The Choice: The Easy Way or The Hard Way Part Two

by When you belong to me

Guess who's coming to The Choice? Patrick Jane, out on a limb, and showing some. Lisbon gone ballistic-(Enough is too much!) Hightower with an agenda or two. An uninvited Red John: Here there be tyger. Lorelei, besotted. The Choice, like their lives, falls under the shadow of Red John. [I don't own The Mentalist, nor Jane. Pity. If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.]

The Choice: The Easy Way or the Hard Way. Part Two.

"Patrick, I am not hearing your choice," Hightower prompted. "The easy way—with or without pharmaceuticals. Or the hard way?"

"There's a line from an old story where someone gives an ultimatum: choose this, or that—meaning 'or else.' Jane shrugged. "The answer given was, 'I shall do neither.'"

"I know the story. But, as I told you, refusal to answer is an answer—and is a choice of the hard way."

"Or, it is a choice of survival. Regardless of what I might do if we had world enough and time—we do not. We have to assume that we are under Red John's scrutiny. Outside the door. Maybe inside. And perhaps with a deadly force marching against us right now. I doubt that Red John would kill me, for various reasons, including that he needs me for the ongoing 'game.' You are another matter. Now that you have made this move—even if I might be willing to regard this, so far, as mere talk, or as an opening gambit, a somewhat unorthodox proposition which, maybe, I had coming—or even to grant you the fig leaf of a medical concern for what condition my condition is in—since I could have resisted taking my clothes off, if I wanted to badly enough, and if there were not, arguably, a chance that I was damaged—"

"Which you were," she interjected.

"For which Red John will also blame you, and also for risking my life," he said. "Some minion will have described to him what you admitted to local law—your mad dash firing at the killer and in my direction. Even if I were to put the very best face on what you have done or said tonight, Red John—will not. We may have only moments, if even that. I doubt that you are really willing to take me by brute force, and I don't know whether you have calculated that, untrained as I may be, I have survived some number of carny roustabouts, and beyond, while wearing a face some people tell me should never go into a bar. But even if I'm wrong and you were, or are, willing to force it—we don't fight in a burning house."

"Patrick, that is one of your better flimflams," Hightower said admiringly. "It may even be true. Or Red John might have taken his eye off the ball, or off of you, for once. Do not doubt that I am serious, whether brutish or not. And I note that you are not as radically celibate, at least in spirit, as you want to claim. You certainly had an eye for Kristina Frye—and a yen. You asked her on a formal date. Risk from Red John notwithstanding, by the way. And why were you more willing to risk Kristina than me?Then Red John had ears on you, at least, and maybe eyes, on that date. When you were helpless in that chair, he could send you 'Kristina's love,' and quote to you what he overheard—'Rolltide.' Red John took her, not just because she made a stupid remark about him on TV, but because of you."

"Thanks for the reminder," he said grimly.

"Damn straight. You allowed yourself to be a normal man, for once, in too many years."

"Kristina paid." His voice was hollow.

"She knew who you were. No psychic powers needed. Just Internet. She accepted the risk. She was not a fool. To her, you were worth the risk. And I am not Kristina. I'm a cop, and more. I have skills."

"Not to face him," Jane warned.

"We'll see. Meanwhile, without putting aside the choice I gave you, I grant you, time may be short right now. So, come hell or high water tonight, both of which could be coming at us shortly, there is one circumstance in which I might give you a little more time for your final choice."

"Um—what circumstance?" His eyebrow went up. Warily.

"I know how you control your bodily functions with biofeedback, self-hypnosis, or whatever other mentalist bits you use." She looked down his body to the relevant region. "You're doing it now. Keeping it down. Playing it cool. Not giving me the satisfaction. Even though you are intrigued. Even though you've been pitching me from day one, down to hugging and holding me, burying your face in my breasts on this very caper, in the mountain town. Also, if it comes to that, to manipulate me in return, you would try to use hypnosis or some other razzle-dazzle on me. Dream on. It wouldn't work on me. Hardcore CIA training, among others, against even advanced hypnosis, brainwashing, sensory deprivation. Way more than you could throw at me, for all your skills, naked in a motel room. Still, I want you to give me your word to use none of that, especially not on yourself—and none of whatever else I haven't said or thought about. And, while not using any of that—kiss me."

"What?!"

"Kiss me. Deeply. Not a peck. Not sister-brother. Not boss-subordinate. Which we both know, we are not, since you always insist you are an independent consultant. The kiss also cannot be a guarded response to what you may argue, later, for any legal purpose, is well over some workplace line. We both know that you don't pay attention to anything like that. You are, famously, 'as independent as a hog on ice.' You so notoriously don't follow orders, that everyone in CBI would just laugh if you cried foul. We're not talking about full-blown sex now. Just a kiss. But a real one. Not holding back anything. Fully, as if you ungrudgingly, and without purpose of evasion, do very much want to do it. Lips, mouth, hands, body. The whole enchilada. No biofeedback, hypnosis, self or otherwise, no nothing of that kind. No reservations about Angela. Worst case, she could not fault you for one kiss in many years. If you could look at Kristina with that thought, if you could hold me today, for a long double-take, watching a man routinely drive a truck away, with all the fascination of seeing the Titanic sink, you can do that much. If you do it properly, and your—barometer—does not stand and deliver, then I might cut you some slack. Not forever, but, say, a little delay while we deal with possible Red John complications, before I press you for the full easy way or hard way choice. To be argued while not under the gun or in a burning house. On the other hand, if it does salute. . ."

"What would you take that to mean—other than that, of course, you are a stunningly beautiful, smart, sexy, outside-the-box, one-of-a-kind woman? And that my body also knows it?"

"That would do for a start. Thank you. And that I haven't been coming from left field. And that we have sense enough to move our asses when Red John is likely after them. NOW! If you are down with that, or up to it."

He stepped forward and took her into his arms, pressed her against his naked body. He took her face in his long-fingered hand. Tipped her head back and kissed her lips, softly, then more firmly, finally opening them slightly. She let her lips soften and press back as his tongue found the corner of her mouth, then more. His other hand held her close, explored her back, her body, found the curve of her ass. Pulled her up against him, almost into him. His long fingers traced on down the nerve endings of her throat. His lips and teeth and tongue teased and explored, savored, tempted.

She opened to him, arched her back, pulled him closer than close, her hands all over the silk of his back, and the twin curves with which she pulled him, if it were possible, even tighter.

She felt the beginnings of a stirring in him, but suddenly wondered whether he was now controlling it in the opposite direction. Had she ever actually taken time to get his word not to?

Well, her fault, if not. She was having trouble maintaining coherent thought. . . .

Hightower's phone rang. It was the ringtone for an office red-alert. Not to be denied.

She broke slightly, just enough to free her lips. And to look at their situation. . . .

There was a matching red alert ringing on Jane's laptop, which was standing lid-open on the motel desk.

