"What'd you think?"

Broker thought about it. "At first he seemed like this aging h.e.l.l raiser, and then..."

"Yeah?"

"His eyes. His eyes were...sad."

Yeager nodded. "The whole family is just a little bit"-Yeager gently waffled his hand-"off center. His sister, Dorsey, was the one who showed it most. And then, I guess, the kid brother, Dale. The dad, Gene, he was crazy but disciplined. Always cooking these wild schemes to get rich, but always worked like h.e.l.l. Now, Gene's dad, Asa-he had the outlaw gene. A regular bomb thrower, back in the days of the Nonpartisan League..."

The term bomb thrower bomb thrower got Broker's attention. He'd been sitting back, hands crossed in his lap. He came forward, opened his arms, draped one back on the rear seat. Put the other hand on the dash. More attentive now, he said, "Sounds like some family." got Broker's attention. He'd been sitting back, hands crossed in his lap. He came forward, opened his arms, draped one back on the rear seat. Put the other hand on the dash. More attentive now, he said, "Sounds like some family."

"Yeah. I think their mom, Sarah, she just checked out and went on automatic pilot. Like one of those women you read about back in the old days: too much work, too much prairie. The wind gets to some people. The winters..." Yeager chewed at the inside of his cheek, looked off across the fields. "Ace, he was the oldest kid. Thing I respect about Ace is the way he fights to keep that outlaw gene at bay. Gets up every morning and has to choose twenty-four hours of not breaking the law. That's a tough one. Another thing, he pretty much looks after everybody."

"You saying Ace has real real psychological hang-ups?" psychological hang-ups?"

Yeager shrugged. "Hard to tell with German farm stock. Everybody keeps it in. Then they get behind with the bank, have a couple bad years, and we get a call from an anxious wife with supper cold on the table. Sometimes find the guy's body out in the corner of a field with his shotgun next to him. Ace? He ain't exactly your Prozac kind of guy, so he maintains with alcohol."

The question was on his face so Broker went ahead and said it: "Not the bomb-throwing type?"

"Ace? Is that what they think?"

Broker decided to take the chance that Yeager was waiting for. "Okay, here we go..."

Now Yeager was sitting forward. "Yeah?"

"They got a picture of Ace standing near McVeigh at Waco."

Yeager rolled his eyes. "They're basing this whole circus on a f.u.c.king picture picture?"

"I didn't say that. But they have a picture."

"Hey, man, these people gotta do their homework," Yeager said, getting more animated. "Remember I mentioned his sister, Dorsey? Well, she was wild as h.e.l.l in high school and then did one of those come-to-Jesus flip turns. She started chasing religious cults. Word got back she was hanging out in this wacko compound in Texas. Turned out to be Koresh's operation. So Ace went down there, just about the time the ATF did their famous ninja walk in their pretty little black suits."

Broker braced himself. "So?"

"Once Ace got down there, he found out that Dorsey had been there but split a month before. Ace eventually found her in Seattle, working in a Starbucks coffee bar. Married some guy and is still there, as far as I know. A happy ending." Yeager squinted at Broker. "If I was you you, I'd put a little more faith in what people say over coffee at Gracie's diner and less in the people who breeze around in black helicopters."

"Okay, maybe he doesn't want to blow up federal buildings-could he be the kind of guy who would run anything anything across the border for money?" across the border for money?"

Yeager kind of sidled closer, on the scent. "Anything? Like something real dangerous?"

"C'mon, Yeager..."

Yeager wagged his finger in Broker's face. "No. Ace wouldn't do that. But that little creep Gordy Riker would. In a f.u.c.king heartbeat."

"Why you so sure Ace wouldn't?"

" 'Cause I've known him all my life. Look, we played Legion ball together. Jesus, could he hit. He was eighteen and people were saying he was another Maris. He had a shot at the majors, hurt his knee in a tryout camp, and never went back. Just bad luck. That's the story of Ace's life. Nothing ever worked out right for him." Yeager shook his head.

"He killed a guy in a bar fight."

"More bad luck. G.o.dd.a.m.n loudmouth Bobby Pease down in Starkweather. Came at Ace with a beer bottle, and Bobby musta been loosey goosey flatfooted when Ace hit him. Broke his neck. Ace did eleven months on the state farm for involuntary manslaughter."

"What about Dale, the equipment dealer?"

Yeager shook his head. "Jeez, I don't know. Parts to that guy are missing. Like, the key to the ignition. Guy is gonna live and die in his folks' bas.e.m.e.nt. He's gonna follow them to Florida."

"And Gordy?"

