# Chapter 23 — Who Will Feed Grissom?
Sarah rinsed the two breakfast bowls and put them into the dishwasher.
Emma was already standing near the door.
She had Michael’s blue hoodie on even though it was too warm outside for it. The sleeves came almost over her hands. In one hand she held her phone. In the other was the small container of fish food she had taken from her bag.
Sarah dried her hands.
“We don’t need that,” she said, nodding toward the container. “Dad still has plenty at the house.”
“I know.”
Emma put it into the pocket of the hoodie anyway.
Sarah picked up her purse and checked for her keys, wallet, and phone. She checked twice without meaning to.
The drive to Michael’s house had once been too ordinary to require planning. Fifteen minutes. Sometimes less. A message beforehand if Emma had forgotten a school folder, a charger, a drawing pad. A quick stop if Michael needed Sarah to look at a package left by the garage.
Now it felt like something they had to prepare for.
Not because of the house itself.
Because of the silence inside it.
Emma went back to Byte’s cage and checked the water bottle. She ran one finger over the bars.
“We won’t be long,” she said.
Sarah could not tell whether she was speaking to Byte or to herself.
“Ready?”
Emma nodded, but did not move immediately.
“Mom?”
“Yes?”
“We don’t have to look everywhere.”
Sarah watched her.
Emma looked down at one shoe.
“I mean, not in his computers or anything. We just have to make sure everything’s okay.”
“That’s exactly what we’re doing.”
“And Grissom.”
“And Grissom.”
That was enough.
The drive did not take long.
Emma said almost nothing. She sat beside Sarah and watched the streets pass, the blue hoodie still zipped despite the weak air conditioning.
When they entered Palmetto Ridge, the turns became familiar.
Emma knew all of them.
The mailbox near the corner that leaned slightly to one side. The house with two palms close to the garage. The place where Michael usually began slowing down even though his driveway was still two houses away.
Then his house appeared.
Sarah eased off the accelerator automatically.
For a moment, everything looked completely normal.
The driveway was empty. The lawn would need cutting soon. The curtains behind one of the front windows hung exactly as they had the last time Sarah had seen them.
Nothing about the house said its owner had disappeared.
Sarah parked and switched off the engine.
Emma released her seat belt, but remained sitting.
Sarah looked at her.
“You okay?”
Emma nodded.
Then she said, “It looks like he’s just at work.”
Sarah did not answer immediately.
“Yeah.”
Emma opened her door.
Sarah followed her to the entrance and took her spare key from her purse.
There had been a time when she used it without thinking. When Emma had forgotten something. When Michael had asked her to check a delivery. For all the small practical reasons two people sometimes kept keys to each other’s homes even after their marriage had stopped working the way it once had.
Now Sarah held the key for an extra second.
Then she unlocked the door.
The house was quiet.
Not unusually quiet.
Simply as quiet as Michael’s house had always been when Michael was not in it.
Emma stepped inside first and stopped.
For one small moment, she looked as if some part of her still expected a voice from the kitchen.
Hey.
Nothing came.
Emma pulled the collar of the hoodie away from the back of her neck.
Then she heard it.
The steady, low sound of the aquarium.
She looked toward the living room.
“Grissom.”
She went to the tank and crouched in front of it.
Grissom came out from between the plants almost immediately.
Emma’s face changed.
“Hey, Grissom.”
She lowered herself until her face was almost level with the aquarium.
“There you are.”
The fish moved slowly along the front glass.
Emma placed two fingers against it without tapping.
“Dad’s still not here,” she said quietly. “That’s why we’re here again.”
For a while, she simply watched him.
Then she stood and began doing what Michael had taught her.
She did not only check that the light was on.
She watched the surface of the water to make sure it was moving properly. She listened to the filter for several seconds instead of trusting that noise alone meant it was working.
No rattle.
No irregular sucking sound.
Only the familiar hum and the quiet return of water into the tank.
She leaned to one side and checked the thermometer.
Then the water itself.
The plants.
Finally Grissom again.
Sarah had stopped a few steps behind her.
“Everything okay?”
Emma nodded.