If he answered THAT, he would be seen, naked. With her.

If SHE did, she would reveal that she was in Jane's motel room, answering his laptop.

And if they did nothing, the screen, and camera were aimed in their general direction. CBI units could be turned on automatically—or remotely—under certain circumstances. It would reveal him naked in her arms.

She was holding his pants, but did not offer them.

She released him, taking an instant to see that he was partially erect. Well, maybe that jury was still out. Unless he had just now been a little deflated by the ringing alerts.

"Get behind the laptop," she ordered quietly.

Jane tried to reach for the pants, but saw that she was not giving them up. Finally he looked at the laptop light, blinking balefully, as both alerts sounded again. He took a couple of quick steps and did get out of view, behind the desk.

Hightower moved to where she would be out of the laptop's view, and answered her cell.

"Hightower here. What is it?"

"What's the matter?" Lisbon asked urgently. "Why did you use the red alert?"

"Why did you!?"

"I didn't."

"If you didn't call," Hightower asked, "who did?"

"Where's Jane?" Lisbon sounded frustrated. "What else is ringing there?"

"Um. I was allergic to something in my room. He forgot to deal with closing his laptop."

Lisbon sounded not quite suspicious, or hiding it. "Well, answer it, for God's sake! Um. Ma'am."

Hightower shrugged, wondering about the crossed calls, seeing Jane making himself small out of camera range, also wondering, and she stepped to answer the laptop, killing the urgent sound.

The laptop screen filled with Lisbon's face, walking somewhere, in the dark. Lisbon reacted, now seeing Hightower and the room through that laptop camera. Hightower blocked what she could, unobtrusively.

"So you are saying that I was calling both your cell and Jane on his laptop?"

"Right."

"Wrong! Less than an hour ago I said goodbye to your sister—lovely by the way—and the kids. And just now my cell went nuts. It wasn't coming from CBI. It was a red alert, from YOU."

"Trust me, the last thing on my mind was calling you," Hightower said truthfully. Jane winced and looked up with a 'give me strength' gesture.

Lisbon did a slight double take. "If you switched rooms, why am I seeing Jane's go-bag? And his pea-coat dumped on the floor, which he doesn't do. And the shirt he had on for the mountains, dumped on top of it. And what do I see where you are holding your hand nearly out of sight—which looks a lot like a couple of inches of. . . . his PANTS."

"I just said I was allergic to something in my room." Hightower was winging it, but her main focus was on trying to work out the problem of WHO CALLED? She added, "I came out of that next-door hellhole and over here to confer, and to check that he was not hiding an injury, as you suggested."

"I did NOT!" Lisbon was losing it. "Jane, come out of wherever the hell you are hiding. Right now!"

Jane looked at Hightower. She gave it up. She gestured for him to come around the desk. It might just be high enough to block some of his more relevant parts. Now soft. The desk was not much of a modesty shield. It would have to do. But the game was, more or less, up.

With a pained look, he did what she signaled: He sidled close to the desk and stepped around into Lisbon's view.

Lisbon's face set in stone. Stone that could be shattered by an unexpected blow.

"You are naked," she said in a low tone. "How could you? If that belonged to anyone, it belonged to me!"

He looked on the verge of saying "not my idea"—but he did not blow the gaffe on Hightower. "I'm sorry," he said in a genuine tone. Then: "I was trying to see whether there was any significant damage before going to bed. Not expecting. . . . But—you're right. I didn't mean—"

"The desk is not a fig leaf," Lisbon said. "Step back. Now!"

He looked reluctant. Then he looked deeper at Lisbon's face. He stepped back and stood naked, facing her.

She looked. She kept her reactions out of her face. Moments passed. Finally she spoke. "Back up further."

He moved back a few steps, so she could see nearly all of him.

"Turn around."

He turned around. Hightower watched Lisbon examine his ass. There was a flicker of flame in Lisbon's eyes, but she tried to suppress it.

"There is a big bruise," Lisbon said tonelessly. "And abrasions. Perhaps something internal. He should be seen medically."

"My very thought," Hightower said.

"I'd rather not hear from you now. Ma'am."

Jane turned back to face her. "Lisbon. . . ."

"You, either. Especially not you."

He moved slightly forward again, against the desk, so that the camera would see him from slightly above the genitals. He couldn't help it that doing so put the rear view in front of Hightower.

"It's time to minimize distractions," he said. "You've each had a call from an unknown source, pretending to be the other."

"And who do we know who can hack into CBI's systems?" Hightower said.

"HIM," Lisbon said sourly. "But how would Red John even know who is where or—with whom?"

"He's watching," Jane answered. "He has to be watching. He has unlimited money, unlimited minions. And either he or some of his minions are sophisticated in technology. Probably both. I'm only beginning to suspect how wide his net is. He buys the buyable, draws in others with blackmail. Or what seems to be his immense personal charisma. Some are willing to die for him. Or to kill. They may be everywhere. Local law—possibly, even probably. Motel managers or other locals. Statewide, many major officials, maybe at or near the top of the political heap. Certainly one cult leader, Stiles, with Visualize tentacles worldwide. If he's not a Red John follower, he was at least informed, telling me about Red John's obsession with me, 'It's a form of love, you know.' Then Stiles told me, exactly, where Red John held Kristina. There may be many others. Possibly national-level leaders. Conceivably international and global powers that be. I don't know how he does it. I just know that he does. And all of that personal power is linked in some unique way to ultimate evil. Assume he's video-bugged everything here and is watching us." He looked at Hightower. "Has been watching us."

Hightower was glad most people could not tell when her face went hot. "Okay," she said glumly. "Assume he's here. We'd better—"

There was a knock on the door.

They both stiffened. Hightower's hand fell to her gun.

Then sharp, imperative knocks.

Patrick grabbed his pants out of her other hand. Balanced to try to put them on. Got one leg in.

A boot hit the door lock. The wood door frame gave way, letting the deadbolt lock snap through it.

The door was smashed violently open into the room.

Hightower's gun cleared her holster and leveled on the door as it opened in front of the intruder, her finger starting to close on the trigger. She managed to turn it aside and a bullet hit the door frame.

Instead of Lisbon.

One booted foot was up where Lisbon had kicked the door open with one practiced move. The ankle that had been sprained was strapped into some hard-shell brace that let her walk. Now she was trying to contain her momentum and catch herself as she burst into the room.

Hightower caught Lisbon with one hand and slammed her back against the wall near the door.

"You're dead!" she snarled. "What possessed you to kick a door in when we expect Red John?"

Lisbon threw Hightower's hand off. Peeled herself off the wall. "You did! Both of you!"

She turned on Jane, still with one leg out of the pants. She gestured to leave them down. Looked at him.

His face was grim. "She's right, Lisbon. You're dead."

"Or you are," Lisbon said with fire in her eye, her years of superhuman restraint having finally giving way. "Just you wait! Right after I level Hightower!"

She turned toward the other woman, menacingly.

