Chapter 2
Sloane
It’s been three days since the explosion, and I swear I can still smell the smoke lingering in my hair.
Jessy has been out of school since then.
I can’t face the thought of sending her back, not yet.
The day after the attack, she was so scared that she pretended she was too sick to go to school.
I gladly bought the lie, spoiling her with love and treats.
She’ll have to go back soon, I can’t put it off forever, but right now it’s not safe.
The police did take it seriously and we’ve been assigned two US marshals for protection. Having them around makes me feel a little safer, but it’s like our lives have been put on hold.
To take my mind off of everything, I’ve buried myself in research.
Legal documents are spread across the coffee table in neat stacks—federal statutes, Department of Justice reports, case studies, and information on the Witness Security Program.
WITSEC, the federal government’s polite term for disappearing people and their tidy little solution to my current predicament.
They want us to disappear and start a new life, to pretend this never happened, we were never these people, to give up everything and run away. They want us to hide.
I scroll through another page of statistics. I can feel a headache emerging, a throbbing at my temple.
Across the room, Jessy sits cross-legged on the rug surrounded by plastic dinosaurs. A Stegosaurus and a Triceratops are locked in a dramatic argument as she crashes them together. “Actually,” she informs them, “you both eat plants not other animals.”
The quiet normalcy of the moment almost feels surreal—apart from the US Marshals watching over us.
Behind me, one of the marshals clears his throat. Marshal Harris has been leaning against my kitchen counter for the past twenty minutes, pretending to check his phone. He’s tall, mid-forties, with the kind of square shoulders that suggest a military background.
His partner, Marshal Reed, sits at the dining table watching the front window. These two men have to face endless days of boring monotony, watching us go about our business because a cartel-connected criminal probably wants me dead.
“You should eat something,” Harris says.
I glance at the untouched plate of toast beside my laptop before returning my focus to the document I’m reading. “I’m fine.”
“You’ve said that six times.”
“I’m still fine.”
He studies me with the weary patience of someone who has spent years babysitting stubborn witnesses. “I’ve worked protection details before,” he says. “People think they can outthink danger if they stare at it long enough.”
“I’m not staring,” I say, chewing on the end of my pen. “I’m researching.”
“Same difference,” he says with a shrug.
I ignore him and scroll down the screen again.
My brain latches onto numbers the way it always does when I’m building a case.
I’m studying the WITSEC relocation statistics, identity reassignment procedures, average witness cooperation length, and failure rates.
My chest tightens slightly as I reach the section labeled ‘Program Breaches’.
Statistics they don’t tell you flash up on my screen, how many witnesses are found, how many are killed, or those who vanished again after the government relocated them.
Most of the cases are decades old, but the pattern is clear enough.
Witness Protection is not a strategy. You disappear and hope the people looking for you eventually lose interest. Whether you win or lose, you lose your life as you know it.
It’s a gamble. The question is, is it one I’m willing to take?
“Mommy?” Jessy says in that sing-song way all children do when they want their mother’s attention.
“Yes, sweetheart?” I mumble, my gaze still fixed on the screen.
“My Stegosaurus thinks you should watch this fight.” She says this without a hint of irony. It’s what the dinosaur wants, not her.
I glance over. The Triceratops has apparently lost the argument and is now lying dramatically on its side. “Well done, Mr. Stegosaurus.”
Jessy beams and returns to her game, picking out a new opponent for her Stegosaurus to conquer.
Marshal Reed watches the exchange with the faintest hint of a smile before returning his attention to the window.
I can’t see out the front window from where I’m sitting, but I know the view like the back of my hand.
I know that the front yard of our small house looks the same as it did a week ago.
The street beyond it hasn’t changed, either.
Children ride past on bicycles, the maple tree sways in the wind, and birds fly overhead—the illusion of normal life.
I suppose to everyone else, life is carrying on as normal. It makes me feel even more isolated.
My laptop pings with another document loading. I lean forward, scrutinizing the new information. “Marshal Harris.”
“Yeah?” he says, slipping his phone into his pocket.
“What’s the longest someone stays in witness protection?”
He shrugs. “Depends.”
“On what?”
