In a low voice, Kara said, “He deliberately ran into these kids. To stop me.”

“You had to stop,” Costa said. “You had to help. You didn’t have a choice.”

She knew it, and it still made her angry. “I want him, Costa. I want him bad.”

It could have been so much worse.

42

Liberty Lake
8:10 a.m.

Glen’s heart was racing. He forced his right foot to ease up on the gas.

That bitch cop had spotted him. How had she known? Nondescript car. Down the street. It made no sense!

But she did, and she followed him. He hadn’t wanted to hit the kid, but he needed to buy time, to get away. He thought she was going to keep coming for him, so he detoured, went east, kept off the interstate.

He drove ten miles east, almost to the state line, before his heart slowed down. He took a deep breath. Then another.

Okay. He was okay.

He had to assume that the cop got his license plate. If she didn’t, the cop cars’ dashboard cameras would have, so he had to assume they could get his plate.

He’d hidden the car and rental house under his shell corporations, but this was the FBI—they had more resources than local law enforcement. He’d never seen anything like this before, an entire team working practically 24-7. Why him? Why couldn’t he have just made his last kill before the feds got involved? He could have been back in his house. He’d been saving up for it for years. He had a plan to get those interlopers out of his house, then he would buy it. It would be his forever.

The way it should have been.

He’d feared this day would come that he wouldn’t be able to punish the man who deserved it most of all.

No. No! I will kill Brian Maddox. He will bleed.

He would get him. He had to. Then everyone else who messed with his plan.

First Maddox, then the interlopers who stole his house, and of course the feds. Especially that bitch cop who made him hit that kid. Glen didn’t want to hit that kid. She made him do it.

His head ached as the same questions kept coming back to him. Over and over.

How had she even noticed him? How had she known?

His father’s voice rang in his head. “Because you’re a weak, stupid kid. Because you are an idiot. If it weren’t for you, boy, your mother wouldn’t have gone out that night and got killed. You are a failure.”

“I am not a failure! I am not weak!”

It was time to draw the line in the sand.

43

Liberty Lake
8:30 a.m.

Andy Knolls met with Bernard Younger at the Liberty Lake branch of a major national bank. It was the only national bank that had an office in the small town, and everyone did their banking here. Andy knew Younger from the Chamber of Commerce, where the manager was active, and the bank sponsored the town’s softball and baseball teams.