The Kept Woman

NINE

Will pressed his phone tight against his ear. He heard Angie’s voice echo in his head.

It’s me, baby. Did you miss me?

Was this the Xanax? Will looked at his phone. CALLER ID BLOCKED. He sat up. He looked around the chapel like Angie might be there. Watching him. Laughing at him. He felt his mouth moving. He didn’t hear any words coming out.

‘Will?’ Her teasing tone was gone. ‘You okay, baby? Take a breath.’

Take a breath.

Sara had said the same thing to him downstairs. Except this time, he wasn’t having a panic attack. He was filled with a blinding, uncontrollable rage. ‘You fucking bitch.’

She laughed. ‘That’s more like it.’

Rippy’s club. Angie’s purse. Her gun. Her car. Her blood. And now the body in the funeral home with her wedding ring.

She had set him up. She had gotten herself into trouble, and whatever way she’d managed to claw her way out had presented an opportunity for her to fuck with his head.

He said it again. ‘You fucking bitch.’

She laughed at him again.

Will would’ve punched her in the throat if she were standing in front of him. He would find her. He would do whatever it took to track her down and strangle the life out of her worthless body.

The chapel door opened. Faith walked in.

Will took in gulps of air, trying to swallow down his fury. His outrage. His resentment.

Faith opened her mouth to ask him what was wrong.

He motioned for her to be quiet, saying into the phone, ‘Angie, why did you do this to me?’

Faith’s jaw dropped. She froze in place.

‘Why?’ Will demanded. ‘You faked that scene at Rippy’s club. You made me think you were dead. You made me think it was your body in the basement. Why?’

Angie was silent, though she’d had an entire day to contemplate her answer.

‘Angie-’ Will’s voice cracked. He felt raw, desperate to hear an explanation. ‘Tell me, God dammit. Why did you put me through this? Why?’

Angie drew out a long, exasperated sigh. ‘Why do I do anything?’ She rattled off some familiar answers. ‘I’m a fucking bitch. I want to ruin your life. I make you miserable. I don’t know what you look like when you’re in love because you’ve never been in love with me.’

Will turned away from Faith, afraid to show her how much he could hate somebody. ‘That’s not good enough.’

‘It’ll have to do for now.’

He couldn’t handle this. He was going to crack, end up dead on the floor, if he let himself feel all the things that were boiling up inside of him. He tried to think like an agent, not a human being who had just been skull-fucked by a psychopath. ‘Whose body is in the basement?’

‘Not yet,’ Angie said. ‘First tell me what it felt like when you thought I was dead.’

Will forced his fingers not to crush the phone. ‘What do you think it felt like?’

‘I want you to tell me.’ She waited for him to speak. ‘Tell me how you felt, and I’ll tell you who’s in the basement.’

‘I can find out myself,’ he said. ‘We’re running her prints right now.’

‘Too bad her finger pads are cracked open.’

‘We can get DNA.’

‘She won’t be in the system.’ Angie said, ‘You’ve been working this case. Other cases, too. What if I told you I could break everything wide open right now, only all you have to do is tell me how you feel?’

‘I don’t want your help.’

‘Sure you do. Remember how I helped you the last time? I know you were grateful then.’

Will couldn’t have that conversation in front of Faith. ‘Did you kill Dale Harding?’

‘Why would I confess to murder now?’

Will felt exhaustion pulling at him like a sickness. ‘Now, as in not like the other times?’

‘Careful, baby.’

He covered his face with his hand. This wasn’t happening. She had hurt other people like this, but never him. He couldn’t stop asking, ‘Why? Why did you do this?’

‘I wanted you to know what it would feel like to really lose me.’ She was silent for a few beats. ‘I saw you today. Don’t ask me where. The look on your face when you thought I was really dead. I bet you wouldn’t miss Sara that way.’

‘Don’t say her name.’

‘Sara,’ Angie repeated, because she would not be told what to do. ‘I saw you, Will. I know that look. I saw it when you were a kid. I saw it last year. I know who you are. I know you better than anybody else on earth.’

The letter. She was quoting from her own letter. ‘Who’s in the basement?’

‘Does it matter?’

Will didn’t know what mattered. Nothing mattered. Why had she done this to him? He had only ever loved her. Taken care of her. Made sure she was safe. She had never done that for him. Not now. Not ever.

She asked, ‘Has Faith managed to get a ping on me yet?’

Will turned around. Faith was on her phone, probably requesting a trace.

‘Josephine Figaroa,’ Angie said.

‘What?’

‘The girl in the basement. Josephine Figaroa. My daughter. Your daughter. Our child, together.’ She paused. ‘Dead.’

Will felt his mouth open. His heart was shaking so hard that he had to sit down. A child. Their child. Their baby. ‘Angie,’ he said. ‘Angie.’

There was no response. She’d ended the call.

He put his hand to his mouth. His breath was cold against his palm. Angie had killed him from the inside, slicing into his heart with a surgeon’s precision. A child. A daughter. His fucked-up genes inside of her.

And now she was dead.

Faith knelt beside him. ‘Will?’

He couldn’t speak. He could only think about a little girl sitting at the back of a classroom struggling to follow what the teacher said because her stupid father couldn’t teach her how to read.

She would have ended up trapped in the system, the same as Will. Abandoned, the same as Will.

How could Angie be so cruel?

‘Will,’ Faith repeated. ‘What did she say?’

‘Josephine Figaroa.’ He had to force the name out. ‘In the basement. Angie’s daughter. Josephine Figaroa. That’s her name.’

‘The basketball player’s wife?’ Faith rubbed his back. ‘We’ll deal with that in a minute. Do you need me to get Sara?’

‘No,’ he said, but Sara was already coming through the door behind them. Amanda was with her. They both looked worried.

And then Faith told them about Angie’s phone call and they looked furious.

‘What?’ Sara demanded. ‘What?’ She couldn’t stop saying the word.

Amanda gripped the side of the podium. She spoke through gritted teeth. ‘Did you run a trace?’

Faith said, ‘We couldn’t lock in. She must’ve timed it.’

‘God dammit.’ Amanda looked down at the floor. She took a shallow breath. When she looked back up, her game face was on. ‘Did we get a phone number?’

‘It’s blocked, but we can pull it on-’

‘I’m on it.’ Amanda started working her BlackBerry. ‘Was Charlie able to match the fingerprints?’

‘No,’ Faith said. ‘Her finger pads were too-’

‘Cracked,’ Will said. ‘Angie knew that. She said the DNA won’t be in the system.’

Sara said, ‘Angie’s blood type was at the scene.’ She kept shaking her head, completely baffled. ‘Her purse. Her gun. I don’t understand. Why would she do this?’

Faith asked, ‘Would Angie’s daughter have the same blood type?’

Sara didn’t answer. She was shell-shocked, the same as she’d been this morning.

‘Daughter?’ Amanda asked.

Will couldn’t answer.

Amanda asked, ‘In the interest of futility, did Angie mention why she did all of this?’

‘She’s a monster,’ Will said, the same words that people had been saying about her for over thirty years. At the children’s home. At foster homes. At the police station. Will never argued them down, but he never believed them either. They didn’t know Angie. They didn’t know the hell she had been through. They didn’t know that sometimes the pain was so bad that the only thing that made you feel better was lashing out at other people.

She had never lashed out at Will before. Not like this.

‘If it really is Josephine Figaroa, we’ll have fresh prints in the system,’ Faith said. ‘She was arrested last Thursday. She had Oxy in her car. I saw it on the news.’

Amanda asked, ‘Angie said this woman is her daughter?’

‘Yes.’ Will couldn’t tell them that Josephine was his daughter too. He had to get some clarity. He needed time to think. Angie had lied about so many things. Why should he trust her now?

‘Figaroa,’ Amanda said. ‘Why does that name sound familiar?’

‘Her husband is Reuben Figaroa. He’s a basketball player.’

‘Marcus Rippy.’ Amanda spat out the name like a bad taste in her mouth. ‘This entire day has been a giant circle leading directly back to him.’

Will stood up. ‘The patrol car can access footage from the street cameras.’

He didn’t wait for a response. He jogged up the aisle. He was outside and in the parking lot by the time they exited the building. Will pulled open the cruiser’s passenger-side door and got into the car. The uni gave a startled bark.

Will pointed to the laptop mounted on the dash. ‘I need the footage from every camera in the area.’

‘I was just pulling that up for your boss.’ The uni punched some keys. ‘These are the ones you want to see. I got two different angles, one from the street that runs in front of the funeral home, one that runs along the back.’

Faith opened the back door and slid into the car.

Amanda knelt beside Will. She told the uni, ‘Dunlop, tell me you found something.’

‘Yes, ma’am.’ Dunlop pointed to the screen. ‘This is right after the funeral van left at eight twenty-two.’

The prank call for a bogus body pick-up. Not a joke from another mortuary student, but a ruse to get Belcamino out of the building.

‘This is where the car first comes in.’ Dunlop turned the laptop around. Will saw the street corner, the rear entrance to the service alley. The night vision was fuzzy. The street lights weren’t helping. At 8:24:32, Angie’s black Monte Carlo SS turned into the alley that ran behind the funeral home. The driver’s face was a blob. A flash of blonde hair under a black hoodie. The car disappeared from the camera’s view as it rolled up the paved alley.

Will hit the arrow key, fast-forwarding the video to pick up the car again. Six minutes passed before the Monte Carlo drove back down the service alley and turned onto the street.

Faith said, ‘She went to the back door where the elevator is. She came back out. Six minutes is enough time to put a body in the freezer.’

Dunlop reached over and tapped some keys. ‘It picks up again here on the front street view.’

The Monte Carlo turned into the lot, using the entrance that was fifteen feet away from where they were. Angie’s car glided into the handicapped parking space. The driver got out. The roof of the car was about four and a half feet off the ground. The woman was around five-eight, close to Angie’s height. She was overweight, not like Angie, or maybe she had bulked up her clothes. The long-sleeved hoodie must have been sweltering, but she kept the hood on, head down, hands deep in her pockets as she walked up the street.

Faith asked, ‘Is it Angie?’

Will shook his head. He was out of the identifying Angie business.

‘Could be Delilah Palmer,’ Faith guessed. ‘Blonde hair, but Delilah changed her hair a lot.’

Amanda said, ‘Dunlop, where do you pick her up next?’

‘Nowhere. She’s either lucky or she knows the cameras.’ He tapped another few keys. He fast-forwarded and reversed through several different street angles before giving up. ‘She could’ve walked under the bridge, jumped into a car on the interstate. Headed up to Tech. Downtown. There are lots of blind spots where she could’a parked another car or had somebody waiting for her. Hell…’ He shrugged. ‘She could’ve jumped on a bus.’

‘Check the buses,’ Will said, because that sounded like something Angie would do. Or maybe not. He was the last person who could predict her behavior.

Amanda’s knees popped as she stood up. ‘Tell me about this Josephine Figaroa.’

‘Basketball wife.’ Faith got out of the car. ‘Oxy. That’s all I know.’

Will said, ‘The husband. Reuben “Fig” Figaroa, one of Marcus Rippy’s alibi witnesses for the night of the rape. He’s a power forward. Very physical. Rebounds well on defense. Kip Kilpatrick’s client.’

‘This hole just keeps getting deeper,’ Amanda said.

‘Here’s her DL.’ Faith showed them her phone. She had pulled up Josephine Figaroa’s driver’s license.

Will studied the photo. Dark hair. Thin and tall. Almond-shaped eyes. Olive skin. She looked like Angie from twenty years ago.

Did she look like Will? Did she have his height? Did she have his problems?

Amanda said, ‘Inasmuch as you can tell anything, the photo resembles the woman in the basement.’

Faith said, ‘She’s a carbon copy of Angie.’

Will said nothing.

‘You two.’ Amanda waved over Collier and his partner. They had been so quiet that Will had forgotten they were there. ‘Ng. Take off those stupid sunglasses. I put you on missing person reports. Josephine Figaroa. Did she come up?’

‘Fig’s wife?’ His face was small without the glasses. ‘No, she wasn’t in any of my searches. I would recognize the name.’

Amanda told Faith, ‘You’ll come with me to talk to the husband. See if we can get an ID, figure out whether or not the wife is missing in the first place. I don’t trust Angie as far as I can throw her, and believe me, if she was here, I would throw her.’

Collier said, ‘The wife’s a pill popper. She did a two-day stint in the Fulton lockup. Got out Saturday. Supposed to be going to rehab this morning.’

‘And now she’s at a funeral home with knife wounds in her chest.’ Amanda tucked her hands into her hips. ‘I don’t trust any of this. Angie’s misdirecting us for a reason. She’s buying time so she can make her play.’

‘What’s the play?’ Collier asked. ‘This is a lot of dead bodies for a game.’

Amanda said, ‘It’s only a game to her.’

‘Josephine has a kid.’ Faith held up her phone again. ‘I found the husband’s Facebook page. Anthony. Six years old.’

Anthony. Jo Figaroa’s son. Angie’s daughter. Will’s grandson?

The picture showed a small boy with a furtive smile.

‘Look at the shape of his eyes,’ Faith said. ‘Those are some strong genes.’

Were they Will’s genes, too?

1989. Angie was stuck in a group home with over a dozen other kids.

Except for that time when she wasn’t.

Faith said, ‘There’s not a missing six-year-old white boy on the wire. We’d know about it immediately.’

Ng said, ‘That’s for damn sure.’

‘Collier,’ Amanda said. ‘What’s your progress on locating Delilah Palmer?’

‘I was gonna tell you before. We found her rental car abandoned in Lakewood. Wiped clean.’

‘Dammit, Collier!’ Faith slammed her hand on the trunk of the cruiser. ‘You found her car? I have to hear about your God damm gas station hot dogs but you can’t text me when-’

Will realized that Sara had disappeared.

He scanned the front of the building, the lawn, the parking lot. He walked toward the street. She was behind her BMW, leaning against the bumper, staring into the distance. The overhead light put a halo around her. Her expression was unreadable. He didn’t know if she was upset or concerned or afraid or furious.

They were ending the day exactly the same way they had started it.

Will walked away from the noise and the screaming and maybe even his job, because he didn’t care about any of them anymore.

He told Sara, ‘Let’s go home.’

She gave him the keys. He opened the passenger door for her, then walked around the front and got behind the wheel. He was backing out of the space when she took his hand. Will felt his heart lift in his chest. This wasn’t the Xanax. Sara’s presence soothed him. Earlier tonight, she had been willing to walk away from him-not to hurt him, but because she only ever wanted what was best for him.

He said, ‘I don’t think I can talk about any of this right now.’

She squeezed his hand. ‘Then we won’t.’

Tuesday

TEN

Faith paged through her notebook as Amanda drove them to Reuben Figaroa’s house. Her columns were hardly worth reviewing. Will had been right when he’d told her there wasn’t a case to be built. Faith saw what he had seen: a bunch of arrows, a bunch of unanswered questions. Nothing added up, even when you threw in the name Josephine Figaroa. The dead woman was just another arrow that indirectly led back to Marcus Rippy.

Maybe she should try to link them to Angie.

Her eyes started to blur. She looked up, blinking to clear her vision. The streets of Buckhead were deserted. It was almost one in the morning. Faith had been dead asleep in front of the television when Amanda had called her to the funeral home. She could barely recall dropping Emma off at her mother’s house. She was so exhausted that her brain hurt, but this was the job. There was no such thing as a reasonable hour to notify a man that his wife was dead.

Not that Faith was absolutely certain that the woman at the funeral home was Jo Figaroa. She certainly could be the woman in the driver’s license photo, but Angie’s involvement skewed everything. Faith’s policy toward liars was to always discount everything they said, no matter how much sense their story made. It wasn’t easy. The human brain had an annoying need to give people the benefit of the doubt. Especially people you cared about.

For instance, Faith was trusting Will when he said that Angie hadn’t told him anything else important, even though he had spent a hell of a lot of time on the phone with her just to be told a victim’s name.

Amanda said, ‘Your mother used to pin her notes up on the wall so that we could see all the moving pieces.’

Faith smiled. The pinholes were still there. ‘Do you think that Jo Figaroa is Angie’s daughter?’

‘Yes.’

‘Who’s the father?’ She didn’t get an answer, so she suggested the obvious one. ‘Will?’

‘I’m not so sure about that.’ Amanda slowed the car. She pulled over to the side of the road. She put the gear in park. She turned to Faith. ‘Tell me what you know about Denny.’

‘Denny?’ Faith shook her head. ‘Who’s Denny?’

‘Short for Holden,’ Amanda explained. ‘Though Denny is two syllables. Holden is two syllables. I suppose that means it’s not short, just less pretentious.’

Faith was too tired for semantics. ‘Let’s just stick with Collier.’

‘Start from the beginning. What did he do? How did he present himself?’

Faith had to pause for a moment so that she could put together her day. It seemed like an eternity had passed since she’d picked up Will at the animal clinic this morning, which was technically yesterday morning because it was past midnight.

She told Amanda about the first meeting with Collier and Ng outside Rippy’s club, the interminable amount of time she’d spent with him at Dale Harding’s, the texts that told her nothing, the tedious observations about his personal life, the constant sexual innuendo, the reluctance to carry on an adult conversation about the case.

‘I don’t trust him,’ Faith admitted. ‘He keeps pushing this Mexican heroin cartel angle. He didn’t tell me about finding Delilah’s car, but he told me about every useless whore he talked to in Lakewood.’

