When Sara reached Ralph Bunche Elementary School, the front entrance of the battered brick building was humming with hundreds of kids glad to be done with the school day. As she turned the corner and made her way through the crowd of students, Sara heard a voice yell, “You’re late.” Sitting on the trunk of a white car was Tiffany Hamilton, Sara’s little sister. Sara knew that Tiffany was tall for a seventh-grader, but her recent decision to start wearing lipstick made her look far older than thirteen. She had wide eyes, dark brown skin, and a long, immaculate braid that ran down her back. She also had an attitude that hit like a truck.

“I said, you’re late,” Tiffany repeated.

“I heard what you said,” Sara said as she reached the car. “I just chose not to respond.”

“Where were you?”

“At my job.”

“Oh, that’s right,” Tiffany said, hopping off the car. Her pink lipstick was shining in the afternoon sun. “I forgot you started. Can you arrest people yet? Do they give you a badge?”

“No, we don’t get a badge,” Sara said, laughing. “We just get a bucketful of lipstick. These days, that can be quite a weapon – blinding our opponents and all that.”

“Very funny,” Tiffany said, squeezing her lips together self-consciously. “So tell me more about work. Do you like it?”

“Of course I like it. This case I’m working on is driving me a little bit crazy, though.”

“Really? Is it a murder? A shooting?”

“It’s a burglary. And guess who the defense attorney is?”

“Perry Mason.”

“How do you know who Perry Mason is?”

“I got a TV.”

“Well, you’re still wrong. Guess again.”

“Is he fatter or thinner than Perry Mason?”

“What makes you think it’s a man? Women can be lawyers.”

“Okay, fatter or thinner?”

“Thinner.”

“Uglier or better looking?”

“Better looking.”

“Taller or shorter?”

“I don’t know. Let’s say the same.”

“Now I know it’s a guy. More or less hair?”

“Less,” Sara laughed. “Especially in that one spot right on the back of his-”

“Jared?”

“The one and only.”

“Oh, my God! You’re going to wipe the floor with him! Can I come and watch?”

“We’ll see,” Sara said.

“What’s it like going up against him? Is it weird? Is he scared?”

“I don’t think he’s too scared,” Sara said as she thought about her two witnesses.

“That means he’s beating you, doesn’t it? How bad is it? Are you about to lose?”

“He’s not beating me,” Sara said. Hoping to change the subject, she added, “Now tell me about school. How’re you doing?”

“Great,” Tiffany said as they passed Columbia Law School. “So where’re we going today?”

“That depends. How’d you do on your math test?”

“Eighty-nine percent.”

“I don’t know – that’s still not an A.”

“C’mon, Sara, you said if I got it up to ninety-”

“I know what I said – and last I checked, eighty-nine is still lower than ninety.”

“Sara, please. I worked all last week to get that grade. And I’m only one tiny point away. One teeny, tiny point.”

“Fine, fine, fine. You’re breaking my heart. Name your poison.”

“Can we go back to the Metropolitan Museum of Art?”

“That’s great with me, but answer this: Do you actually want to go to the Met, or do you just want to sit on the stairs and play Count the Tortured Artists?”

“I want to play Count the Tortured Artists. With fifty extra points for black berets.”

“That’s what I thought,” Sara said. “Pick another poison.”

“How about we go bowling and then eat dinner at Sylvia’s?”

“I can’t do dinner tonight,” