She nodded. “I’ll be right back.”

She walked outside. The early evening air felt fresh and peaceful. The freshness was always welcome, the peace always illusory. She paused by her favorite tree, a massive four-hundred-year-old oak, and braced a hand on its trunk. As always when she touched it, the tree responded by generously giving her energy from its deep, green strength.

She patted it, braced her back and sent out a call. Moments later, Nicholas walked to her. Sunlight shone through his tall, transparent figure.

She remembered the generous, kind boy he had been, and the strong, young warrior who became a Green Beret. In maturity he had been a powerful, quiet man. He had only been in his early forties when he’d been killed. Sudden moisture dampened her eyes, surprising her, and she gritted her teeth against the unwelcome emotion.

Some would say that Nicholas had already given the ultimate sacrifice and that he deserved peace. Both of those things might be true, but she couldn’t afford pretty sentiment. She needed to use every tool she could in order to defeat the Deceiver.

Jamie is right, Nicholas said. My father is dying.

As a spirit, Nicholas would be able to see how Jerry was beginning to disconnect from his physical body.

She didn’t try to prevaricate. Instead she said simply, yes.

In the pale, shimmery figure, a hint of dark, intelligent eyes regarded her. Is there nothing you can do for him?

I’m sorry, no, there isn’t, she said. Now she was lying to a ghost. But I need to ask you to do something for me.

He said nothing, but just watched her. It was so reminiscent of Nicholas’s impassive expression when he had been alive that it goaded her into talking.

I know you would rather stay with your father right now, she said. I’m sorry, but this is important, or I wouldn’t ask. I need you to find Michael and Mary for me. I need to get a message to them.

You have creatures that serve you, he said. Why not ask them? Why me?

She nodded. You’re right, I could ask one of them to do it, but you are so . . . Valuable. Lucid. Reliable. Because of your skills and your intelligence, you have the best chance of getting to them and delivering the message safely. And that’s what matters right now, getting the mission done. She searched his expression for any sign that her words had resonated with him. Will you do that for me? For them?

He still didn’t answer right away, and his face was too blurred and indistinct for her to read. Instead he appeared to be scrutinizing her.

Astra felt an uncharacteristic uncertainty. Had he sensed that she had been lying about Jerry? She was a damn good liar, but often ghosts and spirits could sense things that embodied creatures couldn’t, and as a young man, Nicholas had witnessed her helping some of his people with healing from time to time.

It goaded her into saying, Nicholas, please. I will work to see that your father doesn’t pass until you return and can be by his side.

That would be good of you, he said.

His guarded, measured tone stung, and her mouth tightened. Damn it, she would not feel chastened by him. After his years in the army, he should understand better than anybody the concepts of utilizing limited resources and necessary loss. Jerry would, if he were conscious.

Her voice was curt as she asked, So will you do it?

Yes, he said. What do you need me to tell them?

She gave him the message, and he nodded and turned away. Her eyes stung as she watched his figure fade. She wondered if he would succeed or fail in finding Michael or Mary, or if the Deceiver’s minions would find him and tear him to shreds

She added the fate of Nicholas’s spirit to her own crushing list of burdens as she turned back to the cabin. Maybe she could indulge in the luxury of maudlin emotions at a later time. For now she had to keep her end of the bargain and bolster her dying friend’s strength. Then she had a lot more work to do and more favors to ask.

Chapter Seven

THIS HAD BEEN a bitch of a day, he thought, but things were looking up.

After his scalding shower, he tried to dress in the clothes he’d already had in the motel room. Of course none of them fit. They were sleek and streamlined, and had been much more suited to his last two human hosts.

One had been a handsome, young computer salesman who had been a fitness fanatic. The other had been Mary’s clever, charming ex-husband Justin, who had also been handsome.

He had enjoyed Mary’s ex. Justin had dealt with his kidnapping with a remarkable composure, and even a certain wry humor, and he had been smart enough to recognize a predator when he saw one.

