Thoughts flew through my mind—mainly about Tessa, but also about the case. How was Sabian involved? Who was Jon’s dealer? Did someone help Mannie escape when he managed to get out of the Field Office on Sunday? How did the quantum encryption fit into all this? I had the sense that everything was connected, but I still couldn’t identify the through-line that tied it all together.

Or what it had to do with Tessa.

++++

Blake’s men in Phoenix notified him that Reese was last seen leaving Plixon Pharmaceuticals’ office with two FBI agents.

So, he was working with the Feds.

Alright.

“Load the semis,” he told his men, “and get them on the road. We move on this now.”

Earlier, he’d disabled the tracking device that Agent MacIntyre had brought with her in her shoe, but now that the Feds were onto Reese, he didn’t want to take any chance that it might be able to be traced, so he directed Mannie, who was preparing for the fire, to destroy it.

++++

When my phone rang, I thought it would be the agent I’d just had on the line, but the screen told me it was Greer instead.

“Patrick, listen, something’s wrong.”

“Does this have to do with my stepdaughter?”

“Your stepdaughter? No. The tracking device that I gave to Sasha—it’s come online.”

“How do you know that? You’re on leave.”

“I’ve been keeping tabs on . . . Listen, that doesn’t matter right now. What matters is that it’s back online and I don’t know who to trust. I think Blake might still have someone at the Bureau who’s feeding him information.”

I evaluated that.

Thurman was conveniently attacked by Mannie but was left unhurt.

He’s the one who suggested that Julianne may have been looking for Timothy’s father. His job at the Bureau is handling confidential informants . . .

He’s also the one who located the charities.

What if . . . ?

“Where’s the device?” I asked Greer.

“It’s on the move just north of the line in Connecticut.”

“On the move?”

“Yes. On I-95.”

He told me the GPS location, and I punched it in.

“Hang on,” I said. “Let me check something.”

After putting him on hold, I contacted Transit Corp and had them send me the GPS locations of their trucks in the area.

Two were located on a property off a county road just a few miles from where the tracking device was currently traveling away from.

“When did that device come online again?” I asked Greer.

“About two minutes before I called you.”

Timing.

Location.

A quick calculation—

Yeah, it worked for leaving the property.

A decoy?

I plugged the coordinates in and learned that it was the site of an old greenhouse complex that’d been closed down for several years.

Alright, but then why are there two semis there right now?

That’s it.