"Cunning little f.u.c.ker. And greedy. I been trying to catch him running meth precursor for over a year. He has grandiose dreams of being a big dope dealer."

"Violent?"

Yeager grinned and eyed Broker. "You tell me. Story going round is he knocked you on your a.s.s." He paused, still grinning, then said, "That's how we know you're in on this thing. We figure it was for show. No way in h.e.l.l a guy like you's going to let a Gordy Riker put you on the ground, shot hand or not."

As Broker was composing his comeback, the car radio squawked: "Two-forty, where are you?" "Two-forty, where are you?"

Yeager keyed his mike. "Six north." "Six north."

"Your ten-seventeen just showed up at the SO."

"Ten-four."

Yeager quickly wrote his cell phone number on the back of a card and handed it to Broker. Then he put the cruiser in reverse and backed out of the driveway. "We'll have to finish saving the world later," he said. "My wife just dropped my son off at the office. I gotta coach T-ball."

Chapter Twenty-two.

Ace came down the stairs two at a time; edgy, snapping his fingers, shaking it out. Gordy a.s.sessed him. Uh-huh. So much for mellow. Ace's serotonin was definitely headed south. It was not a coffee day. the stairs two at a time; edgy, snapping his fingers, shaking it out. Gordy a.s.sessed him. Uh-huh. So much for mellow. Ace's serotonin was definitely headed south. It was not a coffee day.

He tossed the cup of coffee he'd prepared and set a bottle of Wild Turkey on the bar with a gla.s.s. As Ace sat down and poured his breakfast, Gordy pointed to the Grand Forks Herald. Grand Forks Herald.

"Inside section. They're scaling back the search for Ginny Weller," he said.

"Ginny was your basic land shark, but she didn't deserve this," Ace said, taking a drink. He produced a Camel from his chest pocket in a snappy display of dexterity, lit it, and inhaled. He pushed the newspaper aside, blew out the smoke, and looked around. "Okay, where'd she go?"

"Out front. On her cell," Gordy said.

Ace took his gla.s.s to the window and saw her pacing on the trap rock with her head c.o.c.ked over in the New American Silhouette: neck straining to cup a cell phone. Ace thought how a whole lot of orthopedic surgeons were going to make out in twenty, thirty years, when all the crook-necked cell-phone casualties came walking into their offices bent over funny.

He took a long, slow swallow and felt the whiskey burn down his throat and rush out to the tiny capillaries in his fingers and toes. He watched the humid prairie breeze catch the summer dress and wash it up around her thighs and hips. A ripple of maroon and green. Alive against her body like a flutter of moths. Or a flag, maybe. A flag just for a woman. It wasn't that she had smallish hips, just tidy and tight, like everything else about her-efficient, traveling light, no padding. And her shoulders were broad.

Those legs and that back. I bet she swam b.u.t.terfly in school, I bet she swam b.u.t.terfly in school, he thought. he thought.

Probably had her kid by C-section, with those hips.

If so, there'd be a halfmoon scar under her belly b.u.t.ton.

Just over her bush.

So am I gonna get to see that scar, or what?

Gordy came up beside him. "One way or another she's going to f.u.c.k us up."

Ace kept his eyes on her and thought, Aw s.h.i.t, Gordy is probably right. Aw s.h.i.t, Gordy is probably right. So much for believing life could move like a soft, easy dance. Course, she was far from soft and easy. He was tired of slow dancing. It was time to make a call. "Don't doubt it for a second," he said. "Like you said, she don't add up." He cuffed Gordy on the shoulder. "She'll be gone before dark." So much for believing life could move like a soft, easy dance. Course, she was far from soft and easy. He was tired of slow dancing. It was time to make a call. "Don't doubt it for a second," he said. "Like you said, she don't add up." He cuffed Gordy on the shoulder. "She'll be gone before dark."

" 'Bout time."

"Yeah. Now, look, something's going on. I don't know what you all were doing downstairs but I just saw her husband meeting with Jimmy Yeager across the road." He reached out, clamped his hand on Gordy's shoulder, and pulled him in closer. "Tonight, you work your jigsaw extra special to see if you got a tail. I'll do the same. If we got company we'll run 'em through an old-fashioned snipe hunt." Ace winked. "Let's have some fun out on the gravel."

"Awright, boss-awright!" Gordy smiled.

Finally.

"It's me, I want to talk," Nina said.

"So talk," Broker said. He had been pacing in the motel room, watching the Weather Channel, mulling over his drive with Yeager and his missing pistol. Hearing her voice, he admitted to himself he had been waiting for the cell to ring, and now it had.

