“Me too.” Emma cracks her door open. She suddenly feels nervous and sweaty and travel-worn. “I don’t look very FBI. At least you’re wearing a suit.”

“Take my jacket.” Bell reaches into the back, hands her his dark suit jacket, pushes his own door open with his foot.

Emma gets out, brushes herself down, and slips the jacket on. Wearing Bell’s clothes is becoming a habit. But the jacket functions as a kind of blazer over her pale T-shirt and jeans. It’s big through the shoulders and long in the sleeves—she rolls the cuffs three turns.

“Is this better?”

Bell is knotting his tie. “Yeah. It looks fine.” He grins. “Kind of a Talking Heads vibe.”

Emma presses a hand to her stomach. “Oh my god, what are we doing?”

“Lewis, relax.”

They make their way forward. A TV newshound is adjusting her mic, setting up for a live report in the middle of the road. A placard for Berryville Quarry and Asphalt on the fence, more moving bodies. The first uniform they come across is a Clarke County trooper, her hair tied back except for her Farrah Fawcett bangs.

“Ma’am?” Bell walks right up. “We’re here to see Special Agent Cooper. We’re with the bureau.”

He shows his ID. Emma scrambles to do the same, with the same aplomb.

“Heya. Thank you.” The woman examines their cards, expressionless. “Agent Cooper is on the far left of the site, at the crime scene. You need an escort?”

“No, thank you, but if you could point me at your sergeant, that would be great.”

The woman points helpfully. “Sergeant Donahee is closer in, he’s talking to the witness.”

Bell’s ears prick up. “We’ve got a witness?”

“Not to the deaths—the discovery. Jud Cleary, he’s a local gentleman. Usually goes out on a tear, ends up in a ditch somewhere until we pick him up and drive him back home. Tonight he decided he’d come visit his former place of employment, got a helluva shock. He’s with the ambulance over there.”

“Thank you, ma’am—can I say who sent us?”

“Senior Trooper Janelle Winshuttle. You just tell ’em Nelly sent you.”

Bell thanks her again and steers Emma away, speaking under his breath. “Always get a name.”

“Now we go see the sergeant?”

“Now we walk in his direction but avoid him. We just want Cooper. Keep your eyes out for our guys.”

A helicopter circles overhead. Farther into the wide quarry area, the rough gravel crunches under Emma’s running shoes. The hot mix plant juts up at the right of what is basically a big truck parking area. Above the illumination of the floods, silos and gantry rigging loom like the backstage set of an enormous theater production.

When they hit an orange tape line, Bell finds another trooper and explains that Nelly sent them. They duck under the tape, blood thumping in Emma’s face when she bends over. Outbuildings and warehouse structures are straight ahead. She spots a figure in a crime scene hazard suit, tugs on Bell’s sleeve.