He got up and left the room with the phone number. I felt bad about ratting out Doyle, but I thought he’d probably be okay. The chief was his brother’s godfather, so they were family friends.

I sat there for quite a while, twiddling my thumbs. Then, curiosity getting the better of caution, I reached over and opened the folder with the FBI logo on the front. On top was a personnel page, complete with photo. I picked it up.

Special Agent Christopher Duncan resided in Bethesda, Maryland. His middle name was Carlos. He’d been in the FBI for eight years. The picture showed a handsome African American man with short dreads. He was wearing a dark suit and a muted green and burgundy tie.

What is this?

I shifted through the rest of the pages in the folder. They all belonged to this Duncan person. I was totally confused. The chief had definitely pointed to the folder I’d picked up.

At that moment, the chief walked back in. Unfortunately, Williams came in right behind him. The bland Pete’s Eats version of him, anyway.

“You shouldn’t be looking at that,” the chief said. “It’s confidential.”

He reached down and jerked the personnel page out of my hands. I saw him glance at it as he was putting it back in the folder. I sat there, stupefied. What was going on here? Was the guy blind?

“Agent Williams, your suspect,” the chief said, gesturing at me disgustedly.

Finally I found my voice. “But that’s not his file!”

The chief glared at me.

I shot a glance at Williams, who was standing quietly by the door.

“Chief, that file belongs to someone named Duncan.”

“Nonsense,” the chief snapped. He jerked his head at me. “She’s all yours. I’ll be in touch if her alibi doesn’t pan out.”

“Wait, you can’t give me to him,” I protested, all my calm evaporating. “What do you mean I’m ‘his suspect’?”

The chief eyed me with displeasure.

“Should’ve known you’d be wrapped up in something like this.”

He stalked out.

Williams’s blandness seemed to vanish. Suddenly he looked a lot less like a milquetoast and a lot more like a murderer. He grabbed me by the upper arm and proceeded to drag me out of the building.

Not too long before, I’d been pretty cool with the idea of surrendering myself to get Justine back, but self-sacrifice suddenly seemed a good deal more concrete and terrifying. I did a fair amount of screaming on the way out of the station. No one came to help me.

Williams had a full-sized van. Not surprising for someone who probably had to dispose of dead bodies regularly. He lifted me into the back of it and cuffed me to a ring in the floor near the front seats. I had to hunch there awkwardly on my hands and knees.