"Don't think about it," Hightower warned. "I know what police training you've had. Your training films say you're not half bad at that limited training. Pretty good, in fact. It doesn't compare to my FBI and CIA training. Even including Israeli Krav Maga. Stand down, Agent Lisbon. That's not only an order. It's a warning. Patrick would get in the middle of it to try to stop us. And he could be badly hurt."

"You stand down! I'll have you up on charges. Sexual harassment—'Under color of authority.' Violation of your obligations as his boss and supervisor."

"Dry up," Hightower said levelly. "I'm not his boss. You're not either. Perhaps fortunately. He always maintains he's an independent consultant. He spits in the eye of authority. Yours. Mine. The Governor's. God's. That's his religion. And we both know him for a royal pain in the anatomy. I couldn't harass him if I tried.'

"Which you did." Lisbon still had her fists balled..

"We're all idiots!" Jane muttered, stepping into the other pant's leg and pulling the pants up, closing them. "Red John is here, electronically, maybe even nearby physically, with God knows what plan or plot, but giving us ample warning—and we three are playing musical Patricks. No fault of Hightower that she didn't shoot you dead center. And she's right that I'd get in between you. So, forget—."

The laptop screen popped on. It showed Lisbon in a police training class. Not bad. Good, in fact. Very good. Finally a quick cut of the real life take down, when she came out of nowhere to flatten the killer who had been about to take out Jane. Then the screen cut to Hightower: A Quantico-like virtual reality course. With real challengers popping out at her. To be mauled. A whole different level of a whole different ballgame. Then a clip of Hightower's real life take down of an armed berserker who was two, maybe three times her size.

Finally a sizzling, quick-cut montage of each woman in work settings, violent or otherwise. Hightower receiving various awards, hard to identify, but some on a national level.

Suddenly, over the montage, spoke a certain voice, known to Jane, and, on film, to Hightower. Jane's face drained to white.

"Take note. I have no dog in the fight of you two ladies. But I will punish any damage to Patrick. You both know he will not stand down. Choose accordingly."

Jane was diving toward the laptop, picking it up as if to smash it down. But its screen had gone dead.

"Red John," Jane said heavily, and put the laptop back down. "Controlling my laptop. Which is probably also still filming us. But he had to be speaking to us—live. He couldn't have recorded a message based on the two of you wanting to go ballistic. He probably spoke from nearby. Though in this virtual world, he could be anywhere in the state—or on the planet. And, in this room, given he's had hours to send someone, he would have backups and other camera angles. Maybe one or two other planted cameras. And he is—laughing."

"No," Hightower said. "Not laughing. Though we've given him every reason to laugh hysterically. But he's too busy sending someone, or coming at us himself, in case we two do go at it, and he fears Jane could be crunched."

Lisbon reached past Jane and slammed the lid down on the laptop. Not that that would help much. She shoved it into the cross-body go-bag that hung across her body. God knew what kind of evidence or classified information or clues to Red John's takeover of the laptop camera and screen it might hold.

"Have Van Pelt check luxury hotels, resorts, or lodges nearby," Hightower ordered. "There can't be an infinite number that Red John would choose. Or maybe he'd even go to some hole-in-the-wall, just to be a contrarian."

"I'll put Grace on that now," Lisbon said. "She'll have results texted to my phone. And I'll also have her running registrations of private mountain cabins or lodges within 50 or 75 miles, or so. It would not be beyond him to haveretreatsor bases up and down the mountain spine of California, perhaps including something near here—or along major highways and freeways, or near airports or heliports. Red John was never a fixed-location serial killer. His 'comfort zone' appears to be at least all of California, and, for all we know, the world. Searching private holdings is harder, and there would be many candidates, but Grace has a feel for such things. However, that can wait. I brought the chopper, since I thought that Jane should be taken for medical attention. Not that I knew what kind of attention he was already getting." Lisbon scooped up Jane's peacoat and pitched it to him.

She shook her head. Settled her gun more firmly in its holster.

"Let's get the hell out of here," Lisbon ordered.

Patrick pulled on the jacket, still shirtless and barefoot.

Hightower was sweeping the walls, looking for bugs, cameras. She found two, traced them to transmitters. She spoke directly into the second camera.

"Back off," Hightower warned through the camera. "He belongs to me."

She ripped out the cameras and transmitters, dropped them in her bag. She scooped up Patrick's bag and other clothes. Pitched his shoes at his feet, and saw him slide into them.

Lisbon was suddenly in front of Hightower. "No, damnit! He is mine."

"Out! Agent Lisbon," Hightower ordered, "Or he is Red John's!"

For a long moment it was a near thing whether Lisbon would hang the expense and land one on Hightower.

But she looked at Jane. Bearing up, though almost shivering—clearly having had a bad day and worse night. He did need the medical attention, if only for shock, and perhaps internal trauma, whether he knew it or not.

And he knew, better than anyone, the supreme danger of Red John. Bad enough, the danger to himself. Jane would figure that Red John could have killed him at any time, and had not. But now there was the danger to two women. And how would he survive if yet another woman he cared about was murdered because of him? Or kidnapped. Or God knew what?

Lisbon spoke into her phone to the helicopter team. "Cover us. We're coming for takeoff."

She took Jane's arm, not with her gun hand, and put her body in front of him, intending to guide him out the broken door.

He was yielding to that logic. Or just to her.

Hightower drew her gun and put her body behind him.

A Jane sandwich.

Both women were preparing to go out the door, protecting him with their lives and scanning for the ultimate prowling danger.

The soft voice came from inside Lisbon's bag.

"All very noble. Jane sandwich on white and rye. But there's nothing to protect him from someone willing to take you two down, temporarily or permanently—and, if not kill him—take him. You have described a Red Dragon you cannot assume would not, at least, take him. You know of one such attempt to take him, which barely failed, and made Jane, who hates guns, have to shoot my acolyte, Dumar Hardy, to save Lisbon. Otherwise I would have had Patrick in that cell prepared for him, next to Maya's. Both of you, and even he—who would usually know better—have become complacent, believing that I will not kill him. Because he thinks, I grant you with some justification, that I am having too much pleasure out of the game. Or because I did not kill him or take him when those snuff film imitators of my signature murder scenes delivered him to me. You may be forgetting that that was not a plan I had begun. I had to intervene in the moment, to punish my imitators—or to pull Jane's idiotic chestnuts out of the fire, after he went in there without backup. Take your pick. But do not presume to read my mind. Even if you suppose that I would not kill him, nothing would prevent me from having a take team outside your door now, with sharpshooters—or even armed with tasers. In fact, I'm considering that I may have to move to take him now, given that the two of you are more or less out of your minds, and not able to keep him safe. Even from each other. Just how do you expect to get him as far as the chopper in the parking lot?"

"He has a point," Jane said. "We are mind-reading him. I could be dead meat, or at least a snatch and grab tidbit. And that would not be so good for the two bread slices, either."

