“His face was all over social media and news websites,” Ellie said. “But the main reason I remember was the billboard on the 110. I saw Alex’s face every day for almost a year when I was taking my Criminal Law and Procedure college class at LATTC.” It was the truth, or at least part of it. His sweet, angelic face had, in fact, haunted her every day on her commute.

There was another reason why she knew Alex Hernandez—a reason why she knew practically every missing carrier in the state of California, one that she would never share with Commissioner Kelly.

Alves looked up from his phone. “The lidding thing is listed in Hernandez’s file. And the photos we have on file look like a solid match.”

Ellie turned her attention to the young woman. She had a round face, but it was lean, the skin healthy and tight. She had a small nose. Good hair. Her mouth hung open. She, too, had given blood. Ellie saw the thick bandages in the crooks of both arms.

“I think she might be Jolie Simone,” Ellie said. “If she is, she’ll have a small heart tattoo on her chest. Her father gave it to her.”

Kelly said, “The father tattooed his own kid?”

Ellie nodded. “For her to remember him by,” she said. “He was a tattoo artist, and he was dying of leukemia. May I pull back the comforter a bit?”

Alves checked with the techs, who were both huddled next to their gear near the entrance of a walk-in closet. The techs said they had taken the necessary pictures, so it was okay to proceed. The smaller one used the camera on his tablet to record Ellie’s movements.

She grabbed the corner of the comforter and carefully pulled it back. Alex Hernandez had a long, lean body and wore blue sweatpants and a San Francisco Giants sweatshirt that seemed too small for him. Had he borrowed the clothes? Yes, he had; she saw his other set of clothes neatly folded on a chair by the window.

“Why is he wearing so many layers?” Kelly asked. “It’s pretty warm in here.”

Ellie answered the question before Alves could: “Your core temperature drops dramatically if you’ve given two or more pints—or, say, fifteen to twenty percent total blood volume. It’s a class two hemorrhage. You have to keep your body warm or you’ll go into shock—which explains why it’s warmer up here than downstairs.”

Kelly turned to Alves and said, “You think they brought the carriers here and gave Vargas a transfusion?”

“I don’t see the point in it,” Alves replied. “You don’t need to bring the carriers. You just need their blood. There’s got to be another reason—one that we haven’t discovered yet.”

Ellie hovered over Hernandez’s body to get a closer look at the woman she believed to be Jolie Simone. She wasn’t wearing layers like Hernandez, just a plain white tank top with a bra. A tanned muscular arm was draped over her waist, and her fingernails were freshly painted a dark red. A cotton ball was taped to the crook of her arm; she’d given blood.