The Old Man(35)

“I’m not going,” she said.

“I told you I’d set you free. This is a perfectly good place.”

“I’m sure it is. I told you I could see how clever you are. But I’ve thought this through again since you woke me up in the middle of the night. At that moment I thought you were completely different from the man I knew. But you’re the same.”

“I don’t want you to go with me, Zoe.”

“When you did all this to get me a new identity, you must have expected me to run away with you, right? You must have at least hoped I would.”

“This isn’t a productive conversation. We’re wasting time.”

“Then let’s get going. I’ll drive if you’re tired.”

“Zoe, this isn’t something you want to get in on. You picked right the first time. When I got you those papers and cards I didn’t know this was going to happen. I thought I’d lost the hunters again, probably for good. The forgeries were just a precaution, and if all went well, we’d never need them.” He paused. “It’s stupid to even talk about this.”

“Probably,” she said. “Let’s go. Do you not want me to drive your new car, or what?”

“A week from now I’m more likely to be dead than alive. If you’re with me, so are you. A hostage is never more likely to die than when the authorities are trying to rescue her. This is your way out.”

“I don’t want a way out. I want to go with you. I’ll be anyone you want, and I’ll do anything you say, without question. You can even change the terms, and I won’t complain. Just take me along.”

“Zoe—”

“Sorry. I don’t know her. I’m Marcia Dixon. I’m on a road trip with my husband, What’s-His-Name Dixon.”

“Henry.”

“Henry? Really?”

“Yes.”

“It’s a respectable name, I guess. So who’s driving?”

“Please think about this, Zoe.”

“I’ve thought of nothing else all morning. I’m thinking we have a long drive ahead of us. I know that if you want to get rid of me you can hurt me, throw me out on the pavement, and drive off. If you kill me they couldn’t punish you worse than they will already.”

“I can’t waste any more time right now.” He reached across her, pushed open her door, and waited.

“Look, I know that you stayed with me for your own practical reasons. You needed a hiding place, and a woman made it look real and settled and normal—not like a hideout, but like a life. I get it. At first you liked the place, and then you liked the sex, and I wasn’t demanding or bitchy or anything, so you stayed, maybe longer than you should have. But I had reasons of my own, and maybe they were mostly selfish too. But over time, something changed for me. It changed for you too. Otherwise you wouldn’t have taken extra risks to make sure I could go with you.”

“You’re right. I did use you. So get out.”

“I know being anywhere near you is a huge risk. But I’d rather take that risk than go back to have the life I would have if I let you drive away without me now. It would be giving up life to give myself a longer time to exist. I would always remember what I gave up. You used me, and I used you too. So keep on using me. I love you, and I can be really useful, and I will be.” She reached for the door handle and shut the door.

He sighed in frustration, put the car in gear, and drove. When they reached the junction with Interstate 72, they swung onto it and headed east. After another hour he left the interstate and kept going, taking the back roads, the long, straight highways that had been replaced by interstates but still carried local traffic.

When they reached the first small, pretty town that had a large park, they stopped to feed the dogs and give them a walk. At another town he sent Marcia Dixon into a small store to buy bottled water, bags of nuts, a box of protein bars, a bag of fruit, and more dog food.

Henry Dixon watched her through the front window. He was aware that a woman in her position might have decided to come along solely to get her kidnapper caught. Right now she could easily be telling the store clerk to call the local police. The television news people would call her a plucky little heroine, and she would be invited on morning talk shows. Maybe they would show footage of her in the foreground with the commander of the SWAT team, and on the pavement in the background there would be a body covered with a sheet. This was the test. Either she was telling him the truth or she wasn’t. He wasn’t sure now why he was so confident that she wouldn’t betray him.

He watched her return to the car carrying the bags of supplies. As she approached, he popped open the trunk and took his time putting the bags inside and moving snacks and dog treats and bottled water to the front seat where they could reach them. Then he let the dogs out to urinate again. As he watched them, he kept listening for the whine of distant police sirens.

She said, “I thought we were in more of a hurry than this. Am I wrong?”

He opened the back door and let the dogs onto the backseat. He stood still for another moment, but he still heard nothing. “No, you’re right,” he said, got into the car, and drove.

After a few minutes of staring into the rearview mirror to reassure himself that there were no cars following, he took out one of his prepaid cell phones and held it out to her. “Call your daughter.”