Silencing Eve

have to get to you. Bonnie said you have to get her away from him right away.”
    “I know that, dammit. What do you think I’m—” He tried to temper the harshness of his voice. “What else did she tell you? Eve hasn’t been hurt yet?”
    “I don’t think so. Sometimes I think Bonnie doesn’t tell me everything she knows. But Eve is still alive, Joe. She was asleep, not dead. Like that princess in the fairy tale. Bonnie said Eve even joked about it to her. A sleeping princess in a cottage not a castle and not a garden of thornbushes but a graveyard of driftwood.”
    He frowned. “What is all this nonsense? You’re not making sense.”
    “I think Bonnie was trying to tell me where Eve is now. She didn’t know exactly. She could only see what Eve was seeing, what Eve knew about the place.”
    “A graveyard of driftwood to keep everyone away from sleeping beauty?”
    “He gave Eve something to keep her asleep,” Ben said simply. “Bonnie was afraid she’d never wake up.”
    Joe muttered a curse. “Anything else? Did Bonnie tell you anything else, Ben?”
    “You’re scared, aren’t you, Joe? I’m scared, too.”
    Joe closed his eyes. God, yes, he was scared. “Yeah, I’m afraid for her. You’ve got to think hard and tell me everything about your dream.”
    “It wasn’t very long. Bonnie said that she had to fight to get through, that someone…” He thought for a moment. “Kevin was keeping her from reaching anyone close to Eve. I’m the only one…”
    “Anything else?”
    He was silent, thinking. “Only that it was Kevin’s castle, I mean cottage, where Eve is now. Is that enough? I repeated everything she told me just like she wanted. Can we find her now?”
    Garden of thorns, graveyard of driftwood, a cottage belonging to a man dead for the last five years. Pitifully slim clues given to a special boy from a spirit from beyond. He should be in hopeless despair.
    He was not in despair. He would not let that happen. He was desperate, but he was reaching out to grasp this fragile straw that Ben was handing him. “We’ll find her. I just have to think and put all this together. You did good, Ben.”
    “Then let me come to help you find her. I won’t get in the way.”
    “I’m on my way to Seattle. That’s a long way from you. I can’t wait for you to get here. Bonnie wouldn’t want me to wait, would she? She was worried, or she wouldn’t have come to you. She’d want me to find Eve as soon as I can.”
    Ben’s silence was troubled. “No, you can’t wait. Eve almost died. I’ll find my own way. Maybe Bonnie will help me.”
    “Ben, stay where you are. I don’t want you to—” It was no use arguing with the boy. He would do what he thought was right. “Take care, Ben. Keep in touch.” He hung up.
    His stomach was tied up in knots.
    Eve almost died.
    Stop thinking about Ben’s words. Move forward.
    But one thing to do first.
    He dialed Venable. “I assume you bugged Ben’s phone?”
    “Would I do that to a fine boy like Ben Hudson?” He paused. “What do you expect. You’ve all shut me out. Even Catherine offers me only crumbs about what she’s up to. I have to take what I can get.” He added dryly, “Though that hogwash Ben was spewing wasn’t worth the planting of a very fine piece of electronic equipment.” His tone roughened. “I won’t have roadblocks put in my way, Quinn. The risk is too great. This isn’t only about Eve. I want Zander. He may be the only bargaining chip I have to get Doane and the location of those nukes.”
    “I’ll get your damn bombs. And I’ll throw Doane’s body at your feet as soon as I get my hands on him. But I won’t have you dangling Ben on your string to force me to play the game your way. He’s a good kid, and he’s trying to help.”
    “Yeah, dreams and ghosts and all that crap,” Venable said. “I can offer you a hell of a lot more help. I sent a team from Homeland Security into Seattle as soon as Catherine told me she was heading there. I also sent a team to Chicago to back any play there. Just keep me informed, dammit.”
    “If I can do it without risking Eve. Otherwise, I’ll handle it myself.” He listened to Venable curse. “And I don’t care if you think Ben’s words were crap or not. Pretend you believe him and see if you can unearth any records about a cottage outside Seattle that Kevin may have purchased five years ago.”
    “The information is probably buried, and it could be a waste of my