“Yeah.”
She listened to the filter once more anyway.
“Dad says just because it makes noise doesn’t mean it’s working right.”
Sarah almost smiled.
“That sounds like him.”
“You have to see if the water’s moving.”
Emma pointed to the surface.
“And listen if it sounds different.”
She looked back at Grissom.
“But he’s okay.”
It sounded like more than an observation.
For the moment, it was the first good news of the morning.
Sarah left Emma with the aquarium and went into the kitchen.
She opened the refrigerator and checked what needed checking. Milk. Butter. Cheese. Orange juice. She looked at dates, smelled one open container, threw it away, and put everything else back where Michael had left it.
She went outside and emptied his mailbox.
There were a few envelopes, advertisements, nothing that looked immediately important. She carried them inside and made a neat stack on the kitchen counter.
Then she opened two windows for a while and let fresh morning air move through the house.
There was nothing remarkable to do.
The power was on.
The refrigerator was running.
The aquarium was running.
The house was doing exactly what it was supposed to do.
Only Michael was not there.
When Sarah returned to the living room, Emma had opened the fish-food container.
She took only the amount Michael had shown her and dropped it into the water.
Grissom reacted immediately.
Emma watched him eat.
“When are we coming back tomorrow?” she asked without turning around.
Sarah sat on the arm of the sofa.
“We can visit Chloe tomorrow,” she said. “Then we’ll come by here afterward and check on Grissom.”
Emma nodded slowly.
“Okay.”
She watched the last pieces of food move across the surface.
A few seconds passed.
Then she asked, “And after tomorrow?”
Sarah looked at her.
Emma still had her back turned.
“We’ll work it out.”
“For how long?”
Sarah did not answer.
Emma looked around the living room then, not at anything specific. The shelves. The books. One of Michael’s small tool cases near the wall. The doorway that led toward his office.
“If Dad doesn’t come back for a while, does everything just stay here?”
Sarah felt the question before she understood where it was going.
“For now, yes.”
“What about his computers?”
“They stay here.”
“And all his stuff?”
“Yes.”
Emma looked down at Grissom again.
“What if it’s a really long time?”
Sarah got up from the sofa arm.
She did not say he’ll be back before then.
She wanted to.
Instead she crossed the room and stood beside her daughter.
“We don’t have to decide any of that today.”
Emma was quiet.
Grissom moved between them and his reflection in the glass.
Then Emma asked, very simply,
“Who will feed Grissom?”
Sarah sat down beside her.
For a second she could not find an answer that did not pretend to know something she did not know.
So she took Emma’s hand.
“We will,” she said.
Emma looked at her.
“Tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow.”
“And after that?”
Sarah tightened her fingers around hers.
“We’ll keep making sure he’s taken care of.”
It was not an answer to everything Emma had asked.
They both knew that.
Emma turned back toward the aquarium.
After a while she said, almost matter-of-factly, “We can’t take Grissom with us.”
“No.”
“He’d hate that.”
“Probably.”
Emma thought for a moment.
“Maybe we should bring Byte here.”
“Byte?”
“Then Grissom wouldn’t be so alone.”
She watched the fish disappear briefly behind a plant.
“And we have to come here every day anyway.”
Sarah looked at her.
“That’s something we can do.”
Emma nodded as if, for the moment, something had been settled.
Sarah let it be settled.
At the Vances’ house, it took less than five minutes for Chloe to take Emma into her room.
Emma had barely finished explaining that they might move Byte back to Michael’s house when Chloe had already begun discussing where the larger cage could go and whether Byte would be happier near Emma’s usual room or somewhere closer to the living room.
Sarah stayed with Laura and Daniel.
Laura waited until the girls’ voices had disappeared behind Chloe’s door.
“What is it?”
Sarah looked toward the hallway.
“Daniels called me last night.”
Daniel looked at her immediately.
“Did they find Michael?”
Sarah shook her head.
“No.”
She lowered her voice.
“He said they arrested someone yesterday.”
Laura sat a little straighter.
“And they found Michael’s old project ID at his house.”
Daniel stared at her.
“What does that mean?”
