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  67. 3:46 a.m.

“. . . gets on the subway. I know I shouldn’t keep following him, but I can’t stop. He gets off on 3rd and H and goes into three or four shops. I can tell he’s trying to lose anyone that might be tailing him. But he isn’t looking for a sixteen-year-old girl, that’s for sure. The last store he goes into, he comes out with a beautiful brunette.

I zoom in real close and take a picture of her face. I wish I had her eyes. They are emerald green.

“It’s gotta be her,” my dad says.

I agree.

“Keep reading,” I tell him.

“I expect the guy to kiss her but he doesn’t. I don’t think they are having an affair, but they are up to something, that’s for sure. They both look over their shoulders, then they walk for three blocks to an office building near S and Man. I snap a dozen photographs. These are going to be worth more than just two hundred bucks. A whole lot more.

“The Sleep Control Program,” I say.

“Maybe,” my dad says.

“What do you mean, maybe? This congressman must have been involved. Maybe he was funneling her money. Or maybe she was funneling them money to keep it quiet. Or passing along intel.”

“Your mom was a CIA agent. It could have been any number of things.”

“I wish there were more pages. I wish we knew what happened after that.”

“I’m guessing she followed them a second time. We may never know what she found.”

“Well, whatever it was, it was worth killing over.”

::::

I check something in one of the binders, then I tell my dad my theory.

“These two, for whatever reason, are not supposed to be seen together. Jennifer takes photos. She attempts to blackmail the congressman, but she gets greedy. Asks for a couple thousand dollars, maybe more. Who knows? He tells her it will take him a couple days to get the money. Maybe a week. Maybe two. She’s patient. She has time, so she keeps blackmailing a few more people. When he doesn’t pay, she threatens to send the pics to the paper or some other government official. They decide it’s too big a risk. Even if they pay her, what’s stopping her from leaking copies? So that’s when mom steps in. This is what she does for a living. She interrogates people. She gets answers.”

In the binder, I’d flipped to Jennifer Nubers’ autopsy report, then skimmed to the line about toxicology.

“They found traces of LSD in her bloodstream,” I tell him.

My dad’s mouth opens wide. He says, “She tortured her. That’s why she was gone for two days. She did to her what they did to you.”

Yeah, but with one big difference.

She didn’t kill me.

::::