They stopped, staying inside and pushing the door shut. Lisbon and Hightower looked at each other.

"Kick me," Lisbon said like a curse.

"The bastard is right," Hightower said. "We're both thinking with our anatomy, if at all."

Lisbon grimaced and spoke into her phone. "Don't stay in the parking lot. Set the bird down again right in front of the cabin door. I don't care if you clip a bush or two. Just don't wreck the chopper. Co-pilot, jump out and come to us with a long gun."

They heard a faint acknowledgment.

The watching man was amused, but not pleased.

He played the keyboard to pull in a better picture from the fallback pinhole camera drilled through the wall from the adjoining cabin a minion had rented. Its view was extremely limited, but it was something.

The police helicopter had first landed some forty yards from the motel cabin. If the three had come out, and John had been on the scene, he could have picked any of them off with his handgun. Not his weapon of choice, unless the task demanded it—when he could, as the saying went, shoot the pips off a playing card. Fortune favors the prepared.

As it was, he had a taser team there, with strict orders not to use guns near Jane.

The women had thought that they would pride themselves on getting Jane out in one piece, and to at least a medical once-over, which had been part of John's own agenda for the vulnerable man who had set out to be his implacable nemesis.

Not that it had ever done Jane much good. Unless you counted saving his sanity from his guilt over his wife and daughter, and his consuming fury at Red John. But as avenging angel, Jane was nothing if not committed. Nothing if not dead game. It was a quality John admired, especially in one who had so few defenses, yet who was willing to go up against murderers, time after time, armed only with his wits and some mentalist hat-tricks—just to stay in CBI for the main game against Red John.

Tonight Jane's most dangerous quarry, and hunter, had had him coming and going. John had watched an interesting show of Patrick naked and afraid. Also, aroused, or nearly so, for which John did not intend to forgive Hightower. And his first speech to them through the laptop had put the fear of God into them. And worse. The fear of John himself.

And rightly so. Even as he sat at the keyboard, he was wearing the holster with his own fallback Glock. Tasers aside, he himself could be on the scene in minutes. And, assuming that he wanted to, he could take out either or both of the women with the Glock. Or even Jane, though that would be, well, counterproductive.

He did not want them to rule that out. As his secon oration had warned them.

Even the women were too interesting to dispose of in a moment. Unless they crossed him.

Especially now that they made conflicting claims to possession of Jane. Who was his.

He was thinking further about the threat he had made to take Jane.

It had been meant mainly to scare them and to punish them for not taking enough care. But it had a certain merit. Hightower had become an unknown quantity, and dangerous. To Jane.

John was beginning to form a longer-term plan, which he might launch later, for Hightower, who was now a little too forthright, and formidable. And off the wall.

While her unwise dash today had worked out for Jane, another time, given what she had also showed for Jane tonight, and so long as she worked with him, or attempted to supervise him, she could get him killed.

That was not acceptable.

Though the high-handed Hightower was interesting, and John might even have wanted to play some of her game, she could not be trusted with Patrick's life.

And there was also the matter of the choice she had put to Jane. How long before she pressed him to choose the easy way, or the hard way?

If he was going to take Jane, soon, this was their most vulnerable location and time.

Though he could always arrange vulnerabilities. But in the interim, something could happen to Jane.

Maybe. . . . He played the keyboard and triggered a prepared signal that would cross-circuit something in the electronics controlling a mechanical system—using preparations he had had planted, long ago, on certain vehicles that might later need to be targeted.

Including the helicopters CBI often used. He hit a final button and entered a code.

That would occasion a delay.

Lisbon's phone came to life and the helicopter pilot's voice said, "Uh, were having a mechanical difficulty here."

"Can you take off?" Lisbon asked.

"No."

"How long to fix it?"

"No clue. We don't even know what is wrong."

The two women looked at each other.

"That would be him," Hightower said.

Lisbon sighed. "Well, keep working on it. Try to find something that could have been planted to disable it. Call for a backup chopper. Stat!"

Lisbon looked at Jane and saw that he had lapsed into his thinking-about-it mode. Which usually did not bode well

John coded a second signal that would ping Jane's laptop, on John's command, and run a prepared sequence of videos.

He put on the black leather hip-length jacket, which had multiple purposes, over the holstered Glock. His physical presence might be required.

He had made preparations such that doing so would be no threat to his identity or his secrets.

The taser-armed men were not privy to his identity or appearance. Very few were. They knew only that they belonged to an organization which could give them orders, and that this stranger ranked them. But, as in any situation where he might be required to be out on a mission, he had prepared in advance and was wearing one of the medium grade, fairly easily-applied, Mission Impossible-type masks. It looked like a normal face. Merely not his face.

There was a still more detailed power version of the mask, with which he could have met with a President or a Prime Minister, and had. Though much harder to use, it served, when he had to deal with someone of stature, or on a particularly close basis.

Lorelei had seen two or three of the masks, including, once, the power version, when she had happened to be allowed to be around when some caper might transpire. She had looked at his own face and had complained, "They are all fine faces, fine enough, but those who only deal with them have no idea how much more powerful your real face is, never mind how much I miss it."

Those lower-tier taser men, or any of his higher level recruits—say, Craig O'Laughlin. He was in play now, using his FBI identity to infiltrate the CBI team to spy on Patrick. O'Laughlin knew only one of John's mask faces—as it happened, the one he was using tonight—and nothing of the identity behind it. And the masks were insurance, even against any of the happenstance bystanders to some action that one always had to reckon with.

No one would recognize or even have a clue to his real identity if he did go to the motel or even did take Jane and was seen.

Security cameras, which were becoming increasingly ubiquitous, even in mountain backwaters, would not have tracked anything helpful since he arrived at this lodge,owned through false identities, merely one of a number of his mountain or metropolitan residences that he could use as bases, at need. Not one of the more elaborate or secure ones, like the island. This was merely the one the most reasonable distance from the mountain-town crime scene to which CBI and Jane had been called. In fact, it was rather fortunately located, and even close enough to the motel.

Even Jane, if taken, would not know John's real face, until or unless that was John's choice.

So recognition was not an issue that barred the way to an action tonight.

He was even wearing, with a special adhesive, the false latex fingerprints. There had been a chance that he would have to wade into the double murder, to spike some threat to Jane. A chance he might have to leave a weapon or vehicle or other evidence behind.

If he acted and something went south, it would not jeopardize his identity or risk major issues.

Still, he distrusted impromptu action or unplanned strikes.

And his gut was saying that for whatever was making Jane "contrite"—John was understaffed.

O'Laughlin was the most likely fairly higher-level reinforcement. Using him could undo his usefulness for the project he was on now, which had taken considerable arranging, and still had a symphony movement or two yet to come.

But if something happened to Jane, the music stopped.

John played the keyboard and called O'Laughlin, setting the video-audio so he would see the other man, but O'Laughlin would not see him or his surroundings. Never give any subordinate, nor, indeed, anyone, more information than necessary.