Amanda confirmed, ‘Ng said that they were handling a domestic call when they got routed to the nightclub?’

Faith strained to recall his exact words. ‘He said it was pretty violent, which means they were probably at the hospital. Grady is close to Rippy’s club, about a ten-minute drive at that time of morning. It would make sense for them to take the call.’

‘The nine-one-one came in at five AM,’ Amanda reminded her. ‘Would you volunteer to investigate a dead body at a warehouse at the end of your shift?’

Faith shrugged. ‘Dead cop. The unis recognized Harding. You’d push your shift for a cop.’

‘True,’ Amanda agreed. ‘What else is bothering you about him?’

Faith struggled to articulate her gut feeling. ‘He keeps showing up. He was with Will when he found the Jane Doe in the office building. He drove him home. He was there tonight at the funeral home. What was he doing there?’

‘Collier and Ng are our APD liaisons. They’re working parts of the case. It makes sense that he’d get the call about the car.’

‘I guess.’ Faith tried to pluck out the obvious answer. ‘Maybe Collier’s just an idiot who keeps falling up. His dad was on the job. He’s obviously got some juice.’

Amanda said, ‘Milton Collier was on the job for two years. He took a fifty-one off a twenty-four, lost two fingers before he could call a sixty-three.’

Faith accessed her arcane knowledge of ten-codes from Amanda’s soup-can-and-string days. Collier’s dad had been stabbed by a crazy person and lost some fingers before backup arrived. She asked Amanda, ‘And?’

‘Milton clocked out on a medical disability. The wife was a schoolteacher. They made ends meet by taking in foster kids. Dozens at a time. Collier was one of them. Eventually they adopted him.’

‘Huh,’ Faith said, because Collier had overshared just about everything, down to his twisted nut sack in high school, but he hadn’t mentioned that he’d been in the system the same as Delilah Palmer.

The same as Angie, too.

Faith asked, ‘Were Collier and Angie ever in the same home together, like when she was sixteen years old and pregnant?’

‘That’s an interesting question, isn’t it?’ Amanda didn’t give the answer, but Faith knew she would find out. Amanda asked, ‘What else did Angie say on the phone call with Will?’

‘It was brief,’ she lied, because the call had lasted just under three minutes. ‘I’m sure she spent some time taunting him.’

‘Why is that, do you think?’

‘Because she’s a terrible human being.’

Amanda gave her a sharp look. ‘She’s cunning is what she is. Look at our day. Angie had us running around in circles. East Atlanta. Lakewood. North Atlanta. Will was all over midtown. You were stuck at Harding’s. I was at Kilpatrick’s. What’s more, Angie has knocked Will out of the equation, which shows brilliant strategy. Will knows her intimately. He could be our best ally in helping us figure out what Angie is really up to, but she has rendered him completely useless. You saw how he was in the basement.’

Faith had seen how broken Will had been, and what’s more, she hadn’t been able to take it. He had been making a weird whooping sound, like he couldn’t catch his breath. Faith ran from the room so that he wouldn’t see her crying.

She asked Amanda, ‘You think Angie’s fucking with him so that he won’t figure out what she’s really up to?’

‘If I were teaching a class on mind games, that play would be part of my curriculum.’

God knew Amanda could play some mind games. ‘Okay, Angie’s screwing with him. To what end?’

‘She’s buying time.’

‘For what?’

‘That’s the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question, isn’t it? What exactly is Angie Polaski up to?’

Faith didn’t think she would ever find the answer. She was so tired and so stressed out that she doubted she could tie her own shoes right now, let alone figure out why Angie Polaski did the awful things she did.

Amanda said, ‘Walk me through it.’

Reluctantly, Faith looked down at her notes again. ‘Harding is murdered Sunday night. Angie stages the scene to make it look like she, Angie, was murdered, but it’s actually Jo Figaroa, who probably shares her mother, Angie’s, rare blood type, B-negative.’

‘Hm.’ For once, Amanda hadn’t been ahead of her. ‘Do you think Angie murdered Jo?’

Faith wasn’t sure. ‘She’s a monster, but I can’t see her killing her own child.’

‘Neither can I, but Harding could have killed Jo, then Angie killed Harding. Or tried to, with the doorknob.’ Amanda asked, ‘What happened next?’

‘Angie takes the body out of the club. She torches Dale’s car, which sounds like something Angie would do if she was pissed off, and she’d be pissed off if Dale killed her kid.’ Faith couldn’t even contemplate a real-life scenario with her own children. There would be salt in the ground for a thousand years. ‘The nine-one-one comes in Monday morning at five. Then Monday night, Angie hands us Jo’s body at the funeral home and calls Will to torture him.’

‘Sara puts Josephine’s time of death around noon to one.’

‘That’s un-Sara-like specificity.’ Faith scribbled the time in the margins. She realized, ‘If Josephine died between noon and one, that means Angie had her in the trunk of her car until she left the body at the funeral home just before eight thirty PM.’

‘There was a lot of blood in the back seat, all type B-negative, and a little blood in the trunk that Sara says could have been left post mortem from the chest wound.’

Faith shivered at the coldness it would take to drive around with your own child bleeding to death in the back of your car.

‘It’s a timing issue,’ Amanda said. ‘Angie is dragging out the clock. That’s why she waited so long to get rid of the body.’

‘Or something changed in her plan,’ Faith guessed, but she really had no idea. She saw Amanda’s earlier logic, because Will was the one person who could probably figure out what Angie was thinking. He knew her motivations. He knew what she was capable of. But it wasn’t just Will she was fucking with. ‘Angie’s worked murder cases before. She knows what it’s like. All the blood and violence freaks you out no matter how many times you’ve seen it. You’re panicked you’re going to miss something. You can’t turn off your brain. You can’t sleep, even when there’s time. Throw in the emotional angle and she’s basically put us in Gitmo.’

Amanda said, ‘I’ll say what I said this morning: we’re missing something big.’

‘Maybe Reuben Figaroa can offer an explanation.’ She closed her notebook. All of the sense was gone. Her notes looked like one of Emma’s coloring projects. ‘I’ll never get back to sleep after this. I could use one of your Xanax.’ She looked up at Amanda. ‘What are you doing carrying around Xanax, anyway?’

‘Just a little trick from the old days.’ Amanda turned back to the steering wheel. ‘You have a suspect who’s too jumpy to talk, you crush half a pill into his coffee. He gets a little loosey-goosey and you have him sign on the dotted line.’

‘I can think of sixteen different ways that’s illegal.’

‘Only sixteen?’ Amanda chuckled as she pulled back onto the road. ‘Talk to your mother. She’s the one who came up with it.’

Faith could see her mother doing this in the seventies, but she couldn’t see Amanda doing it now, which meant that she’d dodged another question. Pressing her was not a mountain Faith was prepared to climb. ‘How are we going to approach Reuben? Is this a death notification or an interrogation? His wife has been missing since at least Sunday night. He hasn’t filed a report.’

‘We should handle this just as we would handle any suspicious death of a spouse.’ Amanda reminded her, ‘The husband is the first suspect. More women are murdered by their intimate partners than by any other group.’

‘Why do you think I stopped dating?’

The comment was meant as a joke, but Amanda cut her a side-look. ‘Don’t let this job turn you off men, Faith.’

Faith studied Amanda. This was the second time in as many days that she had tried to give her dating advice. ‘Where is this coming from?’

‘Experience,’ Amanda said. ‘Take it from a woman who has been doing this job for a very long time. It’s simple statistics. Men commit the most violent crimes. Everyone knows that, but not everyone sees it played out in the real world every single day like you and I do. Remind yourself that Will is a good man. At least when he’s not being pig-headed. Charlie Reed is exceptional-not that you should repeat that. Your thing with Emma’s father didn’t work out, but he’s still a good guy. Your father was a saint. Your brother can be an ass, but he would do anything for you. Jeremy is perfect in every way. Your Uncle Kenny is-’

‘A cheater and a womanizer?’

‘Don’t miss the forest for the trees, Faith. Kenny adores you. He’s still a good person. It just didn’t work out for us. But there’s someone out there who could work out for you. Don’t let the job tell you otherwise.’ She tapped her foot on the brake. ‘What was the street number?’

Faith hadn’t realized they were already on Cherokee Drive. She pointed to a large stone mailbox a few houses down from the country club. ‘There.’

Amanda turned into the driveway. An enormous black gate blocked her progress. She pressed the button on the security keypad. She waved at the security camera discreetly mounted in the tall bushes that blocked the view of the house from the road.

The Figaroas obviously valued their privacy. Faith guessed there was enough front yard for a football field. Still, she could make out the glimmer of lights on the bottom floor. ‘They’re already awake. Do you think the press got wind of this?’

‘If they did, we have a small pool of suspects who could’ve leaked the news.’

Collier again. He was the proverbial bad penny. If he knew Angie, did that mean he knew Dale Harding? And if Harding and Angie were the types of cops that Holden Collier kept company with, what did that say about Collier?

Faith was a big believer in guilt by association.

She asked Amanda, ‘Have you ever heard of a woman named Virginia Souza?’

Amanda shook her head.

‘Collier mentioned her before.’ Faith found her phone in her pocket. She read back through his texts, looking for the woman’s name. ‘Virginia Souza. Collier tracked her down because she worked Delilah’s corner, so they probably had the same pimp. Family said she OD’d six months ago, but that’s from Collier, and I don’t trust Collier because he’s a lying liar.’

‘You sound so much like your mother sometimes.’

‘I wish I could tell whether or not that was a compliment.’ Faith searched the state database for Virginia Souza’s rap sheet. ‘Here we go. Fifty-seven years old, which is a bit long in the tooth for a whore. Prostitution times a thousand, going back to the late seventies. Child endangerment. Child neglect. Accessory to the exploitation of a child. None of which Collier mentioned.’ Faith felt a cramp in her thumb as she paged through the woman’s sordid criminal history. ‘Several drunk and disorderlies. Shoplifting. No drug violations, which is odd since the family said she OD’d six months ago. Or Collier said the family said she OD’d six months ago. Two assaults, both on minors-Collier told me about those. Suspect in the kidnapping of a minor. Suspect in another exploitation. She really has a thing for kids. Known aliases: Souz, Souzie, Ginny, Gin, Mama.’

‘Mama in charge,’ Amanda said, using the colloquialism for a pimp’s right-hand woman. ‘She’s a bottom girl.’

‘Makes sense, considering her age and her sheet. All these assaults on kids, that could be her doing the pimp’s job, keeping the stable in line.’

‘What is taking these people so long?’ Amanda pressed the buzzer on the gate a second time, keeping her finger down long enough to make it clear she wasn’t going to go away. ‘Do you have a phone number?’

Faith was about to look when the gates started to open.

‘Finally,’ Amanda said.

The driveway curved to the left, leading them toward a detached six-car garage at the rear corner of the house. Amanda pulled into the motorcourt, parking beside a Tesla SUV. Striping had turned the pavement into a miniature basketball court with a goal set low enough to indicate Reuben Figaroa had built out the space for his six-year-old son.

‘Kip Kilpatrick,’ Amanda said.

Faith saw the agent standing in an open doorway. His suit was so shiny that it caught the security lights. He had a bottle of bright red sports drink in his hands that he tossed back and forth as he watched the car pull up. Will had underestimated the man’s doucheness. Faith could smell it coming off him like damp in a basement.

Amanda said, ‘Here we go.’

They both got out of the car. Amanda walked toward Kilpatrick. Faith glanced through the windows in the garage doors. Two Ferraris, a Porsche, and in the last bay a charcoal-gray Range Rover, the same type of vehicle that was leased to Jo Figaroa.

Amanda said, ‘Mr Kilpatrick, what a pleasure to see you twice in the same day.’

He looked at his watch. ‘It’s technically two days. Any particular reason you’re out this late visiting another client of mine?’

‘Why don’t we discuss that inside with Mr Figaroa?’

‘Why don’t we discuss that outside with me?’

‘I find it odd that you’re even here, Mr Kilpatrick. Are you making a late house call?’

‘You’ve got five seconds to either explain why you’re here or to get off Mr Figaroa’s property.’

Amanda paused a moment to let some of the power shift. ‘I’m looking for Josephine Figaroa, actually. She seems to be missing.’

‘She’s in rehab,’ he said. ‘Left this morning. Packed her into the car myself.’

‘Can you tell me the name of the facility?’

‘No.’

‘Can you tell me when she’ll return?’

‘Nope.’

Amanda seldom hit walls, but Faith could see that she had found herself flat against Kilpatrick’s denials. She finally laid down the truth. ‘Two hours ago, a body was found that was identified as Josephine Figaroa.’

Kilpatrick dropped the bottle, which exploded against the pavement. Red liquid splashed all over the ground, his feet, his pants. He didn’t move. He barely registered the mess. He was genuinely astonished.

Amanda said, ‘We need Mr Figaroa to positively ID the body.’

‘What?’ Kilpatrick started shaking his head. ‘How did… What?’

‘Do you need a minute?’

He looked at the ground, noticed the spilled drink. ‘Are you sure?’ He shook his head, and Faith could practically hear him coaching himself into putting his lawyer face back on. ‘I can do the ID. Where should I meet you?’

‘We have a photo, but it’s-’

‘Show me.’

Amanda already had her BlackBerry out. She showed him the picture she had taken of the woman’s face.

Kilpatrick flinched. ‘Jesus Christ. What happened to her?’

‘That’s what we’re here to find out.’

‘Christ.’ He wiped his mouth with his sleeve. ‘Christ.’

A shadow passed over the doorway, impossibly ominous, like a monster in a storybook.

Reuben Figaroa came outside, careful not to get his shoes wet. He wore a badly wrinkled gray suit with a blue shirt and black tie. Shaved head. Dark mustache and goatee. He was shockingly tall, his head nearly brushing the door frame. He also had a paddle holster with a striker-fired Sig Sauer P320 clipped to his black leather belt. He wore the gun to the front and looked more than capable of using it.

Amanda said, ‘Mr Figaroa, could we please speak with you?’

Reuben held out his hand, which was three times the size of Amanda’s. ‘Let me see the picture.’

‘No, man,’ Kilpatrick warned. ‘You don’t want to see that. Trust me.’

Amanda gave Reuben her BlackBerry. The phone looked as small as a pack of gum in his enormous hand. He held the screen close to his face, head tilted as he studied the image. Faith was used to Will’s height, but comparatively, Reuben was a giant. Everything about him was bigger, stronger, more threatening. He had only said five words to them, but Faith felt every part of her being telling her that this man was not to be trusted. He was looking directly at a photograph of his dead wife, yet his face showed absolutely no emotion.

Amanda asked, ‘Is that your wife, Josephine Figaroa?’

‘Jo. Yes, it’s her.’ He handed the phone back to Amanda. He seemed positive about the ID, but his affect remained as flat as his tone of voice. ‘Please come in.’

Amanda could not hide her surprise at the invitation. She glanced back at Faith before entering the house. Kip Kilpatrick indicated he would take up the rear. He wasn’t being a gentleman. He wanted to keep an eye on her. Fine by Faith. She made sure he saw her clock the Ruger AR-556 propped up against the door. The rifle had every bell and whistle. Magazine grip. Flash suppressor. Rear-folding battle sight. Laser. Thirty-round magazine.

Reuben led them down a long tiled hallway. He was limping. There was a metal brace on his leg. Faith appreciated the slow pace because it gave her a chance to look around. Not that there was much to see. The house was spotless-literally. There were no photographs on the stark white walls. No sneakers by the door. No clothes piled in the laundry room. No toys scattered into every corner.

Faith didn’t care whether or not a person lived in a mega-mansion or a box, if you lived with a six-year-old child, you lived with his shit. She saw no greasy fingerprints or scuffed baseboards or the scattered sticky Cheerios that inexplicably trailed every child like breadcrumbs.

The living room was just as bare. This was not open-concept. There was no line of sight from the kitchen, just a series of closed doors that could lead anywhere. No curtains softened the floor-to-ceiling windows. No artwork or plants warmed up the space. All of the furniture was raw steel and white leather, built to a basketball player’s scale. The plush rug was white. The floor was white. If there was a kid living here, he was hermetically sealed.

‘Please.’ Reuben indicated the couch. He didn’t wait for the women to sit down. He took the chair that kept his back to the wall. Sitting, he was roughly Faith’s height. His eyes were a weird, almost Confederate gray. There was a long Band-Aid on the side of his shaved head. The bump underneath was the size of a golf ball.

She asked, ‘What happened to your head?’

He didn’t answer. He just stared at her with a look of mild disinterest, the way a lion might look at an ant.

Amanda said, ‘Thank you for talking with us, Mr Figaroa. I’m so sorry for your loss.’ She sat on the couch beside him. She had to teeter on the edge so that her feet would touch the ground. Kilpatrick was slumped into another chair, his feet dangling like Lily Tomlin playing Edith Ann. He seemed more upset than Jo’s husband. His face had not fully recovered from the shock.

Reuben was still looking at Faith, waiting for her to sit.

‘I’m fine, thanks.’ She didn’t want to be scrambling to stand if something went wrong.

There were a lot of things that could go wrong.

