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“The one you lived with.”
“In a serious relationship. Just as I said.”
“Yes, but you deliberately led me to believe—”
“I can’t help that you jumped to the wrong conclusion.”
“Like hell.”
Wes had been following the exchange with interest. Brynn seemed to suddenly remember that he was there. She mumbled an introduction. “This is Wes. Dad, Rye Mallett.”
Wes said, “Can’t say that it’s been a pleasure so far.”
“My sentiments exactly.”
“Was crushing my windpipe necessary?”
“Might’ve been. I wasn’t taking any chances.”
Sounding put out with both of them, Brynn asked, “Is coffee a possibility?”
While Wes was making coffee, Mallett went around to all the windows in the living area and made certain that the blinds were tightly drawn. He also checked the bolt on the front door.
When the coffee was ready, Wes and Brynn sat down at the table across the chessboard from each other. Mallett perched on the barstool. Mallett’s eyes were as watchful as a hawk’s. Or as a pilot’s, Wes supposed. Seek-and-avoid. Wasn’t that the aviation phrase? He was also alert to every sound.
Wes recognized the symptoms of feeling cornered and restless. He figured Mallett wasn’t new at getting out of scrapes. He looked the type.
“How did you get in?” Wes asked him.
“You taught Brynn a trick or two about housebreaking.”
Wes turned to her. “You came through the window?”
“Just like you taught me.”
Wes was pleased. “Then I guess I did something right by you. Cops inside. You didn’t make a sound. Good work.”
She didn’t acknowledge his praise. “We came by taxi, but had the driver let us out a few blocks from here. We walked the rest of the way, saw the sheriff’s SUV at the curb, and the two deputies on your porch. We went around back to wait until they’d left. Your bedroom window was open about an inch.”
“After sleeping in a cell block for years at a time, you appreciate breathing fresh air.”
“Rawlins didn’t notice the raised window when he came into the bedroom. It was open just enough so that we could hear your conversation.”
“Was everything he and Wilson told me the truth?”
“More or less,” Brynn replied.
“Which? More? Or less?”
“Neither Rye nor I harmed the man at the airport. We’re actually very worried about him.”
“I believe that. What’s the ‘but’?”
“But I do have something that Richard Hunt perceives as his.”
Wes slumped. “Your mother died afraid of this very thing.”
“Of what thing?”