O'Laughlin answered from CBI. He was waiting outside Grace Van Pelt's office, while she could be seen running multiple searches on her computer.

"Sir?"

John used the voice O'Laughlin knew—not one Jane had heard, and not his own.

"I want you to gather the A and B men of your cell, arm them with tasers, take their service weapons and hideout guns, or knives, away from them and bring those along yourself. Only issue them back if I authorize it. Also a couple of rifles, under your control. Take the standby chopper I've authorized you to use, and come to the location I will text you. Immediately. Tell A and B on no account to use a lethal weapon on or near Patrick Jane. And preferably not on anyone from CBI. "

O'Laughlin's eyes narrowed, but he said, "Yes, sir." And stood up.

"Brief update report on your CBI monitoring status, first. Van Pelt?"

"Our relationship gives me increasing access. Grace is running searches in the mountain area. I overheard something about private lodges and cabins."

"Rigsby?"

"Hates me, understandably. But does not suspect me. He's running follow-ups with local law on the murders."

"Hightower?"

"Pretty damn good commander, sir. I checked with some of my FBI and other sources. She has FBI, CIA, and Israeli crossover training that doesn't quit. And she doesn't, either. She keeps Jane on as short a leash as anybody could, which is still about a mile long, and gives him room for male-female awareness. A kiss on the cheek, dances he's done for her, etc."

"Lisbon?"

"Nearly climbed a wall today when she couldn't walk and had to let Hightower be out there with Jane, sir. She was sweet to Hightower's kids. But when Hightower and Jane stayed over after Hightower shot the killer, Lisbon taped up her ankle tight enough to be a tourniquet, and hauled out what I guess was an old walking cast she or somebody had used, and strapped it on so she could hobble on that and one boot. And took off like a scalded cat. Anybody would have thought she believed a crime was still in progress."

Close enough. "And Jane?"

"As smart and off the wall as everybody said, sir. Kinder than one might expect. Even to a newcomer wearing a false face. Jane is tortured. But bearing up. Tries to lighten things up for the others. But he's hunting. You. He doesn't forget that for a minute. He doesn't suspect me, but he may have some subliminal antenna that gets something, so he does not like me much. I can't say that I blame him. Plus he's rooting for Rigsby, who, Jane knows, does love Grace."

"Cho?"

"If anybody, Cho scares the hell out of me. He looks at me funny sometimes, but knows nothing definite. Very protective of Jane. Sir, I hesitate to ask you something. . . . Never mind."

"You may ask."

O'Laughlin frowned. Looked as if he wished he could see John's face. But he seized the chance.

"What is it with you and Jane, sir? I know what he wants with you, which is red death. Vengeance. Justice. For his wife and child. Now perhaps also for Kristina Frye. Even for Bosco and his team. And maybe for when you almost locked Jane in that cell next to Maya, and when your Sheriff Hardy came within an instant of killing Lisbon—and Jane had to shoot him."

"Not a complete list," John said mildly. "But a start."

"But—what do you want with Jane, or—from him? Forgive me, sir, but you kill, women. Unless in some rare, incidental case. You don't appear to have that kind of use for Jane. Although one never knows. You could kill him or have him killed, any day of the week. You could have taken him when those film nuts wrapped him up for you. He was in shock and still terrified when the CBI team got to him. He had to have seen your strength. He described how you lifted him up so easily from the floor in that tipped-over heavy chair. Afterward, Grace said he seemed almost—awed. You could have gotten him into your vehicle. But you did not. And—he lied for you. Told everyone that you hadn't said a word. Which I know could not be true of you. Excuse me, sir. I'm going on. I hope I haven't offended you. But it would help me, and my mission for you, even tonight, to know."

"Truth does not offend me," he said. That was true, but the naming of it had led John to certain conclusions about O'Laughlin's future. "This is what I am willing to have you know about Jane, tonight, and going forward. I want you to pass down to your cell in our organization, and anyone else of mine outside your cell that you may have to interact with tonight or later, including the lowest footsoldier out in these mountains. No one is to harm a hair on Jane's head. Nor, as in Asimov's 'first law of robotics'—'A robot shall not harm a human being, nor, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.' No one is to allow a Jane to come to harm. On pain of offending me. Fatally. Unless specifically authorized by me. Clear?"

"As a D-flawless diamond." O'Laughlin was a little tight, closed, now.

"And O'Laughlin, that applies to you, too. Especially to you."

"I have no beef with Jane. I kind of like him, in fact. Though, of course, I would turn him into cold beef if you ordered it."

"I—strongly—prefer that you do not use that metaphor about Jane. I expect, before you are done with all of what I have in mind, you may have a beef with him, or he with you. If so, you are to go down, before you harm him. Or I will deal with you."

O'Laughlin looked wary. "I see. Sir."

"There may be action here tonight. If so, I want you on hand. But stay in the background unless forced to act. Wear a hat, glasses, beard. Mountain clothes. Fake posture. There's not time for much better. Try not to show your face, so you maintain your future usefulness. But if you have to become involved, I want you to watch Hightower. Not for intent to harm Jane. But perhaps for bad judgment triggered by excessive need to protect him."

"Hightower?! O'Laughlin's eyebrows rose. "Jane?!"

"Don't trouble your head. Just do it."

There was a pause. Then O'Laughlin said only, "Of course, sir."

"Go now."

"Sir." O'Laughlin turned, said to Grace, "Work," and left. Cho's eyes followed him.

John took truck keys from a hook. He had not brought an obtrusive vehicle here where a luxury car would be noticed. He had arrived in a mid-grade sedan. One of the vehicles assigned to this lodge, and also registered under false identities, was a powerful older pickup, unobtrusive to the point of invisibility in the local area—with a camper shell that he had fitted out inside with certain amenities and with supplies for impromptu actions and evasions.

If he had been intending to take Jane now, it was the vehicle he would have chosen.

It could even be parked in front of the cabin next to Jane's door, where a minion had rented the adjoining unit for best access to bugging Jane's, including the last pinhole camera through the wall.

John could have the women, and anyone else, like the co-pilot and pilot, tasered, not to start a cop-killer manhunt. And merely take Jane. Carry him off, a few yards, to the camper shell.

Lorelei emerged from the bedroom, wearing only one of his silk shirts. John saw her take in that he was wearing the hip length black leather jacket, hood up for more anonymity, as well as the jacket's serving its other useful functions. He'd known women who admired its style, or perhaps the anatomy which it covered to some advantage. They would often not know that it was an item from a designer in South America who made knockout leather jackets, coats, jeans, etc.—from bullet-resistant fabric plus leather. They were good, or, at least, minimized damage from most firearms. Although there were armor-piecing rounds out there which would shoot one just as dead, even in such a jacket. Still, he had never understood why anyone who could afford one—and they were not beyond the reach of people who routinely bought cars and airline tickets—did not wear one, in this deteriorating world.

