There were two squad cars waiting for them at the dock, and next to one stood Meredith Voight, her gloved hands clasped together and pressed to her lips. Even from that distance, Max could see the grief on her face.

“Grandma!” Pip beamed. He waved from his seat in the plane.

Because they were coming to the dock on Max’s side, he opened his door and stepped onto the pontoon as Henry had, unhooking the rope and tossing it to a man on the dock. Once they’d secured the plane, Max undid Pip’s seat belt and set Pip on the dock. Pip ran as fast as he could into the arms of his crying grandmother.

“Grandma, I was in a plane!”

There were three men in uniform as well, two deputies and one city cop. One of the deputies stepped forward. “Detective Rupert?”

Max nodded and shook the man’s hand.

“I’m Chief Deputy Bennet. It’s good to meet you.”

He must have talked to Niki, Max thought.

“If you don’t mind, one of the boys will give you a ride to the office. We’ll need a full statement.”

“That’s fine,” Max said. He turned and pulled his backpack from the plane and handed it to Bennet. In a voice low enough that only he and Bennet could hear, Max said, “There’s a Glock nine in here. Reed Harris used it to kill Peter Molinar and Lyle Voight. You’ll want to get it to ballistics.”

Bennet took the pack and looked inside, nodding. Then he handed the pack to another deputy. “Take Mr. Rupert and this backpack to the station and wait for me.”

The deputy took the pack in one hand and Max’s arm in the other. Max pulled free and said, “I need a minute.”

He walked to the end of the dock, to where Meredith knelt, hugging Pip tightly to her chest. When she saw Max coming, she stood.

“I’m so sorry, Meredith.”

Her bottom lip quivered as tears streaked down her cheeks. Max stepped in and wrapped his arms around her. He felt her knees give as she leaned into him, a woman barely holding it together. For that brief moment at least, she didn’t have to stand on her own. She hugged him back, and sobbed softly into his shoulder.

“I tried,” Max said at last. “I promise I did.”

She took a breath, held it for a second, and whispered, “I know.”

CHAPTER 76

Max had spent a lifetime sitting in police interrogation rooms, but this was the first time that he had been seated on the other side of the table. He felt a new appreciation for the calculations that muddied a simple round of questions. Max had to explain how he and Lyle had tracked Reed to his shack without dropping the hammer on Niki. He hadn’t yet prepared a version of the story that kept her out of it.

For his part, Bennet was all business. No smiles or chitchat. When Max asked how they were going to process a crime scene so deep in the woods, Bennet ignored the question. Max understood Bennet’s position—a man shows up with one dead body and instructions for where to find two more. Bennet had to consider that Max might be a murderer himself. It helped that Max was a former cop and had brought Pip out of the woods, but that could only take him so far.