There was no response for a while, and then, “It’s you,” she said, in a voice unnaturally quiet, unnaturally calm.

“That’s right. Now as you can tell, I’m at your house. And I heard your last message.”

“Where’s my husband?” The woman sounded as if she was asking whether it was raining in Tucson.

“What about please? Is that a nice way to ask?”

“Where’s my husband, you fat-assed little prick?”

“Let me get him for you.” Beaufort held up the phone. “Here, Carlo, it’s Brigid. Say hi.”

“Brigid! Don’t come home!” Carlo yelled.

Beaufort put the phone back to his ear. “There, you see? No one is going to get hurt. We’ve just been talking, trying to get him to give me what I came here for, or tell me where it is. Then I’ll be on my way. But two things came up. One is that your husband insists he doesn’t lie. The other is”—Beaufort had to figure out how to say this—“how do you know what you know about me?”

“Because, you dipshit, I have Hickock’s confession. Carlo doesn’t have it. He never did.”

Beaufort had tried to sound as cool as she did, but this made him gasp. She must have heard it.

She said, “That’s what you want. That’s why you’ve been hanging around. I admit I was mistaken, I thought you were after me and I hoped to find out information about you and maybe even draw you out by going to your old stomping grounds in Florida.” She told him how she got the document. “What I have incriminates you. No matter what you do, this will end up with the cops. You’re finished, Jeremiah Beaufort. Give it up. Let Carlo call the sheriff to pick you up. Listen to me. Maybe after all this time you won’t get the death penalty.”

“How do you know my name?”

There might have been a half-second pause before she said, “It’s in the confession.”

“I never told Hickock or Smith my real name.”

“It was a long time ago and you were together for more than two months. At some point you must have. So listen—”

Beaufort felt himself go light-headed as his thoughts skittered around looking for a hold on his control. He knew he was sounding hoarse, but he managed to say, “No. You listen to me. You’re at the Tampa airport. By this time you’ve figured out I have friends in that part of the country.”

“So you did have Meadows killed.”

“Stop! Shut the hell up!” Beaufort paused to think. “If you just now called Carlo to warn him, that means you hadn’t read the document until just now. That means you haven’t shared the information with anyone else yet. And I have Carlo.” Then he stopped to hear what she had to say.