Ephraim only cared that the man didn’t look like he’d put up much of a fight. As long as he wasn’t armed, taking over this house shouldn’t be too hard.
Ephraim waited until the old man had lowered himself into a lawn chair, gaze fixed on his roses. He heard the man sigh as he approached, the sound one more of melancholy than physical weariness.
Giving one last look around, Ephraim drew Regina’s gun from his jacket pocket and clapped his hand over the man’s mouth. ‘If you fight me,’ he whispered, ‘you will die. If you scream, you will die. Nod once if you understand.’
The man nodded once, strangely calm. Instincts on high alert, Ephraim looked around again, expecting to see security jumping from the bushes, but no one appeared. Yanking the man to his feet, Ephraim dragged him into the house. He’d watched the man come and go and hadn’t noticed him fooling with anything that could have been an alarm system. Once he got inside, he saw that there was an alarm panel, but it was currently green-lit. Unarmed.
Excellent.
Covering the man’s mouth with duct tape, Ephraim tied his hands behind his back with a length of Granny’s rope and shoved him into a chair. A heavy one that the man couldn’t move on his own. It was made of mahogany. Nice. Amos back in Eden could make better, but Amos was also a master carpenter. Ephraim couldn’t help but wonder what Amos could make with wood like this, though.
He filed the thought away for later. He could decorate his new quarters any way he wanted once he had Pastor’s passwords for the offshore accounts.
He’d already observed that the man didn’t have a wallet in his pocket, but a quick look around the kitchen revealed a wallet and a set of keys. He was happy to find that the wallet contained about five hundred dollars in twenties and several credit cards. He left the cards alone and pulled out the man’s driver’s license.
‘Sean MacGuire,’ he murmured. The photo matched the old man’s face, still suspiciously calm. ‘What’s with you?’ he asked. ‘Why aren’t you afraid?’
MacGuire merely watched him with rheumy eyes.
‘You are a freaky bastard,’ Ephraim muttered, then, Regina’s golden silenced gun in hand, went room to room checking for other occupants. After a thorough search through closets and under beds, he was satisfied that he and Sean MacGuire were alone.
The old man’s bedroom held a few clues. There was a framed photo on the nightstand of MacGuire with an older woman, both smiling broadly, the Eiffel Tower in the background. Another showed them smiling in front of the Taj Mahal, and yet another had them wearing parkas and standing next to a signpost that read Antarctica. The couple appeared to be intrepid travelers.
Or they had been. The man’s bed was unmade, but only half was used. The other half looked as if it hadn’t been touched. There were no women’s things on the dresser and only a few female outfits in the closet. They were the ones in the photos, Ephraim noticed.
He got an odd lump in his throat as he realized that the old woman had probably passed away, leaving the man alone.
Hopefully alone. It would suck if someone else lived here or visited.
But still. It made him not want to kill the guy. Maybe I won’t. It would depend on the man’s attitude and behavior. After all, once he grabbed Mercy, he was headed back to Eden. Nobody could find him there, so it wouldn’t hurt to let the old man live.
But if MacGuire tried something, Ephraim would kill him without a second thought.
He chose the room with the best view of the Sokolovs’ front door and pulled a chair in front of the window. For now, the driveway was filled with the same vehicles that had been there when he’d arrived, in the same places, which was a relief. The black FBI SUV was gone, but unless the tall Fed had taken Mercy and Gideon with him, Ephraim was still in luck.
He went back to the kitchen to find the man still sitting, the expression on his face unchanged. ‘Your old lady’s dead?’ he asked.
The old man flinched. So it’s probably new.
‘Sorry to hear that. Look, Sean, I don’t want to have to kill you, but I will. Just leave me be and I’ll be out of your hair before you know it.’ He opened the commercial-sized refrigerator. ‘I’m starving. You want me to make you something, too? Nod once for yes.’
A single nod.
‘Okey-dokey then,’ Ephraim said cheerfully. ‘Is it just you, wandering around this big old house?’
No nod. Nothing but a fleeting glimpse toward the far wall. Where there was a photo of a woman who appeared to be about forty, her arms around a little girl with red pigtails and Mickey Mouse ears. Sleeping Beauty Castle was in the distance. A man stood next to the woman, with a baby in one of those papoose things, or whatever the hell people called them these days.
‘Your daughter?’ Ephraim asked.
No response once again, but now the man’s eyes flickered in fear.
‘Yeah, your daughter.’ Ephraim constructed two sandwiches. He ate one, then the other before making a third for MacGuire. He pulled the tape from the man’s mouth, taking more care than he normally would. ‘If you try to scream or bite me—’
‘You’ll kill me,’ MacGuire said with a faint Irish accent. ‘Got it.’
Ephraim held the sandwich to the man’s lips, waiting until he took a bite. ‘Why aren’t you afraid of me?’ he asked.
‘Because I don’t care. As you’ve so noted, my “old lady” is dead. We were married forty-nine years. I’m ready to go.’
At least he was honest. ‘All right, then. I’m quite willing to send you to her, just remember that.’ He gave MacGuire another bite of the sandwich, then put it in the fridge. ‘You can finish it later.’ Maybe. ‘I’ve got things to do.’ Once MacGuire had swallowed, he applied another piece of duct tape to his mouth and went to find the router so that he could get the Wi-Fi password. He had some purchases to make, and then he’d post himself at the window until the party across the street broke up and Mercy went home.
Granite Bay, California
Sunday, 16 April, 6.00 P.M.
‘You can call John back if you want to,’ Gideon said, breaking the tense silence as Mercy stared at her phone. She’d been willing herself to do that very thing from the moment he’d brought her phone from the kitchen. It gave her something else to obsess about, she supposed. Something to help take her mind off Farrah, who was still in Karl’s office with André. I’m so sorry, Ro. So damn sorry. But there wasn’t anything she could do for Farrah right now, so she was trying to gather the courage to call her half brother and at least make that situation right.
They sat sideways on the edge of the guest-room bed, hip to hip, silent until Gideon had suggested she return her brother’s call. No, our brother’s call. Mercy really wanted to be by herself for this, but she sensed that Gideon needed her. Or he needed her to need him.