“I don’t think so.”
“So how is this theory connected to my daughter’s kidnapping or Blanche Johnson’s murder? Did one of Shannon’s brothers have my kid send a plea to her in a tape?”
“I haven’t figured it all out yet. That’s why I wasn’t going to tell you.”
Shannon said through her teeth, “So you were just going to keep acting weird? Keeping odd hours. Showing up and leaving again in the middle of the night? For the love of God, Nate, where the hell have you been? In the newspaper archives? Or…the library? Or sneaking around my family’s houses? Running down leads on this Stealth Torcher? Playing detective? How in the world did you think you were going to ‘figure it out’?”
“I haven’t been to the damned library,” Nate snarled. “The truth of the matter is that ever since I found out your daughter was abducted, Settler, I’ve been out looking for her.”
“And you didn’t tell me?”
“You would have just gotten in the way.”
“Shit.”
In the paddock a horse neighed and Nate glanced toward the animals before going on. “Look, it seems to me that Dani is the center of what’s happening here. The first clue was her birth certificate. Left here…at her birth mother’s home.”
“And you think one of my brothers has her?” Shannon could scarcely credit it.
“It’s definitely linked.”
“No one in my family would hurt a child. Any child.”
“You don’t know your family or what they’re capable of,” he shot back so loudly that the crow, still sitting on the roof of the stables, took off in full flight.
“You believe my daughter’s alive,” Travis said.
“Yes.”
Shannon felt a bit of relief. “Because of the tape?”
“No.” He shook his head, the black strands gleaming in the sunlight. “Because if he’d already killed her, he’d have no leverage on you and I think, with what’s happened here—the attack, the burned birth certificate—this has as much to do with you as anyone. I don’t know what the words written on Blanche Johnson’s wall in blood mean, and I haven’t figured out the star and the numbers, but I think it has to do with your family.”
Shannon strode to the far end of the porch and watched as Khan sniffed around the burnt shed. “How could one of my brothers go to Oregon and…and Idaho, and not be missed around here?”
“A person can drive to that part of Oregon in less than twelve hours, twenty-four round-trip. If he flew, say in a private plane, it’s only a few hours.”
“None of my brothers is a pilot.”
“But they have friends.”
“This is getting crazier by the second,” she said, turning to face him, arms crossed over. “You’re trying to make it fit. It’s not some major conspiracy, like, like the Kennedy assassination or what happened to Princess Diana! Who would go to such lengths?”
“Who would?” he agreed.
“Not one of my brothers!” she said emphatically, wishing the conversation was over. “I can’t believe one of my siblings hates me so much as to have nearly let me go to prison! And all of this!”
“What about Neville?” Travis asked.
Shannon froze. “Neville?” A new, cold breath of fear swept across the back of her neck. “But he’s…He’s not even around.”
“And why is that?” Nate asked.
Travis didn’t want to buy anything Nate was saying, but there was something here. He could feel it.
“I don’t know.”
“What do you think, Shannon?” Nate stared at her.