Free Where the River Ends by Charles Martin Page A

that.”
    “Can’t or won’t?” See what I mean?
    A pause. “Won’t.”
    “Son…” He laughed uncomfortably. Senator Coleman did not like
not
being in control. Now that he’d been appointed chairman of the Finance Committee, he liked it even less. “At the wiggle of my finger, every law enforcement officer in the states of Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina will be looking for my daughter. And don’t think for one second that I won’t call out the National Guard.”
    “She mentioned that.”
    “You doubt my resolve, son?”
    “Sir, I don’t doubt your love for your daughter, if that’s what you’re asking. But…this is something I’ve got to do.”
    “Son, you’re deranged. You’ll bring her back here right—”
    “Sir, there’s a part of me that would really like to do that, but…with all due respect, you don’t know—”
    He was screaming now. “Don’t tell me what I don’t know!”
    While his public persona was all poise, polish, cuff links and Hermès ties, his backroom manners were more brass knuckles, Dickies and Carhartt. When he lost his temper, spit collected in the corners of his mouth, spewing like venom the louder he spoke. “You can’t run far enough. Hide and I’ll find you…I’ll have you buried beneath the jail.”
    I guess you picked up on the fact that our relationship had not been smooth sailing. Despite his disdain for me, I’d always admired him. Even voted for him. He’d come from little and done much. And while getting elected is one thing, staying elected is another. He’d managed to do both. From the governor’s mansion to now his fourth term as senator, he’d never lost an election. His tentacles stretched far and wide in Washington. A blessing and a curse—because what they say about power is true. I think in his other life, that one that included the good-old-boy farmer from South Carolina with the piece of hay sticking out his mouth, we’d have gotten along pretty well.
    I swallowed and stared out across the water and at Abbie’s pale frame tucked beneath the tarp. Senator Coleman detested the thought of dying for one simple reason. It was beyond his control. Others’ deaths reminded him of this. The fact that his daughter showed no signs of fearing it might have been his singular weakness. It had always struck me as odd that someone so powerful, so accomplished, could be so easily derailed by something that no human, save one, had ever beaten. Because of this, we’d not seen much of him the last few years. Notice I said we hadn’t seen much of him, not that he wasn’t much help. He was. It’s complicated. He got us into places we’d have never gotten in alone and on more than one occasion bumped us to the front of the line. If we didn’t fly first class, he sent a jet. He helped from a distance because being too close hurt too much. Except once. That’s how I knew he loved her. She knew this too, but that did little to make it any easier.
    I needed to hang up before he traced the call with some NASA satellite. As a ranking member and chairman of several committees, the least of which was Armed Services, they were probably triangulating me now. “Sir, I’m sorry. I’m real sorry for a lot of things, but I”—I spoke softly—“this is for Abbie.”
    “She should be here. With us.”
    “With all due respect, sir. You’ve had four years. You couldn’t have asked for a much more captive audience. If you wanted to be with her, you could have.”
    “Just what is that supposed to mean?” His anger was palpable. He was not used to, nor did he tolerate, discussion that was not geared toward total agreement. I had never fallen in line with this so our conversations had been short and usually started and ended by him. It has its roots in the moment I asked him if I could marry his daughter. Also another short conversation.
    “Sir, I don’t expect you to understand.”
    He was screaming now. “You’re delusional…a dreamer who