Like the boogeyman from an adult fairy tale, he wore a jacket bearing the letters ICE. The Icemen, that's who they were, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents who came in the middle of the night and stole husbands from their wives, tore babies from the arms of their mothers. A scream bubbled up out of her throat, breaking her trance. She jumped up and pounced at the woman who had her baby. The man grabbed her arms, restraining her and deftly snapping metal cuffs on her wrists.

The woman laid Isodora's baby on the changing table, wincing at the smell as she undid the dirty diaper. The man kept his voice low, but it didn't keep him from escorting her out through the front door against her violent thrashing. The baby's screams pierced even her own and Isodora boiled with rage and indignation, her vision blurred with steamy tears.

A white county van waited outside next to the agents' car. The Range Rover belonging to the senator's wife was there, too, and she got out and approached Isodora.

"It's better this way," the senator's wife said, with a face twisted in pain. "Please, believe me."

Isodora thrashed and struggled and spit at the wife's face.

Through her rage, Isodora was aware that two women with short hair climbed out of the van and spoke to the Iceman about the baby. The two took Paquita from the woman agent and put her into the van, snapping her into a car seat in the back and driving off while Isodora howled from the cage in the back of the ICE agents' car. As the van disappeared over the hilltop, Isodora felt her throat constrict and she choked and gagged and banged her head against the glass until everything went black.

CHAPTER 4

CASEY SAT DOWN BEHIND HER DESK AND REMOVED A FILE from her briefcase. Jose dug into a beaten leather valise, pulling out several files of his own, then holding up one like a card for her to see and placing it on the desk before he sat down.