“Shouldn’t got mixed up in all this drug stuff. But didn’t want to work the mines. And didn’t want to take the death money either. You know?”

“I know. I know, baby.” Tears were spilling from them both.

“Didn’t have nothing to do with any killing. ’Cept the bastard warden.” Danny’s pupils were losing their focus, receding into the white pools of the eyes, as Stone had seen on many a dying man.

“I love you, Danny.”

He looked over at Stone. When he spoke his voice was so weak Stone had to bend close to hear. “Me and Willie. State champs . . . Boy caught everything I threw at him. Shoulda played at Tech together. You know?”

“You two were the best, Danny,” Stone said, gripping the cold hand. “The best.”

“California dreaming, man.”

He turned back to his mother. “California dreaming . . .”

Danny’s eyes grew hard and flat, and the fingers that had gripped his mother’s now fell away. Abby bent down and kissed her son and then wrapped her arms around him. And just held him.

Just held him.

Chapter 80

CHAPTER 80

THE CAMEL CLUB sat at Rita’s Restaurant. The place was not open for business today, but Abby had insisted that they use it and her home for as long as necessary. Sheriff Tyree was expected to make a full recovery. He had summoned the Virginia State Police, who were currently sorting out the mess in Divine. Since transport of drugs across interstate lines had occurred, the feds had also been called in. Knox and Alex had run interference with their government colleagues and Stone, Annabelle, Caleb, Reuben and Harry were not part of that questioning. Prison guards had been rounded up, bodies collected and other evidence secured. Judge Mosley had been stopped at a small airport in West Virginia trying to board a regional jet for Dulles International Airport with a travel itinerary that included several countries that had no extradition agreement with the United States.

Stone and the others watched the street through the front windows of Rita’s. Along with the cop cars and black sedans swooping up and down the road, they observed several citizens of Divine walking around as though in shock, some holding dividend checks that they now knew were nothing more than drug money.

Danny’s body had been taken to the morgue in Roanoke along with Howard Tyree’s. Only when the police had zipped him up in a black body bag did Abby relinquish her grip on her son’s hand. And even then she walked down the road after the slowly departing medical examiner’s wagon.

When everyone had had some food and coffee, Stone stood in the middle of the small circle of the best and perhaps only friends he had in the world.

“I would like to thank you for what you did,” he began, looking at each of them in turn.