Page 87 of Gone Before Goodbye

“Very much so.”

“How?”

Charles shakes off her question. “The point is, Marc wanted out. So did Trace. They asked for a face-to-face with Ragoravich. Oleg loved doctors. He thought they could help him. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that he chose to sink his fangs into WorldCures of all charities. From day one, he saw the potential for more than just cleaning his money.”

“Potential how?”

Once again, Lockwood shakes off her question.

“Stop doing that,” Maggie says.

“Sorry, but you have to let me tell it my way, okay?”

She gives him a reluctant suit-yourself-continue gesture with both hands.

“So Marc and Trace are flown in to Ragoravich’s palace. They tell Oleg that they’re grateful and appreciative, but they plan on leaving WorldCures Alliance, and they wanted Oleg to be the first to know. Ragoravich shakes their hands and thanks them for their time. Then they got back on the helicopter with some other visitor. An overweight bald man. That’s how they described him. We still don’t know who he was. They flew the helicopter over an abandoned iron ore or salt mine, something like that, and Oleg’s men threw the bald guy out. Just like that. No warning. Not a word said. Right in front of Marc and Trace.”

Maggie looks at him in pure horror.

“Then they grabbed Trace. Like they were going to do the same to him. They dangled him upside down outside the copter for five minutes, holding on to him by one ankle.”

“My God.”

Charles nods. “Anyway, message received. There was no leaving WorldCures. They were in too deep. Trace, I think he surrendered to that fate. But you know your husband. He was a problem solver. He kept looking for a way.”

She nods to herself at that. Marc believed that he could indeed find a solution to every problem. There was no quit in her husband, just a road not yet taken.

“That,” Charles says, “is where I come in.”

“Marc became your, what, informant?”

“Something like that, yeah. He put out feelers. Quietly. I came to him. I told him the only way out was for him to help us take down Ragoravich.”

“Did he agree?”

Lockwood says nothing.

“Did he agree, Charles?”

“Yes.”

Maggie feels the tears come to her eyes. “You said Trace is missing.”

“Yes.”

“And you also said he may be looking for Marc.”

Charles shakes his head. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

“But you did.”

“Yes.” Charles lets loose a long breath. “There are three theories about your husband’s death. Would you like to hear them in order of believability?”

She wouldn’t. But she still gives a small nod. She knows where he’s going to go with this. She needs to hear him say it out loud.

“Theory One: Marc got caught up in the violence of a volatile region. That’s the most accepted theory, of course. It’s also, for the record, the one I most believe. It’s backed up by evidence and logic.”

“What’s Theory Two?”