Chapter 3: What Was Inside the Case
The detective's name was Reyes.
She had a calm face and careful eyes, the kind that didn't give anything away.
She asked Noah to wait with a uniformed officer just outside the door.
He didn't want to go.
"I want to stay with Grandma."
"I know," I said.
"Two minutes.
I promise."
He went.
The door clicked shut.
Detective Reyes set a photograph on the table between us.
It was a still image, slightly grainy, pulled from security footage.
A man in a light blue shirt standing at the edge of the pool.
"Is this him?"
I looked at it for a long moment.
"Yes.
That's him."
She turned the photo back toward herself.
"His name is Gerald Marsh.
We've been tracking him for eleven days."
My mouth went dry.
"Tracking him for what?"
She folded her hands on the table.
"Ma'am, the case your grandson led us to — it contained a secondary device.
A trigger.
We believe it was placed there as part of a larger operation being run out of this hotel."
I stared at her.
"What kind of operation?"
"I can't share all the details yet.
But I need you to understand something." She leaned forward slightly.
"Marsh didn't choose your grandson randomly.
He watched the pool for two days before he approached anyone.
He chose Noah because Noah had been there every day, at the same time, in the same area.
He knew your grandson would know exactly where to look without drawing attention."
The room felt smaller.
"He used my ten-year-old grandson as a distraction."
"As cover," she said.
"A child pointing under a chair looks like a child looking for a toy.
An adult doing the same thing gets noticed."
I pressed my hands flat on the table to keep them from shaking.
"Was Noah in danger?
Was the device — was it something that could have—"
"The device was not armed," she said.
"Noah was never in physical danger."
"But Marsh didn't know that when he sent him over there."
She didn't answer.
She didn't need to.
I stood up.
"I need to be with my grandson."
"Of course.
But I need one more thing first."
She slid a second photograph across the table.
This one was clearer.
A man I didn't recognize — younger, dark jacket, standing near the hotel entrance.
"Did you see this man at any point this week?
Near the pool, the lobby, the restaurant?"
I looked carefully.
"I don't think so."
"Look again."
I did.
And then something shifted in my memory.
A man at the far end of the pool on Tuesday.
Reading a newspaper.
Never going in the water.
I had thought nothing of it.
"Maybe," I said slowly.
"Tuesday afternoon.
He was sitting at the far end."
Reyes picked up her pen.
"What time?"
"Around three.
Noah was doing laps.
I remember because the man was the only adult at the pool who wasn't watching a child."
She wrote it down.
"Thank you." She stood.
"We're going to need you and Noah to stay in the hotel tonight.
We may have more questions."
"Are we safe here?"
She looked at me steadily.
"Marsh is in custody.
The device has been removed.
The hotel is being swept right now." She paused.
May you like
"But I won't lie to you.
We don't yet know if Marsh was working alone."
