12

Are Christmas trees good or bad for the planet? Furthermore, are they good or bad for the soul?

It feels strange to be sitting in the passenger seat of Kyle’s police cruiser. I observe the equipment: the shotgun attached to the ceiling, the radio, the bulletproof glass partition between the front and back seats. B-cars are more subtle, with all the real gear concealed in the trunk.

“I was watching a documentary on NBC last night about an important spy case,” Kyle says. “You were in New York at the time the case was going on. Maybe you know it. There was a book too.” I know what he’s going to say before he says it: Blue Squared.

Because so much of the case is classified, the writer didn’t know my real name. Despite the requests from Public Affairs, I never granted an interview, and the writer got plenty of things wrong. I remember everything from the actual case, but all I recall from the book is a description of an arrest, a sentence about me in my Royal Robbins pants.

“Did you know the woman who solved it?”

“We were acquainted, yes.”

A bug smashes against the windshield, and Kyle turns on the wipers to remove it, leaving a grotesque smudge on the glass.

“Hey, you promised you’d tell me how you ended up with the FBI.”

“When I was young, I planned to be a professor of literature. In grad school, a friend dared me to apply to the FBI. I did. It was nothing more than a lark. I never expected to pass the written test, which is heavy on math. After that, I didn’t expect to pass the endless rounds of interviews and assessments. And then I didn’t expect to pass my seventeen weeks of training at Quantico.”

“So why’d you stay so long?”

“Fame and fortune, obviously,” I deadpan.

Years ago, when my father asked why I had stayed with the FBI for so long, I realized it wasn’t the cases, the intellectual challenges, or even the occasional adrenaline rush that made it difficult to leave. Instead, it was a feeling of belonging to something worthy.

The organization doesn’t exist for the pursuit of money. No one joins to get rich. Because agents work out of sight of the press and the public, the FBI doesn’t tend to attract self-aggrandizing types. Thanks to the excruciatingly detailed background checks, the office has a uniquely open atmosphere. Everyone is an open book. Questions are usually met with direct and unqualified honesty, even when the answer may not be something you want to hear. I tried to explain it to my dad but ultimately couldn’t find the right words.

Instead, I told him this: With searches and arrests, the call is usually for 4:30 a.m. Driving to the meeting spot, I’m tired, cold, cradling my coffee, navigating empty streets while the world is sleeping. I pull into the corner of a parking lot in front of a big-box store, and I sit drinking my coffee, listening to quiet music, headlights off, hidden in the darkness. Then I see them, two by two—­headlights pulling off the highway, onto the side streets, slowly moving toward me. In minutes, my car is joined by another. The two cars become four; the four quietly become eight. Friends, coworkers, or sometimes strangers who will become friends all standing around in the cold and dark, talking and laughing, relaxed, preparing to complete the serious task at hand.

Of course, I don’t explain all of this to Kyle. I just say, “When I arrived at Quantico, I was such a fish out of water. Now, the FBI is home.”

We veer onto 92 and head over the mountain in silence. Soon we’re enveloped in fog. I power down the window, and the fresh smell of the ocean blows in. I take a deep breath, filling my lungs. In Half Moon Bay, we turn left onto Cabrillo Highway. We follow the highway for half a mile before turning right onto a one-lane road littered with potholes.

“What do you know about Mr. Stafford’s priors?” I ask.

“You mean the stint at Lompoc?”

“Precisely.”

“He did his time, appeared to get out of the business.”

“What does he do now?”

“Sells software for a start-up that’s about to go public. Why? You think what happened to Gray is somehow connected?”

“Don’t know.”

“Doesn’t square with the Lamey twins, though,” Kyle observes. “It would mean the two cases aren’t connected.”

“Agreed.”

At the end of the road, we come to a parking lot. The temperature has dropped twenty-four degrees since we left Greenfield. We get out of the car, passing a small red house set into a flat patch of ice plant. The paint is peeling, and plastic toys litter the patio. Stones have been stacked in rows in a futile attempt to keep the sand at bay. The truck in the driveway is green, the California Fish and Game logo painted on the side. In front of the house, the sandy path narrows. We follow it another few hundred yards down to the beach, where the surf is pounding the shore.

“Where are the surfers?”

“It’s because of the layout.” Kyle gestures toward the ocean with both hands. “Sets splitting both ways, a dangerous shore break.”

“You surf?”

“Dude, I live in a mobile home in Pacifica. Of course I surf.” He narrows his eyes playfully. “What, it wasn’t in my file?”

“You think there’s some warehouse in DC filled with files on regular citizens?”

“Isn’t there?”

“There’s a warehouse, all right, but it’s not in DC. It’s called Google.” I look up and down the beach both ways. It’s eerily deserted. “Tell me the story of the day Gray came back.”

He points south. “Stafford was walking from that direction. And Nicole was alone, over here on a piece of driftwood when she saw him.”

I do a double take. “I don’t remember a Nicole from the file.”

“She asked to be kept out of it, and Crandall agreed. He didn’t think it was relevant. I had to really work to get it out of him.”

“So he just omitted her from his write-up?”

“Pretty much.”

“What was her deal?”

“Tech exec from the city. Originally from Chattanooga, Tennessee, went to Stanford.”

“So why did she want to be anonymous?”

“This isn’t what you’d call a popular beach. The parking lot is sparse, lots of privacy. You remember that Explorer with the blacked-out windows when we pulled in?”

“Yes.”

“On cold days, at lunch time, there’s usually a car or two off in the corner.” He’s trying to put it delicately, which is, to be honest, a little insulting.

“Nicole was screwing someone in the parking lot?”

He blushes. “Something like that.”

“You just said she was alone when she saw Gray.”

“She was. She met the guy in the parking lot. When they were finished, he left, and she went for a walk alone on the beach.”

“Anything else Crandall left out of the file?”

“Probably plenty.”

“I want to talk to her.”

I regret it as soon as the words leave my mouth. Do I really want to get more involved? Reading files is one thing. Doing interviews is something else. As soon as your name appears on a write-up, you’re in it, you’re on the 6(e) list, you’re a case participant. It can be a slippery slope, leading to an appearance at grand jury, an unwelcome stint at trial, all of it. But Rory was right when he said, “You need to work.” In fact, I want to work. I feel a familiar tug, anticipation, the magnetic pull of the unsolved case drawing me in.

“Sure. I’ll call her. She’ll be thrilled.”

Kyle pulls out his phone, goes through contacts, dials a number. After he introduces himself, there’s a long pause. When he asks to meet, there’s an even longer pause. “You could come to the station instead,” he says in a voice I haven’t heard him use—more Officer Kyle than Apprentice Kyle. It seems to do the trick, because the next words out of his mouth are: “No, I’ve got your address. See you in half an hour.”

He slides the phone into his pocket. “Up for a ride to the city?”