"What'd he do?"

"Left with his hat in his hands. He asked Dave Fine to check in on her, but Dave got the same treatment."

"Did you talk to Dave about it?"

"Briefly. He was about to go into a therapy session." Jeffrey felt a flash of guilt, thinking about Lena. He should not have allowed her to use her therapy appointment to interview Fine. Jeffrey had given in too easily because it was convenient.

"Jeffrey?" Sara said, her tone indicating she had asked him a question and was waiting for an answer.

"Yeah, sorry," Jeffrey apologized.

"What did Fine say?"

"The same as Brad. He offered to come in tomorrow and talk some more, but neither one of them seem like they're going to be much help." Jeffrey rubbed his eyes, trying to think of any straw he could grasp. "What about Mark Patterson?" he finally asked. "Does he seem kind of weird to you?"

"Weird how?"

"Weird like…" Jeffrey tried to find the words. He did not really want to go into the Patterson interview with Sara, mostly because of what had happened with Lena. There had been something between her and the boy, something that set his teeth on edge. They both worked off each other somehow. "Weird like I don't know."

Sara laughed. "I don't think I can answer that."

"Sexual," he said, because that was a good word to describe Mark Patterson. "He seemed really sexual."

"Well," Sara began, and he could hear the confusion in her voice. "He's a good-looking kid. I imagine he's been sexually active for a very long time."

"He just turned sixteen."

"Jeffrey," Sara said, as if she were talking to an idiot. "I've got ten-year-old girls who haven't even started their periods asking me about birth control."

"Jesus," he sighed. "It's way too early in the morning to hear that kind of thing."

"Welcome to my world," she told him.

"Yeah." He stared at the jersey on his wall, trying to remember what it had felt like to be Mark Patterson's age and have the world in the palm of his hand. Though, Mark Patterson did not seem to feel that way.

Jeffrey did not like this helpless feeling. He should be back in Grant, trying to figure this out. At the very least, he should be keeping an eye on Lena. For a while Jeffrey had felt she was on the edge, but not until yesterday did he realize that she was closer to falling than keeping herself balanced.

"Jeff?" Sara asked. "What's wrong?"

"I'm worried about Lena," he told her, and the words felt familiar to him. He had been worried about Lena since he hired her ten years ago. First, he was worried that she was so aggressive on patrol, taking every collar like her life depended on it. Then, he had worried that she put herself in danger too often as a detective, pushing suspects to their breaking point, pushing herself to her own breaking point. And now he worried that she was about to lose it. There was no question in his mind that she would explode soon. It was just a matter of when. With a start, he realized this had been his fear from the beginning: When would Lena finally break in two?

"I think you should be worried about her," Sara said. "Why won't you take her off active duty?"

"Because it would kill her," he answered, and he knew this was true. Lena needed her job like other people needed air.

"Is there something else?"

Jeffrey thought about the conversation he'd had with Lena in the car. She had not been exactly sure of herself when she told him the shot was clean. "I, uh," he began, not knowing how to say this. "When I talked to Lena yesterday…" he said.

"Yeah?"

"She didn't seem too sure about what had happened."

"About the shooting?" Sara demanded, obviously irritated. "What exactly did she say?"

"It wasn't what she said so much as how she said it."

Sara mumbled something that sounded like a curse. "She's just playing with you to get back at me."

" Lena 's not like that."

"Of course she is," Sara shot back. "She's always been like that."

Jeffrey shook his head, not accepting this. "I think she's just not sure."

Sara mumbled a curse under her breath. "That's just great."

"Sara," Jeffrey said, trying to calm her down. "Don't say anything to her, okay? It'll only make it worse."

"Why would I say anything to her?"

"Sara…" He rubbed sleep from his eyes, thinking he did not want to talk about this now. "Listen, I was just fixin' to go to the hospital-"

"This really ticks me off."

"I know that," he said. "You've made it clear."

"I just-"

"Sara," he interrupted. "I really need to go."

"Actually," she said, moderating her tone, "I was calling for a reason, if you've got a minute?"

"Sure," he managed, feeling a sense of trepidation. "What's up?"

He heard her take a deep breath, as if she were about to jump off a cliff. "I was wondering if you'll be back tonight."

"Late, probably."

"Well, then, how about tomorrow night?"

"If I come back tonight, I won't have to come back tomorrow night."

"Are you being dense on purpose?"

He played back their conversation in his mind, smiling when he realized that Sara was trying to ask him over. Jeffrey wondered if she had ever done something like this in her life.

He said, "I've never been very bright."

"No," she agreed, but she was laughing.

"So?"

"So…" Sara began, then she sighed. He heard her mumble, "Oh, this is so stupid."

"What's that?"

"I said," she started again, then stopped. "I'm not doing anything tomorrow night."

Jeffrey rubbed his whiskers, feeling the grin on his face. He wondered if there had ever been a time in this room when he had felt happier. Maybe the day he got the call from Auburn, saying he could go to college for free in exchange for getting the shit beaten out of him on the football field every Saturday.

He said, "Hey, me neither."

"So…" Sara was obviously hoping he would fill things in for her. Jeffrey sat back down on the bed, thinking hell would freeze over before he helped her out.

"Come over to my house," she finally said. "Around seven or so, okay?"

"Why?"

He could hear her chair squeak as she sat back. Jeffrey imagined she probably had her hand over her eyes.

"God, you are not going to make this easy, are you?"

"Why should I?"

"I want to see you," she told him. "Come at seven. I'll make supper."

"Wait a minute-"

She obviously anticipated his problem with this. Sara was not exactly a good cook. She offered, "I'll order something from Alfredo's."

Jeffrey smiled again. "I'll see you at seven."

As a boy, Jeffrey had done his share of stupid things. His two best friends from elementary school to high school had lived down the street from him, and between Jerry Long, a boy with a curiosity about fireworks, and Bobby Blankenship, a boy who liked to hear things explode, they had managed to risk their lives any number of times before puberty took hold and girls became more important than blowing things up.

At the age of eleven, the three had discovered the pleasure of exploding bottle rockets in a steel drum behind Jeffrey's house. By the time they were twelve, the drum was as dented and pockmarked as Bobby "Spot" Blankenship's face. By the time they were thirteen, Jerry Long had been given the name "Possum" because, when the drum had finally exploded, a piece of shrapnel had nearly sliced off the top of his head, and he had lain in Jeffrey's backyard like a possum until Jean Harris had called an ambulance to take him to the hospital, and the police to scare the bejesus out of Jeffrey and Spot.

Jeffrey had not earned his nickname until later, when he had started to notice girls and, more important, they had started to notice him. Like Possum and Spot, he was on the football team, and they were pretty popular in school because the team was winning that year. Jeffrey was the first of the trio to kiss a girl, the first to get to second base, and the first to finally lose his virginity. For these accomplishments, he was given the nickname "Slick."