“He doesn’t know yet.”
Sarah shook her head again.
“That was all Daniels was sure of last night.”
A short silence followed.
“Michael is still missing.”
Laura looked toward Chloe’s room.
“Does Emma know?”
“No.”
“Are you going to tell her?”
Sarah folded her hands together.
“When I know what I’m telling her.”
Daniel nodded once.
No one tried to convince her that was right or wrong.
Sarah had nearly told Emma the night before. She had stood outside her bedroom after Daniels ended the call and watched the thin line of light beneath the door. Emma had still been awake. Sarah had known that because she could hear a video stop, then start again, then stop.
She had put her hand on the door handle.
Then she had imagined saying the words.
A man has been arrested.
They found Dad’s old project ID in his trash.
No, they still don’t know where Dad is.
There had been nothing Emma could do with any of it except carry it through the night.
So Sarah had taken her hand away from the handle.
Now, in the Vances’ kitchen, she still did not know whether waiting had protected Emma or merely delayed the moment she would have to be frightened in a different way.
Laura seemed to understand without Sarah saying any of that.
“If Daniels calls again,” she said, “you can take it here. We’ll keep the girls busy.”
Sarah nodded.
“Thanks.”
From down the hall came a brief burst of laughter from the girls, followed by Chloe saying something too quickly for the adults to make out.
Sarah closed her eyes for half a second.
Then opened them again.
Frank Kessler’s office door was open.
Henry stopped outside it with a coffee mug in one hand.
“Frank?”
Frank looked up from his screen.
Henry hesitated.
“Any word?”
Frank leaned back.
“Daniels called this morning.”
Henry waited.
“They arrested Hargrad yesterday.”
Henry looked at him.
“And Michael?”
Frank shook his head.
“Nothing.”
Henry looked into his coffee.
“Right.”
He remained in the doorway.
After a moment he looked up again.
“Hargrad?”
Frank nodded.
“Martin Hargrad. Old field side. He wasn’t Chesapeake.”
“What did he do?”
“Transport. Site support. Equipment.”
Henry watched him for a moment.
“And you knew him.”
“I knew who he was.”
“That’s becoming a pretty important distinction with you.”
Frank did not answer immediately.
Henry took the mug away from the doorframe.
“So what else do you remember about him?”
Frank looked at him.
“Henry—”
“No.”
Henry shook his head once.
“Not this time.”
Frank looked away.
“I’ve been asking myself the same thing.”
Henry said nothing.
“Who else could still be in this?”
Frank rubbed a hand slowly across his mouth.
“Not just who knew the recovery system. Who knew the people. The sites. The old field side.”
Henry’s expression did not soften.
“And?”
Frank shook his head.
“I don’t have a name.”
A short pause.
“Not yet.”
Henry picked up his coffee again.
This time he left without another question.
Frank remained at his desk, looking at nothing on the screen.
Henry’s irritation did not surprise him.
For years, Frank had thought of the old project as something that could be contained by not touching it. The files had been archived. The systems had been retired. The names had disappeared from ordinary work. People moved away, changed employers, got older. Silence had begun to look like closure.
Then Michael had started asking questions.
Then the old credential had appeared in his mailbox.
Then Frank had shredded the pages that frightened him and removed his own RK-03 file as if hiding paper could make the problem smaller.
Now another old name had returned, and Henry had every reason to wonder how many more Frank would remember only after police found them first.
Frank opened a blank page on his screen.
He did not type a suspect list.
He began with something broader.
People who had been around the project without being part of the four recovery roles.
Field support.
Administration.
Contractors.
People who had known where everyone was without needing to know what everyone knew.
He stared at the last line for a long time.
Then he began trying to remember.
Martin Hargrad’s Ford Expedition stood inside a secured vehicle examination bay.
The damage from the attempted flight had already been photographed separately. The crushed area at the rear corner, dirt packed around the right rear wheel, and the scraping from the collision belonged to the arrest event. None of it was allowed to become part of the older story merely because the vehicle now sat inside an evidence facility.
Daniels and Navarro watched while the technician completed the last exterior photographs.