Lorelei would know that donning the jacket meant that he would go out. She frowned.

"That urgent London call is on the cell on your desk."

It was an unwelcome interruption now, but essential. He nodded and gestured for Lorelei to come to the keyboard and screen. "Watch and listen," he said. "Report anything that I should know urgently. Ring my cell. Give me the bottom line, then the essentials, verbatim."

She nodded. She had done it for him before. Even about Jane. Not happily about Jane, but competently. John strode into the bedroom and closed the door.

She looked near the keyboard at the book he had been reading, between things he had to watch or do. It was on evolutionary psychology. Next to it was the latest book on space exploration by the woman expert whose work John admired. There were a number of his favorite books that were replicated in all or nearly all of his homes. There were always bookcases, some of them glassed-in antiques, holding the selection of his favorites, and then other classics, and a variable choice of history books, art, music. A large section on law, psychology and psychiatry, criminology, deviant behavior. Murder. And a varying stream of new books, including fiction. Select poetry.

She loved it here. It was a mountain lodge built of thick, criss-crossed logs, like giant Lincoln Logs, deeply insulating and warm with little added heat on this cold night. This place shared with all the others a theme of its own, deep comfort, and the commonality of a n extraordinary taste which had picked each item of furniture or of art, individually.

And each place had one or more collectors' items—one of them here the brandy set said to have belonged to a royal, and a suspect. John used it casually—he had an ounce or two of an aged brandy in a snifter by the keyboard and screen—an electronics center that was cutting edge, just in the part she knew, and she suspected, much more powerful than even she knew.

And this was merely a minor outpost. She knew that there were others, some still more exclusive, elaborate and well-hidden, that she had never seen.. At least one was an island, with a dedicated staff. He had mentioned it, but she did not even know in what ocean or body of water it was.

But in the ones she knew, there were always surprising luxuries and useful tools or supplies. And then, there were the closets. Or the guest-quarter or master bedroom chests or dressers. She made a point of into them when she could. Most of his guests had been fairly careful about taking their things with them.

But not all. At one or another she had found a high-end Paris designer negligee, with a monogram which fit the initials of a world-class player on the international scene with whom, Lorelei knew from her own research, he had had some interludes.

Another time she had found a magnificent platinum and emerald necklace which she had once seen on a well-known woman at a state dinner covered by the media.

Often he kept guest amenities, negligees, robes, changes of clothes in a few relevant sizes, expensive soaps, cosmetics, brush and comb sets, and other odds and ends, presumably for the comfort of someone visiting on an impromptu, no-luggage basis.

Of course, she had always known that she was not the only one. Far from it. And she had always taken what he chose to give, when and if she could get it. With whatever risks that might entail.

Nonetheless, she always looked for the signs, and felt what she felt.

Once she had found a man's jacket, too small for him, though of a decent size, and of such a luxurious material and fine design that it could only have belonged to some world-class tycoon or celebrity or politician.

She did not know what friends he had or for what reasons he invited them.

She only knew that he did not observe any limits. If there was warning sign, or a 'keep out' or a line on a map, it was in his DNA to cross it.

She realized that she should be watching the screen more closely. She didn't want John to go out. Jane was, as always, an open invitation for John to go into danger.

But John needed the information, and he would check back on her report.

Lorelei watched as Patrick Jane put his arms around Lisbon and kissed her. Lorelei could see that, in spite of herself, Lisbon was caught by it. She'd waited so long. Something melted within her. His touch was magical, on her back, down her body. But his lips and mouth, even more magnetic and magical, distracted her from that touch.

Lorelei wondered whether she was reading some other intention into his movements, or merely being paranoid? Either way, Lorelei watched him like a hawk, now.

Finally, he pulled a little away and looked lovingly down into Lisbon's eyes. "In case we don't get out of it—we will, but just on the off chance, since it is Red John and there might not be time later—I want to tell you now how much you have meant to me. How much I have learned from you. And about you. How much I have... cared. How much I do care. And will always care."

Lorelei saw tears fighting to flood out of Lisbon's eyes as she tried to blink them back.

"Jane. . . ." she choked out.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't even have tried this now. We have to focus. I hope you will understand."

Lisbon blinked. What more was there to understand?

He pulled away. His hands were in his pockets, as if to restrain himself from reaching for her again.

He turned, hunching his shoulders a little, as if to contain his own pain. Fear, perhaps.

If Red John intended to seize the day, it was Jane he might actually seize.

And Lorelei understood that Jane had to know only too well what that would mean for him. The two women John might actually kill, if he had to or wanted to. Jane would probably not die, but he might reach a point of wishing that he had. Living god-knows-where, completely in John's power...She saw him shudder and observed his effort to control his fear.

He approached Hightower, putting his hands on her shoulders, then gathering her in, kissing her, not deeply, but sweetly, holding her with his hands around her body.

"And you, Madeleine. It's not the same, of course, but I have learned a great deal from you, too, and about you—especially tonight. But I haven't forgotten that you fought for me today. That you risked your life for me, and saved me."

He was hugging her, close, his arms around her, touching her.

Lisbon couldn't take it any more. She didn't have to take it. She took a step and pulled Hightower's shoulder away from him. "I don't bloody care—!"

Then things happened faster than Lisbon—or Lorelei—could follow. A handcuff snapped around Lisbon's wrist on Hightower's shoulder. The other end snapped around Hightower's wrist where she had reached up to hold Jane. And at almost the same moment there was another set of cuffs, one around the chain between them, and one that he moved with shocking speed and fastened to the post of a metal grate on a room divider.

And he was suddenly out of their reach before either of them, training and all, could move to respond.

Lisbon reached down with her other hand for her gun. Gone! And Hightower for hers. Gone.

Cell phone? Another twin efforts to reach phones. Gone. And their handcuffs keys. Gone.

He straightened up, squared his shoulders, and suddenly Lisbon saw the primordial male.

And past her rage and outrage at his betrayal, Lisbon's knees went weak. Lorelei saw the knees almost cave. And Lorelei did understand that. . . .

Lisbon would have seen him do many brave things, in spite of his often acknowledged fear.

And down to this, tonight.

"I'm going," Jane said. "Red John will come after me and leave you both safe."

"You will not go!" Hightower was furious. And terrified for him. "That's an order! On pain of what I threatened you with the first day. Lisbon. Gone. Never working with you again."

"But alive," Jane said sternly. "And you, too, Madeleine."

"He'll get you," Hightower added. "I saw your terror of him in that chair on the security film. You know what his getting you means."

"I do know. But it's not a foregone conclusion. I'm wily. And terrified. That lends wings to the feet.Or to some pickup I'll steal."

"You can't," Lisbon said urgently. "These are mountain men—or women—around here. Armed to the teeth, routinely. And all stirred up by the murders. Scared. With reason. They'll shoot you on the spot."

"Well, that's a fair warning. I'll think of something."

