The bird feeder was hung in the only tree in the Perrones' yard, a scrawny black olive. The key was covered with grackle droppings, which Stranahan wiped on the grass. As soon as he entered the house, he scrubbed his hands and put on a pair of rubber kitchen gloves. He was waiting by the front door when Joey knocked. "So, what do you think of my new look?" "I'm there," Stranahan said.

She wore a cropped brunette wig and a gray knee-length house-dress, and she carried a worn Bible. All of it came from a thrift shop they'd found down the street from the produce mart.

Stranahan motioned her inside and shut the door. Her shoulders stiffened and she stood in the foyer for several moments without saying a word.

He took her by the elbow and said, "It's all right." "Is there anything I shouldn't see?"

"I haven't taken the grand tour, but this was on the kitchen counter."

It was a section of the Sun-Sentinel that had been unfolded to an inside page.

Joey read the headline aloud: " 'Coast Guard Calls Off Search for Missing Cruise Passenger.' Oh my God, there I am! 'Local Woman Feared Drowned.' Do you believe this?"

She dropped the Bible and seized the newspaper with both hands. "I knew it, Mick. He's saying I got drunk and fell overboard!"

"That's not in the story."

"No, but it's the obvious implication. 'Perrone told police that he and his wife had shared several bottles of wine earlier in the evening. The couple had been celebrating their second wedding anniversary.' The prick!"

Joey crumpled the newspaper and slam-dunked it into the trash can. "I'm calling Rose," she said.

"Who's that?"

"My best friend. She's in our book club."

Mick Stranahan waited in the living room, trying to figure out who had decorated the place. The sofa and two reading chairs were comfortable and smart-looking, probably Joey's touch. Chaz's contributions would be the plasma TV and the jet-black Natuzzi recliner. The tragic aquarium could go either way. Stranahan was struck by the absence of books and the abundance of golf magazines. No family photographs were on display, not even a wedding picture.

Joey stalked into the room carrying a cold beer in each hand. She gave one bottle to Stranahan. "Rose almost had a seizure. She thought I was calling from the grave-speaking of which, what's that awful smell?"

"The aquarium, I'm afraid."

Joey groaned as she approached the tank. "That frigging idiot forgot to feed the fish!"

They looked like shiny little holiday ornaments, bobbing in the clouded water. Joey turned away in angry disgust. Stranahan followed her through the house, room by room. Nothing more was said until they reached the master bath.

"Oh, cute. My stuff's gone."

"Everything?"

"My toothpaste, makeup." Joey tore through the drawers and cabinets. "All my lotions and creams, even the tampons. This is unbelievable."

She hurried to the bedroom and flung open the closet door and let out a cry. "My clothes, too!"

Stranahan opened the top drawer of an antique bureau. "Undies," he reported, perhaps too brightly. "These he saved."

"Asshole." Joey slammed the closet door so violently that it came off the track.

Stranahan said, "Personally, I advocate cunning and stealth over mass destruction."

He righted the door and set it back in place. Joey grabbed her bra and panties out of the bureau and sat down stiffly on the edge of the bed. "I'm going to cry now, okay, and I don't want to hear a word from you. Not one damn word."

"Crying is allowed. Go right ahead."

"And don't you dare put your arms around me and stroke my hair and give me all that wise fatherly-brotherly bullshit. Not unless I tell you to."

"Fair enough," Stranahan said.

"This was my house, Mick. My life. And he's just sweeping me out the door like I was dirt."

She closed her eyes and oddly found herself thinking of the night that Chaz had begged to tie her to the bedposts. He had chosen Alsatian scarves but had cinched the knots so tightly that her fingers and toes immediately went to sleep. It had been one of the rare times with Chaz that she'd had to fake it, but what made the night more memorable was that he'd passed out on top of her in a creepy sexual stupor. For nearly an hour he had lain there, snoring between her breasts and drooling like a Saint Bernard, yet remaining solidly erect inside her. Joey had felt as helpless as a butterfly pinned to a corkboard.

Upon reflection she realized that the bizarre interlude had been a telling lesson about her husband: Conscious or unconscious, he was completely dick-driven.

"The guy's an animal and I never saw it," she said disconsolately. "A primitive with a Ph.D. And I was a fool for marrying him."

"Joey?" Stranahan was standing at the bedroom door, spinning his hard hat in his hands.

"Yeah?"

"If you're going to cry, then cry. We need to be moving along."

"Give me five minutes alone."

"You got it," Stranahan said.

"Five minutes. Then come back and put your arms around me and tell me everything's going to be okay. All that cornball crap."

"You sure?"

"Yeah, let's give it a shot. But first, take off those ridiculous gloves."

Later they found the rest of her belongings crammed in three cardboard boxes, stacked in the garage next to her Toyota. As Joey began sorting through the depressing inventory, Stranahan warned her that Chaz might become suspicious if items disappeared.

"And don't even think about taking your car," he added.

Glumly she held up a pale orange handbag. "This is what I brought on the cruise."

Chaz had obviously overlooked her wallet, which contained $650 and an American Express card. "The plastic I'm keeping," she informed Stranahan. "We'll need it."

"The cash, too."

"Come here and dig in." Joey pointed to one of the other boxes.

"May I ask what we're looking for?"

"Something saucy," she said. "Something to catch the eye of my worthless troglodyte husband."

Dawn brought a thunderstorm and the screeching of rats. Karl Rol-vaag's pythons had awakened hungry.

For ten minutes the detective stood under a cold shower, a ritual meant to thicken his blood in preparation for the return to Minnesota. Rolvaag believed that living in South Florida had turned him into a weather wimp.

Captain Gallo had told him to take the day off as comp time, but Rolvaag had nothing else to do but work. By the time he'd shaved and dressed, the snakes were finished and Mrs. Shulman was pounding on the door. She lived across the hall in unit 7-G and held the title of acting vice president for the Sawgrass Grove Condominium Association. Her current mission was to evict Karl Rolvaag from the premises. "Good morning, Nellie," he said.

"I heard it, that god-awful screaming again, you sick bastard!" "They've got to eat," the detective said, "same as you and me." "If you weren't a cop, they'd throw you in jail for animal cruelty!"

Mrs. Shulman, who weighed at least ninety pounds, acted as if she intended to punch Rolvaag in the chest. Her bony mottled fists were clenched and trembling.

The detective said, "The condo association paid how much for rodent extermination last year-three or four grand, wasn't it?"

Mrs. Shulman sneered. "Don't get snide with me."

"There's nothing in the rules says I can't keep reptiles."

" 'Dangerous pets,' it's right on page one nineteen."

"Your dog's bitten four people," Rolvaag pointed out. "My snakes haven't hurt anybody."

"Disturbing the peace, then. Those helpless mice screaming and moaning while God's breath is strangled out of them-it's horrible. I had to double up on my Xanax, thanks to you."

"They're big fat rats, Nellie, not Stuart Little. And, by the way, that poison your exterminator uses? It makes their little tummies explode."