Quantico, Virginia, Wednesday…

"But you knew Patty Smith better than you know me, right?"

"So what? I don't need a grudge to do a good job."

"I know that. But wouldn't you like to get her killers?"

Asako lifted the top off the second half of the sandwich and slathered more hot mustard on it. When it was uniformly thick, she seemed satisfied, and pointed the knife at Jay, as the latter stole a few chips.

"I don't deny it. But I didn't ask for the case. My superiors knew that Patty and I were friends. They still gave me the case. And they haven't said anything. What do you want me to do, go off the case?"

"You're going down a road that I had no intention of going down. I just think that knowing Patty so well would motivate you to give me any information you have so I can help out on the case. I made a promise to Dolores."

"That's not an easy promise to keep. This is not an easy case. We have nothing, absolutely nothing, except three shot-up corpses. No motive. No suspects. No reason for their deaths. My bosses are ready to close the books on this one."

"From the FBI's perspective?"

"Yeah, who else?"

Jay told her about the car registered to the DHS. "Are they in on this?" she asked.