“We start clean,” Daniels said.
“Exterior first?” Navarro asked.
“Everything as it is. Then the interior.”
The rear hatch was opened only after the exterior sequence was complete.
The cargo area looked used, but ordinary.
A folded blanket.
Work gloves.
A tie-down strap.
Two empty water bottles.
Along the right side sat a small, flat cardboard box.
Navarro leaned slightly forward without crossing the marked boundary.
“What’s that?”
The technician photographed the box in place before moving it to clean evidence paper.
Inside were two nearly identical sets of metal parts.
Mounting plates.
U-bolts.
Fasteners.
Spacers.
Navarro looked at them longer than she had looked at the blanket or the gloves.
“These look familiar.”
Daniels stepped closer.
The technician left the parts where they were.
“Mounting hardware,” he said. “Two complete kits.”
“For the panels?” Navarro asked.
The technician shook his head slightly.
“Maybe. Same kind of mounting system from what I remember. I’d want the site photographs and part numbers before I say more.”
The photographs were brought up on a second monitor.
First C.M.T.A.
Then the former fire-observation site west of it.
Both panel antennas had been documented from several angles during the earlier scene work. The mounts actually used at the sites were visibly different from the parts in Hargrad’s box. They had been adapted to what was already there—one to the building, the other to the surviving structure at the old tower location.
The technician enlarged the rear of the first panel and compared the hole pattern, dimensions, and manufacturer form against the hardware recovered from the Expedition.
Then he did the same with the second.
He took his time.
“Yeah.”
Navarro looked at him.
“You’re sure?”
“They fit that antenna series.”
“Both sites?”
“Both.”
Daniels looked at the two kits.
“Can you say these came with those two antennas?”
“No.”
The technician shook his head.
“I can say they’re the correct factory mounting kits for that hardware. I can’t tell you which boxes they originally came out of.”
That distinction went into the report exactly that way.
The rest of the first vehicle examination produced no equivalent discovery.
No property belonging to Michael.
No recovered project papers.
No hidden phone.
No boat registration.
No part of the missing lanyard.
The Expedition remained what it had already been before the box was opened: Hargrad’s vehicle, damaged during his attempt to flee.
The two mounting kits added something narrower.
Someone with access to that vehicle had possessed unused factory hardware for the same antenna series installed at both ends of the restored radio link.
That was enough to ask Hargrad about.
It was not enough to answer for him.
His phone did little better.
The device contained ordinary contacts, ordinary messages, and the kind of personal debris accumulated by someone who had used the same number for years.
One stored contact mattered because of the investigation.
FRANK KESSLER.
Navarro checked the retained call information again.
“No call between them.”
Daniels looked at the contact entry.
“Saved number. Nothing more.”
They left it that way.
A contact was not a conversation.
Hargrad had counsel with him when Daniels and Navarro returned to the interview room.
Daniels did not begin by asking a question.
He explained what had been found in the Expedition and what the technical comparison had established: two complete factory mounting kits compatible with the same panel-antenna series documented at C.M.T.A. and the former fire-observation site.
He also explained the limit.
They could not yet prove the kits had originally shipped with those two specific antennas.
Hargrad listened without interrupting.
When Daniels finished, Hargrad did not look at him.
He looked at his attorney.
The attorney raised one hand.
“We need a few minutes.”
Daniels stood.
“Take whatever time you need.”
He and Navarro left the room.
Just under ten minutes later, the attorney stepped into the hallway.
“My client wants to talk.”
When Daniels and Navarro returned, the attorney spoke first.
“Before my client says anything, we need to be clear about one thing.”
Daniels sat down.
“Go ahead.”
“He believes he is in danger.”
Hargrad remained silent.
“If he cooperates,” the attorney continued, “he wants protection. Real protection. Not a promise that someone will make a note in a file.”
Daniels looked at Hargrad.
“I can’t promise you something I don’t control.”
The attorney began to respond, but Daniels lifted a hand slightly.
“But if there is a credible threat to him, we can document it, act on it, and make sure the people responsible for his custody know exactly what they’re dealing with.”
