“You’re still going?”
“The meeting matters.”
She turned. “After everything this week?”
“Especially after everything this week.”
Downstairs, she handed him coffee in the kitchen. Her hand shook once, barely.
At the front door, she straightened his tie.
“Be careful,” she whispered.
Nathan looked at her for a long second.
Then he said, “I intend to be.”
PART 6
The black sedan waited at the gate.
This time, Martin stood beside it.
The cracked leather watch was on his wrist.
Nathan walked down the marble path without looking at his phone. Morning light spilled over the estate walls. Somewhere behind the curtains, Caroline watched. Somewhere beyond the property line, Detective Keene’s people waited. Somewhere on the road to Lake Hodges, Mercer believed he was about to recover a failed murder plan.
Martin opened the rear door.
Nathan got in.
The gate rolled open, and the car slid into the street.
For ten minutes, neither man spoke. San Diego fell away behind them, all glass, ocean light, and expensive silence. The highway carried them inland, toward hills brushed gold by dry summer grass.
Martin checked the mirror.
“Gray SUV behind us,” he said. “Two cars back. Picked us up after the exit.”
Nathan nodded.
“Are you all right, sir?”
“No.”
Martin’s eyes flicked up.
Nathan almost smiled. “But drive anyway.”
“Yes, sir.”
They left the freeway and took the road toward Lake Hodges. It narrowed quickly, bending between scrub-covered hills and old trees. The reservoir appeared to the left, wide and steel-blue beneath the morning sky.
Nathan looked at the water and imagined another version of the day.
A version where Noah stayed silent.
A version where Nathan got into the fake car.
A version where Caroline received a call, cried for cameras, buried him beneath marble, and inherited everything.
The thought did not frighten him.
It clarified him.
Ahead, a white pickup sat near a turnout.
A man leaned against it, pretending to check his phone.
Martin slowed slightly.
“That’s the fake driver from Monday,” he said.
Behind them, the gray SUV closed distance.
Nathan touched the small microphone beneath his jacket cuff.
“Confirm visual,” he said quietly.
Detective Keene’s voice came through the hidden earpiece.
“Confirmed. Keep moving. Do not stop unless blocked.”
The pickup pulled out ahead of them.
The gray SUV moved closer behind.
The road curved along the reservoir. The guardrail was older here, patched in places, scarred by past accidents. Nathan saw how easy it would have been. A staged mechanical issue. A sudden shove. A drugged passenger. A car through metal and into deep water.
The pickup slowed abruptly.
Martin braked.
The SUV behind them accelerated.