Before he could answer, the door to the hospital room opened again, this time with enough force that Margaret Goodfellow gasped and dropped the prayer book that Darren hadn’t realized she’d been holding. He saw Erika stand, saw something electric run through her whole body, her hands curling into two tight fists, before he turned and saw two men in dark suits enter the room with several Marion County Sheriff’s deputies behind them. Greg huddled by the door, not making eye contact with Darren, as he watched one of the men in suits—a federal agent, Darren now understood—inform Mr. Leroy Edwin Page that he was under arrest for the murder of Levi King. As they handcuffed the man to his hospital bed, Erika collapsed over his body. “What is it, Kiki?” Leroy said, dazed. “What’s going on?” The agents and deputies crowded around the accused’s bed, so that Darren was completely squeezed out of the way. He ended up against the back wall near Margaret, the murmur of her renewed praying a hum of refuge amid the clink of handcuffs, Erika’s weeping, Leroy’s moans of confusion, the angry beep of the cardiac monitor as his frantic heartbeat lit up the room like a firework.

18.

18.

IN THE hallway, Darren nearly grabbed Greg by the collar and pulled him to the farthest nurses’ station, out of earshot of the other agents. They’d directed the deputies to watch Leroy on rotating shifts. The two agents were on their cell phones right outside his door. Leroy’s roommate was in the hall asking anyone who would listen for a different room. Darren could not exactly name what he was feeling. Betrayal? But by whom? By Greg, for arresting Mr. Page? Or by the old man for maybe, just maybe, being guilty?

“We found them in the search,” Greg said. “Several articles of the boy’s clothing, including Levi’s underwear.”

Darren winced at the image. “And you found the kid’s blood, hair, something? Did some kind of testing to prove that they’re his?” he asked, knowing that even the FBI couldn’t have turned around a DNA test that fast. It felt rushed, this arrest, and Darren wondered if Greg might be trying to get as much out of the headlines as he would out of a conviction. Maybe that had been his plan all along. Show the incoming Trump Justice Department that the FBI meant business when it came to crimes against the white heartland and then hope they forgot about it once they were trying to find the light switches in their new offices. “You don’t even have a body.”