On one side of him is Aerosmith, the tank top on the other side. Also at the table is a girl Jacob’s age, then a pregnant woman, then a prepubescent boy, then a wrinkled older woman and an overweight bald man. A soccer game plays from the living room TV, and occasionally the men break into cheers or shouts, depending on what happens on the screen.

  Jacob sits back in his chair, his hands in his lap, his gaze jerking nervously between the men on either side of him. He hasn’t touched the food on his plate, though the pregnant woman keeps prodding him to eat.

  Who are you? I ask the question but no one can hear me. Who are you and what are you doing with my son?

  A timer goes off on the stove, and the older woman rises and moves to the skillet, using a spatula to stir the browning meat, and a mouthwatering scent of onions and ground beef fills the room. As the conversation continues at the table, she tosses comments over her shoulder, then laughs at something that has been said. Dialogue ricochets, and I wish Mike were here. With his fluency in Spanish, at least he would understand what they are saying.

  I look for a weapon for Jacob to grab, something he can use to protect himself. There are knives and heavy skillets everywhere, and no one seems concerned about the potential threats. Instead of giving me comfort, I feel even more alarmed. They aren’t afraid of Jacob running. Why? Why is everyone just going about their meal as if my child wasn’t taken at gunpoint from his bedroom?

  I circle the table and crouch beside Jacob, watching as he tentatively cuts at the crust of the empanada. It falls open and steam breaks into the air, and I’m surprised to find that hunger exists even when I am dead. He stares at the food and I mentally urge him to eat, because who knows when or if he will be fed again.

  My son has been kidnapped. This makes no sense. Are these the people who killed me? What do they need Jacob for?

  “You should eat.” The girl two seats down is watching him. “It’s good. A little spicy, but they are my favorite.” She smiles shyly and the corner of his mouth crooks up. Poor Jacob. Three more sentences and he’ll be in love.

  “Rosa!” The pregnant woman waves her fork in the air, at the girl. “¡Cállate la boca y ponte a comer! Él no está aquí para hablar contigo.” She glares at Jacob and points, and I don’t know what she is saying, but the girl rolls her eyes and scoops up a chunk of ground beef.

  “She says I can’t talk to you.”

  “¡Suficiente! Una palabra más y le diré a tu padre que te castigue a golpes.” I flinch at the anger in the woman’s tone, and whatever she says, the girl’s attitude lessens and she slumps in her seat and doesn’t look at Jacob again.

  I need to get him out of here. While it may be mouthwatering smells and family time now, at some point this will turn ugly. These men had a gun, one that they pointed at Jacob’s head.

  I stand behind my son and wait to see what happens next.

  CHAPTER 63

  LENNY

  The pieces of the puzzle are coming in slowly, but they are there and Gersh is not all useless for a child born in the eighties.

  Lillian’s stomach contents include what appear to be a pumpkin spice latte, half of a banana, some crackers, and a cocktail of medicines, including enough Xanax to kill a three-hundred-pound man. Blood tests show a blood alcohol level of .29 and GHB—the former would have had her stumbling around, and the latter she could have gotten her hands on. Together they make me suspect foul play.

  If her cell phone’s location pings are reliable, which they aren’t, all they share is that her killer was smart enough to ditch it before he took her anywhere important. If anything, we should probably look at the places the cell phone didn’t go, rather than those it did.

  Gersh has a tail on the husband, and the traffic department is backtracking his car movements for the last forty-eight hours, including the time of her death.

  At least there was no rape. No evidence of prior abuse, despite the faked call to the domestic center. Also missing . . . any distinguishable foreign hairs, blood, or DNA on her body. If she fought someone off, she did it without her fingernails, and without damaging herself at all. Unfortunately, with GHB in her system, she probably was cooperative. Probably opened up her mouth for the pills, then asked for more.