Hargrad finally looked up.
“If you’re afraid of someone,” Daniels said, “tell me why.”
The attorney looked at Hargrad, then back to Daniels.
“If he talks, you take the threat seriously.”
“Yes.”
A few seconds passed.
Hargrad nodded once.
Then he said, “I bought the hardware.”
Daniels waited.
“The solar panels. The antennas. Cable. Mounting hardware.”
“For C.M.T.A.?” Navarro asked.
Hargrad nodded.
“And the other site.”
“The old fire-tower location?”
“Yes.”
“You installed them?” Daniels asked.
“I helped install them.”
“Helped who?”
Hargrad shook his head.
“I mounted hardware. Ran cable. Got everything where I was told to put it.”
He glanced at the table.
“I didn’t configure the radios. I didn’t set up whatever was running through them.”
“Who did?”
Hargrad looked at his attorney again.
The attorney did not answer for him.
Hargrad took a breath.
“The woman who paid for all of it.”
Daniels’ expression did not change.
“Who?”
“Marlene Davids.”
Navarro said nothing.
Hargrad added, “Marlene Talia Davids.”
Neither investigator reacted to the name.
Daniels wrote it on a sheet of paper.
MARLENE TALIA DAVIDS
He opened the door and called a colleague from the hallway.
“Can you run this name for me? Just see what we have in the system.”
The officer looked at the paper.
“Anything specific?”
“Not yet. Basic records first.”
The officer took it and walked away.
Daniels closed the door and sat down again.
“Tell me about Marlene Davids.”
Hargrad rubbed his thumb along the edge of the table.
“She ran finance and administration for Western Field Operations.”
“Accounting?”
“More than accounting.”
Hargrad looked at him.
“Budgets. Contractors. Assignments. Expenses. Personnel paperwork. She knew who was working where, who was getting paid, who needed access, who reported to who.”
“Technical?” Navarro asked.
“No. Not like Calver. Not like Weber.”
Hargrad shook his head.
“She stayed in the background.”
A pause.
“But everybody knew who she was.”
Daniels waited.
“You didn’t have a problem with Marlene Davids and stay on the same project for very long.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means if she decided you were a problem, pretty soon somebody found a reason you weren’t needed anymore.”
Hargrad did not describe a single firing he could prove had happened because of her.
He described an atmosphere.
A person who did not need to raise her voice because everyone understood where approvals came from.
A person who knew which contractor was late on expenses, who had asked for a transfer, whose access had expired, who had a family member in another county, which field technician was drowning in debt, and which manager could make a difficult employee disappear from the next assignment schedule without ever writing the word punishment.
“When did you hear from her again?” Daniels asked.
“Earlier this year.”
“She contacted you?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Phone first.”
“Out of nowhere?” Navarro asked.
Hargrad nodded.
“I hadn’t spoken to her in years.”
“What did she want?”
“At first? Nothing that sounded like this.”
Daniels waited.
“Old project. Old people. Who was still around. What I was doing now.”
“Then?”
Hargrad’s jaw tightened.
“Then she started saying things she shouldn’t have known.”
“Like what?”
“She asked how Kelly was.”
“Kelly?”
“My daughter.”
A short pause.
“Then she asked if she was still living in Wellington.”
Daniels watched him.
“Was that a threat?”
“No.”
Hargrad shook his head.
“That was the problem. She didn’t say it like one.”
He looked at his hands.
“She was just letting me know she still knew things about me.”
Before Daniels could ask the next question, the door opened slightly.
The officer from earlier motioned him into the hall.
Daniels stepped outside.
The officer leaned closer.
“Davids is in the system.”
“For what?”
“Nothing major. Disturbance call. Disorderly conduct.”
“Recent?”
“I’ll pull the full report.”
Daniels nodded.
“Do that.”
He returned to the room.
Hargrad watched him sit down.
“Keep going.”
Hargrad hesitated.
“She said she had work for me.”
“What kind of work?”
“Same kind I used to do.”
“Transport?”
“At first.”
“And you agreed?”
Hargrad nodded.
“She paid well.”
“Cash?”
“Sometimes.”
