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minutes before the light curve indicated that DJ1 was pointing at us.”
    “Wow.” Charli nodded. Now we’re getting somewhere.
    “Hold on, I don’t get it.” Guccio held his hand in a stop gesture. “You said that they happened at the same time. Now you say they didn’t.”
    “No, they did happen at the same time. We just didn’t see DJ1’s movement until the light from DJ1 reached us 42.2 minutes later. It’s like lightning. You see the lightning, but the sound doesn’t reach you until later.”
    “Okay. Why is that so significant?” asked Guccio.
    “It means,” Charli said, “that DJ1 is capable of generating a wave that travels faster than the speed of light.”
    McGraw threw out his hands. “Ta-daa!”
    * * *
    May 26, 2018
    Charli put her feet up on her desk, leaned back, and scrolled through the file photos of Jake Corby. His nose was one size too large for his face, as if someone had photoshopped it in but gotten the size wrong. He had a timeworn look, like a favorite old tool that had been used frequently.
    In one picture, taken at the top of a ski resort with Lake Tahoe in the background, he held his wife as if carrying her over a threshold. He supported her effortlessly even though she was wearing skis and poles. At first glance it looked like he was kissing her, but on closer inspection his puffed out cheeks were clear. He was blowing a raspberry against her face, and she was laughing. Goofing around. Charli pulled on her ear as she stared at the photo. So much love and happiness. She looked at the date on the back. Jake’s wife was murdered soon after that shot was taken.
    Charli’s office was a few doors down from the Oval Office. It was the smallest one in the West Wing. That suited her fine: less space for clutter. The surface of her desk contained a telephone, a picture of her grandmother, and a photo of a favorite nephew. Nothing else.
    Charli tore herself away from the image of Jake when NSA agent Chandra Bark entered her office and sat in the visitor’s chair. Bark could have passed for a Bollywood star and wore traditional Indian clothing.
    “Jake Corby is dead,” she said. “He spent time in Canada on a cycling trip, sailed across the Atlantic, solo, then down around The Cape of Good Hope and up past Madagascar toward India. He hasn’t been heard from since, and his boat was found drifting, empty. That was two years ago.”
    “So, what do you think? Pirates?” Charli leaned back in her chair, her palms together with her chin resting on her fingertips.
    “Pirates, yes.”
    “No,” Charli said after a pause. “I don’t buy it. Not yet anyway. You’re giving up too easily. Any unidentified bodies wash up over there?”
    Bark’s face reddened. “We haven’t looked into that, but you wouldn’t expect … it’s a big ocean. An investigation found signs of violence.”
    “What signs?”
    “There were gunshot holes in the hull and blood in the cockpit.”
    “Corby’s blood?”
    “We don’t know. We didn’t do the investigation,” Bark said.
    “Who goes on a sailing holiday in the most dangerous, pirate-infested waters on the planet?”
    “Granted.” Bark began to sweat, and her voice sounded strained. “But adventurers, such as those traveling around the world, have done dangerous things like that for years. And pirate attacks on private yachts, especially tiny ones like his, are actually rare.”
    “But if you wanted to fake your death,” Charli said, “That would be one way to do it.”
    “I can think of lots of easier ways than sailing around the world.”
    “Yeah, good point. Let’s not give up on this, though. Is there no money trail?”
    “No. He has lots of money, but—”
    “How much?”
    “We figure at least thirty million.”
    Charli whistled. “That’s all from his kidnap-proofing consulting company?”
    “Yes, plus royalties from his books. The company, Corby Solutions, based in Mexico City, provided seminars and training to help