  Now I sit in a place I used to know well—the questioning pod—only this time I am behind the glass, beside the transcriber and some asshole from Legal, who apparently watches all questioning to make sure the suspect is given cupcakes and back massages. On the other side of the glass, Gersh sits across from Lillian’s boyfriend, who looks cool as a fucking cucumber and is refusing to answer any questions, except to some badge named Pat Horkins.

  “Who the fuck is Pat Horkins?” The Legal guy asks the question before I have to.

  “He’s in narcotics.” The transcriptionist speaks from his spot at the table, and I swear, everyone in this joint is barely old enough to grow facial hair. “Works with a lot of the agencies.”

  Okay, so maybe rosy-cheeked youths are helpful. “Agencies?” I grunt. I examine the boyfriend as best I can through the glass. Maybe he’s connected. An informant.

  “Why you waiting on Horkins?” Gersh asks David Laurent, and I like that he doesn’t use a pad of paper. Makes him seem like he already knows what you’re about to say, and I never knew what to write down anyway. Plus, with this pencil head typing and the cameras humming, you’re getting all the notes you need without having to move a finger. “You an informant? Running drugs out of your boat?”

  The man smiles and says nothing, and in the good old days, now is when you would smack him in the jaw. A woman is dead and he’s toying with us, withholding information that could lead to her killer. Maybe it’s him. He certainly doesn’t seem brokenhearted, and I’m annoyed at the commonalities I’m seeing between him and her husband. At least Mike made an effort to seem upset. This asshole is two seconds away from whistling a cheery tune.

  The door to our cramped room opens, and a uniform comes in and presses the intercom button to Gersh’s room. “Horkins is twenty minutes out. Says he’s DEA.”

  In our room, everyone reacts. The attorney sighs, the kid at the table whistles, and I automatically reach for my flask, then realize it’s in the car. If any news qualifies for a drink, that does. DEA. Talk about a wrinkle.

  “DEA . . . ,” Gersh muses, and if there were a way for David Laurent—who is probably not named David Laurent—to preen, he would be doing it. Fucking feds. Always, always thinking that they are better than us. “Now that’s interesting.”

  Gersh hunches forward. “Now I realize why you aren’t talking. You’re scared, right? That you’ll say the wrong thing, will violate one of those ten thousand rules you suits have to follow. So how about I just toss some ideas out there—just dumb local-cop ideas, you understand—and you just nod if I’m anywhere close to being right. Nothing for the transcript; in fact, I’ll turn off the cameras.”

  Smart. Gersh is smart. I’m nodding, and almost give him a thumbs-up when he faces the window and reaches up and unplugs the camera in the upper corner of the room. I keep my thumbs to myself since he can’t see me, but the sentiment is still there.

  “I’m going to assume that you didn’t kill Lillian. Yes?”

  He pauses, and this is an easy nod for David to make, but an important one, one that will concede his willingness to play this game.

  The man rolls his eyes behind a dorky pair of glasses—What did Lillian see in this dweeb?—and nods.

  “Okay, great. Now I’m going to assume that she wasn’t just a side piece of ass you picked up while suntanning on the job. Was she a part of an operation?”

  This David is less reluctant to answer, and I lean closer, my breath fogging the glass. Come on . . . “I’ll speak to Horkins, when he gets here. Just Horkins. I’m not confirming that I was or wasn’t part of any sort of operation.”

  I growl out a curse. Pansy-ass feds. I swear to God, they’re more trouble than help.

  “I just need to stop running in certain directions if they’re dead ends, you understand?”

  “Oh sure.” David gives a shit-licker smile. “Don’t worry, Detective. We’re all on the same page here.”

  “It’s a fucking nod,” I yell, and the attorney flinches. “Just nod, you fucking fed!”

  “Mr. Thompson”—the attorney clears his throat—“you are here as a courtesy. Please remember that. Also, they can’t hear you.”

  “Is it her husband?” Gersh presses. “Were you trying to get to him?”

  I glare at the boyfriend, but he just sits there in silence, that obnoxious little smirk stuck on his face.

