Chasing Evil: Shocking Crimes, Supernatural Forces, and an FBI Agent's Search for Hope and Justice

In spring 2006, Hilland deploys to Guyana to investigate a major theft of military weapons. John Edward warns him not to trust anyone and to watch for a soccer ball. In Guyana, officials forbid the Americans from carrying firearms. Hilland’s team discovers that the soldiers under suspicion were tortured before their polygraph tests, corrupting the results. Hilland confronts the military handlers and demands that they stop, but the exams still produce no leads.

At the hotel, a young bodyguard wearing a shirt with a soccer ball on it repeatedly watches Hilland. Hilland stages a covert contact, and the youth reveals that he knows the weapons’ location is inside a drug lord’s house. Hilland orchestrates a plan to get the address secretly from the bodyguard. He refuses to give the location to the military officers escorting him, instead insisting on delivering it directly to the base general. At a private meeting, he slips the address to the general and recommends a dawn raid, though he cannot be sure that the conspiracy doesn’t involve the general himself. Before sunrise, the team is taken to the estate, but the guns are gone. They do, however, arrest an international fugitive wanted for a 1990 assassination attempt. Hilland concludes that an insider tipped off the drug lord, crediting Edward’s cryptic cue and corruption warning.

In summer 2007, federal agents investigate NFL quarterback Michael Vick for financing and running the Bad Newz Kennels dogfighting operation. Prosecutors need an admission that Vick personally killed dogs. John Edward tells Hilland that there will be “confusion” before the polygraph, that Hilland should talk about football, and that a third person will be present for the admission. During the pretest, Vick says contradictory things when asked about his role in the operation; he goes on to fail the exam. When his attorney argues that Vick was confused, Hilland points out that Vick himself helped frame the questions. He then reframes the interrogation with a football metaphor, urging Vick to tell the truth to his lawyer. Vick breaks down and admits that he killed dogs by hanging and drowning. He later pleads guilty and receives a 23-month prison sentence.

In 2008, Hilland deploys to Afghanistan to help Special Forces polygraph detainees. Before leaving, Edward warns him to back out if he senses danger. He survives RPG attacks, gets sick, and witnesses the harsh realities of the conflict. An encounter with an impoverished family who offers him their only food alters his perspective on good and evil: “Wherever you are, there exists only two kinds of people in this world—Good and Bad” (305). He returns home months later, 30 pounds lighter.

On Mother’s Day 2008, Hilland’s son, Connor, suffers a catastrophic bicycle accident and flatlines before being revived. As Connor is airlifted to a trauma center, Edward calls, assures him that a deceased grandfather is watching over the boy, and says that Connor will be okay. Connor later recovers.

In September 2009, Yale student Annie Le vanishes from a research lab. The suspect, lab technician Ray Clark, fails a polygraph. While Hilland examines the lab, John Edward calls from Ireland and, without a briefing, identifies the location and tells Hilland to search for a mini-refrigerator. He directs Hilland to a utility room and insists that Annie’s body is between pipes near the men’s room wall. A cadaver dog leads them to a pipe chase, where they recover Annie’s body. Clark later pleads guilty.

Hilland continues to search for Fran Smith; he consults with Edward, who reiterates that Fran’s body will be found, but “not yet.” Following another unsuccessful dig in April 2012, he demands a sign while driving in a snowstorm. The next day, the Carborundum factory, Smith’s former workplace, burns to the ground. He takes this as a signal.

In March 2015, five-year-old Noah Thomas disappears from his family’s Virginia trailer. Hilland arrives to supervise the command post. He learns that both parents are recovering from substance addiction. The mother, Ashley Thomas, fails behavioral tests and a polygraph, showing deception about her knowledge of Noah’s location.

Late on the third day, Edward calls Hilland unprompted from New York. He says searchers have walked right over Noah near the trailer. He gives Hilland specific directions: exit the trailer, turn left, go down a slope past propane tanks, and look for a Star Wars X-wing fighter toy. Another psychic, Jonathan Louis, adds landmarks of a large pile of tires and an open trailer. Hilland returns to the property after 11:00 pm and follows the path, suddenly catching a whiff of Fran’s perfume. An urgent call from Edward tells him that he just walked past the spot and must go back up. Hilland notices a loose lid on a large septic tank and spots an X-wing toy on the ground, pointed at the opening. The next morning, workers recover Noah’s body from the tank.

By this point, Hilland’s daughter is 18 and interested in both psychology and the supernatural. She studies the Smith case materials, hoping to help her father solve the mystery; while doing so, she tells Hilland that Smith is “like [his] dark alter-ego” (339). Hilland undertakes a final, unsuccessful dig at Carborundum, finding only the lingering scent of Fran’s perfume.

A court later convicts Ashley Thomas of felony child abuse and neglect but finds insufficient evidence that she intentionally left Noah unsupervised. Edward suggests that the perfume Hilland smelled on the night he found Noah’s body was Fran’s way of telling him to move on, but Hilland is unwilling to accept this. In 2018, Smith’s third wife provides a detail suggesting that Smith moved Fran’s remains during his three-day disappearance in 1999. Hilland theorizes that Smith buried them in California but cannot get authorization to dig. Edward reiterates that Fran has moved on and that Hilland is the one who is “stuck,” and Hilland realizes the truth of what he is saying.

Hilland and Alex divorce in 2019, and he retires from the FBI shortly afterward. That year, a grand jury indicts Smith for Fran’s murder. On June 28, 2023, prosecutors strike a non-prosecution agreement in which Smith admits to disposing of Fran’s body in a dumpster but does not admit to murder, foreclosing future prosecution unless her remains are found. Devastated, Hilland calls Edward, who frames it as the appropriate outcome in metaphysical terms. Hilland recalls an astrologer telling him that his search for Fran was a search for himself and recognizes a lesson in letting go.

In a brief note, Edward reflects that while he, too, found the news about Smith’s deal hard to swallow, the universe’s justice is above a courtroom’s. Although he thinks it was important for Hilland’s spiritual development to let go of his quest for Fran, Edward still believes she may yet be found. Regardless, he senses that he and Hilland will continue their work.