She’s calm but beneath it all she can’t be. I don’t know of anyone more private than my niece. The idea of agents going through every inch of her personal life is unimaginable. It occurs to me that I might be next, and I wonder what Benton would do if a squadron of his colleagues showed up at our picture-perfect antique Cambridge home.

“Let’s stick with what’s under our nose.” Marino gives up on his slab bench, standing and stretching. “What are they saying you did, Lucy?”

“You know the Feds.” She shrugs from her perch on her rock. “They don’t say what they think you’re guilty of and they don’t ask. They throw things up against the wall until they find something that sticks. Like maybe you don’t remember a detail exactly right. Maybe you say you went to the store on Saturday and it was really Sunday, so now they get you for a false statement, a felony.”

“I don’t suppose you’ve called Jill Donoghue.” I’m sure I know the answer.

She’s one of the most highly regarded criminal defense attorneys in the United States, and a brilliant dirty fighter. That’s exactly what we need right now. It doesn’t mean I like her.

“I haven’t contacted her or anyone.” Lucy confirms what I suspect.

“Why not?” I ask. “She should have been your first call.”

“Come on Lucy. You know better than that,” Marino says. “You can’t be dealing with them and not have a lawyer. What’s wrong with you?”

“I used to be them. I know how to think like them,” she says. “I wanted to cooperate with them long enough to gather intelligence on what exactly it is they’re so hot and bothered about. Or what they’re pretending they’re so hot and bothered about.”

“And?” I ask.

She shrugs again. I can’t tell if she doesn’t have an answer or refuses to say.

“I’m going to wander up to the house to see what the hell they’re doing,” Marino decides. “Don’t worry. I won’t go inside. But I’ll make sure they see me. Fuck ’em.”

“Janet, Desi and Jet Ranger are in the boathouse,” Lucy says to him. “Maybe you can check on them. Make sure they stay there. They need to stay in the boathouse, and remember Jet Ranger can’t swim. Do not let him near the edge of the dock,” she adds emphatically. “Not anywhere near it. They aren’t to let him out of their sight,” she says, and it’s then I see it.

I catch the twitch on her face, an involuntary muscle reaction to an intensely unpleasant thought.

“And tell them I’ll be right there,” Lucy says, and I detect her murderous anger.