“That’s the biggest load of bullshit make-work I’ve ever seen. There’s not a man in Troop G who couldn’t find this road in the dark, and half of ’em probably know which house is the chief’s.”

Lyle nodded. “That’s why I put in the call to Troop D.”

McCrea stared at him. “Are you nuts? They’re down in Amsterdam. It’ll take their CS unit an hour to get here.” He scrubbed his face with one gloved hand, dislodging the snowflakes that were attaching themselves to his eyelashes and beard.

“Eric,” Lyle said. “Stop. And think for a moment. Forget who all’s involved. Lay it out like a domestic violence case.”

Eric’s mouth twisted in disgust. “Domestic violence?”

“Just do it for me.”

“Okay.” McCrea closed his eyes for a moment. “A woman found dead in her home. No signs of forcible entry. No known history of drugs. No arrests. No known involvement with any suspicious individuals.”

“The victim recently separated from her husband,” Lyle added. “The husband left the marital home under protest. The husband has access to weapons and is trained in their use.”

Eric stared at him. “You can’t say… Jesus, you don’t think the chief had anything to do with this?”

“Ssh. Keep it down.” Thank God, this part he had already rehearsed. He didn’t hesitate. “Of course I don’t think the chief was involved. But if you didn’t know him, if you didn’t have any stake in this investigation, who would you peg as the prime suspect?”

Eric’s mouth worked before he could get the words out. “The victim’s husband.”

“And if this investigation gets taken away from us and handed over to the staties, who do you think they’ll come down on?”

Eric shook his head. “But…”

“You don’t think we can crack this case without their help?”

“No, but-”

“ ’Cause I’ll tell you what the staties will do. They’re gonna tag the chief as it, and the entire rest of the investigation is gonna be devoted to proving them right. If we don’t want that to happen, we need to keep this as quiet and lowkey as possible. We need to control any information, starting right here and now. Are you with me?”

Eric stared down at the snow beneath their boots, packed by the footsteps of everyone who had already crossed this dooryard and gotten involved. “I gotta tell you, Lyle. I been a cop ten years now, and four as an MP before that. And this… this gives me a bad feeling.”

“Christ almighty, don’t you think I feel the same way? It’s making me sick to my stomach. If you think it’d go down a different way if the staties took over, please, convince me. I’d love to hear I’m wrong.”

“You aren’t wrong.” Eric squinted toward the neighbor’s house, a good quarter-mile away on the ridgeline. Lights had come on in the windows. Lyle thought he could see someone’s silhouette. Watching them. “Okay,” McCrea said. “I’m in.”

“Good. I want you to run the crime scene. You know to expect the Troop D CS.” A mournful yowl wound through the sky from somewhere behind the barn. “For God’s sake, get ahold of her cat and get it to a shelter.”

“Will do.”

“I’m heading back to the station. I’m going to call the ME when I get into town.”

“You sure you want to wait that long to get the medical examiner out here?”

“Yes. Control. That’s our motto here. Control. I need to tell Harlene to clamp down on the phone calls.” His gut churned, acid and fear and regret all mixed together. “And I need to tell the chief.”

Russ Van Alstyne was really, really pissed off. It surprised him; he had figured he had hours, if not days, of leaden, white-noise numbness ahead of him. Of course, he hadn’t counted on getting picked up-picked up! Like he had a warrant out on him!-by one of his own officers. At the meat counter of the IGA.

He had to admit, Mark was good. He had hustled Russ out of there and into his squad car almost before he knew what had happened. It wasn’t that Russ minded getting called in on a moment’s notice. Lord knows, that had happened more than once in his life. Although he couldn’t recall a time when he had had to abandon a half-filled basket of groceries.

No, what hacked him off was Mark’s refusal to tell him what was going on. “I can’t say” became “I really don’t know anything,” which turned to “Your guess is as good as mine, chief.”

Russ knew he was being a pain in the ass, but he couldn’t figure out anything that would require Mark to drag him in to the station with zero intel on the situation. Even if the unthinkable had happened, and one of his men had been wounded or killed, it would be squawking all over the radio.

The radio. It was part of a nifty computerized information system, currently dark, mounted below the edge of the dash. The whole computers-in-the-cars thing still amazed him. Probably more evidence that he was rapidly approaching the age where they could push him out into the open sea on an ice floe.

He started pressing on buttons. Computer, radio, monitor.

“Uh.” Mark turned toward him. “I don’t think you ought to do that, Chief.”

“Keep your eyes on the road. I don’t want to wind up in the ditch.”

Mark snapped to front, but his attention was all on the small screen, running its boot-up sequence. “Uh. Deputy Chief MacAuley told me to maintain radio silence.”

“Did he, now?” Russ unhooked the mike. “Did he say anything about me maintaining radio silence?”

“No… but I think he-”

“Were your orders to put me under arrest, Durkee?”

Somehow, Mark managed to come to attention while sitting behind the wheel of a moving car. “No, Chief!”

“Then let me explain how it works. Lyle is the deputy chief. That means he gets to tell you what to do. I’m the chief. That means I get to tell him what to do.” The computer screen was asking for an officer number before allowing access. Russ tapped his own into the small strip of keyboard bolted in beneath the screen. The system happily blipped him in.

He keyed the mike. “Dispatch? This is-” He turned to Mark. “What’s your car number?”

“Fifty-four-ten.” Mark was either defeated or disgusted. Russ couldn’t tell which.

“This is fifty-four-ten inbound. I’d like to know why I’m not at home making soup right now.”

There was a long pause.

“Dispatch?” He pulled the mike higher, checking for a loose connection.

“Chief? Is that you?” Finally. Harlene sounded odd.

“Yes. It’s me. And I want to know what the hell is going on.”

Another pause. “It’s…” A crackle. “I think…” A staticky beat. “Just get here as soon as you can. Dispatch out.” Harlene clicked off from her end.

He stared at the computer. Harlene never hung up on him. Never. He keyed the mike. “Dispatch. Dispatch? Harlene?” She wouldn’t come back on the line. “Well, if that’s not the damndest thing I’ve ever seen.” He frowned at Mark. “Is this some sort of elaborate practical joke? ’Cause if it is, I can guarantee you I won’t be laughing.”

“Honest, chief. I got the call, MacAuley said to bring you in, and that’s all I know.”

Christ on a bicycle. Russ prayed that Lyle hadn’t taken it into his head to cheer him up. He could just imagine what his deputy-a long-divorced, self-proclaimed ladies’ man-would consider a picker-upper. Probably a pair of strippers dressed as beat cops. One word leaked about something like that and Russ would be handing his head to the Millers Kill aldermen on a silver platter.

“We’re here,” Mark said helpfully, bumping over the strip separating the police department’s parking lot from the road.

“Thanks,” Russ said. “I might not have recognized it with all the pretty snow.”

Mark flushed red and jammed his cap on his head. They both got out. Russ scanned the parking lot as he tromped toward the front steps. He recognized Lyle’s Pontiac Cruiser and Eric McCrea’s Subaru station wagon. Noble’s nondescript Buick and Harlene’s Explorer. Nobody who shouldn’t be on duty right now, thank God. That ruled out the stripper party. Unless Lyle was planning on wrestling him over to the Golden Banana in Saratoga?