"Face-to-face," she said.

"You had lunch?"

"No."

"There's a restaurant a block from the motel. Gracie's. It's right on the highway."

"I'll be there in fifteen minutes. Did Kit get off home?"

"Lyle Torgeson and Doc Harris flew in and picked her up this morning. She'll be with my folks later today. You should give her a call."

"Not a good idea right now."

"Right, I forgot. Mission over men."

His remark killed conversation for several seconds. He imagined her mind maneuvering in the silence.

"Fifteen minutes," she said finally in her clipped, hard voice.

Broker found himself sitting up, leaning forward, hovering over the tiny phone. "You need a ride?" But the connection had ended.

Broker heaved up off the bed, stripped off his clothes, peeled the bandage from his hand, walked into the bathroom, and ran the shower to revive himself after the long, hot ride along the border. All the shower did was concentrate the humidity into liquid jets. He stood under the needles of water, eyes shut. Then he held his injured hand up to the shower and let the spray irrigate the ragged flesh.

Jane's salve worked. The swelling and redness were going down.

He got stuck, went blank, and then realized he was staring at a Barbie Doll, naked flesh-colored plastic, awkward jointed hips and arms, sitting on the soap tray like a crumb left behind by his daughter, part of a trail leading into the forest of his marriage. He picked up the toy and observed that Kit had cut the doll's red hair short.

So it looked like Nina, or perhaps Jane. He put the doll with his toilet articles so he wouldn't forget it.

One towel. Two. Trying to get dry. Then, gingerly, he tested the smaller, but still red, fan of infection radiating from the wound. Still tender. He applied the Bag Balm and taped on a clean dressing. As he took two of the Vicodin, it occurred to him that ten years earlier he'd have ignored the wound; it wouldn't have slowed him down. He felt every one of his forty-eight years as a specific weight dragging on his body.

He shook his head and swore softly as he pulled on a pair of jeans, cross trainers, a T-shirt. The idea of finally sitting down with Nina brought on a snap of resentment-at finding himself caught up in another of her projects.

They had not planned on getting married. But, then, they had not planned on getting pregnant. Maybe she thought, given her chosen line of work, it would be the only shot she'd have at a child. Maybe he thought that having a kid would nudge her out of the Army. No, not maybe.

She thought he wanted wanted her to get pregnant, his a.s.signed role in the male plot to boot her out of the service. her to get pregnant, his a.s.signed role in the male plot to boot her out of the service.

No, Nina, I just think Mama, Papa, and baby belong under one roof.

So, you can come to Europe.

Or, you can come home.

So you can stick me in the kitchen with a kid and an ap.r.o.n.

Broker shook his head. Ten minutes after he'd met her he told her straight out she had a chip on her shoulder. And she fired right back: That's no chip. Those are captain's bars, mister.

The fact was, she was a disaster in the kitchen.

He looked one last time at the Weather Channel, how the green ma.s.s of precipitation was finally moving out of the upper Midwest. The local report said scattered showers. He eyed his rain parka and decided to leave it. Then he clicked off the TV and left the room.

He grabbed a Styrofoam cup of motel coffee in the lobby and went outside, lounged against the hood of Milt Dane's Explorer, and lit a another cigar. He a.s.sumed she'd come walking into town from that bar. Or maybe Shuster would give her a lift.

Ace.

Carefully he mulled the all-too-ready image of Nina waking up in bed with...

He dragged on the cigar a little too hard and got some smoke down his throat and coughed.

s.h.i.t. So here he was dead in the water, waiting for her to come down the highway. The Missile Park was about a mile west down Highway 5.

Broker remembered back to the beginning. He should have picked up on the clues when he visited her apartment in Ann Arbor-when he met her she was on academic leave from the Army, finishing up her master's in business administration at the University of Michigan.

Her place looked like somewhere Dracula slept between night shifts. Spare and functional. TV dinners and beefed-up vitamin shakes in the refrigerator.

No houseplants. No cat. No paintings on the wall. The only personal item sat on her desk. A trophy from the national military compet.i.tion pistol shoot at Camp Perry. Second place in the fifty-yard offhand with a .45.

Make a note. Never marry a woman who can outshoot you with a handgun.

When Nina barged into his life he had been dating a woman named Linda who worked at a nursery north of Stillwater, Minnesota. Linda had long black hair she pinned up with a turquoise clasp and always managed to look like she'd just stepped out of a grove sacred to Demeter. Always had her hands plunged in potting soil and wood chips. Good old Linda. Always listening to Minnesota Public Radio. Ripe as a D. H. Lawrence love scene.