Angie receives an unexpected call from the Secret Service. They’ve retrieved the python carcass from the roadway and think it might be connected to the report that Angie filed about her storage locker theft. When she arrives, she positively identifies the remains and tells an agent named Paul Ryskamp where they came from.

The novel then switches its focus to the backstory of an illegal immigrant named Diego. Educated in the United States, he is forced to return to Honduras when his visa expires. Political unrest in his own country makes Diego desperate enough to get himself smuggled back into the States. He and a band of illegals land on Palm Beach the night of Kiki’s death. Diego manages to blend in and find a job on the mainland. A few weeks after his arrival, he is walking to work when he spies a pink pearl on the railroad tracks. He takes it, considering it to be a good luck omen. At work that day, ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) agents arrive to arrest Diego and the other illegals who made the crossing with him. When Diego is searched, the pearl is found, and he becomes a murder suspect.

Around the same time, Uric kills Prince Paladin and finds the diamonds and pearls the latter stole from Kiki’s corpse.