Page 156 of Gone Before Goodbye

“No,” Nadia says. “I thought I saved him.”

That slows him down. He keeps the gun up. “Explain,” he says.

“On our way to the TriPoint camp, these young militants—the Child Army… Trace had hired them. To kill Marc. I didn’t know until they grabbed us. I’m the one who convinced them not to go through with it. Trace and I talked after that. He promised me he would find another way.”

“If that’s true—”

“It is.”

“Then Trace lied to you.”

Nadia takes a moment and then says, “In the end, Trace saw the situation for what it was.”

“What was it?”

“Either him or Marc. Marc was going to tell. It would have beenbad for him and Maggie—but for Trace, it would have been the end. He was the one who harvested organs. He’d spend the rest of his life in prison. He tried to make Marc see that. He tried to make Marc see that what they were doing was actually good—it could change the world. Their work saved lives. They were on the cusp of making organ donation simpler and safer and more readily available. How, Trace kept asking himself, did Marc not see that? And still—still—I think Trace would have done the right thing. But then the massacre happened at TriPoint, and Trace went back. He said he wanted to save his friend. He said that an experience like this may make Marc see the light. So I didn’t know. Not for sure. It wasn’t premeditated. It was, I don’t know, a crime of opportunity.”

Nadia looks at Maggie.

“Doesn’t make my husband less dead,” Maggie says to her.

Nadia has nothing to say to that. No one does. For a while, they just stand there. No one talks. No one moves. Maggie turns away from them and stares out over the vineyard. The sun dips lower, bruising the sky a spiraling purple and orange. She finally has the answers. The truth will set you free, they say, but right now it feels as though it will forever hold Maggie captive. She hears Porkchop calling her name, but even he feels far away, unable to reach her. She doesn’t want to hear. She doesn’t want to reply. She doesn’t want to think or process or assess or consider the repercussions.

Not right now.

Right now, she just wants to stare at the spiraling purple and orange and wish the world away.

EPILOGUE

Three days after Maggie gets back to Baltimore, she calls Vipers and asks to speak to Porkchop. She hasn’t seen him since that last day in the vineyard.

The woman who answers the payphone says he’s unreachable.

“Tell him it’s Maggie.”

“Porkchop is off the grid.”

“So you don’t know where he is?”

“No one does.”

“Suppose I really needed him.”

“He’s off the grid,” she says, “but we can put him back on it if there’s an emergency.” Then she adds in a kinder voice: “Give him time, Maggie.”

A week goes by. She calls Vipers again. The woman tells her the same thing. Another week passes. Same thing.

No sign of Porkchop.

Three weeks after that last day in France, Pinky answers the payphone when she calls.

“Porkchop is still incommunicado.”

“Tell him I know,” Maggie says. “Tell him I know, and I don’t care.”

There is a long pause on the other end of the line. Then Pinky says, “You think you know. But you don’t.”

Then he hangs up.