The house was the only safe place he could watch at all times. With Interior 1 trained on the foyer, John was a bird on a full nest. He could tap it up on his phone whenever he needed to double-check it, to calm himself when the worry rose like mercury in a thermometer.

So he’d zipped the painting into the garment bag that held his worn-twice tuxedo and hung it in the foyer closet, in view of the camera, and he found a way to be okay with it. But he hadn’t considered that Owen would show up there.

But he had.

Until Jonathan could talk to Roy and deal—or not—with Owen and the Anningers, he wanted the painting, and himself, gone. It didn’t matter where, just anyplace Owen couldn’t find him.

Dinner at Don Julio’s would end in a fight with Donna. John would see to that. Carly had hand-delivered the kindling for the argument. It would be easy. He’d leave them, pick up the painting, and get triple-digit miles away before the moon came up.

•  •  •

Carly switched from the front to the back seat for the ride to dinner. John kept the conversation light and conspicuously not about the last hour. He felt Carly watching him and caught her studying eyes in the rearview mirror.

They settled into a table by a stuccoed wall hung with sombreros and a driftwood-framed Aztec print.

Donna ordered margaritas. Jonathan prepped the stage for the blowup. He hadn’t looked at or spoken to Carly since they were all together. By now Donna would have noted it, even if not consciously. He felt Carly scorching him with scrutiny from across the table.

The drinks came. He cleared his throat. “So. Carly. Do you want to tell your mother what happened today or should I?”

He felt like a slow learner. He expected her to go red to the ears. He thought she’d give way in front of her mother and he’d deliver a quick, righteously offended attack. Donna would take her side. He would leave. Then whatever happened would be the next thing in his life. He might come back. He might not.

But what he got instead, when he finally acknowledged her, was a Carly who leaned in, nearly sprawling on the tabletop, lowering her chin to rest on her loosely crossed arms. She was interested to the point of amazement. “Nah. I’m good. It’s all you, John-zee.”

Donna looked between them, caught between alarm and amusement. “What’s going on? What happened?”

Rage made syrup of his blood, slow and achingly heavy, and for an ugly instant that hot lethargy dragged against the idea of slapping Carly. He didn’t need this shit.

He took a quarter of his margarita in a single, cold pull.