He had faced highway pileups.
Bar fights decades earlier.
Club funerals.
Bankruptcy.
His father’s death.
His mother’s.
Nothing made him as nervous as that hospital door.
Lily sat in a wheelchair temporarily because walking long distances exhausted her.
She looked at Grant.
“Go.”
He smiled faintly.
“You giving orders now?”
“Yes.”
“Dangerous.”
Ava opened the door.
Hannah Bennett lay in the hospital bed.
Forty-one.
Pale.
Dark hair pulled loosely behind her head.
Oxygen tubing beneath her nose.
Monitors attached across her chest.
She looked at Grant.
And immediately started crying.
“You came.”
Grant stood still.
“Hannah?”
She nodded.
“I’m sorry.”
He glanced toward Lily.
“For what?”
“For sending her.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“I tried.”
Grant frowned.
“When?”
“Years ago.”
He stepped closer.
“What do you know about Michael?”
Hannah looked toward the door.
“Lily okay?”
“Yes.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“She crossed the road?”
Grant’s chest tightened.
“She found me before she crossed.”
Hannah closed her eyes.
“Thank God.”
Grant pulled a chair beside the bed.
“What happened this morning?”
“I knew something was wrong with my heart.”
“You sent your eight-year-old out alone?”
Hannah’s eyes filled.
“No.”
“I called Mrs. Ellis.”
“She was supposed to come.”
“I didn’t know she had fallen.”
Grant nodded.
“Ava told me.”
“I started getting dizzy.”
“I was scared I’d lose consciousness.”
Hannah looked toward him.
“I put the note in Lily’s brace because I knew she wouldn’t lose it there.”
Grant understood.
A backpack could be forgotten.
A pocket emptied.
Her brace stayed with her.
“Why my name?”
Hannah stared.
“Because Michael told me if anything ever happened to both of us, find Bear.”
Grant looked away.
His brother had trusted him.
After years of silence.
Despite the fight.
The realization hurt.
Grant asked:
“Where is Michael?”
Hannah's expression changed.
“I don’t know.”
Grant’s jaw tightened.
“The note says he’s not where they said.”
“I know where he might be.”
“Then start there.”
Hannah took a breath.
“Six years ago, Michael took a contract job in New Mexico.”
“What kind?”
“Industrial repair.”
“He said it would be three days.”
Grant nodded.
“That matches what investigators told me.”
“He called me the second night.”
Grant leaned forward.
Hannah continued.
“He sounded scared.”
“Michael didn’t scare easily.”
“I know.”
“What did he say?”
“He said someone had made a mistake.”
“What mistake?”
“He didn’t explain.”
“He asked me to pack a bag for Lily.”
Grant’s face hardened.
“Why?”
“He said he might need us to leave town.”
“Then?”
“The phone disconnected.”
Hannah waited.
“Next morning they found the truck.”
Grant remembered.
Burned almost beyond recognition near an abandoned mining access road.
Hannah continued.
“They told me Michael was inside.”
“You didn’t believe them?”
“Not after the second call.”
Grant became still.
“What second call?”
Hannah looked at him.
“Three days after the truck was found.”
Grant stared.
“Michael called you?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
“A man.”
“What man?”
“He wouldn’t give his name.”
“What did he say?”
Hannah's voice became quieter.
“Michael survived.”
Grant’s heart slammed against his chest.
“What?”
“He said Michael was badly injured.”
“Where?”
“He refused to tell me.”
“Why?”
“He said people were watching.”
Grant stood.
Anger replaced shock.
“You had a call saying my brother was alive and you never told me?”
“I tried.”
“When?”
“Grant—”
“When?”
Hannah looked at him.
“I called the number I had.”
“That number was disconnected after I moved.”
“I sent a letter to your old shop.”
Grant remembered the old Phoenix address.
He had closed the business abruptly after his partner died.
Mail forwarding expired.
“How long after?”
“Two months.”
Grant sat again.
The anger disappeared into something worse.
Bad timing.
Missed routes.
Dead numbers.
A letter lost between buildings.
Hannah continued.
“The caller contacted me three times.”
“What did he want?”
“Nothing.”
“He kept saying Michael was alive but couldn’t come home yet.”
“Did you believe him?”
“I didn’t know.”
“Police?”
“I told them.”
Grant blinked.
“What did they say?”
“They thought it was a scam.”
“Did the caller ask for money?”
“No.”
“Personal information?”
“No.”
“Then why scam you?”
“That’s what I said.”
Grant leaned forward.
“When was the last call?”
“Five years ago.”
“What happened?”
“He said Michael had been transferred.”
“To where?”
“He gave me one word.”
Grant waited.
“Redstone.”
“Hospital?”
“I didn’t know.”
“Town?”
“I searched every Redstone I could find.”
“Nothing.”
Hannah pointed weakly toward the bedside drawer.
“My bag.”
Grant opened it.
Inside was an envelope.
Old.
Folded.
Hannah said:
“Take it.”
Inside were handwritten notes.
Dates.
Call times.
Partial phone numbers.
Phrases.
Michael’s contract company.
Names of investigators.
One line underlined repeatedly:
REDSTONE / CEDAR / 47
Grant stared.
“What is cedar forty-seven?”
“I never knew.”
Grant looked at her.
“Why now?”
Hannah began crying again.
“Because three weeks ago I got a photograph.”
His skin prickled.
She nodded toward the envelope.
Another photograph.
Grant removed it.
A group of men outside what appeared to be a rehabilitation center.
Nothing remarkable.
Then he saw the man in the rear.
Thin.
Beard.
Older.
Standing with a cane.
Grant’s fingers tightened.
Michael.
Maybe.
The photograph was blurry.
But Grant knew the way his brother tilted his head when looking toward a camera.
Same left shoulder slightly higher.
Same half smile.
“Where?”
“The envelope had no return address.”
“Any writing?”
Hannah nodded.