She had spotted another assault rifle by the front door, an AK-47 that looked like it had been retrofitted with a bump fire stock, which effectively made the weapon a legal machine gun. There was a second handgun inside a heavy-looking hinged glass box on the coffee table, another Sig Sauer, this one a reverse two-tone Mosquito.

Amanda had a five-shot revolver in her purse that she kept inside a Crown Royal bag. Faith had her Glock in her leg holster. They would be no match for Reuben Figaroa. He was turned in his chair, his elbow resting on the back corner, so that his hand was less than two inches from the Sig on his hip.

Reuben said, ‘What happened to Jo?’

‘We’re not sure,’ Amanda admitted. ‘The autopsy has yet to be performed.’

‘When will that be done?’

‘Later this morning.’

‘Where?’

‘The morgue at Grady Hospital.’

He waited for more details.

‘The medical examiner for the Atlanta Police Department will perform the procedure, but someone from the GBI will be on hand to offer assistance.’

‘I want to be there too.’

Kilpatrick sat up. ‘He’s in shock,’ he told Amanda. ‘Of course he doesn’t want to be there when his wife is autopsied.’ He shot Reuben a look of warning. ‘When did she die?’

‘Perhaps Mr Figaroa can tell us first how he spent yesterday, Monday?’

‘Don’t-’ Kilpatrick said, but Reuben held up a hand to stop him.

‘I was at my doctor’s office first thing Monday morning. As you can see, I’ve recently had surgery on my knee. I had to do a follow-up appointment. After that, I had a business meeting with Kip, then we had another meeting with my lawyer, Ditmar Wittich. Then I was with my various bankers for the rest of the day. City Trust. Bank of America. Wells Fargo. Kip can give you their numbers.’

Kilpatrick said, ‘Obviously none of the people Fig met with can tell you what they talked about, but I can get the times verified. The banks will have security footage. You’ll probably have to get a warrant.’

‘There’s still late Monday night and into this morning.’ Amanda told Reuben, ‘Forgive me, but it seems odd that it’s two in the morning and you’re still dressed in a suit.’

‘That’s why I delayed you at the gate,’ he said. ‘I felt it would be inappropriate to answer the door in my pajamas.’

Amanda nodded, but she didn’t point out that his suit looked like he’d been wearing it all day.

Reuben asked, ‘Where was she found?’

Amanda didn’t answer the question. ‘I was hoping you could help us with the timeline.’ She turned to Kilpatrick. ‘You said that you packed Jo into her car Monday morning?’

‘Figure of speech.’ Kilpatrick saw that he’d painted himself into a corner. ‘I packed the car for her Sunday night. I don’t know what time she left Monday morning.’ Kilpatrick’s eyes kept nervously going to Reuben. ‘So the last I saw her was Sunday night. We were at a party.’

Faith asked, ‘She drove herself to rehab in her own car?’

Kilpatrick had seen Faith looking in the garage at Jo Figaroa’s Range Rover. ‘I don’t remember.’

‘And you?’ Amanda asked Reuben.

‘Sunday night,’ Kilpatrick answered before his client could. ‘Reuben was at the party too. So was Jo. She left early. Had a headache, wanted to pack, I don’t know. Reuben took some pain pills when he got in. This is Sunday night, after the party. He woke up Monday morning and assumed Jo had left for rehab. In a town car, because her Rover was still here.’ He was just making this up as he went along. ‘You know with rehab, they don’t let the patients make any calls home for the first two weeks, so we had no way of knowing whether or not she arrived at the clinic.’

Amanda could’ve punched all kinds of holes in the story, but she only nodded.

Reuben asked, ‘Who killed her?’

‘We’re not sure that she was murdered.’

‘The picture,’ Reuben said. ‘Someone hit her face. Beat her.’ He looked away. His clenched fists were the size of footballs. It was the first time he had registered any emotion about his wife. ‘Who killed her?’

‘Ms. Wagner,’ Kilpatrick interjected. ‘I feel that you should know that Jo had an Oxy habit. Pretty serious. Fig had no idea until she got busted. That’s why she’s in rehab. Was going to rehab.’ He stopped to swallow, clearly flustered. ‘You should be looking for her dealer. Underworld people.’

Faith remembered what Will had said about Angie supplying drugs to young girls. Her way of helping them stay off the streets. Had she supplied drugs to Jo Figaroa, too?

‘You have an impressive gun collection.’ Amanda looked around the room, pretending that she hadn’t noticed the arsenal before. ‘Is it a hobby, or are you worried about your family?’

Reuben fixed his steely gray eyes on her. ‘I take excellent care of my family.’

Kilpatrick said, ‘Ms. Wagner, I’m sure you’re familiar with Georgia HB60 section one through ten. Law enforcement officers are not allowed to ask private law-abiding citizens about guns or permits, or any other weapons, concealed or visible. Especially inside a private home.’

Faith asked, ‘Did Jo say goodbye to Anthony?’

Reuben’s eyes narrowed. ‘Yes.’

Faith waited, but he obviously wasn’t going to offer more. ‘Is Anthony here?’

‘Yes.’

‘Can we talk to him? Maybe his mother-’

A phone rang, a piercing bell that for some reason made Faith’s hand move toward her gun. Reuben’s hand moved too. Very slowly, he reached into his pocket and pulled out an iPhone. Faith looked at Kilpatrick. He had moved to the edge of his seat, tensed, waiting. Reuben’s eyes were no longer so steely. His almost stone-like demeanor cracked just a little bit.

They all watched him put the phone to his ear.

‘No,’ he mumbled. He waited. ‘No,’ he mumbled again. He ended the call. He shook his head once at Kilpatrick. He kept the phone in his hand, which was all right by Faith, because she wanted his dominant hand to stay occupied. ‘Sorry,’ he apologized. ‘Private matter.’

‘Reuben?’ An older woman had pushed open one of the doors. She was African American, impeccably dressed, with a choker of pearls around her neck. ‘Would you like me to bring your guests some tea or coffee?’

‘No, ma’am. We’re fine.’ Reuben smoothed down his tie. ‘Thank you. Everything is fine.’

She hesitated, then backed out of the room.

The exchange had taken seconds, but Faith had caught a glimpse of the woman’s face. Her bottom lip was quivering.

Kilpatrick explained, ‘That’s Jo’s mother. She’s got a heart condition. We’ll wait to tell her the news when she can handle it.’

‘Forgive me,’ Amanda said. ‘But was Josephine adopted?’

Reuben had regained his composure. The flat affect was back. ‘Yes. She was an infant when it happened. She never knew her mother.’

‘How sad.’ Amanda coughed into her hand. She patted her chest and coughed again. ‘I’m sorry to trouble you. Could I have some water?’

‘I’ll get it.’ Faith walked toward the kitchen.

Reuben started to stand, but Kilpatrick said, ‘It’s cool.’

Faith saw why it was cool as soon as she entered the kitchen. Bullet head. Tight black clothes. Laslo Zivcovik was sitting at the kitchen island. He was eating ice cream from the carton. The woman who had to be Miss Lindsay stood on the other side. She was wringing a white towel in her hands, clearly unsettled by what was going on in the next room. The pearls hadn’t been Faith’s only tip-off. The older woman’s lip quivered the exact same way Will had described it.

Faith said, ‘What a beautiful kitchen,’ even though the kitchen more closely resembled a padded room at an asylum. The cabinets were white. The appliances were all hidden behind white panels. The marble countertop waterfalled onto the marble floor. Even the open staircase in the back of the room was a painfully bright white.

‘Thank you.’ Miss Lindsay folded the towel. ‘My son-in-law designed it.’

That explained a lot. Reuben might as well be a slab of marble himself. ‘It must be a chore keeping it clean, especially with a little boy. Your daughter must have a lot of help.’

‘No, she does it all on her own. Cleans the house. Does all the cooking. The laundry.’

‘That’s a lot of work.’ Faith repeated, ‘Especially with a little boy.’

Laslo’s spoon clattered onto the counter. He asked Faith, ‘You need something in here?’ His Boston accent made him sound like he had cotton shoved into his cheeks.

Filling a glass of water wouldn’t take long enough, so she said, ‘I volunteered to help with the tea.’

‘I’ll get the kettle.’ Miss Lindsay opened and closed cabinet doors, which told Faith she didn’t visit much.

‘Yo.’ Laslo tapped his spoon on the counter for attention. He pointed to a hot-water dispenser, which meant that Laslo had been here a lot.

‘All these new-fangled gadgets.’ Miss Lindsay started taking down mugs. White. Gigantic. Built for Reuben Figaroa, like everything else in the house.

Faith started filling the mugs with hot water. The kitchen counter was so tall that she felt the need to lean up on her toes. She asked Miss Lindsay, ‘Are you here to watch your grandson?’

She nodded, but didn’t speak.

‘Six years old, so he must be in first grade?’ Faith filled another mug. ‘That’s such a wonderful age. Everything is exciting. They’re so funny and happy all the time. You just want to hold on to them forever.’

Miss Lindsay missed the counter. The mug shattered like ice against the marble floor, white flecks shooting everywhere.

At first, no one moved. They stared at each other in some kind of Mexican stand-off until Laslo told the old woman, ‘Go upstairs, sweetheart. I’ll clean this up.’

Miss Lindsay looked at Faith. Her lip was quivering again.

Faith said, ‘I think you met my partner yesterday. Will Trent.’

Laslo stood up. His boots crunched the broken ceramic on the floor. ‘Go upstairs and take care of Anthony. All this noise down here. You don’t want him to wake up and get scared.’

‘Of course.’ Miss Lindsay bit her lip to stop the quiver. She told Faith, ‘Good evening.’

Her cane clunked against the floor as she walked toward the back staircase. She turned to look at Faith, then she started the arduous climb. What felt like an eternity passed before her feet disappeared.

Laslo’s boots pulverized the broken mug as he took his place back at the kitchen bar. He gripped the spoon. He scooped some ice cream into his mouth and smacked his lips. His eyes were on Faith’s breasts. He said, ‘Nice tits.’

She said, ‘You too.’

Faith used her shoe to kick open the swinging door, knowing it would leave a mark. Amanda was already off the couch, her purse in her hands. She said, ‘Thank you, Mr Figaroa. We’ll be in touch. Again, I’m so sorry for your loss.’

Kilpatrick showed them out. He let them take the lead down the hallway like he was afraid they would dart off and find something he couldn’t explain away.

At the back door, he told Amanda, ‘If you have any more questions for Fig, call my cell. Number’s on my card.’

‘We’ll need him to positively ID the body. A DNA sample would be helpful, too.’

Kilpatrick smirked at the suggestion. No lawyer willingly gave up a client’s DNA. ‘Take another picture once you have her cleaned up. We’ll go from there.’

‘Wonderful,’ Amanda said. ‘I look forward to seeing you in a few hours.’

Kilpatrick wouldn’t stop smirking. ‘Yeah, that on-the-record interview with Marcus that you talked Ditmar into agreeing to yesterday-that ain’t gonna happen. Call Ditmar if you don’t believe me.’

He didn’t slam the door, because he didn’t have to.

Amanda gripped her purse like she wanted to strangle it as she walked to the car.

Faith walked backward, looking up at the second-floor windows. There were no lights on. No Miss Lindsay peering out from behind the curtains. Faith had the same feeling that Will had described before: something wasn’t right.

They both got into the car. They were both silent until the car was turning onto Cherokee.

Amanda asked, ‘Nothing from the mother?’

‘Laslo was there.’ Faith asked, ‘What about that phone call? Kilpatrick almost jumped out of his skin.’

‘Curiouser and curiouser.’ Amanda said, ‘Reuben Figaroa is an angry man.’

Faith would’ve said ‘duh’ to anyone else. The guns lying around the house. The operating room aesthetic. Reuben Figaroa was a human checklist for a controlling husband. Whether or not that crossed into violence was an open-ended question. At the very least, it made sense that his wife would be popping pills on her way to the grocery store.

What didn’t make sense was why she had been murdered.

Amanda said, ‘His alibi will hold. You know that. And I find it very convenient that his entire day was filled with people who are professionally bound by one legal standard or another to keep their mouths shut.’

‘Angie got her killed,’ Faith guessed. ‘That’s what this is about. Not Marcus Rippy or Kilpatrick or Reuben or any of that. Angie did one of those Jerry Springer “Surprise, I’m your mother!” things and trapped Jo into doing something that ended up getting her murdered.’

‘Don’t let the tail wag the dog,’ Amanda warned. ‘I’m worried about the son-Anthony. Even I know there should be some toys, or at least a few smudges on the glass coffee table.’

‘Backpack, shoes, coloring books, crayons, Matchbox cars, dirt.’ Faith had forgotten how much dirt boys dragged in. They were like lint traps to every particle of dust in the atmosphere. ‘If a six-year-old boy lives in that house, then his mother spends all day cleaning up after him. And she does it on her own, by the way. Miss Lindsay confirmed that Jo doesn’t have help. She does the cooking, the cleaning, the laundry, just like a real housewife.’

‘Jo disappeared Sunday night. For all intents and purposes, it’s now Tuesday morning. We’ll assume the husband doesn’t scrub toilets. Did Miss Lindsay take over the cleaning?’

‘I don’t see how. She could barely lean down with her cane. But you’re right that something is going on with Anthony. I kept pressing her buttons on the kid, and she would’ve cracked if Laslo hadn’t been there.’ Faith said, ‘We can call the school. They’ll give out truancy information. I’m assuming he’s at E. Rivers. It’s basically a publicly funded private school for rich white kids.’

‘It’s too early. No one will be there until six.’

Faith yawned reflexively at the mention of the late hour.

Amanda said, ‘I want to talk to that Jane Doe that Will found in the building. She must have seen something. Where did she get all that coke?’

Faith was still yawning. Too much information was coming at her too fast. Her brain felt like a spinning top. ‘Figaroa seemed unequivocal about the identification from the photo. How could he be sure? Her head is the size of a watermelon. Someone beat the shit out of her.’

‘Here’s another problem.’ Amanda pointed to the clock on the radio. ‘We got there at one in the morning. They were all awake, dressed. Kilpatrick was there in a suit. Reuben was in a suit. Laslo was there. The mother-in-law still had her pearls on. All the lights were on in the house. They were staying up for a reason.’

Faith said, ‘Kilpatrick didn’t know that Jo was dead.’

‘No,’ Amanda said. ‘He was shocked when I told him. You can’t fake that.’

‘Figaroa was in a knee brace. But he had that bump on his head. Someone took a heavy swing at him.’

‘Jo?’

Faith laughed, but only out of desperation. ‘Angie? Delilah? Virginia Souza?’

‘The AK by the front door looks retrofitted for automatic.’

‘The AR by the back door has a slide fire. That’s one hundred rounds in seven seconds.’ Faith shook her head, trying to clear it. ‘What the hell is going on in that house?’

‘Concentrate. Kilpatrick is a fixer. Laslo is a fixer. What problems were they there to fix?’

‘If we’re buying that Kilpatrick didn’t know Jo was dead, then that’s not the problem they were fixing.’ Faith reminded her, ‘Miss Lindsay was at Kilpatrick’s on Monday afternoon. That’s when she saw Will. She was upset about something.’

‘Her daughter was arrested for possession of drugs.’

‘Yeah, last Thursday. Jo was out of jail by Saturday. Her mother was at Kilpatrick’s with a new problem. A Monday problem. An after-Harding-was-killed problem. An after-her-daughter-disappeared-but-we’re-saying-she’s-in-rehab problem.’ Faith thought of another red flag. ‘She went to Kilpatrick, not Reuben.’

‘That phone call Reuben got a few minutes ago. That was strange.’

‘It seemed like they were all waiting for a call, even Miss Lindsay. The minute the phone rang, she stuck her head out of the kitchen to find out what was happening.’ Faith turned to Amanda. ‘If the call wasn’t about Jo, then the only thing I can think of that would upset Miss Lindsay that much is Anthony.’

‘Put it together, Faith. Reuben Figaroa went to Kilpatrick’s office Monday morning. Next, they both met with his lawyer. Reuben spent the rest of the day visiting three different banks, and now they’re all at the house, early in the morning, fully dressed, waiting for a phone call. What does that tell you?’

‘Ransom,’ Faith said. ‘Angie kidnapped her grandson.’

ELEVEN

Will paced outside Jane Doe’s hospital room while her doctors did their morning rounds. He stuck his hands in his pockets as he paced. He felt weirdly exhilarated, almost giddy, even though he hadn’t slept last night. He was thinking more clearly now than he had in the last thirty-six hours. Obviously Angie thought she could wind him up with her mind games, but all she had done was laser-focus his desire to bring her down.

And he was going to bring her down hard, because he knew exactly what she’d been doing.

‘Will?’ Faith said. ‘What are you doing here?’

He didn’t stop to explain himself. Everything that had been knocking around his head for the last seven hours exploded out of his mouth. ‘I looked back at my notes from the Rippy rape investigation. Reuben Figaroa was Rippy’s main alibi at the party, and Jo Figaroa was her husband’s main alibi. Angie knew this. She also figured out that Jo was a junkie, and junkies are really easy to control. She manipulated Jo into blackmailing her husband. If Jo broke Reuben’s alibi, then that broke Rippy’s alibi, and the whole thing came crumbling down. But instead of caving in and paying them off, Reuben went to Kilpatrick. Kilpatrick put Harding on to solving the problem. Harding called the cops in to bust Jo, and when that didn’t shut her up, he solved it by killing her.’ He felt himself smiling, because all the clues had been there right from the beginning. ‘Angie called me to clean up the mess, because that’s what she does.’

