Mikayla threw a bunch of curse words at him, and climbed onto the back bumper of his truck to reach inside.

  “Hey!” He grabbed her by the arm.

  “Get off me!” she yelled at him.

  “Just get down here!”

  “Quit it!” I told him.

  I didn’t stop to think like I probably should have. I stepped in to help, if I could. I’m not even sure what I was trying to do, but I got caught in the scuffle. The guy yanked Mikayla back onto the sidewalk, and she slammed into me just as I got there.

  I went down hard. My mouth hit the cement, and I tasted blood.

  “Ali!” Zoe said, and came over as I sat up. When I ran my tongue over my front teeth, I could feel a sharp edge where one of them had broken.

  “Ali!” Zoe said again. “You’re hurt!” She was kneeling next to me now, while the fight with Mikayla and the maintenance guy kept going on. They were shouting at each other, and practically on top of me. Mikayla was crying, too.

  “Give me that!” she said, and reached right over me to grab a handful of clothes back from the guy.

  That’s when I saw the gun. It was inside Mikayla’s sweater and tucked into her waist at the back. The pistol had a squared-off stock, and looked to me like a 9mm. I don’t like guns, but 9mm are standard issue for the police department. I know one when I see one.

  Nine millimeter was also the caliber of weapon that had been used on Zoe at Anacostia Park that day.

  “Ali, are you okay?” Zoe asked me again.

  It was all going by in a blur. The cops were coming over now. My jaw hurt like crazy. My lip was bleeding.

  But mostly, I was thinking about that pistol. And those black boots Mikayla was still wearing. And that long sweater of hers, the one that I might have mistaken for a coat when I saw someone standing over Zoe right after she got shot.

  Was Mikayla that person? Was she the shooter we’d been looking for?

  All those feelings from that day at the park washed over me like some kind of nasty echo. I remembered seeing Zoe hurt. Not knowing what to do. Wondering if another shot was going to go off.

  But that was then. This was now. I had to focus.

  Two cops had come over, and both of them were arguing with Mikayla.

  “I need them to stop taking my property,” she said. “I didn’t do nothing!”

  “Miss, you need to calm down,” one of the cops told her.

  “I just need my cart,” she said, pointing at the truck and trying to get to it. “It’s right there.”

  “I don’t know if that’s yours,” the second cop said. She’d put herself in Mikayla’s way now and wasn’t budging. “Just take a step back. This is your last warning. We will arrest you.”

  “Whatcha warning her for?” somebody called out.

  “Just let her take her stuff and go!” Zoe said. “Leave her alone!”

  “Everyone, give us some room!” the other cop shouted at the crowd. He turned and started forcing people to back up, even while I was still down there on one knee, bleeding from the mouth. But he didn’t seem to care about that.

  This was going from bad to worse, quick. And I knew what I had to do next. There was no question.

  I just wished I didn’t have to do it.

  I STOOD UP to talk to the nearest cop, and when I did, I kept my voice low.

  “Sir, I think the police might be looking for that girl,” I said. “It’s about a case that belongs to a guy named Detective Matheson at MPD.”

  “Oh, yeah?” he asked, like I was talking nonsense. If he cared that I was bleeding, he didn’t say so. “How do you know that?”

  “She’s carrying a nine-millimeter weapon,” I told him. “And I think it might have been used in a shooting last week. My dad is with MPD, too.”

  “Your dad?”

  “Detective Alex Cross,” I said.

  For the first time, the cop really looked at me. I could see right away how he’d flipped one-eighty and suddenly wondered if he ought to be taking me seriously. Zoe was trying to talk to the other cop, but everything was a crazy mess.

  “Hey, Roberts,” my cop said, and jerked his head in Mikayla’s direction. “Pat her down, will you?”

  I stood up to see better, but he grabbed me by the shoulder to stop me.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “Taking you home,” he said. “You shouldn’t be here. And your mouth is a mess. You’re going to need a dentist.”