“What was the first job?”
“She wanted me to look at the old sites.”
“C.M.T.A.?”
“C.M.T.A. and the old fire-tower location.”
“What were you supposed to do there?”
“Nothing. Just see if I could still get to them.”
Hargrad shrugged once.
“Roads. Gates. What was still standing. Whether somebody had blocked access. That kind of thing.”
“And after that?” Navarro asked.
“Later she gave me a list.”
“For what?”
“Solar hardware. Two radios. The panel antennas. Cable. Connectors. Mounting parts.”
Hargrad looked at Daniels.
“The idea was to take the old telephone connection at the fire-tower site and get it back to C.M.T.A. over radio.”
“You built it?”
“I mounted it.”
Hargrad shook his head.
“I did not configure it. I wouldn’t have known how.”
“Then who configured it?”
“Calver.”
Navarro looked up.
“Elias Calver?”
“Yes.”
“How did Davids get him involved?”
“I don’t know.”
“You never asked?”
“I didn’t want to know.”
Hargrad looked down.
“One day I was told Elias would handle the technical side. That was it.”
“You were there when he configured it?” Daniels asked.
“For part of it. I had the hardware mounted. Elias came in after that. He configured the radios, checked the link, did whatever he had to do with the old telephone side.”
Hargrad paused.
“I knew enough to carry the parts. Not enough to understand what he was making them do.”
Daniels opened his notebook to an earlier page.
“The argument at Calver’s house.”
Hargrad looked at him.
“What about it?”
“The neighbor heard you talking about money. About getting something running again.”
Hargrad said nothing.
“He also heard Calver tell you he couldn’t do it alone,” Navarro said.
Hargrad leaned back slowly.
“Yeah.”
“Was he talking about the recovery path?” Daniels asked.
After a moment, Hargrad nodded.
“Yes.”
“And when you asked him who he needed, what did he say?”
Hargrad answered after a short hesitation.
“Alpha.”
“That’s what he said?”
“Yes.”
Hargrad nodded.
“He said it wouldn’t work without Alpha.”
“Did you know who Alpha was?”
“Not then.”
“When did you find out?”
“Later.”
“How?”
“Marlene told me.”
“She gave you Michael Weber’s name?”
“Yes.”
Hargrad looked down again.
“That was when I realized this wasn’t just about getting old equipment running again.”
“What exactly did she tell you?” Daniels asked.
“She said she doubted Michael would just agree to help.”
“Those were her words?”
“Close enough.”
Hargrad rubbed his hands together once.
“She said he’d walked away from it years ago. That he wouldn’t want any part of bringing it back.”
“Did she say what she planned to do about that?”
“Not then.”
Daniels let the silence sit.
“When did that change?”
Hargrad looked up.
“What?”
“When did this stop being about equipment?”
Hargrad’s attorney watched him closely.
Hargrad spoke more quietly.
“When she told me we might have to bring Michael to them.”
“Bring him to who?”
“Marlene. Calver.”
“Both of them?”
“That’s what I thought.”
Navarro leaned forward slightly.
“Thought?”
“Marlene never gave me the whole picture.”
“What did you say when she told you to bring him?” Daniels asked.
“I asked her how I was supposed to get him.”
“And?”
“She said that wasn’t her problem.”
Navarro remained still.
Hargrad continued.
“She said I understood the assignment.”
“Anything else?”
“No.”
He shook his head.
“She hung up.”
Daniels watched him.
“And you did understand it.”
Hargrad did not answer immediately.
“Yeah.”
“What did you think she expected you to do?”
Hargrad glanced at his attorney.
Then back at Daniels.
“Get him into a vehicle.”
“Voluntarily?” Navarro asked.
Hargrad slowly shook his head.
“I didn’t think he was going to come voluntarily.”
No one in the room moved for several seconds.
Daniels turned to a clean page.
“All right.”
He placed the pen against the paper.
“Start with July thirty-first.”
Hargrad’s face tightened.
“What was the plan?”
“Calver gave me information on him.”
“What kind of information?”
“Basic stuff. Where he worked. What he drove. Family.”