Faith didn’t say anything for a few seconds. Finally she asked, ‘How would Angie know about the witness statements?’

‘They were in my files at home. She must’ve seen them. I know she saw them.’ He realized he was talking too fast and too loud. He slowed himself down. ‘She mixed up the witness statements. She knows my system, the color coding, and she mixed them up to let me know that she’d seen them.’

‘Where’s Sara?’

‘Downstairs, watching the autopsy.’ He gripped Faith’s arms. ‘Listen to me. Angie lost her leverage when Jo died. She’s trying to get us-’

‘We think Angie kidnapped her grandson.’

Will felt his grip loosen on her arms.

‘He wasn’t at school yesterday. He didn’t show up this morning.’

Will scanned her eyes, trying to understand where this was coming from. ‘He could have a cold, or-’

‘Come over here.’ She led him to the chairs across from the nurses’ station. She made him sit down, but she stood in front of him, stood over him really, and told him what she and Amanda had found.

Will’s earlier elation over cracking the case started to dissipate the moment she mentioned Miss Lindsay poking her head out when the phone rang. By the time she had finished recapping the last few hours, Will was leaned over in the chair, his hands clasped between his knees, completely deflated.

Everything she said made perfect sense. The lawyers and bankers made sense. The expectation around the phone call made sense. Angie getting her daughter murdered and still trying to pull some cash out of it made sense.

What was wrong with him? How had he loved such a despicable person?

Faith said, ‘You could be right about the blackmail plan going sideways, only when Harding took out Jo-’

‘Angie saw Anthony as the perfect stand-in.’ Will rubbed his face with his hands. Survival of the fittest. Angie always kept moving forward. She didn’t worry about consequences because she never stuck around long enough to deal with them.

He said, ‘I hit Collier.’

‘I figured that out. I wish you’d hit him harder.’ She covered a large yawn with the back of her hand. ‘We’re going to have to rework Collier’s side of the case. He lied about Virginia Souza’s death by OD. She’s alive and kicking as of last week. We’ve got footage of her at the jail posting a cash bail on an eighteen-year-old picked up for solicitation. Delilah Palmer is still our only solid lead. She could be a victim. She could be a perpetrator. Either way, the first person she’d go to for help is her pimp. We need to find Souza. If she really is the mama in charge, then she’ll know who Delilah’s pimp is. We get the pimp, we get Delilah.’

‘Agent Trent,’ the doctor said. ‘You can talk to the patient now, but keep it brief and try not to excite her any more than she already is.’

Faith asked, ‘What’s she excited about?’

The doctor shrugged. ‘Free food, clean sheets, nurses to wait on her, cable TV. We replaced all of her blood, so this is probably the first time in decades she’s been clean. She’s been on the streets for twenty years. We’re like the Ritz here.’

‘Thanks.’ Faith asked Will, ‘Ready?’

Will wanted to stand, but he felt like he was weighted down with lead. Yesterday’s numbness had returned. Every lost minute of sleep slammed into him like a pile driver. ‘We can’t do anything, can we? About Anthony. His father hasn’t reported him missing. We can’t demand to see him because we don’t really have any proof that something’s wrong. Reuben’s got a wall of lawyers telling him his rights, and if he’s as much of a control freak as you say, he’s going to insist on handling all of this on his own.’

Faith said, ‘Amanda’s working on a warrant to tap his phones. She’s got four cars outside his house. If anyone leaves, they’ll be followed. But you’re right, you and I can’t do anything right now except work our end of the case.’

Will felt the elephant from last night take a tentative step onto his chest. He shook it off. He wasn’t going to humiliate himself again the way he had at the funeral home. ‘Angie said that Jo was my daughter. Sara says my blood type doesn’t rule me out.’

‘Do you believe Angie?’

He told Faith the only truth he knew. ‘All I can think about is punching her in the throat until her windpipe collapses so that I can see the panic in her eyes while she suffocates to death.’

‘That’s disturbingly specific.’ Faith got that expression on her face that told him she was going to try to mother him. ‘Why don’t you go home and get some rest? It’s been a tough couple of days. I can interview Jane Doe. Amanda should be here any minute. You probably shouldn’t be talking to a potential witness anyway.’

‘It’s already tainted. I’m the one who found her.’ Will stood up. He straightened his tie. He had to take a cue from Angie and keep moving forward. If he let the stress get to him, if he had another stupid panic attack, he’d never be able to hold up his head again. ‘Let’s do this.’

He let Faith lead the way. Jane Doe 2 was one of three Jane Does on the ward. Jane Doe 1 was in a quiet room at the end of the hall. Jane Doe 3 had a cop outside her door. Grady was Atlanta’s only publicly funded hospital. There were a lot of Does here.

Their particular Jane Doe was in a tiny room sectioned off by a glass window and a heavy wooden door that wouldn’t close all the way. Machines pumped and hissed. A heart monitor tracked beats. The lights had been left on. Both of Jane Doe’s eyes were blackened, because that’s what happened when your nose collapsed into your face. Heavy bandages were wrapped around the top two-thirds of her head, leaving her mouth and chin exposed. Greasy brown hair puffed out between the gauze. Two surgical drains, basically clear bags that caught excess fluid and blood from the wound, were dangling down either side of her face. She reminded Will of the colo claw fish from the bad Star Wars.

Jane stopped eating her Jell-O mid-bite when Faith and Will walked in. ‘Leave that door open. I don’t wanna end up being another black woman who dies mysteriously in police custody.’

Faith said, ‘First, you’re not in police custody, and second, you’re not black.’

‘Shit.’ Jane rubbed at her white arms. ‘How’d I manage to fuck up my life so bad, then?’

‘I’m assuming personal choice had something to do with it.’

Jane put down the empty cup. She sat back in bed. Her voice was raspy. She was older than Will had first thought, closer to fifty. He had no idea why he’d ever thought she might be Angie.

Jane said, ‘Whaddaya want? I gotta sponge bath in a few minutes, then Judge Mathis is on.’

‘We want to talk to you about Sunday night.’

‘What’s today?’

‘Tuesday.’

‘Holy shit, that was some blow.’ The drain bags flopped against her cheeks as she laughed. ‘God damm, bitch. Sunday, I was on the moon.’

Faith gave Will the look that said she didn’t have the patience for this.

He told Jane, ‘I feel like we got off on the wrong foot. I’m Special Agent Trent with the GBI. This is my colleague, Faith Mitchell.’

‘Call me Dr Doe, on account’a I’m in a hospital.’

Will doubted the woman was carrying an ID and he couldn’t fingerprint her without arresting her, which brought its own problems. He said, ‘All right, Dr Doe. Someone was murdered Sunday night in the building across the street from where we found you Monday morning.’

She asked, ‘Shot?’

‘We’re not sure. Did you hear a gunshot?’

Jane leveled him with a gaze. ‘Do you know that at least once a year, a dog shoots somebody?’ She seemed to think this was useful information. ‘You ask me, people should be real careful about keeping dogs in their homes. Aha.’ She looked past Will. Amanda was in the doorway. Jane said, ‘The captain always commands from the back of the ship.’

Amanda accepted the compliment with a nod of her head. ‘Agent Mitchell, why hasn’t this suspect been transferred to the prison ward downstairs?’

Faith said, ‘You mean the one with no TV or sponge baths?’

‘Damn, bitches, you don’t gotta go DEFCON so fast.’ Jane struggled to sit up in the bed. ‘All right, I got information. What’s in it for me?’

Amanda said, ‘You’ve got one more day in the ICU, then you’ll be transferred downstairs to the regular patient wards. I can get you a couple of extra days on the ward. After that, you’ll be enrolled in a treatment program.’

‘Nah, I don’t need no program. I’m back on the coke as soon as I get outta here. I’ll take the extra two days, though. And you’ll give it to me because I was in the building when it happened.’

‘The office building?’ Will asked.

‘No, the whatsit, the one with the balcony.’ Her brown teeth showed in a smile beneath the bandages. ‘Now I got your attention.’

Faith crossed her arms. ‘What time did you get there?’

‘Aw, shit. They stole my Rolex.’ She patted her wrist. ‘What time? How do I know what time it is, bitch? It was dark outside. There was a full moon. It was Sunday. That’s what I know.’

Faith stepped back so that Amanda could take over. She knew when a witness had turned against her.

Amanda said, ‘Start with the gunshot.’

‘I was across the street in the office building, bedding down for the night, right? Then I hear this gunshot and I’m like, “What the fuck?” Like, could it be a backfire from a car? Could it be a gangbanger, which, holy shit, that ain’t my jam.’ She coughed to clear some phlegm from her throat. ‘Anyway, so I’m lying there thinking about what can I do. Then I decide I need to check it out in case there’s some kind of gang thing going down, get my ass outta there, ya know?’

Amanda nodded.

‘I’m on the third floor, tucked up in my crib, so it takes me a little while to get down. Place is a goddam deathtrap. Before I’m out the door, I hear a car streak off, like burning rubber.’

Will bit his lip so a curse wouldn’t slip out. Jane Doe had gotten there too late.

Amanda clarified, ‘You heard a car leaving the scene?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Did you see the car?’

‘Sort of. Looked black, with some red along the bottom.’

Angie’s car was black with red stripes.

Jane said, ‘But there was another car in the parking lot. White, kind of foreign-looking.’

Dale Harding’s Kia.

‘And, so, I go back up to my crib, right? Don’t need to get involved in that shit with cars running off in a hurry. I been out there on the street long enough to know a deal gone bad when I see it.’

Will felt a moment of disappointment, but then Jane started talking again.

‘So I’m back up in my crib, just lyin’ there, and I get to thinking, well, shit, you know what I’m thinking. Maybe I got it wrong. This is a transactional kind of neighborhood. I got some scratch in my pocket. There’s a car outside that building, another car just screeched off, it seems like there’s gonna be a dealer inside, right? Simple economics.’ She pushed herself up in the bed again. ‘So I mosey on back across the parking lot, go inside the building, and it’s dark as shit. Windows are tinted or something. I’m walking around blind and then my eyes get with the program and I see there’s this gal on the floor. At first I thought she was dead. Started checking her pockets, but then she moved and I was like, “Whoa.” ’

Amanda asked, ‘This is the bottom floor, not the upper level?’

‘Correct-o-mundo.’

‘Where was she lying on the floor, exactly?’

‘Shit, I dunno. I’d need a map, right? Not like I was paying attention. I just walked into the building and boom, there she was.’

‘What did she look like?’

‘Dark hair. White gal. She’s laid out on her side. Can’t move her arms and legs, can barely move her head, but she’s making this moaning sound so I’m like, “All right, that’s it. I’m gettin’ the fuck outta here,” only I can’t because there’s another car pulls up in the parking lot.’

‘The same car?’

‘Yeah, but I seen it for real this time. Square nose like an older car. But I ain’t no car expert, right?’

Angie’s Monte Carlo was black with a square nose. Why had she returned to the scene? Why had she left in the first place?

Amanda asked, ‘How much time had passed since the car first peeled off?’

‘Mebbe ’bout thirty minutes? I dunno. Don’t have to punch a clock in my line of business.’ Jane continued, ‘So, the car is out front, so I booked it to the back. Hid behind that bar thing. Peeking out, like…’ She elongated her neck. ‘And I see this second bitch comes in. Tall. White. Long hair like the first one. Thinner. Don’t ask me what her face looked like because who the hell can see in that place? Like a fucking tomb.’ She pointed to the pitcher on her bedside table. ‘Gimme some of that, will ya, honey?’

Will was closest, so he poured some water into a Styrofoam cup.

Jane took a drink, drawing out the tension with a loud gulping sound. ‘Okay, so the second bitch comes in, and she’s just fucking furious, right? Kicking things around. Cursing. Motherfuck this. Motherfuck that.’

Definitely Angie. But why was she mad? What had she screwed up?

‘She goes upstairs like she’s marching against Hitler, you know what I mean? Feet just pounding.’ She put down her cup. ‘I hear her upstairs, doing what, I don’t know. Throwing shit around. Going in and out of rooms. Leaving shit. Moving shit.’

Staging the crime scene.

‘She’s got a flashlight. Did I tell you that?’

Amanda said, ‘No.’

‘One’a them little lights that’s real strong. That’s why I’m not leaving my cover, right? Didn’t want that light shining on me. Who knows what the bitch would do?’

She went silent.

Amanda repeated, ‘And?’

‘Oh, well eventually the bitch came back downstairs. She says another couple’a three motherfucks, kicks the chick on the floor. Real hard. And the chick, she moans loud-like: “Uhhhhhn.” That’s when it got interesting.’

Again Jane went silent.

Amanda warned, ‘Don’t draw this out.’

‘All right, I’m just trying to have some fun here. I don’t get to talk to people much.’ Jane took another drink of water. ‘So, bitch just stands there listening to her moan for a coupla minutes. Staring down at her like “You piece of shit.” Then, wham, bitch just grabs the chick by the leg and starts dragging her out of the building. And man…’ She shook her head. ‘That chick was moaning before, but when the bitch yanked on her leg, that’s when the screaming started.’

Will felt a pain in his jaw. Had Angie dragged her own mortally wounded, paralyzed daughter out of the building?

‘Then, bitch comes back in again and starts kicking things around again.’

Hiding the fact that she’d dragged a body across the floor.

‘She leaves for real this time. Next thing I hear something like a car door slamming. Lots of car doors slamming.’

Faith asked, ‘Could it have been a trunk?’

‘I don’t got, like, radar ears, bitch. It was just lots of things slamming shut on a car.’ She looked exasperated. She didn’t like Faith asking questions. ‘Anyway, then there’s this whoosh! like I don’t know what. Big whoosh. And I look up at the windows-now the windows are blacked out, right, but I see these flames shooting up like a Viking funeral. Just…’ She waved her arm around. ‘All over the place.’ She dropped her hand. ‘That’s it. The car pulled away.’

Amanda asked, ‘Did you see anyone else?’

‘Nah, that’s the truth. Just the bitch and the chick and the fire.’

‘No children?’

‘What the hell would a kid be doing there? It was the middle of the night. Should be tucked up in bed.’

Amanda asked, ‘You didn’t go upstairs to see what the first woman did up there?’

Jane licked her lips. ‘Well, I might’a. Just out of curiosity.’

Amanda rolled her hand, indicating she could continue.

‘There was a dude up there. Not dead, but just as good as. The light was better on account of the windows are right across from the balcony.’

‘And?’

‘Bastard was a fucking whale. Sleeping real sound, but like I said-not dead. But close. You could tell. Or at least I could. I seen some people die in my time. Pissed himself already. Had a doorknob in his neck. Like that guy from TV. You remember that show?’ She snapped her fingers twice, like in The Addams Family.

Will provided, ‘Lurch, but I think you mean Frankenstein.’

‘That’s right.’ She winked at him. ‘I knew you were the smart one, honey.’

Amanda said, ‘I’m waiting to hear where the coke came in.’

‘Dead guy’s jacket pocket.’ She patted her chest. ‘If I squatted down, stretched my arm real far, I could take it without getting blood all over me. Two fucking grams. I ain’t seen that much blow since I was a kid.’

‘So you went across the street because…’

‘I couldn’t stay in there with that guy dying. That’s just weird. And who knew if the bitch would come back? God damm, she already left and came back once.’ Jane started breaking off pieces of Styrofoam from the cup. ‘So I moseyed back across the street, partied until the sun came up. Then the cops rolled in, so I was like, shit, I better cheese it up the stairs. Once I started climbing, I couldn’t stop until I got to the top. That blow was fucking pure, man. One hundred percent.’

Will saw Faith roll her eyes. Every dealer said his blow was pure.

Amanda asked, ‘Is that it? You’re not leaving anything out?’

‘Hell, it don’t seem like it, but you never know, right?’

Amanda typed on her BlackBerry. ‘I’m going to have another agent take your statement. He’ll bring a sketch artist who will talk you through the night, try to jog your memory.’

‘That seems like a lot of trouble to go through.’

‘Consider it part of your get-out-of-jail-free card.’ Amanda motioned for Will and Faith to follow her out of the room. She walked a few feet down from Jane’s room, stopping in front of the nurses’ station.

Faith asked, ‘Do we believe her?’

Amanda said, ‘Charlie found a bloodstain on the lower level. He thought it came from a nosebleed.’

Will said, ‘Angie could know how to stage a crime scene.’

‘I’m trying to wrap my head around this.’ Faith tried to talk it out. ‘Somehow Jo bled out in the room upstairs, then she made her way to the bottom floor, where she collapsed. Angie leaves for some reason. She comes back for some reason. She drags Jo to her Monte Carlo, blows up Dale’s Kia, then drives off again?’ She added, ‘And leaves her own daughter marinating in her trunk for six hours?’

Will stifled his impulse to say that Angie wouldn’t do something like that.

Amanda said, ‘I’m getting a lot of pushback on that warrant for Figaroa’s telephone. We got the street surveillance approved, but just barely. No one has left the Figaroa house except Laslo. He was sent to McDonald’s for breakfast. He bought three cups of coffee and three breakfast platters.’

‘Three, not four, which means that they didn’t get anything for Anthony.’ Faith said, ‘Let me get my notes. I need to talk this out again.’

