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“But you don’t believe it.”
Matthew hesitated. “I don’t want to believe it.”
Cam sighed. “Yeah. But that’s not the same thing.”
“No. It’s not.”
The brothers were silent. Then Alex spoke.
“Does she know your cell number? I mean, if she does and she hasn’t contacted you…”
“She doesn’t know the number.” His jaw knotted. “But she knows my name. That I’m from Dallas.”
The implications were clear. If Mia had wanted to reach him, she could have.
“In that case, man, come on home with us. Give this up. Write it off as—as just one of those things.”
Matthew smiled at his brothers. “Is that what you’d do?” Their silence was all the answer he needed. “Come on,” he said, wrapping his arms around their shoulders. “I’ll buy you those steaks, put you on a plane—”
“Listen to him,” Alex said. “Big talk, from a man who spent his last dollar buying toys from a thug named amigo.”
“He’s not a thug. And I’ve got a credit card.”
“Yeah, yeah. Promises, promises…”
The brothers joked and laughed and spent the next couple of hours together, carefully avoiding any discussion of Mia Palmieri until the last possible minute.
At the airport, their smiles faded.
“Be careful, okay?” Alex said.
Cam nodded in agreement. “Things get hairy, call us.”
Matthew said he would. He smiled, gave them a thumbs-up, watched them board the Learjet for the flight home.
Then he got into his SUV and started driving the same route he’d taken in what felt like a different lifetime.
The route through the mountains, that would once again lead him to Mia.
He was sure of it.
If Hamilton had told him the truth, if Mia had gone, she’d want to go someplace safe. Someplace where she could plan her next steps without having to worry about the cartel or Hamilton or the authorities.
She’d be afraid to try to get back to the States. For all she knew, Hamilton or even the government would have her stopped.
There had to be a safe haven, a place Hamilton wouldn’t think she’d go, a place the authorities didn’t know existed.
Matthew could think of only one place like that.
I feel so safe here, Mia had said, of his house in the Cachalú.
And it would be safe. She was smart. She had to figure Hamilton would chalk it up as the last spot to look for her, assuming he was looking. Why would he expect her to return to the place where he’d found her the first time?
She had to figure, too, that Matthew had returned to the States. He’d done his job by finding her. Anyway, she could check easily enough. All it would take was a couple of phone calls. To the house, to his Dallas office.
He knew where she was. In the mountains. He could feel it in his bones. His Comanche bones, the ones that were still tied to the Old Ways.
Mia was in the Land of the Sky.
