He waited as the two years of probation ticked down, his discharge date being the start of his new plan. Did Sandy think that there would be no price to pay for her treachery? Had she been that shortsighted? For two years, Reed followed the rules, put on a show so the world would believe that he had capitulated.

As the SUV bounced its way across the dusty field, Reed couldn’t help but puff with pride. He had won. It didn’t matter that some bitch of a judge had deprived him of his son—not even allowing visitation. It didn’t matter that Sandy had brought another man into his son’s life. He had the boy, and she was dead. He had slammed his checkmate down on the board with authority.

When the vehicle came to a stop, Reed went to the back where Pip sat in his car seat. Pip—the name stabbed Reed in his heart. She had gone out of her way to erase Reed from the boy’s life, going so far as to take away the boy’s true name—Reed Harris, Jr.—and calling him Pip like he was some Dickensian orphan. Reed would soon change all that. When the time was right, he would whisk the boy away and they would start a new life with new names. Until then, he thought it best not to confuse his son any more than he had to. He would grit his teeth and call the boy Pip.

Reed opened the door and leaned into the car. “Hi, Pip. Do you remember me?” He smiled and waited for his son to recognize him. But when that recognition came, there was no excitement. What Reed saw on the boy’s face was puzzlement.

He lifted his son from the booster seat and held him for the first time since the night of the fight. The child had grown so much. Reed had seen Pip a few times in town, hand in hand with his mother, the restraining order forcing Reed to turn and walk in the opposite direction. But he had created a fake Facebook account under the name of a woman that Sandy vaguely knew. He then tricked Sandy into friending him so that he could watch his son grow up through the pictures online.

Pip didn’t hold on to Reed or fold into his arms as Reed carried him to his Tahoe. Reed understood. They were strangers. It would take time to work through all of the destructive lies that Sandy had told the boy. He put Pip into the warm vehicle and buckled him into a new car seat. Then he returned to Spud, waiting next to Sandy’s SUV.

“Roll the windows down a couple inches,” Reed said. “We want it to sink fast but we don’t want her stuff to float out.”

The vehicle faced the bluff. Below it, the river turned in an oxbow, where the water would be deep enough to hide the car as long as it didn’t float around the bend before it sank.