Will didn’t want to listen to another recap.

He looked past Faith’s shoulder, pretending that he was listening. He watched the nurse typing something onto a tablet computer. All of the patient files at Grady were digitized. The whiteboard behind the nurses’ station was still low-tech. They hand-wrote patient names and updated their status so that they could keep track of the ward. As Will watched, the nurse went to the board and erased Jane Doe 1. She wrote in a new name with a red marker. All caps, which was easier for him to read. And it helped that he had seen the name several times before.

He said, ‘Delilah Palmer.’

Amanda asked, ‘What about her?’

He pointed to the board.

The nurse had overheard him. She explained, ‘Domestic abuse. They can’t find the boyfriend. She walked into the ER with a knife sticking out of her chest.’

‘When?’ Faith asked.

‘Early Monday, right before my shift.’

Will said, ‘I thought we checked the hospitals for stabbing victims.’

‘We didn’t.’ Faith sounded furious. She told the nurse, ‘Olivia, the patient’s been Jane Doe One since I was here last night. What changed?’

‘The orderly checked her clothes before he took them down to the incinerator. He found her driver’s license.’ Olivia capped the marker. ‘She’s still in an induced coma, so you can’t interview her. Anyway, I thought this was being handled by the APD.’

Amanda asked, ‘Who caught the case?’

‘I can look it up here.’ Olivia referenced the tablet computer. Her face broke into a smile. ‘Oh, it was Denny. Denny Collier.’

TWELVE

‘Subarachnoid hemorrhage,’ Gary Quintana said. ‘That sounds like spiders.’

‘It’s a spidery area,’ Sara told him. ‘But basically it means she had bleeding in that part of the brain.’

‘Oh, wow. Weird.’ Gary continued reading Josephine Figaroa’s preliminary autopsy report. Whatever Amanda had said to the young man yesterday morning had clearly left a mark. His shirtsleeves were rolled down. He wore a knit tie in place of his heavy gold necklace. Even his ponytail had been neutered. Instead of jutting proudly from the back of his head, the hair had been gathered into a neat bun.

She was sad to see the ponytail go.

‘Okay.’ Gary read aloud from the conclusion. ‘Cause of death is an epidural hemorrhage. What’s that?’

‘It’s another type of intracranial bleed.’ Sara could tell he wanted to know more. ‘She experienced an external trauma to her head. The skull fractured, tearing her middle meningeal artery, which branches off the external carotid and helps supply blood to the brain. Blood filled the space between the dura mater and the skull. The skull holds a fixed volume, meaning it can’t expand. All of that extra blood put too much pressure on her brain.’

‘What happens when that happens?’

‘In general, the patient loses consciousness transiently. At the time of injury, they’re typically knocked out for a few minutes. Then they wake up and exhibit a normal level of consciousness. That’s why these bleeds are so dangerous. There’s a severe headache, but they’re lucid until the bleed progresses enough to shut down the brain. Left untreated, they slip into a coma and die.’

‘Wow.’ He looked at the gurney that held Figaroa’s body. They were standing in the hallway outside the APD morgue, which was located in the sub-basement of Grady Hospital. The gurney was pushed up against the wall, awaiting transport. Thanks to a batch of bad meth, the medical examiner had a full house.

Gary said, ‘She sure went through some hell.’

‘She did.’

He returned to the report. ‘What about “fracture of the cervical vertebrae?” That’s the neck, right? That sounds really bad, too.’

‘It is. She would’ve likely been paralyzed.’

‘Her heart was bruised, too.’ He frowned, disturbed by the findings. ‘Somebody whooped the hell out of her.’

‘Not necessarily.’ Sara explained, ‘The skull fractures are evenly distributed. The ribs and cervical vertebrae are fractured, as you said, but the thoracic vertebrae and long bones aren’t. She’s not really bruised except on one side. Did you notice that?’

‘Yeah, what’s that mean?’

‘That it’s very likely that she either fell or was pushed from a great height. The cervical fractures are a tip-off. You don’t get those from being beaten. She fell from at least twenty feet up. She hit the ground on her side. Her skull fractured, the artery tore, and then a few hours later, she died from the brain hemorrhage.’

‘That balcony inside the club was about thirty feet up.’ Gary looked at Sara with a sense of awe. ‘Wow, Dr Linton. That’s pretty cool how you scienced that out.’ He handed her the report. ‘Thank you for sharing all this with me. I really want to learn.’

‘I’m glad Amanda assigned you to my division.’

‘Yeah, she got me to slick up my look.’ He patted his tie. ‘I gotta represent, you know? The focus should be on the victims, not on me.’

Sara supposed this was reasonable advice. ‘I should track them down to let them know about the findings. Do you have any more questions?’

‘Yeah, she’s just, like, out here in the hallway. You think it’s okay if I put her back in the freezer?’

‘I think that would be very nice.’ Sara patted him on the shoulder as she walked toward the stairs. The ICU was six floors up, but the elevators at Grady worked on their own time and she needed to find Amanda sooner rather than later.

Of course, finding Amanda meant she would also find Will. Sara was shaken by an unwelcome reticence. She still wasn’t sure how she felt about last night. Will hadn’t wanted to talk in the car, but then he wouldn’t shut up once they got home. He hadn’t slept. He had been almost manic, spouting theories that were the equivalent of a snake eating its own tail. He was furious with Angie. He was deeply hurt, whether he would admit it or not. Everything that came out of his mouth was either talking around Angie or talking about her. Sara looked at him as a doctor and wanted to medicate him, and this time make sure he didn’t palm the pill. She looked at him as his girlfriend and wanted to wrap her arms around him and make everything better. Then she had looked at him as a woman who’d been married, who knew how to be in a healthy relationship, and wondered what the hell she had signed up for.

Sara pulled open the door to the ICU just as a man was yelling, ‘So fucking what?’

Holden Collier threw his hands into the air. His boyish affability was gone. It was no wonder why. Amanda, Faith and Will were crowding in on him. Two of the Grady security guards were standing close by, their hands resting on their guns.

Collier demanded, ‘Why would I report a domestic when we’re looking for an unexplained stabbing?’ He threw up his hands again. ‘It’s explained. The boyfriend did it. She won’t name him. What am I going to do?’

‘Tell me again.’ Amanda’s tone was hard as steel. ‘From the beginning.’

‘Unbelievable.’ Collier threw up his hands a third time.

Sara had no idea what he was being accused of, but his innocent act was filled with textbook overreaction.

He said, ‘I was already at the ER with a perp. I took the domestic. She was bleeding out, but I got her story. Boyfriend came after her with a knife. She won’t tell me his name. Where she lives, whatever. Same bullshit as usual. She went into surgery. I wrote the report. I told them to call me if her status changed. That’s my job.’ He wasn’t finished. ‘You’re so fucking hell-bent on jamming me up, you don’t even see what this case is really about.’

‘Tell me what it’s about.’

‘Rippy’s club is a shooting gallery. Gang tags are everywhere. Harding has a shit bucket in his closet. He was running drug mules up from Mexico and it got him killed, end of story.’

Amanda asked, ‘What about your relationship with Angie Polaski?’

Sara bit her lip. Angie. She would give her entire life savings to never, ever have to hear the woman’s name again.

Amanda said, ‘Sunday night into Monday morning, you had three calls back and forth with a burner phone. One of them lasted twelve minutes.’

‘I was talking to an informant. He uses a burner. They all use burners.’

‘Who’s the informant? I want his name.’

‘I’m not doing this here.’ Collier had finally realized he couldn’t bluster his way out of the problem. ‘If you want to question me, I’ve got a right to have my union rep in the room.’

‘Give him a call, Denny. This is happening.’

‘Can I go?’

‘We’ll be in touch.’

He stomped off, barely acknowledging Sara as he bumped open the door to the stairs.

Faith had her hands on her hips. She was furious. Amanda was furious. Will looked the same as he had for the last twenty-four hours, like a deer caught in the headlights.

Amanda said, ‘Dr Linton. What do you have?’

‘Nothing you’re going to like.’ Sara felt sorry to again be the bearer of bad news. ‘According to the preliminary autopsy report, Josephine Figaroa died of a brain bleed. The stab wounds in her chest were very shallow, post mortem, so there wasn’t any bleeding. The cut on her cheek was post mortem, so no bleeding. Her fingertips didn’t crack from the heat. Someone sliced them with a razor, probably to hide her identity, which doesn’t make sense, but that’s your department. Speaking from my department, I can tell you the finger cuts were post mortem too, because there was no bleeding.’

Amanda clarified, ‘You’re saying that the blood at the crime scene did not come from the woman who was autopsied downstairs.’

‘Exactly. All of her bleeding was internal. My guess is that she fell, probably from the balcony. Charlie said there was some blood on the ground floor. I’m assuming it came from her nose. She was alive for several hours, probably paralyzed, before the bleed killed her.’

Amanda didn’t seem surprised, which was not unusual, because she had a good poker face. What was puzzling was that neither Faith nor Will seemed surprised either.

Amanda asked, ‘Could it be possible that there was a second victim at the crime scene?’

‘Absolutely. The club was heavily trafficked over the last few months. Someone with even a rudimentary knowledge of crime scene investigation could temporarily pull the wool over our eyes. At least until the labs, fingerprints and analysis came back, which could take weeks, maybe months.’

‘Did you see any signs of a child?’

‘A child?’ Sara was confused. ‘You mean a toddler? Infant?’

‘Six years old,’ Faith said. ‘We have a missing kid. We think Angie took him.’

Sara’s hand went to her chest. She looked at Will, expecting him to be staring at the floor, but instead he looked back at her. There was a hardness to his expression that she had never seen before. His manicness was gone. Anger had enveloped him body and soul.

He said, ‘We think Angie had a blackmail plan going with Jo. Jo ended up dead, so Angie thought she could leverage the grandson.’

‘But she told you that Jo was dead. You had no idea that Jo even existed, let alone that she was Angie’s daughter. Why would she tell you anything?’

‘Something went wrong with the plan.’ Will had to be guessing, but he sounded certain that Angie had yet again risked someone else’s life for her own reward.

Amanda said, ‘Come with me.’ She took Sara into a room with a cop standing outside. The lights were low. Sara scanned the equipment by the bed: cardiac monitor, central line, catheter, NG tube, test tube. The patient’s right arm was elevated, propped on pillows-not too low so that the blood rushed into her fingers, not too high so that there wasn’t enough circulation. Surgical gauze and drains ballooned around the hand. O₂ sat measures were on the tips of her fingers.

Sara said, ‘Her hand was reattached.’

‘Yes.’

Sara studied the woman’s face. Brown hair. Olive skin. The eyes were swollen, but they still had the distinctive shape.

Amanda said, ‘She was admitted as a Jane Doe, but they found her ID this morning. Delilah Palmer.’

That name sounded familiar. Instead of asking Amanda more questions, Sara went back to the nurses’ station and asked to borrow a tablet computer. She still had her admitting privileges at Grady. The nurse, Olivia, knew her from before.

Olivia said, ‘The waiting room should be empty.’

Sara got the hint. Four people blocking the ICU hallway was never a good idea.

They all walked down to the empty waiting room. Will stayed at Sara’s side. His shoulder touched hers. He was trying to make sure the connection was still there. She couldn’t find it in herself to let him know this was true.

Sara sat down on one of the chairs. She logged into the system and scanned the woman’s CT, X-rays, MRI and surgical notes.

Finally something made sense.

Faith asked, ‘Well?’

Sara relayed the information from the chart. ‘She was stabbed sixteen times, mostly in the torso, twice in the head. The tip of the knife broke off in her collarbone, minimizing the reach of the blade, which is probably why it just missed the heart and liver. The bowel was punctured. Her left lung collapsed. What remained of the knife was left imbedded in her sternum. The first slash must have been to her arm.’ Sara held up her own arm, the same as she had done yesterday morning. ‘The attacker came straight at her. She took a defensive posture. The knife sliced her wrist, nearly severing the joint. She would’ve been flailing her arms, trying to stop the attack, which would spray blood everywhere, like a hose. Fortunately for the victim, the blade severed the radial and ulnar arteries. I say fortunately, because the arteries contract when they’re sliced in two. That’s why suicides tend to fail. You sever the artery, it rolls up into the arm and stops the blood almost like when you pinch the end of a garden hose to stop the pressure.’

Will asked, ‘That’s where all the blood came from, right?’

‘That volume of blood could definitely come from this type of injury.’ Sara studied the X-rays again. ‘This isn’t the first time she’s been attacked. She’s got several older, healed fractures to the face and head. Two breaks in her arm, probably separated by a few years. These are classic signs of abuse.’

Amanda asked, ‘Does the chart give Palmer’s blood type?’

‘They typed her when she came into the ER. It’s B-negative. Type is inherited. You would need either a B mother or B father to have it.’

‘Like Angie,’ Faith said.

Amanda asked, ‘Can you pull up Delilah Palmer’s past admits?’

Sara went back to the home screen. She found Delilah Palmer’s medical history, which hadn’t been ported into the ICU chart yet. ‘Palmer was born here twenty-two years ago. Ward of the state. Overdoses. PID times five. Bronchitis. Skin infections. Needle abscesses. Heroin addict. She had a baby two years ago. Hold on.’ Sara went back to the belly scans from two nights ago. ‘Okay, according to the most recent chart, the one that was started Sunday night, the woman lying in the bed at the end of the hall has a scar for a C-section.’ She flicked back through the screens. ‘But the older chart says that Palmer had a natural childbirth two years ago, which would fall in line with an episiotomy scar, which is what the body downstairs, the one Angie left at the funeral home, has.’ She looked up. ‘The body downstairs showed signs of long-term IV drug use, but there’s no indication of drug use in the woman at the end of the hall, who is supposed to be Delilah Palmer.’ Sara felt slow on the uptake. ‘The body downstairs is Delilah Palmer. Jo Figaroa is here in the ICU. Angie switched their identities.’

‘That’s what we think.’ Faith showed her two photographs on her iPhone. ‘The one on the right is Jo Figaroa. The one on the left is Delilah Palmer.’

Sara studied the two women. There was an eerie similarity. ‘Are they related?’

‘Who knows?’ Faith asked. ‘They both had the shit kicked out of them. Figaroa’s own husband couldn’t tell them apart.’

Sara didn’t point out that Will hadn’t been able to, either.

Faith said, ‘We have a witness who puts Angie sticking Palmer in her trunk. I’ve gotta assume that Angie mutilated the body so we couldn’t get a positive ID off the fingerprints.’

Sara asked, ‘Why would Angie want us to think that Jo Figaroa was dead?’

Will said, ‘She’s working a scam. That’s the only explanation. Our Jane Doe put together the night of the attack for us. Harding’s dying. Josephine is bleeding to death. Angie rushes Josephine to the hospital, then instead of leaving town or lying low, Angie drives back to the club to remove Delilah and stage the scene. That’s a lot of work for somebody who doesn’t like to do a lot of work. I guarantee you there’s some kind of payday at the end of this.’

Sara felt overwhelmed with disgust. She dropped the tablet on the chair beside her. She was sick of Angie’s games, and she was the only one in the group who actually had the luxury of walking away.

Will seemed to sense that she was at the end of her rope. ‘I’m sorry.’

Sara didn’t want to blame him. If ever there was a victim of Angie’s machinations, it was Will. ‘Do you have any idea where she is? Where she might be keeping a child?’

He shook his head, and she saw the idiocy of her question. If they knew where Angie was, they would be breaking down her door.

Faith said, ‘We can only hope that because he’s her grandson, she’ll… Motherfucker …’ Faith’s voice trailed off. ‘She’s here.’

They all turned in unison.

Angie had just stepped off the elevator. She looked up. Her mouth formed an ‘O,’ a perfect reflection of their shock. She tried to get back onto the elevator, but the doors closed. She scrambled toward the stairs.

She wasn’t fast enough.

Will had bolted the moment he’d seen her.

In seconds he’d closed the gap between them. His arm shot out. His fingers snagged the back of her collar. Angie was wrenched back by the neck. Her feet flew out from under her. She hit the floor. He picked her up and threw her into the waiting room. Chairs clattered, crashing into each other, tipping over. He snatched her up again, his fist went back. The only thing that kept Will from shattering her into pieces was the two security guards jumping on his back like they were taking down a charging bull.

‘Will!’ Faith yelled, leaping into the fray. She pushed him against the wall. ‘Stop it!’ She was panting, out of breath. She said, ‘Stop it,’ quieter, still making it clear she wasn’t going to let him do what he obviously wanted to do. ‘Calm down, okay? She’s not worth it.’

Will shook his head. Sara knew what he was thinking. Killing her was worth it. Hurting her was worth it.

Sara said, ‘Will.’

He looked at her, his eyes on fire.

‘Don’t,’ she said, though she wanted him to.

The fire abated. The sound of her voice seemed to relax some of the tension from his body. He held up his hands in surrender, telling Faith, ‘I’m okay.’

Faith stepped back, but she made sure that she stayed between him and Angie in case he changed his mind.

‘Shit, baby.’ Angie slumped onto the floor, chuckling like this had all been great fun. She wiped blood from her mouth and nose. There was more blood on her shirt, but it hadn’t come from her face. ‘Last time you came at me like that, we were both naked.’

Amanda said, ‘Arrest her.’

