“Ruiz should call in the FBI. They’re much deeper into this space than we are.”
Sam retrieved the secure BlackBerry she used to communicate with Nick. Send the message to Avery. We need their expertise on this. Ask him to call me as a friend, not as the Homicide LT.
Nick responded right away. Will do.
“What’re you doing?”
“I’m asking my husband to contact our friend Agent Hill so the request doesn’t come from me.”
“This is making me very uncomfortable, Lieutenant. You were ordered to steer clear of the investigation, but you’re calling in the FBI?”
“My husband is asking a friend to help.”
“Is that how the brass will see it? Is that how Captain Ruiz will see it?”
“I’m not concerned about that right now. I want to find my nephew.”
“As do I, but I’m not willing to risk a rap. If it’s just the same with you, I’m going home. If Captain Ruiz requests assistance from my team, we’ll gladly provide it, and I suggest you loop her in on these matters so she can pursue them. I hope you understand.”
Sam held back a frustrated retort that wouldn’t accomplish anything in the effort to find Ethan. “I understand.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine. I get it.”
“I want you to know I admire you very much.”
“That’s nice to hear. Thank you for coming.”
“I’ll pray for your nephew.”
As the woman departed, Sam wanted to scream with frustration and a powerful feeling of impotence. She was used to taking whatever action necessary to serve her victim of the moment, but in this most important of cases, she was being forced to stand down.
Chapter Five
Sam was contemplating her next move when her phone rang with a call from Avery Hill.
“Hey.”
“I heard about your nephew. What can I do?”
“Nothing officially. I’ve been told to steer clear, and if they think I called you in, I’ll be in deep shit.”
“You didn’t call me in. My boss did.”
“The big boss, you mean.”
“The biggest one. My friend, the president, told me his nephew is missing and asked if I could help. He told me about the incel texts, and that sends up all sorts of red flags for me. We’ve got people assigned full time to that area.”
“Like, how many people?”
“About twenty agents from the Domestic Terrorism team.”
She gasped at such a large effort. “Avery, my God. I’ve never even heard of it before today.”
“It’s been an issue since the nineties. They’re heterosexual men who blame women and society as a whole for their lack of romantic partners. There’s all this crazy vernacular as part of the so-called manosphere. In addition to incels, they’re classified as Pick-Up Artists, Men Going Their Own Way and Men’s Rights Activists. Incels seem to have the most violent tendencies when it comes to acting on their grievances against women. We’ve seen cases where couples have been targeted because the guy is successful in getting a woman to be with him, so they hate him as much as they hate the woman who rejected them. Remember when the husband and daughter of that federal judge in Oregon were murdered at their home?”
“Yes,” Sam said, swallowing bile that burned her throat as this became more horrifying by the second.
