“I was thinking of me and my two associates billing at our regular hourly rate. I can get you our fee schedule first thing next week.”

“That sounds fair.”

“Great, but there is one other small thing. This whole concept really won’t work unless we get a guarantee of a certain flexibility on the part of city government.”

“How do you mean?”

“I mean, if the police or the district attorney decide to seize any- and everything we may get over the phone by search warrant as it comes in, then we’re not going to get any calls.”

Turner pondered that for a brief moment. “I could make a couple of calls and be of assistance in that respect. Meanwhile, I could have a contract drawn up in the next couple of days, but if you’d like to get started as soon as you can, we can be old-fashioned gentlemen and seal the deal with a handshake right now. How does that sound?”

Again, Hunt wasn’t completely sure how it sounded, but what Turner was suggesting was certainly not unethical and it would put Hunt, Mickey, and Tamara to work at full pay immediately. And it wasn’t unusual for a job to morph slightly or even greatly as its execution played out. He was sure he could stay on top of what were clearly Mr. Turner’s priorities.

So, stifling his minimal scruples, he stood up and reached out his hand across the table. “That sounds like a deal to me,” he said.

Wyatt Hunt hadn’t been to Devin Juhle’s home out on Taraval Street in a very long time. In the first years after Hunt had opened his office as a private investigator, he had nearly lived with Devin and Connie and their three children-Eric, Brendan, and Alexa. He and Juhle had been baseball teammates in high school, and they had still played games together, often including the children, whenever he came over-Ping-Pong, basketball, foosball, catch.

That was before California v. Gorman. It was also before the scandal involving Hunt’s former associate that had knocked the bottom out of his business and essentially destroyed his credibility with the Police Department and most of the criminal law community.

Hunt wasn’t kidding himself-this thing with Juhle wasn’t simply a bridge to mend. It was a chasm to breach.

Now, at nine-thirty on a Sunday morning that had blown in blustery and cold-the three days of San Francisco’s summer weather having exhausted their allotted run-Hunt parked his Mini Cooper on the street in front of Juhle’s small stand-alone two-story home, made sure he was packing presents for the kids, and sat for a moment gathering the courage to go and face the music, the near-tragic opera, that he’d helped to compose.

Finally, unable to stall any longer, he opened his car door and walked across the lawn and up the four steps to the front door and rang the bell. The chimes rang within and he heard running footsteps and the door flew open.

For a horrible second, Hunt thought that Brendan, the middle one, age eleven or so, didn’t even recognize him. He’d grown about four inches and had put on fifteen pounds. But the face suddenly broke a smile as he said, “Uncle Wyatt!” and the boy actually threw his arms around him. Then, calling back into the house, “It’s Uncle Wyatt.”

More footsteps from down the hallway that led to the kitchen in the back of the house, and here was Connie in green sweats, formidable and attractive as ever, drying her hands on a dish towel, her expression welcoming and warm, with just a trace of concern around the eyes.

“Well, look at who’s here!”

He stepped into the house and they hugged, bussed each other on the cheeks. After which Connie held him out at arm’s length. “It’s so good to see you, Wyatt. So good.” And then, her face clouding over, “Is everything all right?”

“Everything’s fine.” He looked around her and saw Alexa hanging back in the hallway, her body language quizzical and reserved. Hunt gave her a tiny wave and a “Hey, sweetie,” but she only nodded and Hunt realized that it wasn’t only Devin he was going to have to win over again.

Connie was going on. “Devin’s off with Eric at soccer. Can you believe Sunday morning at seven o’clock? Is that obscene or what? But they ought to be back in a half hour or so, if you’ve got time to hang around for a while. Was he expecting you?”

“Unlikely. I wasn’t sure I was expecting myself until I woke up.” Hunt took a beat. Then, “You think he’ll talk to me?”

She made a face and broke a half-smile that told him she wasn’t too certain of that, but the actual words she said were, “Stranger things have happened. Meanwhile, how does a cup of coffee sound?”

“Like a fanfare of trumpets.”

Amused, Connie shook her head. “I remember what I’ve missed about you.”

They were catching each other up on their respective lives over the past months, the talk flowing as it always did with Connie, Hunt halfway through his second cup at the kitchen table, when they heard a noise and Connie said, “That’s the garage door.”

They fell then into a sudden and tense silence, waiting.

The garage connected to the kitchen. Eric was the first one through the door. Unlike his younger brother, he was about the same physical size as the last time Hunt had seen him, but his face had broken out with acne and his voice had a different pitch when, tentative yet polite, he nodded and said, “Hi, Uncle Wyatt.”

“Hey, big guy. Good to see you.”

“You too.” He advanced and reached out his hand, which Hunt, standing, shook. He chose to take it as a good sign that they still called him “uncle,” perhaps still considered him Juhle’s brother on some level.

Devin evidently wasn’t in any hurry to get in the house. He would have known Hunt was inside from the distinctive car parked out front. The connecting door closed shut behind Eric and they heard some sounds from the garage-Devin closing his driver’s side door, throwing the duffel bag where it belonged.

Hunt found his breath snagged in his throat.

Juhle opened the door and stood for a second in the doorway, holding it open. Nodding first at his wife, then briefly at Hunt, he turned and closed it with an exaggerated gentleness. Turning back around, he leaned up against the counter and crossed his arms over his chest, nodding again, his face a mask. “Hey, Wyatt,” he said with no inflection whatever. “What can I do for you?”

“I don’t think so,” Juhle said. “That’s police work.”

The two of them sat at either end of a sagging beige sofa in the downstairs family room, a converted half-basement where Juhle had his Ping-Pong/pool table set up, along with a dartboard and a foosball game area. A television rested on the middle shelf of a built-in bookcase mostly devoted otherwise to sports trophies for the kids, and Connie’s washer and dryer reinforced the place’s basic functional nature. Juhle’s house wasn’t big, and the family and their activities filled it all up, every spare inch.

“It’s police work,” Hunt countered, “that won’t do any good. You won’t get the calls we’re going to get and if you did, you’ll spend all your time screening out the nuts.”

Juhle shrugged, shook his head dismissing the idea. “How many good tips you think you’re going to get? Two? Three? Not even that. End of story.”

“No, it isn’t. Not if we get the reward set up and it gets big, and it will.”

“What’s big?”

“I don’t know. Maybe a hundred grand, maybe more. Mick’s shooting for the moon, and he’s a charmer.” Hunt came forward on the couch. “So we’re not talking any couple of calls a day here. It’s not impossible the reward might go to half a mil, and if that happens, the flakes come out of the woodwork. You know this and I know it, and you’re going to spend half to all of your time either chewing your cud on nothing or running down ridiculous leads trying to identify one good one.”