‘For what?’ Angie asked. ‘Getting beat up by a cop in front of a bunch of witnesses?’ Angie lifted the tail of her shirt to survey the damage. Her side had been stitched up, crudely, to close a wound. Will had broken open the sutures. ‘Anybody know a doctor?’

Sara said, ‘I’m not touching her.’

Angie laughed again. She shook her head. ‘Jesus.’

Will said, ‘Where’s Anthony? Who’s watching him?’

Angie pressed her hands to the floor, pushing herself up to standing. Her purse fell down her shoulder, another cheap knock-off bag. ‘Who’s Anthony?’

Will ripped Angie’s purse from her arm.

‘Hey…’

He held her back with one hand. He threw the purse at Faith.

Angie reached up for his hand, but Will pulled away as if she’d burned him with acid. He was clearly trying to keep his temper under control. The God’s honest truth was that Sara still didn’t want him to.

‘iPhone. iPad.’ Faith laid out the contents of Angie’s purse across two chairs. ‘Flip phone. Five-shot revolver, fired once. Prescription.’ She tossed the bottle to Sara. ‘Tissue. ChapStick. Change. Business cards. Purse crap.’

Sara looked at the bottle. The script was from a vet clinic off Cascade Road, prescribed to a pet named Mooch McGhee. Keflex, which was fine if you were a dog and couldn’t get MRSA. Sara put the bottle back on the chair. Angie could figure that out on her own.

‘Unlock it.’ Faith held out the iPhone to Angie. ‘Now.’

‘Go fuck yourself.’

Will took the phone. He unlocked it in two tries. He handed it back to Faith, who immediately went to the call log.

She said, ‘Collier’s number is on here. Twice last week. Three calls early Monday morning that match the times on his phone.’

That explained Collier. Yet another man whose life Angie had ruined.

Faith said, ‘She’s got a lot of calls back and forth from a 770 number.’ Faith hit the callback button. She let it ring for a full minute before hanging up. ‘No answer. No voicemail.’ Again she scanned the log. ‘This is all with the 770 number. Incoming at one forty Monday morning. Outgoing thirty-two seconds later. Then outgoing half an hour later. Incoming at four AM, then another incoming at one fifteen yesterday afternoon. Then seventeen outgoing calls over the rest of yesterday and into today.’

Will asked Angie, ‘Who are you trying to get in touch with?’

‘My mother.’

Amanda had her own phone out. ‘I’ll do a reverse trace.’

Faith went to the texts. ‘This was between the flip phone and Angie’s phone, twelve twenty Sunday night. She writes: WHAT DO YOU WANT? The flip phone writes back: IPAD. Then a few seconds later: NIGHTCLUB. NOW.’ She scrolled up and waited for a photo to download.

Faith’s mouth dropped open. She showed them the phone, stunned.

At 12:16 Sunday night, Angie had been sent a picture showing Josephine Figaroa with her back pressed against a car window. A man’s hand gripped her neck. She looked like she was screaming. Beneath it was the word DAUGHTER.

Faith scrolled up again. There was another photo, this one sent at 12:15 Sunday night. It showed a young boy with the blade of a large hunting knife pressed into his throat. The word below read GRANDSON.

Sara put her hand to her own heart. The boy’s terror cut through her like she was holding him in her own arms. ‘Where is he?’

Angie raised an eyebrow, as if this was yet another mystery.

‘Where-’ Sara made herself stop talking. Angie fed off pain.

Faith checked the flip phone, going through the sent messages. ‘The first photo I showed you, the one of Jo Figaroa, was taken with this flip phone. The second photo, of Anthony, was forwarded to the flip phone by the same 770 number that Angie has been trying to call.’

‘The 770 number is from a burner.’ Amanda had obviously heard back on the reverse trace. ‘We’re working with the phone company to find out which tower it’s pinging from.’

Will asked, ‘Who sent that picture of Anthony? Was it Delilah Palmer? Was it Harding?’

Angie ignored him.

Faith picked up the iPad. She pressed the home button.

‘Don’t,’ Angie said, for the first time registering concern. ‘You can’t turn it on.’

‘Why not? This is why your grandson was taken, right? For whatever is on this iPad?’

Angie pressed her lips together. She watched Faith’s finger on the button.

Will said, ‘Turn it on.’

‘No.’ Angie reached out to stop her, but Will pushed her away. She said, ‘If you turn the power on, then the files will be erased.’

‘What files?’

Angie said nothing.

Will said, ‘She’s lying. Turn it on.’

‘Go ahead,’ Angie dared. ‘The files will be gone and we’ll never see Anthony again.’

Faith asked, ‘Should we risk it?’

Amanda sighed. ‘It’s an hour in traffic to get it to the computer lab. We don’t know where the boy is. We don’t know if she’s telling the truth. The files might already be wiped clean. Or we turn it on and we wipe it clean.’

Will said, ‘Schrödinger’s cat.’

Angie clearly didn’t get the reference, which gave Sara a sense of victory because she did.

‘All you need is a Faraday cage,’ Sara said. ‘It’s a grounded metal screen that blocks electrical fields. That’s why your phone won’t work in an elevator. Go down to the sub-basement, stay inside the elevator and you can turn on the iPad without any signal interference.’

Angie snorted. She asked Will, ‘This is what gets you going?’

‘Yeah,’ he told her. ‘It is.’

Angie rolled her eyes. She still had her hand pressed to her stomach. Blood was seeping between her fingers. ‘What are you looking at?’

Sara couldn’t answer. She was gripped with the same low-level fury that had followed her around since Charlie told them that the Glock was registered to Angie. Every good moment Sara had with Will was always going to have Angie’s shadow lurking over it.

‘Aw.’ Angie pouted her lip. ‘Little Sara’s upset. Are we going to have another Bambi incident?’

Sara slapped the shit out of her.

Angie raised her hand to retaliate, but Faith caught her wrist, twisted her arm behind her back and forced her into the wall. ‘Don’t forget how many people were happy to hear that you were dead.’

‘Don’t forget how many weren’t.’ Angie wrenched her arm away. She rubbed her wrist. ‘Give me my shit back. I’m leaving.’

Will said, ‘You’re not going anywhere. Who has Anthony? I know you don’t have him.’

She shook her head, laughing like he was too stupid to understand.

‘You’ve never called anybody seventeen times in your life. You fucked this up, right? You lost Anthony and now you’re trying to get him back. That’s why you told me it was Jo in the funeral home instead of Delilah. You wanted me to go to Reuben Figaroa’s so that he was forced to put out an Amber Alert.’ He was standing close to her, crowding her space the way he would any suspect. ‘Your plan went sideways and you needed me to figure out that his son was gone.’ He stepped closer. ‘We’re here now. We know Anthony is gone. We know Reuben’s being blackmailed to get him back. Tell me what you know. Let me help make this right.’

‘What the fuck do you care, Will?’ She slammed her palms against his chest, pushing him away. ‘I can handle this, all right? I can take care of myself and my family the same as I’ve been doing all my fucking life with no fucking help from you.’

Will’s jaw jutted out like a shard of glass. ‘Your grandson’s life is at stake.’

‘You’re the one stopping me from doing what I’ve gotta do.’

‘Angie, please. Let me help you. I want to help you.’ He sounded desperate. ‘If that’s my grandson out there, then I deserve a chance to know him.’

‘Nice try.’ She pulled away. ‘Jo isn’t yours. Not unless you got my hand pregnant.’ She gave Sara a pointed look. ‘Which, if that was possible, your girlfriend would have a load of fetuses pouring out of her mouth.’

Sara tensed every muscle in her body so that she wouldn’t lash out again.

Angie asked her, ‘Did you read the note I left for Will?’

‘Yes.’

Angie was clearly thrown that there wasn’t more.

‘Please,’ Will said. ‘Angie, there’s a little boy out there. Your family. Maybe your only family. Tell us how to help him.’

‘Since when do you care about helping family?’ She gave a derisive snort. ‘I’m your family. I’m fucking bleeding and you don’t even care.’

Will took out his handkerchief. He pressed it to Angie’s side.

Sara felt her heart start to wither at the sight of him touching her so gently.

‘I’m sorry,’ he told Angie. ‘I didn’t mean for it to get like this. You’re right. It’s my fault.’

Angie glanced at Sara. Real or not, she wanted to make sure that Will’s obsequience had an audience.

Will said, ‘I know I hurt you. I’m sorry. Please, Angie. I’m sorry.’

Angie looked away from Sara, but only so she could soak up Will’s misery.

‘Please,’ Will repeated. Sara wanted to snatch the word out of his mouth. She hated the sound of his begging. ‘Please.’

Angie let out a short breath. ‘Do you know how bad things have been for me?’ Angie covered Will’s hand with hers. Sara couldn’t tell if she was breaking down or just playing Will like she always did. ‘Do you know the things I’ve had to do? Not just this week, but before?’

‘I’m sorry I wasn’t there.’

‘Harding was him, Will. When Deidre checked out, Harding was the guy on the other side of the door.’

Will took the words like a blow. This wasn’t an act. ‘You told me he was dead.’

‘He is now.’

Shock had almost rendered Will speechless. ‘Angie-’

‘What he did to me…’ Angie’s voice was low, troubled. She could see the effect her words were having on Will. ‘He did it to Delilah. He did it to a lot of girls. For years. I couldn’t stop him.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ His hand reached out. He stroked back her hair. ‘I could’ve done something. Protected you.’

‘I fucked up so bad, baby.’ Angie inhaled sharply. She was crying. ‘I know I fucked with you, but it was only to protect Jo. I had to buy her some time in the hospital, some time to heal, while I worked on getting Anthony back.’

‘I get it now,’ he said. ‘I understand.’

‘I don’t know how it all went so bad…’ She swallowed hard. ‘Dale was always smarter than me. Always stronger. He got inside my head again. Him and Mama, like they always did. I never saw it coming.’

‘We can still get Anthony back,’ Will said. ‘Let me help you.’

‘I just needed six more days. Then I could get Anthony, take care of Jo, make sure she got her happy-ever-after.’ Angie sniffed. ‘Somebody deserves a happy-ever-after, don’t they? Somebody needs-’ Her voice broke. ‘I can’t lose him, baby. I already abandoned her once. I can’t lose her kid.’

‘We’re not going to lose him.’ His hands went to her shoulders. He looked her in the eyes. ‘When you said your mother sent you the photo of Anthony, you meant Virginia Souza, right?’

Angie stiffened.

‘Right?’ he repeated.

Angie jerked away. ‘You fucking asshole.’

Will’s face registered a deep satisfaction. For once, he’d managed to be the one doing the manipulating.

He told Amanda, ‘Dale Harding was Angie’s pimp. Virginia Souza was his bottom girl.’ He wiped his hands on his shirt like they were dirty. ‘Virginia has Anthony. She’s the one who took the picture. She’s the one who has him.’

Angie glared at him. ‘I fucking hate you.’

He stared at her with a look of utter contempt. ‘Good.’

Amanda asked Angie, ‘Where is Virginia Souza?’

‘Go fuck yourself, you dried-up old bitch.’

‘All right. You’ve outspent your welcome.’ Amanda told Faith, ‘Take her down to the prison ward. Get her some medical attention.’

‘No!’ Angie panicked. ‘Leave me up here. Handcuff me to Jo’s bed if you have to.’

Amanda tried again, ‘Where is Virginia Souza?’

‘She’s not gonna hurt him. The father’s the highest bidder.’ She had her arms crossed low on her belly. She was pressing into the wound, making the blood run. She tried again with Will. ‘There’s a video on that iPad. Something that’s worth a lot of money. Virginia knew I had it. She said she’d trade Anthony for the iPad. I was supposed to meet her yesterday morning, but she double-crossed me.’

He was still unmoved. ‘Virginia called Reuben Figaroa directly. That’s why you wanted me to intervene. I get Anthony back for you, and then what? You sell whatever is on the iPad?’

‘I don’t give a shit about the money. You know that, baby.’

Amanda asked a third time, ‘Where is Virginia Souza?’

‘You don’t think I’ve been looking for her?’ Angie demanded. ‘She’s lying low. Not in her usual places. Nobody will tell me where she is. They’re scared of her. They should be.’ Angie wiped her eyes again. She always saved her tears for herself. ‘You can’t trust her. She’s a cold bitch. She doesn’t care who gets hurt, especially kids.’

Sara chewed at the irony.

‘There’s something else.’ Faith asked Angie, ‘Why did you come here?’

‘To say goodbye to Jo, in case…’ Angie looked out into the hall. ‘I kept waiting for the Amber Alert, but it didn’t come.’

Faith said, ‘Reuben won’t report him missing. He’s trying to handle it on his own.’

‘I figured.’ Angie took one of the tissues from her purse. ‘I was going to go to his house and shoot him in the head.’

The casual way she detailed her plan to murder a man sent a shiver of cold through Sara’s veins.

Angie blew her nose, wincing at the pain in her side. ‘Without Reuben, the iPad matters again. I could do what I was going to do in the first place. Trade the iPad for Anthony.’

‘With Kip Kilpatrick?’ Faith guessed.

Angie was still trying to get Will’s attention. He was deliberately looking away from her. She said, ‘I know I fucked this up, baby. I was just trying to help my daughter. She doesn’t even know who I am.’

Will’s face was stone. Angie had no idea what she had done to him. Sara’s only hope was that this new-found clarity would last longer than the crisis at hand.

Amanda’s phone rang. She listened for a beat, then told them, ‘Reuben Figaroa left his house. Laslo Zivcovik is in the car with him. They’re going west on Peachtree. Just crossed over Piedmont. We’ve got three cars on chase. The other stayed at the residence.’

Faith said, ‘He’s going away from downtown, toward the malls. Public place. Lots of people. That’s where I’d do an exchange.’

Amanda looked at her watch. ‘The mall just opened. There won’t be much of a crowd yet.’

Angie said, ‘He’s doing reconnaissance. That’s why he brought Laslo. Reuben is a control freak. He thinks his wife has been murdered. Somebody stole his son and is demanding money. This is why I wanted to go through Kip. I told Virginia that Reuben would shoot her in the head if he ever got the chance.’

Amanda said, ‘I don’t know how fast I can get SWAT there. The Buckhead precinct can do deep backup. We’ve got three agents in three cars. We’re at the end of rush hour. It’ll take an hour for us to get up to Buckhead. We can go lights and sirens part of the way, but-’

Sara said, ‘There’s a helicopter on the roof.’ She had flown in the air ambulance for emergency transports. ‘The Shepherd Spinal Center has a heliport. That’ll cut your travel time to fifteen minutes.’

‘Perfect,’ Amanda said. ‘Faith, handcuff Angie to the bed, get someone from APD to sit on her. Make sure they’re not connected to Collier. Will goes with me in the chopper. He’s the better shot and Reuben hasn’t seen his face.’ She tossed her keys to Will. ‘My rifle is in the back of the car. The magazines are in the lockbox. Get my speedloader and a pack of ammo.’

Instinctively Sara grabbed Will’s arm. This was happening too fast. Amanda was talking about shooting people. People shooting back. Sara didn’t want him to leave. She didn’t want to lose him.

Will cupped his hand to Sara’s face. ‘I’ll see you back home when this is over.’

THIRTEEN

Will studied the map on the wall inside the security offices at Phipps Plaza. There were a thousand ways the hand-off between Reuben Figaroa and Virginia Souza could spin out of control. Deshawn Watkins, the chief of security, outlined a few of them for Amanda.

‘There are four possible points of approach directly into level three.’ Deshawn pointed out three different escalators and the elevator that serviced all three levels inside the main atrium. ‘Then there’s another set of escalators if you go through the Belk department store. One up, one down. Then there’s this elevator here inside Belk, and another elevator here at the street entrance. None of the main elevators go to the parking garage except this one here and here.’

Amanda said, ‘So we’re effectively inside a sieve.’ She looked at her watch. They were assuming that the meet would take place on the hour or half-hour. She told Will, ‘It’s eleven sixteen. If we get past noon, we’re going to have to rethink this. There’s no telling how many people will turn up here for lunch.’

Deshawn said, ‘You’re talking most of the people who work in the stores, a lot more kids. This place is filled by twelve thirty.’

Will rubbed his jaw as he studied the map on the wall. The layout was familiar. He’d been to Phipps with Sara more times than he would’ve liked. The mall was three levels, stacked like a wedding cake, with the smaller top tier pushed to the front. There was a round open atrium that ran through all three floors. The railings were glass with polished wood and gold handrails. The elevator had a glass back. Will couldn’t help but be reminded of Marcus Rippy’s nightclub, though the ambience was the exact opposite. The floors were sparkling clean. Skylights brought in ample sunshine.

Reuben Figaroa sat in the food court area on the third level, the same as he’d been the entire time. He had picked a good location to trade off his son. Or maybe Virginia Souza had chosen the spot. Even on a Tuesday, the top level was a mecca for pre-school children. The Legoland Discovery Center hosted Toddler Time every Tuesday morning. The movie theater was running a cartoon marathon. Kids weren’t the only problem. There was a large open food court with several fast-food restaurants. Scattered through the rest of the mall were elderly mall walkers and shoppers perusing the over one hundred stores.

If Will was going to trade off a kid for money, this is where he’d do it.

Then again, they didn’t know whether or not Reuben Figaroa meant to make a trade.

A public place. A controlling man who owned a lot of guns. A terrified little boy. A woman who had built her life around hurting kids.

