I scan the photo with a portable scanner before attaching it to an outgoing email. I forward it to the contact who has been unofficially working on this investigation for as long as Macy has. I forward it to Crew Grier, Kendall’s once-boyfriend. I leave my contact details, hoping he will be more forthcoming with his investigation when he pieces together Macy’s connection to the case. It’s a long shot, but it’s better than nothing.
The whoosh of my email being sent has only just finished ringing in my ear when my phone vibrates. I dig it out of my pocket before staring down at the screen. The number is unfamiliar, but the area code is local.
I answer on the second ring. “Rogers?—”
“Where did you get that image?”
My anger spikes, caught off guard by my caller’s hostility. “Excuse me?”
“The photo you forwarded me. Where did you get it?” His tone is clipped and accusatory. “Who are you?”
My eyes drift to my laptop, and the truth dawns: I used my personal email to contact Crew. “Agent Grayson Rogers. I’m with the bureau. I’m working on a case with Macy Machini. She’s my partner.” My last three words come out more claiming than intended. It can’t be helped. I’ve always had a barrier up when itcomes to keeping Macy’s connection with Kendall’s case out of the wrong hands.
There’s a pause, and I can almost hear the wheels turning on the other end. “Partner?” Crew repeats, hearing the ownership in my tone as readily as I do. He’s picturing something more than a work colleague, and I let him. “Why does she look familiar?”
“She’s Kendall’s sister.”
“I know that, dipshit,” he bites out, shocking me with his gall. “I meant familiar as in I’ve recently seen her.” I can’t see him, but I imagine his mouth forming anOwhen a surprised gasp echoes down the line. “She was the pregnant woman who accosted me and my partner outside the Lamaze class.” His incredulous tone carries an unexpected protective note. “We thought she was going to break our cover; that’s why my partner went in so hard. How the fuck did she know Monica majored in art?”
“It’s Macy.” The pride in my tone can’t be missed. “She’s as smart as she is beautiful.”
Crew whistles in agreement, then calms down enough to solve the puzzle I gave him earlier. “Macy’s with the bureau?”
A confirming hum vibrates on my lips. “She’s the head of a task force on the West Coast.”
“But secretly the running point for Kendall’s case?”
I let silence speak on my behalf.
His huff this time is wary instead of impressed. “She needs to be careful. This runs deeper than anyone realizes.”
“This?”
He’s good. Not as good as Macy, but he’s up there. “This…” He waits for the air to go stale before continuing. “I’ll forward you my notes. I’ve got phone records, emails, and a few photos that Kendall sent me during her last week at NYU that havenever been included in her file. There’s a guy in the background of one image from her sale three years ago?—”
“Kendall was sold ten yearsafterher abduction?” Paper shredding rips through my ears when I flick through her file. I’d remember a fact like that, but I don’t recall ever seeing anything about her being sold years later.
“Yeah.” Crew’s grinding teeth bellow down the line. “Three years ago in Miami. By the time we raided the warehouse, she had already been transported to her new owner.”
His personal ties to the case make him share intel without realizing it, but I keep probing for more. “We?”
Air whizzes out his nose as he mutters smugly, “This goes higher than the bureau, Agent Rogers.”
Reading between the lines, I say, “CIA.”
He neither confirms nor denies my accusation. I don’t need his confirmation. I’ve known for years that most of the baby-making trade runs outside US borders, and his silence is extremely telling.
I talk from both my heart and my head. “If you want to find Kendall, you need to bring Macy onto your team.”
He sounds reluctant. “I can’t do that. I don’t have the authority.”
“Bring her in as a consultant. You don’t need approval from the hierarchy to do that.” I know this firsthand, as I’ve worked with the CIA under the same guise many times in the past fourteen years.
After a stint of silence, Crew says, “I don’t feel comfortable doing that.”
“Why?” I snap out, my anger rising.
He scoffs as if he couldn’t read a billboard sign if it were directly in front of him. “She’s pregnant, and I don’t give a fuck what you say; a prosthetic stomach didn’t cause the discomfortthat crossed her face when she sat on the yoga mat during Lamaze class.”