  CHAPTER 64

  MIKE

  There is a point in every problem when you must decide whether to solve the problem or run. My problem is simple—I need this damn encryption key, and it takes only three hours of looking for me to realize that I am not going to find it, not soon enough to satisfy my clients. Which is a shame, because running is going to be a huge pain in my ass. Like, colonoscopy-prep levels of gut-wrenching shitassery.

  I have, of course, prepared for this. You don’t work thirteen years for an organized crime syndicate without having backup plans stacked on top of backup plans. I have three cars at various lots in the city, each gassed up, their trunks full of suitcases, food, weapons, and cash. I have two alternate aliases for Lillian, Jacob, and myself, and Bitcoin balances in both US and foreign accounts that could fund us for the next three years, which is plenty of time to set up new lives and employment.

  The issue is that once I step off that ledge, once I go dark for longer than a few minutes, I will be marked, and then there will be no going back, ever again. It won’t matter if I find the key and move Colorado in time to save the day. It won’t matter because trying to deliver Colorado will create a trail, and the minute that last digit is entered, my fingertips will be cut off and my eyelids peeled back, and I will be forced, from that position, to watch as my child is tortured because doing it improperly is not acceptable.

  I am out of time and out of options because this city has swallowed up this bottle and I am the idiot who put it within arm’s reach of a borderline alcoholic with some belief that nostalgia would prevail. Who gives an F if nostalgia worked for the last nine years? It was stupid, and as a result, I have to run, which means Jacob has to run.

  I park in the driveway beside Jacob’s car and walk up to the house, holding my breath as I check the recycling bin by the side door, on the off chance that Lill chucked it there. Nothing. The side door is unlocked, and I step inside. Another rule Jacob hasn’t listened to. Always lock the doors. Always. Tick. Tick. Tick.

  Mentally, I assemble a list. Grab Jacob, get a few blocks over, flag a taxi to the closest flee car—the Mazda in the Century City parking garage—and leave. I call out his name as I climb the stairs to the second floor, my mind clicking through the rest of what I should do before we leave the house. Wipe the computers. Leave the phones. I knock on the door to Jacob’s room and turn the knob. I need to take the—

  I stop because there’s a man sitting on the edge of his bed, smiling at me. I look for Jacob, but the room is empty. I look at the bed but don’t see any blood.

  “Michael,” Luis says warmly. “It’s been a long time.”

  CHAPTER 65

  MIKE

  “What’s going on, Mike?” Luis folds one ankle up on the opposite knee and looks at me. “You have not started to move Colorado. Why?”

  Jacob’s bathroom is just off his bedroom, a Jack-and-Jill layout that connects to the guest room, and I listen, hoping and also not hoping that he is inside. Luis follows my gaze and shakes his head. “He’s not here, Mike.”

  I sink against the dresser in relief. “He doesn’t have anything to do with—”

  “Oh, Mike.” Luis tsks. “The young never do. But that doesn’t mean that they don’t suffer the sins of their fathers, right?” He shakes his head sadly. “I mean, take your father. You suffered from his sins. Both you and your mother did.”

  I don’t respond, and my relief at Jacob not being here is replaced by the growing fear that Luis is the reason that he isn’t. “Where’s Jacob?”

  “He’s safe, Mike. You understand, of course, why we had to take him.”

  I shake my head. “Luis, I’ve worked for you all for thirteen years, I would never run—”

  “Of course you wouldn’t,” he says broadly. “I’m not worried about that. Because you know, Mike. You know how we would react to that. And it’s a shame, with you already losing your wife . . .” He stands and claps his hands on either side of my shoulders, and I remember when I first met him. I’d found him charming. We’d met at a Vegas craps table and then taken shots with cigars, and he’d asked me a dozen questions about diversification of portfolios, and I had come home and bragged to Lillian about the new client I had. The new client, who was bringing over a mid-six-figure account. Back then, I thought that was big. Back then, I was so impressed by Luis and his future possibilities that I bent a few securities laws. Wee ones. Unimportant ones.

