"Hale is still out there," Rhett said. Mara followed his gaze toward the highway. "And law enforcement knows where he is," she answered. "You can't add anything useful by getting yourself killed on a road after everybody you came for is safe." Rhett knew she was right, which did not make the advice easy to accept.
He approached Norah and explained that investigators needed him to give a statement about Hale's call, but that he would not leave without telling them where he was going. Eli looked up sharply. "You're going away?" he asked. Rhett shook his head.
"Only as far as the road where the investigators are working. Then the hospital. Deak and Mara will stay with you and your mom."
Norah looked at the watch on her son's wrist. "Caleb told me you would always be there if Eli needed someone," she said. "For years I didn't know whether that was still possible." Rhett glanced at his broken reflection in the vehicle window.
"Neither did I," he admitted. "But I know he's here now. That's enough to make the rest possible."
A federal vehicle left the plant ahead of him, and Rhett rode with the club in a controlled convoy rather than the reckless chase his anger initially demanded. The motorcycles were there to transport their members and provide statements, not to force Hale's vehicles off the highway. Ahead, investigators tracked the fleeing vehicles through ordinary law-enforcement channels. Rhett watched the dark road unspool beneath the headlamps and tried to trust that other people could finish a job he had carried in his chest for four years.
Near the county line, the line of vehicles slowed. Red and blue lights swept across Route 9 ahead, reflecting from two stopped SUVs and a row of official vehicles positioned to keep traffic clear. Rhett recognized the shape of Hale's second vehicle through the windshield. Several people stood beside the roadside under supervision, their hands visible, while uniformed agents spoke into radios and coordinated the scene.
The club pulled safely into a designated turnout. Rhett stepped off the motorcycle and saw a tall man in a dark coat walking toward him with a folder beneath one arm. The man was in his late fifties, with silver hair at the temples and the tired, deliberate posture of someone who had spent decades learning that an investigation could not be rushed merely because the people inside it were desperate. He showed his identification before speaking.
"Rhett Callahan?" the man asked. Rhett nodded. "Alderman Cross," the man said. "Federal investigator. Caleb Mercer sent me a message years ago, and I've been expecting to meet you since the moment his file finally reached my office tonight."
Rhett looked beyond him at the stopped vehicles. "Hale?" he asked. "In custody pending formal proceedings," Cross replied. "He offered information within the first minute after the stop. We will evaluate anything he gives us, but information isn't a license to escape responsibility for what he's done."