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“That she misses her uncle.”
“What do you say back to her?”
“That I miss him, too.”
He held her gaze for a moment, then said, “Rebecca—”
“It’s Grace now.”
He tilted his head to one side. “Why Grace Kent?”
“It was suggested by the forger who made all my false documents. I didn’t have another name picked, so I went with his choice.”
In spite of her confession to a federal crime, he smiled. “I thought maybe you’d remarried a guy named Kent.”
“I don’t want another husband.”
“After the one you had, I can’t say that I blame you.”
“Did you tell him where we are?”
Jack was already shaking his head. “And I don’t plan to. I’m not here to cause you any grief. Although I could have you arrested for living under an assumed name.”
“Some big, bad FBI agent you are,” she scoffed. “Don’t you have anything better to do?”
“Oh, I’m busy. I’m presently following up on a strange incident that occurred in Utah. Before that, I looked into a curious happening in Wichita Falls, Texas, that to this day, after two years, remains unexplained. First one that captured my interest took place in Kentucky.”
Her face became a mask.
“What do you know about a soccer coach in Salt Lake?” he asked.
“That chances are good he’s Mormon?”
“He’s not. He moved there from Virginia.”
“They don’t have Mormons in Virginia?”
“The night before a championship game, what would possess a soccer coach to take a baseball bat to his femur and smash it all to hell? At least he claims the breaks were self-inflicted.”
He let that resonate. Rebecca said nothing.
“What’s also strange,” Jack continued, “you’d think his team of thirteen-year-olds, their parents, and members of the community would be appalled by this tragedy. But nobody who knows him regrets his forced retirement. He had a winning record, but many questioned the methods he used to motivate his players.
“It’s rumored he instilled fear. Any kid who made a mistake was humiliated. I say rumored because the kids themselves were tight-lipped about what took place during practices and after a losing game. One of the dads told me it was like his son was afraid to tattle.
“On the night of the incident, the coach told the emergency responders, his wife, the police, his priest, every-damn-body that he did that to himself. Then he clammed. No details. No reason why. No nothing. As recently as yesterday, he still refused to talk about what went down that night.” He gave her a meaningful look. “You see the irony here?”
“How could I possibly miss it? You practically spelled it out in capital letters on the wall. And it’s quite a story. However, how it relates to me, I don’t have a clue.”
“Want me to spell that out, too?”
“If you think I’m guilty of something, then why don’t you arrest me?”
“I don’t want to arrest you.”
“Then what excuse do you have for hiding in the bushes last night and all day today, keeping track of my every move?”
“I don’t enjoy spying on you.”
