The text message arrived at 2:17 AM Pacific Time, vibrating my phone across the nightstand of my Seattle hotel room with enough force to wake me from a fitful sleep. I\u2019d been dreaming about the Castellano case again\u2014the same nightmare where I\u2019m running through dark corridors trying to reach Angela Moretti before they do, always one door behind, always one second too late. I grabbed the phone, squinting against the sudden brightness, expecting it to be Deputy Chief Crawford with an update on the protection detail.<\/p>\n
Instead, my mother\u2019s name glowed on the screen. The message was characteristically brief, characteristically tone-deaf: Finally did something about that house of yours. You\u2019re welcome.<\/p>\n
I stared at those words for a full thirty seconds before my sleep-deprived brain could process them. The house. My house in Alexandria, Virginia.<\/p>\n
The three-bedroom colonial I\u2019d purchased two years ago after making Deputy U.S. Marshal, the property I\u2019d specifically chosen because it sat exactly fifteen minutes from the federal courthouse and twenty minutes from the Marshal Service headquarters in Arlington. My fingers moved across the screen: Mom?<\/p>\n
What do you mean? The response came immediately, as if she\u2019d been waiting for me to wake up and appreciate her handiwork. Sold it.<\/p>\n
You were never there anyway, always traveling for that job of yours. The money will help your sister with her wedding. You can stop being so selfish now.<\/p>\n
I sat up so abruptly I nearly threw the phone across the room. My heart was hammering, my mouth suddenly dry. This had to be a joke.<\/p>\n
Some kind of terrible, ill-conceived joke that would make sense in the morning after I\u2019d had coffee and could think clearly. You sold MY house? I typed, hands shaking.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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