This could go like clockwork or it could go like hell.

Will mentally walked through the best-case scenario: Souza walks into the mall with Anthony. The good guys scoop up the kid and return him to his father. Second-best: Souza manages to give them the slip as she makes her way to the food court, she trades Anthony for the money, the good guys isolate her on the second level, then make an arrest.

Will didn’t want to think about the worst-case scenario, the one where Reuben, who didn’t mind hitting women, demanded payback. The one where Virginia Souza had a gun or a knife and a kid in her hands. The one where they went to a second location that there was no way to control.

Then there was Laslo.

Then there was the possibility that Souza had an accomplice.

As the mama in charge, she had her pick of young girls who would do her bidding. Any one of them-any two or three of them-could be posing as one of the young mothers in the food court.

Souza’s girls were street savvy. They would know what a cop looked like. They could warn Souza. They would have her back if the trade went south. They were all as feral as Angie, hardened and mean and desperate to do whatever it took to protect their family.

Amanda said, ‘She won’t take the elevators. That’s not a quick getaway.’

‘It wouldn’t make sense to go down to the parking garage.’ Deshawn pointed to the map again, the glass elevator in the atrium. ‘She’d have to go down two levels, then this is the closest exit. But we can keep the elevators from going down to the garage if you want.’

‘Do that.’ Will told Amanda, ‘Reuben has the knee brace. He won’t be able to move fast.’

‘Let’s hope it’s not Reuben we’re following out of this mall.’ Amanda asked Deshawn, ‘How would you get out of here? Down the escalators to the second level, then what?’

‘Level one is the only way out.’ Deshawn was still at the map. ‘If we take out the parking garage, there are twelve street entrances. Three each at Belk, Saks and Nordstrom. Then we’ve got two more entrances off Monarch Court and one more entrance off the Avenue of the South. Either one can take you to Peachtree or the interstate. I’d go this exit at the valet parking station.’

‘Makes sense,’ Amanda said. ‘Reuben’s car is parked in front of Saks. He takes a right, he’s in the car, then onto the interstate.’

‘Or home,’ Will said, but Amanda’s look told him that she didn’t think it was likely.

Her radio clicked. She walked to the other side of the room, checking in with the team. Twelve uniformed cops from the APD’s Buckhead precinct were scattered around the mall. SWAT was on the roof and staked out across the buildings on the corner. Mall security was keeping to its regular rounds so as not to raise suspicion. Three of the GBI agents from the chase cars outside Reuben’s house were spread out near the escalators. The fourth was trailing Laslo, who had been casing the mall for the last hour and a half.

Angie was right about Reuben Figaroa. He had come early to give himself a tactical advantage. Which was good, because it had given Amanda time to set up her people too.

Will’s biggest concern was, had Virginia Souza done the same?

All they had to identify the woman by was her last booking photo, which had been taken four years ago. Her long, stringy brown hair and smeared make-up made her look like central casting’s idea of an old whore. If Souza was as smart as Angie said, she’d know that she couldn’t walk into Phipps Plaza looking like herself. The mall was too high-end for her to go unnoticed.

Deshawn said, ‘We can call in maintenance, maybe put up a barrier on that escalator, make it look like it’s broken down.’

Will said, ‘I’m worried that might tip him off.’

‘He doesn’t look jumpy.’

‘No,’ Will said, but that wasn’t necessarily a good thing. A composed man was a man who had made up his mind.

They could detain Reuben. You didn’t need cause to do that. But then Souza might have a spotter who warned her off, and the next time they saw Anthony he would be in a gutter or on the internet.

Will looked at the bank of high-definition monitors on the wall. The displays were in full color. There was no need to toggle through the different security cameras. There were sixteen screens. The largest monitor, the one in the center of the wall, showed Reuben Figaroa.

He was sitting at the back of the food court, one level up from where Will stood. The open atrium was at his shoulder. There was no way he could escape over the side. Even a basketball star couldn’t survive a three-story fall. Fortunately, the tables immediately around him were vacant. The other shoppers were keeping a wide berth. The mothers seemed especially suspicious of a man sitting alone in the place where they had brought their children.

Reuben had come incognito, a Falcons hat tight on his bald head. A laptop was on the table in front of him. He was slumped in the chair in an attempt to conceal his height. His mustache and goatee had grown into a full beard, because he was one of those guys who needed to shave every four hours. He was wearing a black T-shirt and black jeans, not exactly combat gear, but close enough. A large duffel bag was at his feet. Because of the T-shirt, they knew he wasn’t wearing a gun, but the duffel bag was easily large enough to accommodate a rifle or an automatic machine gun or a handgun, or all three.

Amanda was off the radio. She told Will, ‘Laslo just left the mall. He moved the car to the Ritz-Carlton. He’s parked in the valet lane. This is about to happen.’

Deshawn said, ‘He’ll leave out the Nordstrom side to get to the Ritz.’

‘I’ll let SWAT know.’ Amanda gave Will the radio, then headed toward the door. ‘Faith is on her way up. I’ll take my place. Will, be ready to move wherever you’re needed. Belt and suspenders.’

Deshawn picked up a desk phone. He told Will, ‘I’ll tell Nordstrom security we think they’re going to see some action.’

Will watched the monitors. The security office was right outside a single escalator that led to the top floor. Amanda held on to the handrail as she climbed. Like Reuben, she was in disguise, dressed in a pastel-blue tracksuit and white T-shirt that she had picked up at one of the stores. Her big purse was empty except for her revolver and three speedloaders. She was wearing glasses. A floppy white old-lady hat was on her head. Like everyone else on the team, she wore an earbud that worked as a two-way radio, picking up her speech through a vibration in her jaw.

Instead of walking toward Reuben, she sat down at one of the tables outside Belk, about sixty feet away. She kept her back to him. Phil Brauer, one of the agents from the chase cars, was already at the table with two cups of coffee. They blended in well, passing for an old retired couple with time on their hands.

Amanda said, ‘We’re in place.’

Deshawn asked Will, ‘You sure we don’t just clean this place out?’

‘It’ll tip her off.’

‘That’s a big risk.’

‘We’ve got someone inside the Legoland, another at the theater. We’ll lock down everything the moment there’s any sign of trouble.’

‘What about the pedestrians?’ He pointed to the monitor showing the food court. ‘There’s at least a dozen people there.’

Will had counted nine, including a table of four young mothers with babies in strollers. Amanda had placed herself between the women and Reuben Figaroa. ‘If we don’t get this kid today, then the woman who has him will trick him out to the nearest pedophile.’

‘Jesus.’ Deshawn let that sink in. ‘What’s your plan if she tries to run off with the kid, takes him hostage or something?’

Will tapped the rifle on his shoulder.

‘Jesus.’

Faith entered the room. She was wearing the black suit she kept in the trunk of her car instead of her usual GBI blue shirt and khakis. Her gun was on her hip. She nodded at Deshawn, asking Will, ‘What’ve we got?’

‘Amanda is here with Brauer. She put herself between Reuben and this table.’ He pointed to the four young mothers. They were laughing. One of them was feeding her baby. Another was on her phone.

Faith said, ‘They can take cover inside the Belk if they need to.’

Will said, ‘We’ve got one of our guys inside Legoland. Store security knows to bring down the gate if there’s trouble. They’ve been keeping the kids to the back where there’s a birthday party. The gift store is at the front so there aren’t a lot of potential problems there. Same with the movie theater. The cartoon lets out at noon, but we’ve got APD inside, behind the concession stand and at the mall exit, ready to lock them in place.’ He showed her the map on the wall. ‘We’ve got the escalators covered here, here, here and here.’ He pointed to the corresponding areas. ‘Laslo is parked across the street from here. SWAT is outside.’

‘They’re good. I didn’t see them.’

‘We gave all the store managers Souza’s booking photo. They’ve been told not to approach her. We didn’t want to pass the photo to the clerks and start a lot of chatter.’

‘She’s not going to look like her booking photo.’

‘It’s all we have.’

Faith stared at Reuben Figaroa. ‘I don’t like that duffel bag. Even with a million bucks in cash, it doesn’t need to be that big.’

Will followed her gaze to the monitors. Reuben was still sitting at the table staring at his laptop. ‘We had one of our guys sitting near him, but Reuben got spooked, so we had to pull back.’

‘He couldn’t tell what was in the bag?’

‘No, but Reuben’s been looking at pictures of the wife and kid on the laptop, scrolling through them over and over again.’

‘Who’s that?’

Will looked at the big monitor. A young woman was walking toward Reuben. She sat down three tables away. Her head was bent toward her phone. White earbuds disappeared into her hair. She was wearing what most of the other mothers were wearing, some variation on a gym outfit.

Reuben stared at the woman for a long while before turning back to his laptop.

Faith said, ‘Her shoes are wrong.’

Will looked at the red shoes. They were slip-ons. ‘You mean because she’s not wearing sneakers?’

‘A woman who can sit around a mall on a Wednesday morning in her workout clothes doesn’t buy her shoes at Walmart.’ She added, ‘Also, why is she here if she isn’t with a kid?’

Will studied the other women on the periphery of the food court. Invariably they had some form of child attached to them, whether they were holding a baby or dragging a toddler away from Legoland.

Deshawn said, ‘It’s eleven twenty-eight.’

‘Green jacket.’ Faith stepped closer to the monitors. ‘That’s a woman, right?’

An androgynous-looking woman was waiting outside the elevator on the first level. She was wearing dark sunglasses and a Braves baseball cap with the brim pulled low. Her jeans were dark blue. The dark green jacket was zipped almost to her neck. Her hands were tucked into the pockets.

Deshawn said, ‘She doesn’t work here. At least not so that I’ve noticed.’

‘Is that Souza?’ Faith asked. ‘She could have the kid somewhere else, maybe in a car downstairs.’

A second location. The worst of the worst-case scenarios.

Will got on the radio. ‘We need a quiet sweep of the garage. Check for Anthony in a parked car.’

The woman pressed the elevator button again. Her hand went back into her jacket pocket. There was something furtive to her movements. She was clearly nervous.

Will clicked on the radio again. He told Amanda, ‘We might have someone in the elevator. Green jacket. Stand by.’

‘Ten-four,’ Amanda said.

‘She doesn’t look young, right?’ Faith practically had her nose touching the monitor. ‘The way she carries herself. She’s not talking on her phone or listening to music. It’s too hot for that jacket.’

Deshawn said, ‘We’ll see her face when she gets on the elevator.’

The doors slid open. Green Jacket didn’t look up as she got on. She kept her head down, hands still tucked deep into her pockets. The doors started to close, but her arm shot out, stopping it.

‘Shit,’ Faith said. Yet another woman was getting onto the elevator. Tall, blonde ponytail, dressed in a V-necked T-shirt and running shorts. She was trying to wrangle a two-seater baby stroller onto the elevator. An infant was in the front seat. A little girl dressed like a character from the Lego movie slept in the back.

‘I don’t like this,’ Faith said. ‘That’s two kids. Two hostages.’

As they watched, Green Jacket leaned down, gripping the front of the stroller and pulling it onto the elevator. There was an exchange of pleasantries before the doors closed. They silently rode up to the third level.

‘She’s still not looking at the camera,’ Faith said. ‘Nobody keeps their head down all of the time like that.’

Will held the radio to his mouth. ‘Green Jacket, getting off the elevator.’

Phil Brauer stood up from the table. He threw away his coffee cup in the trashcan. Green Jacket helped the blonde maneuver the stroller out of the elevator, then walked toward the movie theater. Brauer sat down at another table. He put his phone to his ear. Will heard the man’s voice on the radio. ‘Can’t tell with the hat. She’s got dark hair. Looks about the right age.’

They all leaned closer to the screens. Green Jacket stood in front of the box office. She looked up at the board that showed the movie times.

‘Is it her?’ Faith asked. ‘I can’t-’

‘Contact,’ Amanda said.

Reuben Figaroa was standing up.

The blonde with the tandem stroller stood on the other side of his table.

Virginia Souza.

The bottom girl had cleaned up well. She had dyed her hair honey blonde instead of bleaching it. Her make-up was understated. Her clothes accentuated her body but didn’t show off too much. The ponytail gave her a more youthful look. She had been here before, taking time to study the other women to make sure she would blend in.

‘It’s Anthony,’ Faith said.

She was right. Anthony was in the back of the stroller. He was dressed in pink. His legs were folded up underneath him. He was too big for the seat. His eyes were closed. They were shaped like Angie’s. His skin was Angie’s. His jeopardy was Angie’s.

Will clicked the radio. ‘It’s her. She has Anthony and an infant in the stroller. There’s a second woman, probably backup, three tables over, red shoes.’

Amanda said, ‘Alpha team, Delta team, lock down.’

She was closing off Legoland and the theater.

Faith asked, ‘What are they saying? They’re just standing there.’

There was obviously a terse exchange going on between Reuben and Souza. Will saw that the man’s fists were tightly clenched. He kept looking at his son, then at Souza, like he couldn’t decide whether or not losing Anthony was worth the pleasure of killing her.

‘She told him about her backup,’ Faith guessed. ‘That’s the only reason he’s not on top of her. Red Shoes has to have a gun.’

‘The iPad,’ Will said, because he knew how these women worked. ‘Souza wants to put Reuben on the hook for more money. She thinks she can get the iPad from Angie.’

Amanda cut in. ‘Brauer texted. He can’t hear them. He can’t see what Red Shoes is doing. Can anyone see her hands?’

Will told her, ‘She’s got her phone in her lap.’

‘The purse,’ Faith said, because like almost every woman there, Red Shoes had a purse that could easily accommodate a handgun.

Phil Brauer moved his chair, turning sideways. He was holding out his cell phone like he needed glasses to read something, using his peripheral vision to check on Green Jacket.

She was still looking at the box office times. She still had her hands in her pockets.

Faith said, ‘They’re sitting down.’

Reuben was in his chair. He didn’t slump like before. His shoulders were straight. His legs were so long that his knees reached the other side of the small table. Souza had to keep her chair pulled back so that she could face him. Her mouth kept moving. She seemed blind to the effect her words were having.

Faith said, ‘This is taking too long. She’s worked men more than half her life. Why can’t she see that he’s about to explode?’

‘Just go in.’ Deshawn sounded desperate. ‘Why aren’t you guys moving? Nobody’s armed.’

‘You don’t need a gun to throw a baby over the side of that balcony.’

‘Jesus.’

Will squinted at the infant in the front seat of the stroller. ‘Can you tell if the baby is moving?’

Faith shook her head. ‘Where’s the diaper bag, the sippy cups, the extra blankets, the wipes?’

‘You think it’s fake?’

‘Why would she bring a baby? They’re too much trouble.’ She said it again, ‘This is taking too long.’

Reuben Figaroa seemed to be thinking this same thing. He had his hands clasped together in his lap. He wasn’t reaching for his duffel bag. He wasn’t talking. He glared at Souza as she lectured him. His anger was like a third person at the table. Will could almost see the crank on his back winding tighter and tighter. Souza either had no idea what she was doing or she assumed that she had all of the power.

Reuben Figaroa didn’t like women with power.

‘Red Shoes is getting up.’

The young woman stood and walked toward the escalator. Her phone was pressed to her ear.

Will kept his eyes on Virginia Souza. She was warning Reuben about something, giving him an ultimatum. Her finger jammed into the air. She didn’t seem to notice that her chair was moving, sliding her closer and closer to the table.

Will said, ‘He’s got his feet hooked around the chair legs.’

‘What’s he doing under the table?’

Reuben’s hands were working on something, peeling at something.

Will put the radio to his mouth.

It happened so fast that he didn’t have time to press the button.

Souza’s chair yanked forward, pinning her to the back. Reuben plunged a large knife straight into her throat. Her hands went up. He grabbed her wrists, holding them with one hand while with the other he stabbed her belly again and again underneath the table.

‘Shit!’ Faith hissed.

Blood poured down Souza’s chair. She slumped over.

Reuben stood with the duffel bag. He reached for Anthony.

‘Watch out!’ Deshawn screamed.

Green Jacket was drawing down on Reuben. Double-barrel stainless-steel Snake Slayer. Two shots from the derringer would send ten.38 special-sized projectiles flying through the air.

Phil Brauer ran toward the woman, but it didn’t matter.

Reuben pulled a Sig Sauer out of his duffel and shot Green Jacket in the head.

‘Lock down!’ Amanda ordered. ‘Now!’

Will ran from the room, his rifle slamming into his back. Faith was on his heels. They were fifty yards from the atrium, one level below the food court. He felt like he was running on a treadmill as he circled the large opening. Every step forward took him two back. Faith bolted up the escalator to the third floor. Will rounded the far side of the atrium. He slung around his rifle, slid across the floor on his knees and took up position across from where Reuben Figaroa stood.

The barrel of Will’s rifle rested on the railing. His eye was to the scope. The safety was off. His finger stretched along the trigger guard.

He took a breath.

Forty yards.

He could make the shot in his sleep, but Reuben held Anthony to his chest, his giant arm crushing his son’s ribs. The muzzle of the Sig Sauer was pressed against Anthony’s temple.

Amanda said, ‘Drop it!’

Her stance was wide. She had her revolver out, fifteen feet from her target. Faith had stopped the escalator. She was lying flat to the stairs. Phil Bauer was kneeling behind a table. They had formed a triangle, trapping Reuben inside. Like Will, they were all looking for a shot. Like Will, they were all coming up short. Anthony covered his father’s heart, his lungs, his belly, any place that a bullet could stop him.

