“Shouldn’t we fire up the motor?” Quincy asked.

“We can’t risk them hearing.”

Another geyser of flame erupted from the mansion, sending a plume of smoke into the sky.

Steven lay with his eyes closed now. “It was Blue … who insisted upon it. Have an escape route, she said. Make sure if we’re ever compromised, nothing remains. They cannot have our records.”

“But all that research. All of it gone,” Quincy said. “My great-grandfather’s letters…”

“No,” Steven said, raising a trembling finger towards William. “It’s all there.”

William reached up to touch the flash drive on the chain around his neck. “But if they get to Blue…”

“Rudd is among the few to be notified when there is a security perimeter breach. They were long gone as soon as he got the alert. The one thing the Corcillium knows best is how to hide.”

“How do we get in contact with any of them now?” William asked.

Steven slowly opened his eyes. “We don’t.”

Lynn gripped the side of the chair with such ferocity that her knuckles whitened, the veins in her age-spotted hands rising. She pushed herself to stand once again and resume her pacing in front of the French doors that overlooked the stately eastern white pines.

“If you’d like,” Roxy said, flipping through the Country Living magazine for the twentieth time while propped up with seven pillows on the bed, “I can call for a vacuum. Best form of therapy for you.”

“How could I have been so stupid?” Lynn asked.

“Stupid had nothing to do with this, at least this time.” Roxy put the magazine down on her lap. “When armed government agents say for national security reasons you have to fly to DC, you go. Especially when your daughter signs the order.”

Lynn’s eyes flashed. “How could she?”

“Listen,” Roxy said, attempting once again to position the pillows to support her lower back. “Kate is a lot of things, and things have gone extremely south in the last few years, but she still loves you. She wants you close—”

“But we aren’t close to Washington.” Lynn motioned to the windows. “Those are Maryland pines out there. I made Tom take me out to Boonsboro and Chestertown when he used to insist I come with him to DC. I know the Maryland countryside. We’re here because it’s remote and no one could find us.”

“I’m not going to defend her. I obviously don’t agree with what she’s done. But after seeing what’s happened to William…”