I think about her obsession with the harmful effects of pollution and the sun. I had no idea about her magical beliefs and pathological vanity. To my knowledge no one has ever mentioned she has a blood disorder, and all of it will hold Lucy in very poor standing with the authorities. She knew these details. Obviously she did because she’s talking about them in the recording I saw. But I’m not aware that she’s ever passed the information along to anyone, and then my mood dips deeper into the dark trough of guilt.

I was the moving force behind Lucy’s internship at Quantico. Carrie was telling the truth when she said I was instrumental in lining it up and had implemented strict guidelines for how the FBI was to deal with my teenaged niece. So I suppose it’s fair to say that it’s my fault Lucy ever met her mentor, her supervisor Carrie. The nightmare that would unfold is because of me. And now it’s unfolding further. And I wasn’t expecting this. And I honestly don’t know what to do except to get to Lucy as fast as I can and make sure she’s safe.

Marino pats his pockets for his cigarettes. This is the third time he’s lit up since we left Cambridge. If there’s a fourth time I might have to give in. I could use a cigarette right now. Badly. I try to shut out images from the video. I try to get past what I felt, which was like a spy, a traitor, a terrible aunt as I watched Lucy and Carrie together intimately and barely dressed, as I listened to Carrie’s disrespectful, disparaging comments about me. I wonder the same thing I always do. How much is deserved? How much is an accurate portrait of who and what I really am?

I’m so tense I might explode to the touch, and my right leg throbs, the ache spreading down my thigh to my calf muscle. Even the slightest adjustment of the accelerator is at a price. When I press the brake as I just did, I pay for it all right, and Marino hunches his shoulder and sniffs his shirt to make sure he doesn’t smell bad.

“It’s not me,” he decides. “Sorry about that, Doc. You stink like a decomp and might want to stay away from Lucy’s dog.”

I DRIVE SLOWLY around blind curves where round convex mirrors are mounted on thick old trees. I look and listen for anything coming.