He nodded brightly as if adding that expression to his repertoire. “Oh, hey, I was gonna ask—you have a nickname you go by?”

“Not really.”

“Good. I like ‘Amelia’ just the way it is.”

For a ridiculous moment she thought he was going to kiss her to celebrate the capture. Then he started off after Mason, Nathan and Garrett.

Brother, thought exasperated Amelia Sachs, watching Jesse turn to give her a cheerful wave: One of the deputies wants to shoot me and one of them’s just about got the church reserved and the caterer lined up.

Sachs walked the grid carefully inside the mill—concentrating on the room where Garrett had kept Lydia. Walking back and forth, one step at a time.

She knew there were some clues here as to where Mary Beth McConnell was being held. Yet sometimes the connection between a perp and a location was so tenuous that it existed only microscopically and as Sachs traversed the room she found nothing helpful—only dirt, bits of hardware and burnt wood from the walls that had collapsed during the mill fire, food, water, empty wrappers and the duct tape that Garrett had brought (all without store labels). She found the map that poor Ed Schaeffer had gotten a look at. It showed Garrett’s route to the mill but no destinations beyond that were marked.

Still, she searched twice. Then once more. Part of this was Rhyme’s teaching, part of it was her own nature. (And was part of it, she wondered, a delaying tactic? To postpone as long as possible Rhyme’s appointment with Dr. Weaver?)

Then Lucy’s voice called, “I’ve got something.”

Sachs had suggested that the deputy search the grinding room. That was where Lydia had told them she’d tried to escape from Garrett and Sachs had reasoned that if there’d been a struggle something might have fallen from Garrett’s pockets. She’d given the deputy a fast course in walking the grid, told her what to look for and how to properly handle evidence.

“Look,” Lucy said enthusiastically as she carried a cardboard box over to Sachs. “Found this hidden behind the millstone.”

Inside was a pair of old shoes, a waterproof jacket, a compass and a map of the North Carolina coastline. Sachs also noticed a dusting of white sand in the shoes and in the folds of the map.

Lucy started to open up the map.

“No,” Sachs said. “There could be some trace inside. Wait till we’re back with Lincoln.”

“But he could’ve marked the place where he’s got her.”