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information, but in the ten years since the robbery none of the stolen money had been recovered. Seven million dollars in used banknotes, unmarked and untraceable, had simply vanished. Nobody knew the serial numbers because the cash was being taken out of circulation and destroyed. It was old, soiled and torn, but still legal tender.
    Audie Palmer had survived the robbery despite being shot in the head, and a fourth gang member – believed to be Palmer’s older brother Carl – had got away with the money. Over the past decade there had been false alarms and unconfirmed sightings of Carl. Police in Tierra Colorado, Mexico, reportedly arrested him in 2007 but they released him before the FBI could get a warrant for his extradition. A year later an American tourist holidaying in the Philippines claimed that Carl Palmer was running a bar in Santa Maria, north of Manila. There were other sightings in Argentina and Panama – most of them anonymous tip-offs that led nowhere.
    Desiree turns off the Spanish lesson and gazes at the passing farmland. What sort of idiot escapes the day before his release? She had already considered the possibility that Audie might have fled to avoid a reception committee. Surely he could have waited one more day. Under the reoffending policy in Texas he could get another twenty-five years.
    Desiree had been to Three Rivers FCI once before to interview Audie and to ask him about the money. It was two years ago and Audie hadn’t struck her as being an idiot. He had an IQ of 136 and had studied engineering at college before dropping out. Getting shot in the head could have changed his personality, of course, but Audie had come across as polite, intelligent and almost apologetic. He called her ma’am and didn’t comment on her height, or become annoyed when she accused him of lying.
    ‘I don’t remember much about that day,’ Audie told her. ‘Someone shot me in the head.’
    ‘What do you remember?’
    ‘Being shot in the head.’
    She tried again. ‘Where did you meet the gang?’
    ‘In Houston.’
    ‘How?’
    ‘Through a distant cousin.’
    ‘Does your cousin have a name?’
    ‘He’s very distant.’
    ‘Who hired you for the job?’
    ‘Verne Caine.’
    ‘How did he contact you?’
    ‘Telephone.’
    ‘What was your job?’
    ‘Driving.’
    ‘What about your brother?’
    ‘He wasn’t there.’
    ‘So who was the fourth member of the gang?’
    Audie shrugged. He did the same when she mentioned the money, spreading his arms as though ready to be searched then and there.
    There were more questions – an hour of them – taking them in circles and over hurdles and through hoops until the details of the robbery were a tangled mess.
    ‘So let me get this straight,’ said Desiree, not hiding her frustration. ‘You only met the other members of the gang an hour before the robbery. You didn’t know their names until afterwards and they all wore masks.’
    Audie nodded.
    ‘What was going to happen to the money?’
    ‘We were going to meet up later and divide it up.’
    ‘Where?’
    ‘They didn’t tell me.’
    She sighed and tried a different approach. ‘You’re doing it tough in here, Audie. I know everybody wants a piece of you – the screws, the cons. Wouldn’t it be easier if you just gave the money back?’
    ‘I can’t.’
    ‘Doesn’t it bother you that people are out there spending it all, while you’re rotting away inside?’
    ‘The money was never mine.’
    ‘You must feel cheated. Angry.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘Don’t you begrudge them getting away?’
    ‘Resentment is like swallowing a poison and waiting for the other person to die.’
    ‘I’m sure you think that’s very profound, but to me it sounds like bullshit,’ she told him.
    Audie smiled wryly. ‘Have you ever been in love, Special Agent?’
    ‘I’m not here to talk about…’
    ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to embarrass you.’
    Recalling the moment, she experiences the same emotion again.