“Whether the people looking for them stop.” I appreciate that Marshal Harris is a straight shooter, a man who won’t lie or make empty promises, even if his words aren’t comforting.
I rub my eyes, trying to push past the headache building behind them.
Thirty-two hours, that’s how long I’ve spent reading about the witness protection program since Detective Alvarez, the man in charge of my case, first suggested it.
It’s been thirty-two long hours of reading federal policy manuals, testimony transcripts, and court cases.
If disappearing with WITSEC were a legal contract, I’d know every clause by now.
Jessy suddenly gasps. “My Velociraptor escaped!”
The toy skids across the hardwood floor and bumps into my foot. I pick it up and hand it back to her. “Phew, that was a close one. He nearly ate my foot! He’s a dangerous predator,” I say, playing along.
“Very.” She studies the toy thoughtfully. “Do bad guys have dinosaurs?”
I know Jessy’s really asking, ‘Are we safe? Do the bad men have monsters to hurt us with?’ I’ve been trying to make this as normal as possible for us, but with the marshals in the house, and what happened outside her school, it’s impossible to hide the fact that everything is not normal.
“No, sweetheart. Dinosaurs are extinct, you know that,” I remind her, avoiding the real question.
Jessy seems satisfied with this explanation and returns to her battle.
I look back at the screen, my eyes feel tired from staring at its blue light for so long. I adjust in my chair, trying and failing to get comfortable. Then, a paragraph catches my eye:
Witness relocation may require immediate identity reassignment, severing prior personal and professional ties indefinitely.
It’s something I already knew, of course, in theory, but now the reality of it hits me.
That word, ‘severing’, it’s so violent, so abrupt and final.
I’d have to cut off everything, my practice, my cases, I’d have to stop practicing law and take on a new identity as far removed from my chosen career as possible.
A career I’ve fought so hard to succeed in.
I’d have to give up everything, my entire life, my identity, my skills, my name, I’d even have to alter my appearance.
Everything. Gone. There’d be no turning back.
I’d have to do that to my daughter, too.
I’d have to teach Jessy to be afraid, to never tell anyone anything about her past; she’d need to become a whole new person, make new friends, and take up new hobbies—there’d be no more dinosaurs.
The idea sits heavily in my chest. Perhaps I could do it for Jessy, give up everything I love to keep her safe, but can I expect her to do the same? Can I really burden my child with such a weighty secret that she’ll have to keep for the rest of her life?
A loud buzz from Harris’s radio cuts through the quiet room. Both marshals stiffen instantly. Harris presses the button. “Harris.”
Static crackles through the speaker. I can’t make out the words, but the tone of the voice on the other end is sharp and urgent.
Reed stands up immediately. Whatever he’s heard has put him on high alert.
“What is it?” I ask, my voice coming out thin and reedy with nerves.
Neither of them answers, their faces fixed in identical frowns. Harris listens for another few seconds before replying. “Copy.” He lowers the radio slowly, grim-faced and serious.
“What happened?” I say. The two men exchange a look, and my stomach drops. I know the news was bad, very bad. “What happened?” I repeat.
Harris exhales. “There’s been an incident.”
I bite down my frustration. I don’t want them to break it to me gently. I just need to know. “With who?” My heart starts racing.
“With our vehicle detail. Marshal Carter was following up on a lead connected to Escar’s network.”
I frown, confused and a bit irritated at being kept in the dark. “I didn’t know there was another marshal assigned.”
“External support,” Reed says quietly.
“What kind of incident?” I ask carefully, my gaze darting over to Jessy, who thankfully, is too absorbed in her game to pay us any attention.
Neither man speaks for a moment. Then Harris says, “He’s dead.”
“Jessy, why don’t you go fetch your new storybook, and when you’ve finished playing, we can do some reading practice,” I say, trying to sound calm. Jessy jumps up excitedly and rushes off to do that.
As soon as Jessy’s thundering footsteps have receded and she’s out of sight, I turn my attention back to the marshals. “How?”
“Drive-by shooting,” Reed says. “About twenty minutes ago.”
A hollow feeling spreads through my chest. I never even met Marshal Carter, and now he’s dead because of a case I prosecuted.
“And his partner?” I ask, well aware he must have one.
“She’s in critical condition.”