"Jane, please..." Lisbon clearly didn't care if it was begging.

He shook his head, regretfully, solidly. "It's not my idea, Lisbon. It's a locked-in imperative. I couldn't be there for Angela and my child. But I'm here now, and I cannot have another woman, or women, murdered because of me."

He jammed the laptop back into Lisbon's bag, apparently to block any camera on it that might still be working. But he did not smash it to cut off the audio. He would know there might still be some advantage for the women if Red John could still communicate with them.

Lorelei's screen went dark. She played the controls and found a dim pinhole video drilled through their cabin wall. It gave only a very narrow field of view, and flickered on and off, as if the signal were failing. Lorelei reached for her cell phone to call John, but stopped to squint at the dim flicker.

Jane put the women's two guns on the floor, out of their reach. And two handcuff keys, a little further. "You'll figure out how to reach these before long. So you can blow Red John's head off if he does try to come in, and you two won't be in danger. Your cell phones, a little later, to give me some lead time."

He put his finger to his lips to warn them not to say anything and went, silently, out of view, toward the the back wall, not announcing what he was doing. Maybe a window there?

"Son of a bitch!" Lisbon burst out. "You're lying! It's not just throwing yourself—"

Hightower broke in "—in front of the tiger! You're baiting the tiger—with yourself! Hunting the tiger! You don't just want to save us. You mean to kill Red John!"

"You notice that?" he said rather coldly, and moved back toward her, into view. Lisbon—and Lorelei—could see his fear, permeating him, chilling him, making his flesh crawl. What was out there was far worse than leopard.

"You can't go out there, Jane," Hightower warned. "Apart from all other dangers, he IS a serial killer. I've been up to my ears in his FBI profile for years—he's killed some women who arguably were not much loss, and some who apparently were, like your wife, as well as some men, and I still don't know what is his ultimate trigger. You may have thought you were safe, since he let you go. But you just may not have hit his ultimate trip wire. Yet. Not since you apparently triggered him toward damaging you through Angela and your daughter. This could do it, toward you, yourself."

He shrugged. "Or—I get him."

Hightower snapped. "Not bloody likely. He will come after you, and he will not be damn pleased that you are going out—and making Red John himself go out there in the mountain dark after you—where there be tygers—spelled cougars—not to mention bears—brown, black, and for all you or I know even grizzly. I suppose it doesn't even pay to mention wolf packs. Plus mountain men and women, after this day, armed to the teeth, wary. Not only would they shoot at you, say, if you tried to hotwire a pickup, but you can't even try to hunker down in an unoccupied cabin. Locals will be spooked, paranoid, and loaded for bear, and you'll look a lot like bear to them. They'll think you could be an unknown part of the murder plot. Why else would some dumb, citified dude in a peacoat, when it is mountain-parka cold, be wandering around these mountains in the dark?"

"And unoccupied cabins would show up on Red John's search," Lisbon added. "He'd be right behind you. In a rage. Hightower is right, this time. You could blow whatever restraint he has had about you all to hell. He is a serial. He could kill you. If not worse."

He winced, his eyes tight, but he tried to shake it off. "Worse is still not as bad as another woman, or two women I care about, dying because of me. And if he kills me, I won't be around to worry about it. But I will have had my shot at him. Don't bet against me."

"Don't bet against us," Lisbon pleaded. "You can stay here and make a stand, even if he does come, with two trained guns dedicated to your survival."

"At the risk of your lives," he said bleakly. "No. The adult of the species leads the cougar away from the downy chicks."

"Unchain us," Hightower said, between an order and plea. "We—'chicks' will agree not to stop you if you still want to go, but you won't leave us helpless."

"And you have a very nice bridge you will sell me," Jane said. "Seems like I heard something tonight about 'the hard way.' "

He was going. Not to risk another woman. Nor these women.

"Jane," Hightower said imperatively, "If you go out that door, I will run you to ground. And I will beat you like a rented mule! And I'll do it—the hard way."

"You'll try," he said, "If we are lucky."

"And I will beat you to within an inch of your life!" Lisbon concurred.

He smiled sadly at Lisbon. "You've threatened to beat me or to beat something out of me, often enough, with various graphic metaphors. Let's hope I get a chance to distract you out of it again."

Hightower threw in, "None of that will work with me. I am not Lisbon. I'll do it."

"Still a better alternative," he said, painfully.

He let the fear of the night and its dangers, and its nightstalker-in-chief, show in his face for a moment, then touched his fingers to his lips in the gesture of throwing them a kiss, and moved out of Lorelei's view.

Lorelei assumed that he opened the window, silently, and stepped through the back window.

It was a long moment before Lisbon felt with her other hand and found the slim holster on her ankle—empty.

He'd left them their main guns. For their safety. But he had Lisbon's backup gun.

Lisbon's face said: Thank God!

Hightower had followed Lisbon's discovery. And made a similar one of her own. So he had two backup guns. Hightower put a silencing finger to her lips, then said loudly:

"Patrick, I do warn you, don't go near that door. If Red John doesn't get you, I swear that I will."

Lisbon picked up the cue. "Right after me. Jane, stop giving me that smug look. I will beat you silly, this time, just for the first part of this night. Let alone for this stunt. What are you trying to see out that peephole in the door?"

"Red John could have a posse out front, Jane," Hightower added.

Meanwhile, they started working with the chains, the cuffs, the metal grate. Wordlessly. As silently as they could. And like maniacs. If they could do it soon enough, maybe while still maintaining the audio illusion of arguing with him, in case Red John no longer had video, or not much, they could go after him, with some shot at beating both bears and Red John to him.

They looked at each other grimly. He was not, after all, a mountain man. A babe in these woods.

But then, he was still Patrick Jane. . . . Scared. Vulnerable. But never count him out.

"Jane, please. . . ." Lisbon pleaded. "For—me!" She gave it a beat. "All right, don't answer then. You'll pay."

Well, you couldn't fault them for trying.

And the pinhole camera was flickering so badly that Lorelei could not see much. Then it went dead.

"Never mind, Lisbon," Hightower said. "He's playing with us, but showing some sense not to go out the door."

Lorelei called John's cell. He took a moment to answer, probably putting London on hold.

"Jane's gone!" Lorelei said. "Wanting to draw you away from the women, he said. But they understood that he also wants to lure you after him, to kill you. He's handcuffed the women to each other and to a post, leaving the keys just out of reach. He's out the back window, but they are pretending he's still there, and that he's planning to go out the front door. In case we just have audio, which is all we do have, now. The last pinhole camera just failed. But he's out the back window. He has their two backup guns. A peacoat. And no shirt. The women are worried about tygers—cougars, bears. Cold. Armed mountain men. And you."

She had moved quickly to the door of the bedroom as she talked, and opened it into John's face.

"Change of plan," John said into the London phone. "Later."

He hung it up without a further word. He picked up an emergency backpack from a shelf.

