Chapter 41: What the Floor Carried

The second attempt to move Xiaotian began with Lili refusing to call the armored police van discreet. "It has 'Redwood Harbor Police' on both sides," she said. "The letters are taller than he is." Hollis looked through the school window at the van. "The first car was followed." "That makes this one conspicuous. It does not make it discreet." "It has better doors." "Then say that." Dawn had not yet cleared the roofs across Harbor Street. The news crews had thinned to one van and a reporter asleep in the passenger seat. Two patrol cars blocked the alley. Ruiz had cameras on the front entrance, the rear door, and the opened school end of the old access passage. The passage itself lay behind the records-room wall. Late the night before, Hollis's team had found the seam where the survey put it, and a section of brick had turned inward on…