He had enjoyed taking over Justin’s body even more, but he had only inhabited the body for a day before Mary had killed it. What a waste of a good host.

The monkey suit he currently inhabited was much bulkier than the bodies of the previous two men. When he tried to slip on a clean pair of slacks, the monkey’s thigh muscles strained at the expensive material, and he couldn’t fasten them at the waist. He tore off the pants, kicked them across the room and sneered at the pile of clothes he had tossed in the corner earlier. He refused to put on the monkey’s filthy clothes again. Instead he tied a towel around his waist and got to work making more phone calls.

He had dozens of drones, the careful harvest of several years’ work, scattered across Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin. They had been actively involved in the hunt for Mary and Michael. It would take some of the drones longer than others to drive to Grand Rapids, but by the time Martin and his colleagues from DC arrived later that evening, he would have assembled another team.

In a half an hour, one of the nearest drones would bring him clean, serviceable clothes that would fit the monkey. He didn’t bother ordering anything too fancy. He had no plans to stay in this body a moment longer than necessary.

Once he finished the phone calls, he ordered a couple of pizzas and paid for the food with the monkey’s credit card. After all, like Warren Buffett, he believed that one of the best traits of the very wealthy was maintaining frugal financial habits. Then he was ready to sit down with his laptop.

The first thing he saw when he opened his in-box was an e-mail from Martin, with an attachment. Martin’s note was short and to the point.

Here’s the info on Crow. I have one of my staff digging around for more information, but in the meantime, here is the FBI file on our subject.

Smiling with satisfaction, he clicked on the encrypted attachment, punched in a pass code and opened the digital copy of a dossier on Nicholas. He began to read the contents.

Naturally Crow had excelled at everything from an early age. As a teenager, he’d had his choice of career paths. Several universities had courted him with football scholarships, but instead he chose to go the Ivy League route. He took a scholarship to study public policy and public administration at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. When he graduated, Crow joined the army, where he distinguished himself again.

Boring.

He stopped reading and started to scan. He already knew that Crow had been an exceptional man. Crow had to have been in order to have occupied the position he’d had.

No, he was looking for something else on Crow, something meaty that he could sink his teeth into, and hopefully shake something useful out of it.

Crow’s mother and father had been divorced from the time that he was six years old. He had lived in Chicago with his mother, who had been a nurse, and he had spent summers and Christmas vacations with his father, Jerry Crow, now retired. Crow’s father had owned a couple of antique stores, which he sold several years ago, and he was reputed to be a First Nation elder and active in his tribal community.

And the elder Crow lived in northern Michigan.

There we go.

There was the first little nugget of something to nibble on.

His mother had died in a car accident in the nineties when Crow had been serving overseas. His father, Jerry Crow, was still alive. The dossier even had a digitized photo of him, although it appeared to be at least ten years old. The man in the photo was around sixty or so.

He had terrible dress sense. He wore a flannel shirt and Levi’s, and he held a lit cigarette between the fingers of one hand. His gray-streaked black hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and his strong face was creased with laughter as he looked off camera.

“I think I need to pay you a visit, Jerry,” he said to the photo. He tapped the laptop screen with a blunt fingernail. “Offer my condolences on the loss of your son. I feel optimistic that you and I will have an interesting conversation.”

A knock sounded on his motel door. He strolled over to look through the peephole. The first of his drones had arrived, carrying packages of clothes. As he dressed, other drones arrived until within a couple of hours, he felt replenished with both energy and resources.

The state patrol had not yet reported any sign of the car Michael and Mary had been driving, but that had been a long shot anyway. It was more to keep pressure on the pair and make sure they kept moving than anything else.

In the meantime, he was clean, well fed, dressed and he had manpower, weapons and equipment. Plus he had a man in northern Michigan that he was very much interested in talking to. He set his drones to various tasks, then he settled on top of the bedcovers, folded his hairy monkey hands together and closed his eyes to focus on marshaling his forces in the psychic realm.

