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“Right,” Laura said. She rested her head back against the headrest of the seat. It wouldn’t be long now until they were at the airport. Maybe she could find somewhere to get her head down in a lounge for an hour until the flight. Then she could get another two hours on the plane, and she would be able to go on that for the rest of the day.
It didn’t sound like enough, but it was going to have to be.
“Wake me up when you’re parked,” Laura said, knowing that the ten extra minutes might actually make a difference.
CHAPTER FIVE
“You awake yet?” Nate asked, teasing, glancing over at Laura in the passenger seat.
“Yeah, sorry,” she said. “Are we almost there?”
Nate nodded ahead. “Just entering Jones Harbor town limits. You still thinking about last night?”
“Yes.” Laura sighed. “What you said about lying to Chris. You really think I should? I mean, it’s lies on top of lies, and I know how much you hated that I lied to you.”
“Yes,” Nate said immediately. It wasn’t like he hadn’t thought about it before. Everything Laura said to him was basically a trigger these days to check that she was safe. She’d come close to being lost so many times—even last week, on their last case—that he was starting to get a sense of hypervigilance about her.
“Yes? That quick?” Laura asked. “You didn’t even have to think about it?”
Nate cleared his throat. Maybe he’d given himself away a little there. “Well, it’s still a new relationship, isn’t it? You’re not ready to move in together or anything like that.”
“No,” Laura said, though there was a hesitancy in her voice that Nate didn’t particularly like.
“So, don’t risk it,” Nate said. “The more people know, the more risk there is.”
“That’s true,” Laura replied. “I guess you’re right. I’ll keep quiet for now. I just don’t like the idea of piling lies on top of lies.”
“Still,” Nate said with a shrug. “I know you like him a lot, but you felt that way about Marcus once. And if he had that information now, he could do a lot of damage with it. Just don’t rush in, is what I’m saying. You might end up never having to tell him the truth anyway.”
“Right,” Laura said, though her tone was a little flatter this time. Nate felt a flash of guilt, but only a flash.
“That’s the docks up ahead, isn’t it?” he asked, slowing the hire car.
“It is,” Laura replied, sitting up straight and looking ahead. “I think we need to go down this road to the right.”
Nate concentrated on guiding the car, hoping Laura would put it out of her mind and agree with his assessment. He didn’t like the thought of Chris knowing about her powers. Not right now, and not him.
He wasn’t sure that others would react as well as he had, and he hadn’t reacted well at all. Chris could fly off the handle. Could decide that she really was losing it. He might even bring the accusations to Marcus and do something about Laura’s custody of Lacey—small though her allowances were even now.Chris was that kind of guy, Nate thought, from what he knew of him. The type to think it was his duty to get a child taken away from a crazy mother.
And that was just if he didn’t believe her.
If he did…
Chris was a doctor. Not the experiment kind of doctor, but still. He had to have a healthy curiosity about medical things. Surely, he would want to find out how Laura’s ability worked. Run scans on her brain and tests on her body to see what was unusual about her. Poke her and prod her until he unlocked the mystery—or maybe until he pushed too far and broke her. Laura had already been through enough, and something like that might also push her off the wagon.
Nate pulled up alongside the entrance to an area of the docks that was restricted to pedestrians only, according to the sign in the parking lot. It was easy to see why. To their right, the sea glittered in the late morning sun, a gentle wave cascading through it. Up ahead, a walkway continued out over the water, wooden planks extending out as far as Nate could see—though the distance was compounded by bristling hulls and masts of ships, some old-fashioned and some modern, which were docked all along it.
The docks were busy, civilians walking up and down easily. Nate frowned. “They haven’t cordoned off the area.”
“Any evidence that was around here will have been lost,” Laura said, undoing her seatbelt. “Fantastic. Always great to pull up to a crime scene and find out that the locals don’t have any competence whatsoever.”
“Little town like this, they’ve probably never seen anything on this scale before,” Nate said. He opened his door. “Better go find them.”
He and Laura walked across the wooden decking. His boots thudded satisfyingly on the walkway, but to either side, dark water beckoned. He wondered how deep it was. Deep enough, for certain, for the boats not to get stuck. Here, close to the shore, they were small fishing boats and one-person crafts. Ahead, though, where the main walkway turned out toward the sea, he could see that they were larger.
The farther they went, the more obvious it became as to where they were headed. A cluster of people was gathered around what looked like police tape not much farther down the walkway, and beyond that was a wide expanse that appeared to be clear of pedestrians. At least they had managed to mark off some of the area, even if their net didn’t extend nearly far enough.
They approached the tape rapidly and ducked underneath it, not challenged by anyone. That wasn’t a good sign, either. Relying on the ability of the locals to follow instructions was never the best plan.
