River’s End

been prepared. Breathing shallowly she rubbed the hand he’d touched.
    “Daddy. Oh God.”
    He’d been so close. He’d touched her. He’d put his hand on her, and she hadn’t known who he was. She’d looked into his face and hadn’t known him. All those years ago. with the security glass between them. Jamie had told him Olivia would never know him.
    His daughter, and she’d given him the absent smile of one stranger to another. He sat on a bench in deep shade, washed down pills with bottled water. Wiped the clammy sweat from his face with a handkerchief.
    She would know him, he promised himself. Before another day passed, she would look at him and know him. Then it would be finished.

Thirty-two
    It irritated Noah that he couldn’t connect with Lucas Manning. Unavailable. Out of town. Incommunicado. He wanted a follow-up interview, and he wanted it soon. Then there was Tanner himself.
    Oh, they’d talk again all right. Noah thought as he pushed himself away from his laptop and paced to the window. He had a great deal to say to Sam Tanner. Maybe the son of a bitch thought the book would be a tool, perhaps even a weapon. But it was going to be neither.
    When it was done, it would be the truth. And when it was done, if he had any skill, it would be a closing for Olivia.
    The closing of that hideous part of her life and the opening of their life together. She would be finished with her guided hike by now, he decided. And he could use a break from the book. So what was stopping him from going over to the Center? She might be a little annoyed, accuse him of checking up on her.
    Well, that was something she’d have to get used to. He intended to spend the next sixty years, give or take, making sure she was safe and happy. He shut down his machine and walked downstairs through the empty house. The MacBrides were at the lodge, and he imagined his mother had nudged them into having a meal with her. Bless her heart.
    He checked the doors before he left, making sure they were secured. And, as a cop’s son. just shook his head at the locks. Anyone who wanted in, he thought, would get in.
    He’d learned that the hard way.
    Following instinct, he detoured toward the garden, and casting one guilty look over his shoulder, plucked a handful of flowers to take to Olivia.
    They’d make her smile, he thought, even as she pretended to be peeved that he’d stolen them from her grandfather.
    He straightened quickly at the sound of a car and remembered he hadn’t thought to hook his knife onto his belt. The wavering sun glinted off chrome and glass, then cleared so that he recognized Jamie Melbourne at the wheel.
    By the time he’d walked to the car. she’d shoved the door open and jumped out. “Are they all right? Is everyone all right?”
    “Everyone’s fine.”
    “Oh God.” She leaned weakly against the fender, dragged a hand through her hair. She wasn’t quite as polished as usual, he noted. Her makeup was sketchy, her eyes shadowed and her simple slacks and blouse travel-crushed.
    “I—all the way up here. I imagined all sorts of things.” She dropped her hand, closed her eyes a moment. “My mother called me last night, told me. She said he’d been here. Inside the house.”
    “It looks that way. Why don’t you sit down?”
    “No, no, I’ve been sitting. On the plane, in the car. I couldn’t get here any sooner. She didn’t want me to come, but I had to. I had to be here.”
    “No one’s seen him, at least not that I’ve heard. Liv’s at the Center, and your parents are at the lodge with mine.”
    “Good. Okay.” She heaved out a long breath. “I’m not a hysterical person. I think once you’ve faced the worst and survived it, you cope with anything. But I came very, very close to losing it last night. David was in Chicago, and I couldn’t reach him for what seemed like hours. It probably wasn’t more than twenty minutes until my brain clicked back and I thought of his cell phone.”
    Because she looked as if she needed it, Noah gave her a smile. “I love technology.”
    “I sure had good thoughts about it last night. Nothing’s ever sounded so good as his voice. He’s on his way. Canceled the rest of his meetings. We all need to be together until . . .” Her eyes went dark. “Until what, Noah?”
    “Until it’s over,” was all he said.
    “‘Well. I’d better get my bag inside—and have a good, stiff drink.”
    “I’ll get it for you.”
    “‘No, it’s just a carry-on. God