She turned the other way and ran into the girl—about sixteen, bad teeth, bad hair, bad bruises on her wrists.

“Sorry,” Caitlin said.

The ghost brushed past her.

Caitlin walked to the front window. Frodo’s truck still sat at the pump, nozzle in place.

She grabbed trail mix and a bottle of water, then found a travel-sized mouthwash. She looked up, saw bathroom Wendy at the refrigerators. The girl picked two bottles of Mountain Dew, glanced around. Her eyes met Caitlin’s, then shifted away. Caitlin went back to the coolers.

The girl tried to walk past. “I’m not stealing.”

“Yes, you are. Do you need help?”

“Stealing?”

“To get away from the guy you’re with?”

Her eyes shot toward the bathroom. “What? No.”

“Is he family, an uncle or something?”

“Please, don’t.”

Caitlin checked the window. Frodo removed the nozzle from his tank.

“Last chance, do you want me to take you somewhere?”

The girl shook her head no.

Caitlin grabbed a twenty from her purse, handed it to her. “Don’t let him know you have this.”

She wrestled the Mountain Dews from the girl’s hands and walked to the counter.

“Hey, wait.”

Caitlin pushed everything toward the clerk, swiped her card. “It’s on me.”

Frodo climbed behind the wheel of the truck.

Caitlin grabbed her receipt, left the Mountain Dews. “Good luck.”

She went for the door. Frodo pulled away from the pumps, put a turn signal on, and waited for traffic.

Caitlin got in her truck, started the ignition.

“Wait.”

She looked up. Bathroom Wendy stood outside the gas station door, Mountain Dews in hand.

Caitlin watched Frodo disappear in the rearview and rolled down her window. “Get in, Wendy.”

*   *   *

Caitlin got her to local law enforcement. The deputies tracked down a distant relative, said all the right words about getting Wendy help. She left the girl with the two Mountain Dews and her phone number.

With no hope of finding Frodo, she started the three-and-a-half-hour journey back to Bloomington under a steady deluge. Around ten PM, her dry Los Angeles roots got to her. The Midwest had three seasons more than California, and she was wasting good thunder. She took an exit, parked on the side of a country road. She lowered the windows and listened to the majesty of nature’s percussion section.

The ring of her phone disrupted the symphony. She didn’t recognize the number or the 786 area code. “Hello?”

“Bergman, it’s Mike.”

Caitlin closed the windows. “Where are you?”

“According to the nice people whose campfire I’m sharing, I’m in Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park on Key Biscayne.”

“Key Biscayne? As in the Florida Keys?”

“Apparently, and I may have messed up.”

He told her the tale.

“So Fodor said he would talk to his brother?”

Mike repeated the exchange. “He said, ‘I’ll talk to Nate; he’ll talk to Kieran.’ Does that make sense to you?”