Reuben screamed, ‘Back the fuck up!’

Will looked through the rifle scope. Reuben’s finger was wrapped around the trigger. One single twitch and Anthony’s life would be over. Will knew that Amanda was going through the same checklist that he was. If she hit Reuben’s leg, he could still pull the trigger. If she aimed for his head and missed, he could still pull the trigger. If she hit his head, he could still pull the trigger. If she miscalculated by even the smallest fraction, she could end up killing a six-year-old boy.

Amanda said, ‘You’re surrounded. There’s no way out.’

‘Get the fuck out of my way.’

Will tensed. Reuben had an athlete’s reflexes. In seconds, he could flick his wrist and shoot Amanda, and Will would be left with the same bad choices.

Reuben walked toward Amanda. He limped in his knee brace. ‘Get back, bitch.’

‘You don’t want to do this.’ Amanda backed up. Will’s view was obstructed as she passed in front of the elevator. ‘Put the gun down and we can talk.’

Reuben kept walking, Anthony tight to his chest. Will moved counter to him, rifle up, praying for a clean shot.

Reuben punched the button on the elevator. ‘I’m walking outta here.’

‘Put the boy down,’ Amanda said. ‘Put him down and we’ll talk.’

‘Shut the fuck up!’

The sound of his father shouting was enough to wake Anthony from his stupor. His eyes went wide as he realized what was happening. He started screaming, a high-pitched sound like an animal caught in a trap.

The elevator doors opened. Reuben got on. Will had a straight line through the glass wall of the elevator. He still couldn’t shoot. Even from this distance, he wasn’t sure the bullet wouldn’t pass through Reuben and kill Anthony.

The doors closed.

Will jogged back around the atrium. The elevator car passed the second floor. He ran toward the next escalator. The stairs were going up. Will shuffled down, his feet tripping on the metal treads. He grabbed on to the rails, lifted his legs and hurled his body the rest of the way down.

His feet hit the floor just as the elevator doors opened.

Anthony was crying. He squirmed to get out of his father’s arms. Reuben struggled to hold on to the kid and the gun. He was yelling at the boy to be quiet. Will ran at a crouch, using the back of the escalator for cover. The butt of his rifle was jammed into his shoulder. He kept one eye on the sight.

Anthony kept flailing, arms wide. His feet kicked, landing a blow on his father’s bad knee. Reuben dropped him.

Will swung around and pulled the trigger.

The world stopped spinning.

The butt of the rifle recoiled into Will’s shoulder. There was a flash at the end of the muzzle. The cartridge ejected out to the side. The bullet sliced the dense air like a knife cutting open a bag of flour.

Reuben Figaroa’s shoulder jerked back. He slammed against the elevator doors and slid to the floor.

Will followed him down, going to one knee. His trigger finger started to pull back again, but Anthony stopped him.

Reuben had the Sig pointed at his son’s back. His aim was steady. Will had put the bullet in the wrong shoulder.

Reuben said, ‘Come here, boy.’

Will was fifteen feet away from Anthony. Reuben was less than two.

‘Anthony,’ Will said. ‘Run.’

Anthony didn’t move.

Will slid his knee across the floor, trying to get a better angle. Reuben’s flanks were protected by the deep elevator alcove. The only shot that could take him out would have to come from the front.

‘Stop.’ Reuben’s eyes tracked back and forth between Anthony and Will, and then Faith.

She was on the other side of the escalator. Another triangle, again with Reuben at the center. Will heard footsteps as more officers approached, but he didn’t dare take his eye off Reuben Figaroa.

‘Anthony,’ Reuben ordered. ‘Get over here, boy.’

Faith said, ‘Anthony, sweetheart. Come to me. It’s okay.’

Will slid over a little bit more. His finger tensed on the trigger.

Reuben screamed, ‘Now, God dammit!’

Anthony stepped back.

Will took his finger off the trigger.

Reuben wrapped his injured arm around his son. Anthony fell into him, his head blocking his father’s face. The Sig pressed at the boy’s temple. Anthony didn’t struggle. He didn’t speak. He had learned to be still when his father was angry. All of his fear channeled into his lip, that quivered like his adoptive grandmother’s, and the look of resignation in his eyes that he’d inherited from Angie.

When she talked to Will about the abuse, she never talked about it. She only gave advice: All you have to do is wait until it’s over.

Anthony was waiting for the inevitable. The screaming. The hitting. The black eye. The split lip. The sleepless nights as he waited for the door to open.

‘Back away.’ Reuben had to rest the side of his hand on his son’s shoulder. He was panting hard. Blood poured from the bullet hole just below his clavicle. They were at the same impasse as the one upstairs, only now, Reuben was even more desperate.

Will said, ‘Put down the gun. You don’t want to do this.’

‘Shit.’ Reuben’s hand started shaking. Blood slipped down his other arm. The muscles were spasming, tensing his chest and shoulders. ‘What’d you hit me with?’

‘Hornaday sixty-grain TAP URBAN.’

‘Tactical Application for Police.’ Reuben’s eyelids were heavy. His face was slick with sweat. ‘Reduced penetration for urban environments.’

Will used his back foot to push his knee forward. He couldn’t come from the side. He had to get closer. ‘Sounds like you know your ammo.’

‘You see that Snake Slayer that bitch pulled?’

‘Probably had.410 Bonds in the chamber.’

‘Lucky I stopped her.’ Reuben blinked sweat out of his eyes. Will wondered if the man’s vision was blurring. There were a lot of important things near the clavicle. Subclavian arteries. Subclavian veins. Sara would know. She would record the damage in Reuben Figaroa’s autopsy, because if the man hurt Angie’s grandson, he would not walk out of here alive.

‘Let’s talk this out,’ Will said. ‘You’re gonna need surgery. I can help you.’

‘No more surgery.’ Reuben shook his head. He was blinking more slowly now. His arm was not so tight around Anthony. The muzzle of the Sig had tilted upward, but he could still put a bullet in his son’s brain.

Will moved closer.

Faith made a noise. Anthony looked at her. Will did not. He knew she was trying to wave the boy over.

‘Don’t.’ Reuben straightened the gun.

Will asked, ‘What’s the trigger pull on that Sig? Five and a half pounds? Six?’

Reuben nodded.

‘Why don’t you move your finger? You don’t want to make a mistake.’

‘I don’t make mistakes.’

Will slid closer. Ten feet. If Reuben moved just a little to the side, Will was close enough for the head shot. To make one. To receive one. Will couldn’t trust the gun in Reuben’s hand. It was upstairs all over again. Reuben could flick it out and kill Will. He could flick it back and kill Anthony.

Will said, ‘You’re not doing too well, man.’

‘I’m not,’ he agreed. The arm around Anthony started to relax again. The boy could pull away, but Reuben could still shoot the gun. At Anthony. At Will.

‘Let’s talk this out,’ Will repeated. He pushed a few inches closer. The rifle was out in front of him. Thirty-nine inches of weapon. One hand on the grip, the other on the stock. Will slid his hand farther down the barrel. His shoulder would dislocate if the gun went off. He curved his back, buying the illusion of extra space.

Reuben said, ‘I can’t leave my boy alone.’

Will couldn’t look at the kid. He couldn’t see Angie’s eyes looking back at him. ‘You don’t have to take Anthony with you.’

‘There’s nothing left for him,’ Reuben said. ‘Jo’s gone. My career is gone. That video gets out, and my freedom is gone.’

Will said, ‘Do you see how close I am?’

Reuben’s eyelids fluttered. He straightened the Sig.

Will said, ‘I can pull the trigger right now.’

‘So can I.’ Reuben’s breathing was shallow. His skin had no color. Will could see every single pore in his face, every single follicle of hair. ‘I’m not going to leave my boy alone.’ He swallowed. ‘Jo wouldn’t want that. Her real mother left her. She would never leave her son.’

Will pushed himself closer. He thought about why Reuben was doing this, how the loss of control had spun out his life. He asked, ‘How do I stop this, Reuben? Tell me how to save your son.’

‘Who killed her?’

Will tried to think of the best lie to tell him, the one that would keep him from murdering his son. That Jo was still alive, that Reuben had something to live for? That Jo was dead, but the woman behind her murder was in police custody? That she was Jo’s mother? That she had tried to ransom her own grandson?

Reuben was out of patience. ‘Who, man? Who killed Jo?’

‘The woman upstairs.’ He couldn’t tell if he’d made the right choice, but he had to keep going. ‘Her name is Virginia Souza. She’s a prostitute who met Jo in jail. They argued. Souza took out her revenge.’

To Will’s great relief, Reuben started nodding, like that made sense. ‘Was it over drugs? What they fought over?’

‘Yes.’ Will moved another millimeter, then another. His hand slid farther down the barrel. Too far to safely hold on to the stock. There was no way he could safely fire the rifle now. ‘Souza knew that Jo was rich, that she had money. She followed her to the party. She kidnapped her. She took Anthony.’

Reuben nodded again. The reason was obvious. His wife had hidden her addiction. She would hide other things. ‘Bitch is dead now.’

‘That’s right,’ Will said.

‘Jo too.’ He stopped to swallow. ‘She betrayed me. Betrayed everything we had. She didn’t listen to me.’

‘That’s what women do.’

‘They just take and take and spit you out like you’re nothing.’

The muzzle of the Sig had tilted up again, but again not enough to clear Anthony’s head. Reuben was faltering. His muscles were twitching. His nerves were in disarray. His finger could pull the trigger by mistake or by design. Whether it was pointing at Will or at Anthony when it happened was going to be a delicate dance.

‘Stop moving,’ Reuben said.

‘I’m not moving.’ Will moved up.

Reuben’s throat flexed as he swallowed. ‘She kept it from me. The pills. She stole that video. I know she’s the one who stole it. Ruined my life. My son’s.’ He swallowed again. ‘My son.’

Will was close enough now. He could only grab one thing: the gun or Anthony.

Anthony or Will.

All it came down to was which direction the gun was pointing.

‘It’s okay.’ Reuben was looking at Will now, a flatness to his eyes. His mouth gaped open. His lips were blue. He was having trouble getting air. He blinked, slow. He blinked again, even slower. He blinked a third time and Will lunged forward, his arm swinging through the air, backhanding Anthony out of the way.

Reuben’s head exploded.

Hot blood splattered Will’s face and neck. Bone was inside his mouth, up his nose. His eyes were on fire. He fell back, dropped the rifle. He clawed at his face. Strings of muscle and tissue caught in his fingers. He sneezed. Blood sprayed onto the floor. He could barely see it. He was standing, walking backward like he could get away from the carnage, but the carnage was all over him.

‘Will!’ Amanda yanked him forward by his arm. He stumbled, tripping over his own feet. She kept pulling him, then dragging him across the atrium, down a corridor, where he bounced off the wall. He was completely blind. Carpet was under his feet. He tried to open his eyes, but he couldn’t. Splinters were ripping apart his eyeballs-shards of Reuben Figaroa’s bone and teeth and cartilage.

‘Lean over.’ Amanda pushed him down.

Cold water streamed into his mouth, his face. Chunks of gray matter slid down his skin. He saw light. He blinked. He saw white porcelain, a tall faucet. They were in the bathroom. He was leaning over the sink. Will reached for the soap dispenser. It ripped off the wall. The bag burst. He took handfuls of soap and scrubbed his face and neck. He ripped off his shirt. He scrubbed his chest until the skin was raw.

‘Stop,’ Amanda said. ‘You’re going to hurt yourself.’ She grabbed his hands. She made him stop before he peeled the skin off his body. ‘You’re okay,’ she told him. ‘Take a breath.’

Will didn’t want to take a breath. He was sick of people telling him to take a breath. He stuck his head under a different faucet in a clean sink. He rinsed out his mouth. The water was pink when he spat it into the bowl. He rubbed his face, scratching the skin, making sure there were no more pieces of Reuben Figaroa in his eyes and hair.

‘Drink some more water.’

He picked something out of his ear. Red grit, part of a molar.

Will threw the tooth against the wall. He leaned his hands on the basin. His breath was like fire in his lungs. His skin burned. Phantom drops of blood slid down his face and neck.

‘It’s all right,’ Amanda said.

‘I know it’s all right.’ He closed his eyes. It wasn’t all right. Blood was everywhere. In the sinks. Pooling onto the floor. The bathroom was freezing. He was shaking from the cold.

‘Anthony?’ He clenched his teeth to keep them from chattering.

‘He’s safe. Faith has him.’

‘Jesus,’ Will mumbled. He tried to regulate his breathing, to get back some sense of control over his body. He squeezed his eyes shut. ‘I wasn’t sure Faith had a line.’

‘She did. I did. All of us did. But he beat us to it.’ Amanda started pulling paper towels from the dispenser. ‘Reuben Figaroa killed himself.’

Will’s head jerked up in surprise.

‘The second Anthony was gone, Reuben put the gun under his chin and pulled the trigger.’

Will stared at her in disbelief.

She nodded. ‘He killed himself.’

Will tried to play it back in his head, but all he remembered was the fleeting concern as he shoved Anthony out of the way that the kid would fall and hurt himself.

Amanda said, ‘You did everything right, Will. Reuben Figaroa made a choice.’

‘I could’ve saved him.’ Will wiped his face with a paper towel. The rough paper was like a cat’s tongue. He looked down expecting to see blood but finding only the dark stain of water.

Was Faith wiping Anthony’s face in another bathroom?

When the gun had gone off, the boy had been standing as close to Reuben as Will had been. For how many years would Reuben’s son feel the slick fibers of his father’s brain dripping down the side of his face? How many nights would he wake up screaming, scared that he was suffocating on the gray matter and bone that he’d sniffed up into his nose?

‘Will,’ Amanda said. ‘How could you have saved him?’

Will shook his head. He had made the wrong choice. He’d felt it in his gut even as the lie had come out of his mouth. ‘Reuben would’ve put down the gun if I’d told him the truth about Jo. That she was alive. That he had something to live for.’ He wadded up the paper towel into a ball. ‘You heard what he said about not leaving Anthony alone, that Jo wouldn’t want that. No way he would’ve pulled the trigger if he’d thought there was still a chance that his family was intact.’

‘Or he would’ve shot you instead. Or been shot by any one of us, because he stabbed a woman to death two floors above us. He shot another woman in the head. He beat his wife for nearly a decade. He threatened to murder his own son. Where are you getting this notion that there was some romantic bond between Reuben Figaroa and his wife that you could magically invoke and make everything better?’

Will chucked the paper towel into the trash.

‘If you love someone, you don’t go out of your way to hurt them. You don’t torture them. You don’t terrify them or make them live in constant fear. That’s not how love works. It’s not how normal people work.’

Will didn’t need Amanda to point out that there wasn’t much daylight between Angie and Reuben. ‘Thanks, but I think I’m going to pass on today’s parable.’

Amanda didn’t respond. She was looking at his bare chest. The round, perfect Os that the cigarettes had seared into his flesh. The black tattooing left by the electrical burns. The Frankenstein stitches around the skin graft from when a wound refused to close.

Before Sara, he would’ve scrambled to cover himself. Now, he was just intensely uncomfortable.

Amanda unzipped her jacket. ‘I used to come watch you on visitation days.’

Visitation days. She meant at the children’s home. Will had always looked forward to the visits, until he started dreading them. All the kids were bathed and trotted out for prospective parents. And then the kids like Will were trotted back in.

‘I couldn’t adopt you. I was a single woman. A career gal. Obviously I was unfit to take care of anything more than a pet rock.’ She wrapped her jacket around his shoulders. Her hands stayed there. She looked at him in the mirror. ‘I stopped visiting because I couldn’t stand the longing. Not my own, which was hard enough, but your longing broke my heart. You wanted so badly for someone to pick you.’

Will stared down at his hands. There was blood crusted into his cuticles.

‘I picked you. Faith picked you. Sara picked you. Let that be enough. Let yourself accept that you’re worth it.’

He used his thumbnail to scrape out the blood. His skin was still pink. He shivered again from the cold. ‘She’s going to be alone.’

Amanda helped him into the jacket. ‘Wilbur, women like Angie are always going to be alone. No matter how many people surround them, they will always be alone.’

He knew that. He had seen it all of his life. Even when Angie was with him, she still held herself apart. ‘Do you think we have a case against her for letting Delilah die in the trunk of her car?’

‘With Jane Doe as our only witness? No security footage, no DNA, no incriminating fingerprints, no smoking gun, no corroborating testimony, no confession?’ Amanda laughed at the futility. ‘It’s Denny who’s going to suffer. I can keep him out of jail, but he’ll lose his job, his pension, his benefits.’

Will didn’t want to feel sorry for Collier, but he did. He knew too much what it felt like when Angie threw you to the wolves.

‘Let me get this.’ She tried to zip the jacket. She couldn’t get it closed past his chest. The bottom was too short. The waist hit him above his navel. ‘I’ll have to buy you another shirt before you go back out there. You look like a Filipino sex worker.’

She meant it as a parting shot, but he couldn’t let her go yet.

‘It’s never going to catch up with her, is it?’ He said, ‘The people she hurts. The damage she does.’

‘Trust me, Will. Life always makes you pay for your personality.’ Amanda gave him a rueful smile. ‘It catches up with her every single second of the day.’