“I’m sorry, Avery. I love you and we’ve been on some wild rides together, but this one might be too crazy for me to jump aboard.”

“Just hear me out. She was sitting in Roman Manchester’s office when the plane hit the tower. I know this from interviewing Manchester, who, along with twelve of his employees and two of his partners, made it safely out of the North Tower. He lived to tell his harrowing story of escaping the towers. Is it too far-fetched to believe the woman sitting across from him that morning also survived?”

Avery saw the first glimmer of conviction in Christine’s eyes, before she shook her head.

“But the medical examiner’s office identified Victoria’s remains. That’s what sent you to New York in the first place.”

“They identified a bone fragment that belonged to Victoria, yes. But I spoke with Livia Cutty this morning and we took a closer look into the discovery. The specimen used to make the identification was a tooth.”

“A tooth?”

“Apparently the medical examiner’s office recovered thousands of bone fragments from the ruins of the towers, hundreds of which were teeth.”

“How is that even possible, Ave?”

“By filtering through the debris. Over the years, several sifting projects have been completed. The goal of these operations is to tediously sort through the rubble cleared from Ground Zero in order to find artifacts. Each time a sifting program is completed, more items are discovered. Wallets, driver’s licenses, wedding rings, jewelry, bone fragments, and . . .”

“Teeth.”

“Hundreds of them.”

“Good Lord.”

“Livia Cutty tells me that most of these small bone fragments and teeth are still waiting to be matched to victims. So, if Victoria Ford was identified from a single tooth found in the rubble of the Twin Towers, and no other specimens have been matched to her . . . What if Victoria Ford was injured during the chaos of 9/11, as in, she lost a tooth, but still managed to escape the towers?”

When Christine failed to respond, Avery continued.

“Thousands died when the towers collapsed. But thousands more made it safely out of the buildings. What if Victoria was one of them?”

“How? The hospitals were flooded that day. She never sought medical attention?”

“Maybe she didn’t need it,” Avery said. “And if it were something as minor as a few broken or lost teeth, maybe her friend—who was an emergency medicine physician—helped her.”

“Natalie Ratcliff.”

“Exactly,” Avery said, standing up and walking over to the bed where Victoria’s manuscripts rested. “And in a crazy way—yes, a bat-shit-crazy, Avery-Mason-presents way—I think Victoria’s manuscripts prove it.”

Christine shook her head. “I’ll say one thing. Your flare for the sensational is unparalleled. Make the connection for me.”