Hargrad stopped for a moment.
“His daughter’s name.”
“Emma,” Navarro said.
Hargrad nodded.
“Yeah.”
“Then what?”
“I watched him for a day or two.”
“Why?”
“To learn his routine.”
Hargrad looked at Daniels.
“When he came and went. What was normal for him.”
His voice lowered.
“That was when it stopped feeling like a job.”
“What did you learn?”
“He was predictable.”
“Meaning?”
“Work. Home. His daughter. Same places. Same times, mostly.”
Hargrad looked toward the wall.
“He didn’t act like someone who thought he was being watched.”
“Did you ever approach him?” Daniels asked.
Hargrad nodded.
“Once.”
Navarro looked at him.
“Before July thirty-first?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“At his house. I waited until he came home.”
“What did you want?”
“I told him people were trying to get the old system running again.”
“How did he react?”
“He got angry.”
Hargrad looked directly at Daniels.
“He said he was done with it. That he had nothing to do with any of it anymore.”
“And then?”
“I left.”
“You did not threaten him?”
“No.”
“You did not mention Emma?”
“No.”
Hargrad swallowed.
“Not then.”
Daniels did not interrupt.
“On July thirty-first,” Hargrad continued, “I put three photographs under his windshield wiper at Chesapeake.”
Navarro’s expression changed.
“Photographs of what?”
“Emma.”
Hargrad’s voice had become quieter.
“One was her outside the Vances’ house. One was her with Sarah.”
He paused.
“The third was Michael outside his own house.”
Daniels’ pen stopped moving.
“Where did you get the photographs?”
“I don’t know.”
“Someone gave them to you?”
“They were in my mailbox.”
“With a note?” Navarro asked.
“Just an instruction.”
“What did it say?”
“Give these to Michael Weber.”
“And you put them under his windshield wiper.”
Hargrad nodded.
“That was my idea.”
“Why?”
Hargrad looked down.
“Because I didn’t want to hand them to him.”
A short silence.
“Not after the way he looked at me the first time.”
“What was written on the photographs?” Daniels asked.
“Only one of them had anything on the back.”
“What?”
“A time.”
“And?”
Hargrad hesitated.
“White van.”
“What did you understand that to mean?”
“That Michael was supposed to come out at that time and get into the white vehicle.”
“Your Expedition?” Navarro asked.
“No.”
The answer came immediately.
“The note just said white van. I didn’t know what vehicle it was.”
“Who was driving?” Daniels asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Where was it taking him?”
“I don’t know.”
“Were you there when Weber came out of Chesapeake?”
“No.”
“Did you see him get into any vehicle?”
“No.”
Hargrad looked from Daniels to Navarro.
“All I knew was what was written on the photograph.”
“The time and ‘white van.’”
“Yes.”
“And after you put the photographs on Weber’s car?”
“I left.”
Daniels watched him for several seconds.
Hargrad had just admitted enough to move him far beyond the peripheral field-support man he had tried to be at his front door.
He had helped rebuild the physical communication path.
He had obtained and mounted the equipment.
He had watched Michael’s routine.
He had approached him at home.
He had delivered photographs of Michael’s daughter and wife as pressure.
He understood Michael would not cooperate voluntarily.
But his account still left the most important physical moment unfilled.
Hargrad said he had not been at Chesapeake when Michael entered the white vehicle.
He did not identify the driver.
He did not identify the vehicle.
He did not know where it went.
And nothing he had said yet told Daniels where Michael was now.
The door opened again.
The same officer stood in the hallway.
This time he did not have the earlier sheet of paper in his hand.
“You asked for basic records on Davids.”
Daniels stepped out.
“What did you find?”
The officer glanced through the open doorway toward Hargrad and then back to Daniels.
“She has a vehicle registered in her name.”
“What vehicle?”
A short pause.
“A white GMC Yukon.”
Daniels said nothing.
Navarro had stood up behind him.
“Current?” she asked.
“No.”
Daniels looked at the officer.
“Why not?”
“She reported it stolen.”
For a moment, no one spoke.
Daniels asked only one question.
“When?”