  “But I just told you—”

  “Exactly. It’s not safe here.”

  I couldn’t believe it. Now all of a sudden, he cared about my well-being? Just because of who my dad was? I couldn’t say anything for sure, but it seemed like a pretty good guess.

  And either way, he wasn’t letting me get any closer to what was going on. I could only watch while the other cop, Roberts, put Mikayla up against the wall and started frisking her.

  “Hey! Hey! There’s no call for that!” someone said.

  “Why you messing with her?” someone else said.

  “Ali!” Zoe yelled. I thought she was still trying to help me, but when I saw her face, I realized it was more like the opposite. “What did you do?” she screamed right at me. Elizabeth tried to hold her back, and I was still trying to get to her, but there was no way. My cop was practically dragging me to the car.

  “Let me go!” I told him. “I need to talk to her!”

  “You can call your girlfriend later,” he said.

  “I trusted you!” Zoe yelled. “I thought you were different!”

  Every word was like a punch in the stomach.

  “Zoe, I didn’t have a choice!” I said.

  She pointed over at Mikayla, where they’d just pulled that pistol off her.

  “Why would you go after her like that?” she asked.

  I didn’t even understand the question. Shouldn’t that gun have spoken for itself?

  “Is she the one who did this to you?” I asked. “She is, isn’t she?”

  Zoe just shook her head and didn’t answer. It was like we were suddenly strangers. Or worse. More like she hated me.

  “Let’s go,” the cop said. We were at his cruiser now, and he’d already opened the back door.

  “Get in!” he told me.

  I tried to pull my arm free one more time. “Hang on! Am I being detained?” I asked. “Because if not—”

  He practically laughed in my face. “You watch too much TV,” he said. “Just get in the car. Right now!”

  Zoe wasn’t done with me yet, either. “I brought you here to help people!” she yelled. “And now you do this?”

  Elizabeth, and Mr. Knight, and a whole bunch of others were looking at me, too. And for the first time, I did want to get away. Because I wasn’t a good guy here. Not to them. Not anymore. I was a bad guy, just like the cops and all the others.

  And I didn’t have the first idea about how to make it right.

  Like maybe ever again.

  “ARE YOU MRS. Cross?”

  “Yes. I’m this young man’s great-grandmother. What’s happened?”

  “Ali here has gotten himself involved in a couple of matters—”

  “A couple of matters?” Nana Mama said, and looked at me standing there on our front stoop with the cop. “What on earth happened to you? Oh, my Lord!”

  She’d just seen my broken tooth, and all I wanted to do was press pause, as much as I’ve ever wanted anything.

  “We’ve already contacted Detective Cross. He’s on his way,” the cop told her.

  “Thank you, officer,” Nana said, and steered me right inside, closing the door behind us. “Does it hurt? I’m calling Dr. Villaseñor right now.”

  “It doesn’t hurt,” I told her. But I could feel that broken edge, like a little piece of glass in my mouth.

  Dad showed up pretty quick, too. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but he kept a lid on whatever he wanted to say until we’d been to Dr. Villaseñor’s for my emergency appointment.

  That was a whole thing, too. I had to get a temporary piece put on my tooth while they made a permanent one. Which meant I’d have to go back.

  But that was the least of my problems. Because once we were in the car again, Dad called off the truce and really let me have it.

  “You know, I was actually thinking we needed to start giving you a little more freedom,” he told me. “You’ve been saying how your rules haven’t changed since fourth grade, and that seemed like a reasonable point to me. But it’s not a conversation we’re going to have anymore. You really blew this, Ali. I’m just glad something worse didn’t happen.”

  “I wasn’t trying to make trouble,” I said. “I was trying to help.”

  Dad wasn’t even listening, though.

  “And you skipped school,” he said. “Is this the first time you’ve done that?”

  “Yes, sir,” I said. Still, I knew how disappointed he was.

  But didn’t it count for something that I was trying to help people experiencing homelessness when this happened? Or that I might have actually done something real to help solve Zoe’s case?

