THERE WASN’T A SINGLE NOTE ABOUT ISABELLE MORRIS’S EARLIER interviews in the thin unclassified file I had gotten from the Bureau, so I couldn’t compare her stories with what I was hearing now. She told us she’d been home the evening before the kidnapping, left the house around seven thirty the next morning for the Branaff campus, and then went right back home again after she’d been released. None of it ruled out a connection to the case, but I thought we were probably wasting our time with her as much as she did.
On the way back in, Sampson and I stopped at an empanada place he likes on Sixteenth. We ate our turnovers in the car with a couple of Yoo-hoos. God save our digestive systems. Mine anyway. Sampson eats like he’s part goat. It’s been that way since we were ten years old.
“So what are you thinking?” Sampson said. “Those kids still alive? Any chance at all?”
I stared over at him. “If no one’s made any demands yet, that’s a terrible sign. On the other hand, the FBI or Secret Service could be sitting on something. Let’s face it, Ethan and Zoe Coyle are two of the highest-value targets in the world.”
John demolished half an empanada in a single bite. “You thinking this could be international?” Sampson said. “Terrorism?”
I shrugged. “For the moment, I’m throwing darts, John. But I’ll tell you one thing. I keep coming back to the Gary Soneji case.” Prior to this, the Soneji mess had been the biggest kidnap investigation—and in some ways, the biggest debacle—I’d ever been attached to.
“Soneji worked at the school he took those kids from,” Sampson said. “I remember they had to drag you kicking and screaming onto that case. And now here you are, kicking and screaming to get onto this one.”
“Yeah.” I looked down at the pile of busywork files on the seat between us. “I just hope those kids are alive. John, I still remember the day we found Michael Goldberg in that grave. I don’t want to relive it. I don’t want to find another dead child.”