“Let’s hope nothing shows up. It shouldn’t because I’m fairly certain Carrie is spoofing the ICE line. The texts aren’t really from Lucy or any device she owns.”

“You should give me your phone.” Marino holds out his hand. “I need to take out the SIM card and the battery if you want any proof you ever got what you’re saying. We need to be able to show Lucy had nothing to do with it.”

“No.”

“Your SIM card may be the only record you’ve got …”

“No.”

“The longer you wait—”

“I’m not disabling my phone,” I interrupt him. “If I do that I can’t see anything else she decides to send.”

“Do you hear yourself?”

“The video links are the real reason I rushed out of here this morning. I was afraid Carrie had Lucy’s phone and what it would mean if that were true. I have to keep my phone.”

Marino bends over to look at something below me at the back of the truck. He’s interested in a taillight.

“When I tell you more about the videos you’ll understand my concern,” I continue to explain, “and Lucy wasn’t answering when I tried to reach her. Janet wasn’t either. Now we know it was because the FBI was herding them around and seizing their possessions. What is it? What have you found?”

Marino has gotten interested in one of the truck’s white high-intensity LEDs.

“Shit,” he says in an ominous tone. “I don’t believe it.”

“Now what?”

“Right under our nose. What they mean by in plain view.” He hovers over the left taillight, his hands clasped behind his back the way he does when he wants to make sure he doesn’t touch something. “Can you hand me some clean gloves?”

I snatch a pair out of the box for him. I stick my head out of the back of the truck to see what he’s found as I’m battered by heavy rain. It runs down my face and the back of my neck as I count the screws missing from the left taillight’s chrome mount. Five are gone. The one that remains is scratched and gouged.

Chapter 31

CHAPTER 31

THUNDER CLAPS. WATER HISSES AND SPLASHES AROUND his big black leather sneakers.

Marino talks on his phone to Al Jacks or Ajax as he’s called. I piece together the gist of what the former Navy SEAL is asking about the house itself. He wants to know what makes Marino think someone could be inside. Is there any chance Hyde is in there? Maybe he’s injured or a hostage? I watch all this from the back of the truck as Marino formally requests the assistance of SWAT, his earpiece flashing blue in the wet din. I’m well aware of the risk he’s taking.