  I also wanted to tell Dad about how the police had acted, and how they’d treated me so differently when they found out I was a cop’s kid. But none of it erased the fact that I’d skipped school. And Dad definitely wasn’t done talking about that part.

  “As of this moment, you’re grounded for at least a week. We’ll see,” Dad said. “You’re also giving up whatever you think this investigation of yours has been. You haven’t proven yourself even remotely capable of handling something like that.”

  “That’s not true!” I said back. “I’m good at this, Dad, and you know it.”

  It wasn’t what I’d been waiting to say, but it just came out. I kept going, too.

  “I may do stuff I shouldn’t, and I know I’m going to be punished,” I said. “But you know what else? When Gabe was missing, I was the first one to find out who he was with. And I might have just found out who shot Zoe, too, before the police did. You should tell them to use me more, not less.”

  Dad just blinked a couple of times. I don’t think he could believe I was saying all that. In a way, I couldn’t believe it, either.

  It’s not like I thought he was going to turn around and magically deputize me for giving a good speech. But you know what else? Maybe he should have.

  Seriously. I know I’m just a kid. And I know there’s all kinds of things I’m not qualified to do, or just plain shouldn’t do, because of my age. But who ever said that meant a kid couldn’t also be useful? Maybe even in ways that an adult never could.

  I was really mad now, partly because my investigation had just crashed and burned. But also because I was tired—dead tired—of people not taking me seriously. Including Dad, sometimes.

  “With everything that’s happened, this is what you want to talk about?” Dad asked. “Your investigative skills?”

  “I’m just trying to do whatever’s best for Zoe,” I said. “Hundred percent. Isn’t that exactly the kind of choice you’ve been raising me to make? Isn’t that what you do for a living? We need more good cops, Dad. And I think I’m going to be one someday.”

  Dad took a deep breath. I could tell he knew I was right about all that. And we both knew it wasn’t just that simple.

  “None of that gives you any license to leave school the way you did, much less to go to that camp, much less without permission,” Dad said.

  “But I just—”

  “Do you even hear how many things are wrong with that sentence?” he said over me. I don’t think I’d ever seen him so steamed before. And he’s a homicide detective, so just think about that for a second.

  “Can we just go home, please?” I asked. I was wiped out. My mouth was numb from the dentist, and all I wanted to do was get back to my room, close the door, and try to sort this all out.

  “We’re not going home,” Dad said. “Detective Matheson is waiting to speak with you.”

  “Right now?” I asked.

  “You wanted to be a part of this? Well, you got your wish. So pull it together, because we’re headed to MPD,” Dad said. “Welcome to the real world, son.”

  ALEX TOOK ALI to his cubicle on the third floor of the Daly Building, and parked him there. Matheson passed through the office soon after that.

  “Hey, sorry, we’re a little stacked right now. Ali, I’ll be right with you,” he said.

  “He can wait,” Alex answered. It was hard to know how best to wrap Ali’s head around the choices he’d made that day. The most Alex could do for now was give them both some time to cool off.

  He left Ali where he was and followed Matheson back up the hall. “What have you got?” he asked the younger detective. “Has she confessed to the shooting?”

  If Matheson was put out by the questions, he didn’t say so. But he also didn’t stop walking as they talked. It was a technique Alex used himself, whenever he didn’t want to be pinned down by someone at work.

  “I guess you could call it a confession,” Matheson said. “She’s saying Zoe Knight was a ‘spoiled rich girl’ and that she was just trying to roll her over for some cash when the gun ‘went off by accident.’” Matheson stopped at the third floor elevator bank and pushed the call button. “Yeah, and she’s probably got a bridge to sell me, too,” he said.

  “So you don’t buy it?” Alex asked.

  “Not the way she’s telling it, anyway,” Matheson said. “I’m waiting on ballistics. We’ll see if that weapon is a match, and take it from there. Meanwhile, she’s squared away with Child and Family Services for the night.”

