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from deep out in the lake. They were cruising at a slow speed, lights still out. The moon was partially covered by some thin clouds.
    Marco studied her a moment. “That isn’t my problem. He wasn’t coming after me, per se. He was after you, and I got in the way. I’ll settle with him for that.”
    “How did you handle it in Mexico?”
    “You don’t give up.” He shook his head, then said, “I had plenty of contacts. I took a leave. Slipped into Mexico. Part of my family is down there. I got some help, tracked the killers, settled the issue. The troubles I got into later weren’t directly connected to that. I can tell you that I spent some very bad months in a prison near Mexico City. I wouldn’t have survived if a relative hadn’t made contact with friends in the prison. I got protection from a powerful clique. Then, well, I got out.”
    “That the part you can’t talk about.”
    “Yes.”
    “Okay,” she said. “I’m good with getting the shooter. I’ll deal with the other part once I find out who he’s connected to, or if he’s on his own.”
    They pulled into the boathouse and were just starting to talk about going up to Markleeville, getting a room, and then seeing Gatts in the morning, when she fell—her leg buckled getting out, and she missed her step. She went down against the side of the boat and the ladder. Had he not grabbed her, she would have gone into the water. He helped her to her feet.
    “Muscles cramped up,” Sydney said. She massaged her leg and headed up to the house slowly, with Marco’s hand on her arm for support.
    “Hey,” he said, “you need to rest everything for a while.”
    When she realized she wasn’t really doing as well as she had thought, that the pain meds had fooled her a little, she acceded to the necessity of settling down, maybe getting a little sleep.
    “I want to go with you to see Gatts,” she said. “Let me get some rest for a couple hours.”
    He did a perimeter check, then, in the dark, they ate peanut butter sandwiches with blueberry spread and drank some milk with it, thanks to what he’d taken from the doc.
    She grew very tired around midnight and took the guest room on the main floor. He chose a recliner in the living room. It gave him the best surveillance of the grounds and the house.
    ***
    Marco was up every hour checking the grounds, worried that more people knew about her relationship with the Shaws than her doctor friend. For a time, he sat out on the deck and stared at the darkness of the lake, trying to get a clear understanding of the mess he was in and where it might go.
    He could go up and try and find Gatts without her, but he didn’t much like the idea of leaving her in the condition she was in. Plus, if she found him gone, what would she do? Then there was the issue of whether he would take the Shaws’ vehicle. He didn’t want to drive his around. Adding to it all was the problem of his uncle—if Marco couldn’t respond positively, and soon, what would he do? Questions and no immediate answers.
    We’ve got to talk to Gatts, he thought, getting up. He went into the bedroom to see how Sydney was doing, and she was in a deep sleep. Marco frowned. It was almost midnight. He went back outside to check the perimeter again. He started wondering if her fall had been faked.
    But then he thought that was a stretch. She could have really hurt herself, hit her head, and that would have pretty much put her out of business. He knew she wouldn’t have risked it.

15
    That Sunday night, four hundred sixty miles southeast of Tahoe in a penthouse suite at the Desert Towers high above the Vegas Strip, Ogden Thorp ignored his lawyer, who was at the back of the room trying to get his attention.
    Thorp was busy displaying his investment dream to a small gathering of wealthy investors, some of the richest and most powerful men in gaming and hotels. Two of them were CEOs of Silicon Valley tech behemoths. Also in the mix was a Chinese billionaire who