance of the way a person spent her time on earth. Running and hiding was not a life; it was just getting through the day.
George Bellamy was adrift. These spells came upon him in the gauzy numbness between waking and sleeping, courtesy of his disease. He was sometimes treated to an unprompted magic carpet ride through time and space, and at the end, he was amazed to find himself in the here and now. Here—in this paradise of a place, so beautiful it almost hurt to look at it. And now—at the last part of his life, which had not always been beautiful. It had never been boring, though.
Once he was gone, he imagined people would say he’d fought a brave battle with cancer or some such nonsense. In fact, he was not brave in the least; he was scared shitless. Who the devil wouldn’t be? No one knew for certain what awaited him in the vast infinite, no matter what one’s teachings were.
But still. Death was one of the Great Inevitables. George was working hard on accepting his fate, but a few things were holding him back, like the last uncut anchor ropes that kept a hot air balloon from soaring. If he wanted to fly free with boundless energy, he was going to have to find a way to untether