  “What?” Alex asked. “How old is this girl?” He’d been assuming that Mikayla Dunbar was an adult.

  “Sixteen,” Matheson answered. “She ran away from a group home about six months ago, and she’s been living on the street since. Mostly over at that encampment where everything went south today. She’ll be better off, in any case.”

  Well, maybe, Alex thought. Based on what he knew about the system in DC, not every kid in a group home was better off than every kid on the streets out there. It was heartbreaking, but true.

  Still, Matheson was right about one thing. This didn’t add up, especially if Zoe had known all along who the shooter was.

  “Have you talked to Zoe Knight?” Alex asked.

  “Of course.”

  “And?”

  The elevator arrived. Matheson got on and turned around to face Alex.

  “And I’m going to wait for ballistics, then take it from there,” he said, retreating to his usual tight-lipped approach. If Ali weren’t so involved in the case, Matheson probably wouldn’t have even let loose as much as he had.

  “I’ll swing back to speak with your son in a few,” Matheson said.

  And before Alex could say or ask anything else, the doors slid closed.

  I TEXTED ZOE while I was waiting to talk to Detective Matheson.

  Zoe, I’m really sorry I made you so mad. I hope you can understand that I didn’t have a choice. Can we talk?

  Even if Zoe did hate me now, I didn’t have any regrets about telling the cops about Mikayla’s gun. I’d do the same thing again, and I wasn’t going to apologize for that.

  Still, I wanted to talk to Zoe in the worst way. Was I right about Mikayla? Is that who she’d been covering for?

  And if so, why? What did Mikayla have over her? Was it some kind of blackmail situation?

  Zoe didn’t answer my text, though. I tried one more time, and then I left it alone.

  When Dad finally came back, he brought me over to someone’s office where they could close the door and hear what I had to say. Matheson came in a minute later, and sat behind the desk across from the two of us.

  “What’s going on with Mikayla?” I asked right away.

  “Don’t concern yourself with that,” Matheson said. Like I’d ever not concern myself with that. “I want to know what you know, Ali. Or at least, what you think you know, about Zoe Knight’s shooting. And I want you to start from the beginning.”

  I felt like I was all in at that point. The only way to get through this now was to just keep telling the truth.

  I started with what happened at Anacostia Park that day, and what I’d seen, and how Zoe had asked me to keep it to myself, which I hadn’t done. That much, Matheson had already heard from me.

  Then I told him how the boots and coat (or sweater) I saw were similar to the ones Mikayla had been wearing at the K Street encampment. And I told him about spotting the gun she was carrying that morning, too.

  “I think she’s the one who shot Zoe,” I said, “and I think Zoe’s been protecting her, but I don’t know why. I also don’t know if it has anything to do with Dee-Cee’s ex-boyfriend, Orlando, but I do know that he at least had the opportunity to be at the park that day.”

  From the way Matheson looked at Dad, he seemed pretty surprised about how much I had to say. I don’t think Dad was surprised, though. Mostly, he still seemed mad. I just hoped he could be mad and a little proud of me at the same time.

  “Anything else?” Matheson asked.

  “Maybe,” I said. “I don’t know if it has anything to do with Zoe, but I do know that Darnell and Kim were arguing on Saturday night, and they said something about the police. Also, as far as I can tell, Dee-Cee wasn’t part of any of this. And neither was Zoe’s dad, I’d say, but I barely know him.”

  Matheson scribbled some more notes before he looked up again.

  “Impressive,” he said. “I hope you’re thinking about getting into law enforcement someday.”

  “Someday,” Dad said. As in, not anytime soon.

  I tried getting in a few questions of my own, but Matheson wasn’t talking. No surprise there. I was still going to have to wait for any word on Mikayla.

  As for Zoe, I had a text waiting for me when Dad and I got back to the car. I was psyched to see her name on my phone, and even a little happy for a second there.

  But then I read the text itself, and went right back to not knowing what to think.

  ZOE KNIGHT:

  You don’t know me