“Not necessarily. We could write what we know on the bottom of this mattress. I doubt he’ll think to flip it over.”

Unless he decided to take it with them. Why would he leave it behind only to have to buy another one? But it was a chance—and it could be their only chance, which meant they had to take it, regardless.

A spark finally entered Edna’s eyes and a bit of color showed in her cheeks. “Do you really think he’d reveal where he plans to take us?” she asked hopefully.

Evelyn held her breath for a second. She needed to fan the small flame she was attempting to build inside of Edna—and yet she couldn’t outright lie to her. That wouldn’t be fair and could cost her credibility later, possibly when she needed it most. “Have you ever heard the saying ‘You miss every shot you don’t take’?” she asked.

“No,” Edna replied. “But I get the point.”

“Then let’s do all we can, take every opportunity. I’d rather decide my own fate, wouldn’t you?”

When Edna squeezed her eyes closed, several tears escaped and ran unheeded down her cheeks, but she nodded.

Anchorage, AK—Tuesday, 3:45 p.m. AKDT

Lyman had driven Edna Southwick’s SUV to a strip mall—one obscure enough that they weren’t likely to have video surveillance and yet big enough that they had a fairly busy parking lot where he could leave the SUV among plenty of others.

After he parked, he got out and went shopping, purposely staying in the store for over an hour so that anyone who’d seen him go in would be unlikely to still be there when he came out.

Once he did emerge, it was raining, which meant people were paying even less attention to what was going on around them as they rushed to avoid getting wet.

Relieved, he drew a deep breath and called an Uber to take him and his groceries back to the ranch.

He knew the police would find his landlady’s Explorer eventually. When it didn’t move after several days, an employee would likely report it. That could happen even sooner if the police turned to the media to help them find Edna and the make and model of her vehicle were heavily publicized, but Lyman hoped he’d have at least a few days before that. Even if the police came upon it right away, there was nothing inside it to lead them to the ranch. He’d checked. The SUV was registered to her home address. He had her purse in the staff room, so no one could stumble upon that. And he’d worn gloves so he wouldn’t leave fingerprints when he drove. He’d even gone to the trouble of running her car through a car wash, getting the tires and hubcaps sparkling clean in the area set aside for cheapskates and fussbudgets who didn’t want to pay the detail guys. He’d seen several forensics shows—while lying in bed day in and day out at Beacon Point—where some tiny weed or bug helped authorities track a vehicle to a particular crime scene, but that wasn’t going to be what happened to him.