Page 105 of Jack
“Oh yeah. Redhead. Hot.”
“Yeah, and I was broke after our first date. We went to the state fair.”
Stein laughed. “That’s what happens when you’re captain of everything. You had the ladies snowed.”
“Hey—is it my fault that Dad paid us minimum wage?”
“What are you talking about? You got use of the boat and his truck, and I know you got out of at least two speeding tickets.”
“One. The other ticket was for making out with Clarissa Fairmont.”
Stein grinned. “She was a year older than you.”
“I know.” Jack laughed. “That relationship lasted one date too. I was so mortified about being found out that I drove her home and never called her again.”
“You let your mistakes have too much power over you.” He shook his head.
But the words found Jack, burrowed in.
He glanced at Stein as they left Duck Lake and headed south for the gated community. “I thought you said that maybe my mistakes can be God’s plan.”
Stein lifted a shoulder. “Sure. But only if they don’t turn into a bullet that sits inside you, infecting your insides.”
A gate cordoned off the entrance to Eagle Lake as if it were a high-security compound. Never mind that the fencing ended at the forest, some fifty yards on either side of the stone pillars and wrought-iron gate.
A coded box sat at the entrance, which meant . . .
“We need an inside man,” Stein said. “Keep driving and drop me off.”
“Are you going to do some super sneaky SEAL stuff?”
“Something like that.” He winked. “Circle back around and wait down the street until you get my text.”
“Please don’t break any laws.”
Stein grinned, slid out, and disappeared into the woods.
Jack kept moving, parking down the road on a semi-cleared forested road. From here, the stately houses that lined Eagle River rose, many of them made of brick, all of them with three-car garages, basketball courts, and theater rooms, and there was a pavilion in the center of the neighborhood for picnics.
A bedroom community for the wealthy who worked in Minneapolis. Or now, remotely.
Ten minutes.C’mon, Stein, don’t do something stupid?—
Jack’s phone buzzed and he picked it up.
Stein
Now. Hurry.
Jack pulled out and spotted the gate opening as he drew near. He rolled through, kept going, and then spied Steinbeck emerging from the booth. He slowed, and Stein slid into the passenger seat.
“Go, go.”
He hit the gas—not hard, but enough to keep them winding into the community. Maybe thirty homes, but he lost himself in one of the streets, per Stein’s direction.
“How did you do that?”
“These places have no security, although they promise it. I walked up from the inside and told the attendant that I was a resident and I saw a couple kids setting a fire down at the pavilion.”