"Send the full video to my phone," he ordered, looking at something on the phone. Did he have some kind of tracking software that could work for this?

"Don't go!" Lorelei urged. "I know you are not sane about this, but Jane really does mean to kill you."

She pressed against him with her body, naked under the shirt, put her arms around his neck.

"That's what he means," he said grimly, in the voice she never wanted to hear. That voice.

He peeled her off, not forcefully, but not to be denied. He picked up a rifle, pushed his left arm into the knife sheath under the black jacket, checked the knife.

His face was set in granite. That face.

She got between him and the door, which she knew was a serious mistake. But essential.

"You are in that state," she said tightly. "You must not go. Even for his sake. We're not in Los Angeles, and if we were, they have a story every other week about a bear in someone's back yard, or a cougar attacking, even killing somebody, on a jog in a city park. Or a cougar eats 11 of a local farmer's alpacas. 'Civilization encroaching on the animals' habitat,' they call it. Now imagine that its not even civilization, but gold prospectors and these mountain people, plunked down in the heart of habitat, armed to the max, and spooked enough by murder to shoot Jane, even accidentally."

His rage was so deep that she could almost see his real face through the mask. Rage. And terror.

"Or shoots him on purpose," she pressed on. "And what if you go after Jane and it is his own damn fault that you are out in the freezing cold, and some cougar or bear, senses that he, more than anyone, does not belong there and is prey. What if you do have to fight a bear, or a cougar to save him—and you are damaged before you kill it? Or a bear knocks the gun out of your hand and you have to fight it with your knife. Gut level, you have to be churning with rage, that your Jane has had some nerve to go out there, knowing that you'll have to come after him, into the cold and dark, and no matter what else is out there hunting him—while he hunts you. And he knows that you know that he can't flimflam a mountain lion. Or do dances with wolves. He's probably tenderfoot enough to think that climbing a tree would save him from a mountain lion, not knowing that it climbs trees like a bandit. But Jane does know his Red John, and he's using himself and the peril to him out there as bait. He really does mean to kill you, John."

"Yes." It was still that voice. Worse than she had ever heard it. Deep anger.

"John, you mustn't let him make you do this. Stay here—even for his sake. He'll set a trap for you, if he can. Gun you down if he gets a chance. If the cougar doesn't get you first. Say that it almost does and you are hurt. Then he tries to shoot you with one or both of the hideout guns. His people think he hates guns too much to use them to kill. But he shot and killed Hardy. Say, since you are what you are, you make him miss or you take a shot to that bullet-resistant jacket, which is still like taking a mule kick, but you manage to keep going at him. And then you are so crazed and enraged that you punish him on the spot. "

Lorelei paused and took a deep breath. "Or worse. John, if you kill him in that rage, think how you will feel tomorrow. Please. Stay here. Let the agents get to him with the help of local police who know the territory."

He put his hands on her shoulders and they bruised her, not because he meant to harm her, but because the hands, and the rage, had a life of their own.

He moved her aside, not gently, but not intending damage, out of his path to the door.

"Point taken," he said. Still that voice, but perhaps he was more aware of it now. "But no. No agents. No law. Just—what he asked for."

"What are you going to do?" Lorelei asked urgently. He moved unhurriedly, but with the tiger-stride quickness to the door of the garage.

"Find him." He went out the door.

Lorelei heard the truck motor fire up and fade in the distance.

Author's Note: Shall I continue?

What ideas or comments does this inventive readership have?

If some would like to deal themselves a hand and write a chunk, that would interest me. Or. . . .?

I appreciate all the reviews and comments on The Choice, and the PMs back and forth that they generated were not only illuminating, but also generated new friendships.

LouiseKurylo was an astonishment, though perhaps she should not have been a surprise. Her PMs further showed the soul and heart always embodied in her fiction, which I have followed with great pleasure. I had long considered her, at the least, one of the top ten writers in all of fanfiction. And one of her stories, several of which I re-read often—is in the top tier of all time. Everything that I know about her from the PMs is impressive, illuminates her fiction further, and shows a unique depth of character. She is unexpectedness, embodied. And benevolence. She is a Renaissance woman. And I know yet more depths are to come. . . .

Clairebare was full of surprises, as always. Including in her welcome review—("Where did you come from?" . . .'3d characters. . ." Etc. ) The dedication of The Choice to her was long in the making, and a major part of the reason was that many of her stories spring a surprise—like a trap. And another massive reason was, hopefully, to tempt her, in her words in her review of The Choice, to do "More, please." If her fans have to wait much longer for more of her stories, I fear that the mass longing from them may prompt the universe to find a way to sic Red John on her. Not, of course, McAllister, wherever—or whoever—he may be. But the real Red John. (That is, of course, in my view, the one in the stories in my head—or on the pages of The Choice.)

FiascoWay not only made penetrating comments in his review, but, in PMs he added valuable and thought-provoking analyses, answered questions, and showed the importance of a rare-in-fan-fiction male perspective. I am very appreciative of his levels of thinking. I have enjoyed his stories very much. He is most interesting.

Thorntons comments were most welcome. I always look for her stories, especially now, Reality Bytes.

I look forward to more reviews, comments, and encounters with the unique people who value TM fiction.

Note: For some unknown (to me!) reason, perhaps pertaining to a conspiracy theory I have about computers, (or they have about me,) I found that they viewed my efforts to post some reviews of recent stories as a challenge to drive me crazy. Nasty things happened during my attempts.

I seem to have had many odd experiences with recalcitrant computers. (Sometimes, I hope, it can also have been the fault of a site. Wishful thinking, I know.) A dear friend was recently watching Star Trek. She said that I do to computers what Kirk did to some of his machine antagonists, such as Nomad: He drives them crazy. In that context, perhaps here's another example relevant to some wonderful writers whom I have tried to review. Perhaps someone out there can help.

I had not posted reviews of stories that had moved me in several ways because I'd thought it was unseemly to do so when I had not contributed any stories of my own, for various reasons. (I have played, in exact detail, with quite a few TM stories in my head.)

I have, over time, jotted down notes on certain authors and particular stories, thinking that at some time, I might actually post them as reviews. Recently, I have written reviews of some new stories. These include LouiseKurylo's new sequel to her The Long Way Home, and stories by FiascoWay, and Reality Bytes by Thorntons, among others. I wrote these all in one place, figuring that I could separate them and post them as reviews all at once. You understand that this strategy makes it more difficult, I reasoned, for the current computer to screw anything up. I kept this in the general direction of my previous notes. I now cannot find those pages. (I lately did a 'Save As' on a different, simple document. It never showed up on 'Recent Documents.' A search of the whole computer turned up a similar title—which would not open. At all.)

I have tried all I know to do to find the document with notes and reviews, to recover them. And to hold back my hand from destroying this computer.

Yes, I know. You will be thinking that it might not have been the computer's fault.

Please don't tell it that.

I'll take on Nomad, anytime.