Chapter 6

The call came at 7:15 the next morning, before the courtyard had even unlocked its doors. Priya was at her station, arranging the tins for the second day of the convention, when her phone buzzed against the counter. She didn't recognize the number, but a vendor's instinct — the one that said not to ignore anything during the four days the hall was open — made her answer.

"Miss Moreno?"

It was Warren Cole's voice, but the flat, professional tone he'd used for statements was gone. He sounded like a man who had been up all night.

"I need you to come to the registration office," he said. "Bring your brother. Bring your father. And bring that cloth."

Priya stood frozen for a second, the phone against her ear, the courtyard still and dusty in the morning light that slanted through the high windows of the pavilion. "What happened?"

"Just come."

She hung up and looked at Kieran, who was already pulling on his hoodie, his eyes sharp with the same alert stillness he'd worn the morning before.

"Warren?" he asked.

Priya nodded. "He says bring the cloth."

They found Teodoro at the registration office, standing at the window with the envelope from the anonymous complaint in one hand and his phone in the other. He didn't look like he'd had a good night either. He wore the same charcoal jacket, but the midnight-blue shirt underneath was rumpled, and his reading glasses were on his nose, not in his pocket.

Warren was behind the counter, and the clerk beside him had the look of someone who had watched a file grow larger than she'd expected and was trying not to let it show.