His words seemed to come from far away as more thoughts assaulted Marisa. Her daughter and that...that evil man. What was he doing to her? Maybe the best scenario would be that her daughter was locked in a closet. Maybe at least then he wouldn't hurt her. But her sweet pajarita, afraid of the dark, crying and alone.

Nate twisted to look into Marisa's eyes. "Hey, why don't you go lie down for a while?"

She tried to shake the fears off, though the awful images wouldn't go away that easily. "I'm fine." She glanced at the coffee. No way she could pick it up without spilling it everywhere. She focused on Brady. "No cops. Please."

"Your choice, but..."

Nate's phone rang. He slipped it from his pocket and checked the caller ID. "It's Julio." He held the phone to her, but she shook her head. "Put it on speaker. I can't think. I need you guys to hear."

Nate did and then set the phone on the coffee table. Marisa answered.

"He wasn't there," Julio said in Spanish.

"Can we speak English? My friends are here."

"Okay." He shifted the language. "I knocked, and nobody answered. I gave it a few minutes, but when nobody came, I let myself in."

Brady's frown told them what he thought of that. Marisa didn't care. "Did you see any sign of my daughter, any clues—?"

"I took many photos. The place was pretty clean. There were two bedrooms. The master bedroom was normal. But the other one he used as an office. Lots of photographs of a young boy in there. Also, a lot of information about a company called G&K, newspaper clippings, financial statements, stuff like that."

"That makes sense," Marisa said. "This whole thing goes back to that scandal."

"I didn't see anything that made me think a kid was there."

Marisa's heart sank.

"Except the stuff in the trash can." Julio sounded curious suddenly. "See, the guy's kind of a health food nut. Had all sorts of grains and seeds and crap. Even had kale in the fridge. And those fruit drinks that health food stores sell. But in the trash, there are wrappers from those frosted things that go in the toaster, and more wrappers from packaged cookies. Oh, and a spent cup and napkins from an ice cream shop.

Marisa turned to Nate. His eyes were as wide as hers must be. Ana had told them she'd had ice cream. "They were there."

"Yeah," Julio continued, "looks like it. And there's one scrap of paper. I mean, this is why I shred everything. It's amazing what you can learn from a trash can."

Brady's eyes narrowed.

"What was on the paper?" Nate asked.

"Maybe an apartment?" He rattled off an address. "I checked it on my phone. It's in Chelsea."

Chelsea. Marisa and Nate looked at each other again.

Brady said, "What?"

Nate shook his head and nodded to the phone.