  I stepped over the line and it moved. Then I stepped over it again and it grew fainter. Blurrier. I took a few more steps, and now I’m here, and my son is somewhere “safe,” and all I need to do to bring him back is move $400 million that I can’t access.

  His hands tighten on my shoulders, and he is looking up into my face and giving the same warm, encouraging smile that he gave to Wes Flockhart, right before he used a drill bit on his left collarbone. “We want to make sure you’re okay, Mike. Because my partners, they are getting nervous.”

  As they should be. They should be shitting their pants, because if this savings account is gone—and it is gone—every one of them is ruined and dead. Including me. And including Jacob.

  He smiles again, but I can see the fear in his eyes, and I wonder if he’s the one who put that bug in Lillian’s calendar. “So let’s go together, Mike. Let’s go and transfer Colorado to where it belongs.”

  CHAPTER 66

  LILLIAN

  Something has changed, and Aerosmith and Tank Top are all business, and they are moving Jacob down a staircase and into the basement. Now is when my mothering instincts scream the alarm because nothing good exists in this basement. There are shackles—actual shackles—attached to the wall and hanging, waiting for someone’s wrists and ankles. I don’t have to see this. I could fade away, return to the morgue, where I could watch as they pin my skin back together in a way that will look natural for the funeral. Or I could go to the house and watch as my husband continues to coldly rearrange his life to accommodate one fewer person. But if Jacob has to be here, I will be here. I will feel each pain and watch and agonize because that is my duty as a mother, even if I feel like I’m fading with each hour that passes. Even now, as they say something to him, as they push him into the chair and one of the men draws his gun . . . their voices are beginning to muffle, and Jacob is blurry, then sharp. I blink rapidly and try to ground myself, try to stand in between his chair and the gun, try to say something that someone will be able to hear. I plead that we have money, that we will pay, that they do not need to kill this boy.

  Now a folding table is set up beside Jacob’s chair and I know what they are going to put on it. Elements of torture. Wire cutters. Shocks and knives. I am nauseated as they carry in a cardboard box, set it on the surface, and reach inside.

  Then a surprise. The first item pulled out is not a knife but a laptop. Then a keyboard and mouse. A long extension cord, which is plugged in to the wall and then attached to the back of the computer.

  Jacob is as confused as me and watches everything they are doing, his head jerking from side to side as he tries to take it all in.

  I catch the word padre in something they say to him, and I’m not sure whether this is someone else’s father or his, but I hope they call Mike. Mike will handle this. He will find whatever money is needed for a ransom—and I suddenly think of my life insurance money and wonder whether that is what this is about. We had two policies on me, and they totaled more than $5 million, maybe six.

  People would certainly kidnap and kill someone for that money. It could pay off this house and buy five more. Cover the costs for a caregiver for the older lady. Private school and college tuition for the girl.

  Repercussions. Mike loved to talk about them. Small and large, the trickle effects of our actions. Here is the trickle effect of mine. I died, and my life insurance put my son at risk.

  No matter, because Mike will pay. He has to pay, and he won’t just pay: he’ll think through how to pay in a way that will ensure Jacob’s safety, and he’ll anticipate any dangers, and he’ll examine the situation from each side and every angle, to guarantee success.

  I take a deep breath and try to channel the confidence toward Jacob, who looks terrified. From behind me, the door at the top of the stairs opens. I turn and look up, and there is Mike.

  My hope and confidence plummet at the look on his face.

  CHAPTER 67

  LENNY

  I give up on David Laurent’s interview when the brass and the feds show up. It isn’t just Horkins; two other suits arrive, which is enough to convince me that Laurent was an undercover agent and Lillian was a target. Why is still a giant question mark, but I trust Gersh to get to the bottom of it and leave the station before anyone starts asking questions about why I am there.

  I drive over to Lillian’s house to take a look. As a detective, I wasn’t Sherlock Holmes and didn’t break any sort of department records, but I was a good cop. I noticed things that others didn’t, and I had an intuition that kept a few bad characters from slipping through some cracks. So I take a moment, a long moment, as I drive by and just observe.