“I think they intend to show that Carrie Grethen is a ruse, a ghost Lucy has conjured up as an alibi,” Janet adds.

“But what I don’t understand is why they would want to show such a thing,” I say to them as I consider the Depraved Heart videos and whether they’re evidence that Carrie is alive.

They’re not. I’m forced to admit it to myself as much as I can’t stand the thought. I know damn well the videos don’t mean what I wish they did. The recordings were made seventeen years ago. All they really show is that Carrie was alive then, and besides that I don’t have these videos or even the links texted to me. I can’t prove a goddamn thing.

“Payback,” Lucy says.

“I doubt the FBI has the time or energy to get a warrant and do all this simply because they’re vindictive.” Donoghue tap-tap-taps the tip of her pen on the legal pad.

“You’d be surprised by the government’s capacity for pettiness and wasting money and time.” Lucy’s sarcasm is biting, her hostility simmering.

“Payback might be the icing on the cake. A little bit of icing on a very little cake.” Janet is always the voice of reason and if anything tends to understate. “But certainly not the whole of it, maybe not even a significant part. Of greater importance is the FBI has reason to want Carrie dead. They want it badly. That’s more important to them than paying you back, Lucy. Again it’s just my opinion but an educated one. I know the Feds. I used to be the Feds.”

“They want Carrie dead now? Or they want her to stay dead?” I ask.

“That’s my question too,” Donoghue says, and I wish she’d stop tapping her pen.

Everything is plucking my nerves right now.

“Do they want her dead?” Donoghue poses. “Or is it that they don’t want anyone to think she wasn’t dead after all?”

“They want her to stay dead,” Janet replies. “They don’t want anyone to find out she was never gone.”

“What reason besides the obvious embarrassment?” I inquire.

“That’s what I want to know,” Janet answers. “But the obvious reason is a bad enough one for them. It would be like finding out Bin Laden is still out there somewhere after our government has reassured us that he’s buried at sea. Just as Carrie supposedly was buried at sea when the helicopter went down.”

“I can see why everybody might want her dead,” Donoghue comments. “Certainly what she did to you”—she looks at me—“demonstrates her callous indifference to human life, her depravity. You could have died. You could have been permanently maimed. You could have lost your leg at the very least.”

“True,” I reply. “All of the above.”