Silencing Eve

satisfied with the answer?”
    “No. He’s been dodging it.”
    “Good. Then you’ll not trust him any more than you do me.”
    She smiled faintly. “But I believe I’m beginning to trust you, Kendra.” Her smile faded. “I’ve got to get this clear in my mind, but I don’t want to blow your little scenario. Who knows that Eve is alive?”
    “Joe, Zander, Jane MacGuire, Margaret Douglas, and the people who have been concerned with the hunt for Eve from the beginning.”
    “Not Eve’s mother, Sandra?”
    “No, it was Joe Quinn’s call. He decided that she was too erratic to trust with that information.” She made a face. “Actually, Joe was being diplomatic. Replace erratic with selfish. You’ll notice she didn’t come today—too devastated. But not too devastated to give one TV and three print interviews this morning.” She shrugged. “I don’t know what their relationship was, but it was definitely complex.”
    Catherine was mentally going over the other names Kendra had given her. “Margaret Douglas…” she repeated. “You broke off in the middle of telling me something about a Margaret. Why?”
    “Margaret is … difficult.”
    “You don’t want to talk about her.” Catherine’s eyes narrowed on her face as she tried to remember the exact words Kendra had spoken. She had been so upset and intent on digging for the truth that she had dismissed it at the time. “You said something about your not being able to put the entire scenario together sooner except for her.”
    “No, just not as soon.” She turned back to the window. “Look, I’m not going to try to explain Margaret to you. She has to be experienced. All I’m telling you is that she’s a good kid and no phony. I’d trust her in the trenches.”
    “But I’m not you. I’ll make up my own mind,” Catherine said. Her gaze followed Kendra’s to the crowd below. “Which one is Margaret?”
    “The girl standing next to Jane MacGuire. She tends to stay close to her when she can. She’s a bit protective.”
    “Of Jane MacGuire?” She had met Jane, and no one appeared to be less in need of protection. Strong. Very strong. And Kendra had been referring to Margaret as a girl, even a kid. She gazed curiously at Jane and Margaret standing beside her.
    Golden. Margaret seemed bathed in sunlight, tanned, sun-streaked hair, slim in her simple black dress. She did look young, nineteen or twenty at the oldest. She was appropriately solemn for the occasion but there was an aura of vitality, a barely restrained exuberance, held in check. “Why protective?”
    “Jane saved her life. She took a bullet for her from Doane’s cohort, Blick, when all of this madness first started. Margaret believes in payback.”
    “Interesting. I believe I have to talk to this Margaret Douglas.” She turned toward the door. “Would you like to come along and introduce me?”
    “No, I have some thinking to do. You’re on your own.”
    “Thinking?”
    “Things are changing,” Kendra said soberly. “I have some decisions to make.”
    “Don’t we all,” Catherine said. She opened the door. “Thank you, Kendra. And thank God you found out that we might still have a chance of freeing her.”
    “I should have found out sooner. It’s to do all over again.”
    “Maybe not. It appears a trap is in the offing.”
    “He’s managed to sidestep traps so far.” She paused. “Good luck, Catherine.”
    The words sounded curiously final, Catherine thought, as she left the house and ran down the porch steps. Imagination? Maybe. Everything was looking dark to her right now.
    Dismiss it.
    She had to probe, to find which way to go. She had not been pleased that Kendra Michaels had been suspicious about Venable’s motives and response to that disaster in the ghost town. Kendra had impressed her as being very sharp. Catherine had worked with Venable since she was a girl of fourteen and knew him as well as anyone. He was always an enigma, but he was a professional. Yet his priorities were always to the job, and she could see that if he had been torn, Eve might have been downgraded in importance.
    So walk carefully and discreetly around Venable.
    And don’t trust him any more than she could throw him.
    She started to make her way through the crowd toward Jane and Margaret.
    But she’d only gone a few steps when Margaret Douglas said something to Jane and was walking briskly toward Catherine.
    Catherine stopped and watched her move. Margaret was worth