She visibly shuddered at his flippant remark. “Do you know why they’re trying to kill you? Is it connected to what happened to Jenny?”

“I don’t know, honestly. It could be connected to something totally unrelated. Old enemies,” he added.

“Please be careful.”

“I always am, Alex. It’s why I’m still here.”

Devine watched her walk inside, then started back down the drive. But as he was doing so he noted for the first time that the drive also had a branch off to the right, heading toward some of the other buildings he had seen on his first night here. He hung a quick right and drove off.

The first three buildings he reached were abandoned or falling down, and otherwise uninhabitable. The fourth one was not.

He parked in front and looked back at the main house. It was not visible from here because the trees and large bushes neatly blocked this building from both the house’s view and from the coast road.

He got out and approached the door. The walls were stone while the door was wood. It was locked. The windows were blacked out and seemed to be painted shut. He tried his lock gun, but the lock was superior to his skill and equipment. He walked around the building and quickly found that was the only door.

He studied the path to the building’s entrance. Well-worn, so well used. And recently. He stood at the window and took a quick inhale. He had done this in the Middle East. Munitions and explosives all had distinct odors. He wasn’t smelling anything like that. Yet there was some scent in there that he couldn’t readily identify. And there was also a humming. Was it insects, bees? Was there infestation in there?

He waited, listened. No, it was too consistent, same sounds, same rhythm.

Mechanical, not natural, he concluded.

He took out his phone and Googled something. It took a few minutes of searching before he found what he was looking for.

Closest place was twenty miles from here.

He jumped into the truck and sped off.

Nearly two hours later Devine was back with what he needed. He returned to Jocelyn Point but stopped short of the entry driveway.

He made the rest of the trip on foot as darkening clouds gathered above him.

He slipped in and out of tree lines, and waited behind bushes to make sure there was no one about. It felt like he was back in the Afghan mountains hunting the Taliban and its iterations, all while they hunted him.

He reached the building, found a good spot, and set up what he had purchased.

The surveillance camera was motion operated so it wouldn’t be on continuous feed and was capable of being synced with his phone, which would alert him if there was any activity. He performed all the necessary tasks, including securing the tiny camera to the trunk of a tree with a direct sight line to the door.

Now he just had to wait for his trap to be sprung. But while he was waiting for that he had things to do. He drove off.

However, he was just about to run into an obstacle.

Chapter 61

Harper and Fuss passed him going the other way in their patrol car.

The cruiser whipped around, the roof lights cranked on, and the siren ruptured an otherwise quiet day in Putnam, Maine.

An exasperated Devine slammed a fist against the dashboard and barked, “I don’t have time for this shit!”

He steered the truck over to the shoulder, cut the engine, and waited for them to pull in behind. He didn’t get out. Devine decided to let them come to him.

And they did.

“Step out of the truck, Devine,” said Harper, his hand once more on the head of his baton.

Devine poked his head outside the truck window. “Are you arresting me... again? What was wrong with the first time?”

“Out, now!”

Devine climbed out just as it began to rain.

“Come back to the cruiser and get in,” ordered Harper. “Before we all catch pneumonia.”

Devine sat in the back seat, with Harper next to him. Fuss leaned over the front seat to face them.

“What’s up?” Devine asked.

“What’s up is why do you think it’s your job to go around riling people up?”

“Not sure what you’re talking about.”

“Then let me give you an example. You basically accused Françoise Guillaume of dereliction of duty if not outright conspiracy.”

“I never said that and—”

“And I heard that Alex Silkwell nearly killed herself because you were throwing around wild accusations about her sister and the attack on Alex all those years ago.”

“Who the hell told you about—”

Harper continued to talk right over him. “And you’ve pretty much convinced Mildred that Earl Palmer was murdered when there is no evidence, nada, of that being the case.”

Devine flicked his phone screen and tapped an icon. Then he held up the phone. On it was the picture he’d taken of the noose. “Eight coils plus a round turn and two half hitches.”

“What?”

“The noose. Eight coils. And then it was secured to the rafter with a round turn and two half hitches. It’s typically used to secure a rope to a stationary object.”

“So? Earl was a lobsterman. He probably knew every damn knot there was.”