She arches an eyebrow like I owe her an explanation, but she’ll find out soon enough.

“I’m not your personal mail courier,” she says.

“Mail courier?” I repeat, with no idea what she’s talking about. The laughter’s turned my voice whiny and breathless.

“Some young man demanded I give this to you or Detective White, whomever I saw first.” She waves something small in the air. “Said not to follow him.” She shakes her head, wire glasses shuttling across her nose. “Like I’d bother.”

“When was this?”

“Not two minutes after I arrived.”

I dart past her down the long hallway to the front entrance.

The cold air slaps me awake, and I’m blinking in the sun across the parking lot. But there’s no one.

Beyond the pines, cars speed along the highway. Amy’s young man could be driving any of them. He could be parked on the opposite side of the street in front of a warehouse building watching me now. I squint and see the fall of a sparrow from a power line, its descent lost somewhere in dead limbs and black wires.

Inside, Amy’s already back at the front desk. She brought my box out with her.

I purse my lips.

“What did he look like?” I demand.

“Who?”

“The young man,” I say impatiently.

Amy makes a show of turning on her computer. “He was wearing a ball cap, so I couldn’t see his face.” She types in her password, screwing up her lips trying to remember, as if she doesn’t enter it every day.

“Short? Tall? Fat? Thin?”

“Tall.” She nods thoughtfully. “And skinny. His head bobbed like a praying mantis.” She scrunches her nose. “Had blond hair, too, I think.”

Blond. Tall. Skinny. Not a lot to go on, but who else could it be besides our helpful giraffe?

I narrow my eyes at her. “Where is it?”

“I think it should go to Detective White, seeing as how…” She gestures to the box.

“I’ll take it now.” I hold out my hand.

She sighs and makes a show of pulling open her desk drawer. “Suit yourself,” she says, and drops a small black flash drive into my palm.

It takes less than a minute to race back to the task room and two for the file to load. I drum my fingers impatiently, casting furtive glances over my shoulder. Truman’s office door is shut. But I know I don’t have much time before it opens again.

I hold my breath and press Play.

The image is dark with only a flicker of light at the top corner. The beam moves in small, hesitant increments and then drops to the bottom.

I sink into my chair.

On the screen, I see the blurred outline of a figure and various objects illuminated by a hazy glow. A handful of tattered blankets. Buckets in the corner. Then the light disappears.