I allow myself a moment to imagine life on the run. How much worse would it be than my current predicament? Just Jacob and me, living off the land somewhere tropical. I fantasize that he might even see it as something of an adventure, between the different animals we’d encounter and the prospect of swimming every day. But then reality invades even my efforts at escapism. Jacob won’t be five years old forever. He’ll need to go to school and have friends, and I’ll need to be able to feed, clothe, and shelter him. I have a limited skill set outside of the American justice system, a lack of fluency in any language other than English, and no idea how to create a new identity for us. I flash on going it alone, but I won’t abandon my son. That would be worse than prison. Worse than death.

“LeMarcus told me that he normally asks for a quarter-million-dollar retainer, but as you and he go way back, he agreed to take the deed on our house,” Stuart says, snapping me out of my own thoughts on the futility of escape.

“Awfully kind of him,” I say.

“Yeah. So when all this is over, we’re probably going to be homeless.”

“Speak for yourself,” I say. “The odds are very good that I’m going to have free room and board for the rest of my life.”

He looks at me with tears in his eyes. I know what he’s going to say before the words come out.

I stop him cold. I just can’t go there now.

“I don’t want to talk about it, Stuart. I . . . I just need some time to think all of this through on my own.”

35. ELLA BRODEN

35.

ELLA BRODEN

“Hi, Ella. This is Drake McKenney.”

The call woke me, even though it’s after ten in the morning. I quickly try to shake the grogginess out of my voice.

“Oh . . . hello . . .”

I’ve never spoken to Drake McKenney one-on-one. I’ve shaken his hand a few times and even shared the platform with him at press conferences, where I stood off to the back while he, front and center, would take credit for the accomplishment that was usually my doing. He never stopped by my office, although I worked one floor below him for five years. Never even called. Not after I won at trial, or when I was given the office’s highest commendation, or when I resigned. Not even after Charlotte went missing.

“Did I catch you at an inopportune moment?”

“No . . . it’s fine. How do you know my cell number?”

“Ah, you’d be surprised what we know about our former ADAs.”

I’m sure he meant for the remark to sound witty, maybe even charming, but it comes across as creepy, as if I’ve been under surveillance.