First he had to cast the net out. He needed to have a presence in every port town. Then he had to tighten the perimeters. Then they could concentrate on sweeping the countryside. He would tear this state apart with his bare hands, if that was what it took to find them.

Another knock sounded on his door. One of his drones answered it. He did not let the interruption disrupt his work until he heard Martin’s voice. Then he sat up in bed to watch Martin usher two other people into the room, a man and a woman. They both wore dark suits and were sharp looking, intelligent and fit. These would be Martin’s colleagues from DC.

As intelligent and as capable as they no doubt were, they had trusted Martin. They never stood a chance. The moment the door closed, several of his drones, including Martin himself, faced the two FBI agents with guns drawn.

Slowly they put their hands up. Martin stepped forward to divest them of their weapons, while their wary gazes darted from drone to drone, until finally they looked at him, as well they should.

He rolled off the bed and onto his feet.

“Hello, hello,” he said cheerfully. “It’s about time you showed up.”

Martin said, “We’ve been in dialogue with the director of the Michigan State Police about how best to direct the manhunt. I have set up a personal meeting with him in an hour, at the District Six headquarters in Rockford, and I told him that I would be bringing a consultant with me.”

“Excellent,” he said. “That should give us plenty of time to finish up things here. After I meet the director, we’re going to travel north to visit Nicholas’s father. You’ll need to arrange for air transportation. We have a lot to do and a lot of ground to cover before it gets dark.”

“Certainly.”

While drones might have their limitations, the more intelligent people were, the better-functioning drones they made, and really, Martin was the best example of what a drone could be.

“Martin,” the female said, “I don’t know what the f**k is going on here, but so far, you haven’t done anything that you can’t back out of.”

She kept her voice low and controlled. Her hard, composed expression said that she was ready for the slightest opportunity they might give her, and she would turn it to her advantage.

Oh, he liked her. He wanted to take her first.

He strode forward, one of the monkey’s paws outstretched.

“Please, allow me to introduce myself,” he said, smiling. “Although, there really isn’t any need for an exchange of names. I’ve had so many over the years, and you’re never going to remember what I tell you, anyway.”

Chapter Eight

MARY HAD LEARNED to count her life in small segments, and at the moment she was vastly contented with life. She didn’t have to drive anymore, her belly was stretched full with good food, her body no longer ached from bruises or any deeper injuries and she had a pillow. And a blanket. Sufficient unto the day.

She intended to pay attention to the passing scenery as Michael located a route back to Highway 131. But she did have that pillow, and somehow it found its way between her ear and the car door. She rested her eyes for a minute.

Nasty things whispered in the dark. She surfaced back to consciousness fast.

“That’s the fourth time I’ve woken up bad in the last couple of days. It’s starting to piss me off,” she muttered, before she opened her eyes. She sat up and sent a bleary gaze around, reaching out to touch Michael’s arm for comfort. “What’s happened? How did they find us?”

“It’s not how they found us,” he said. “It’s what we’re driving into.”

The dichotomy between how things felt in the psychic realm and how things looked in the physical realm was disorienting. Visually everything appeared normal, even scenic. She hadn’t slept more than ten minutes. The architectural landscape had condensed and the early evening traffic had worsened. Michael’s arm felt warm and bulky with muscle.

She noticed his face had gone wary and still. His gaze held an alert expression she was beginning to recognize. The expression did peculiar things to his eyes, turning their gray color polished and impenetrable, like the hard, reflective surface of a drawn sword.

How many dead bodies had they left behind in the cabin’s clearing? Twenty? Thirty? They had been trained hardened soldiers, probably mercenaries. How many had looked into Michael’s executioner gaze as they died? A convulsive shudder ran through her.

He nudged her hand. “You wanted a vacation on the beach,” he said. “Tell me about it.”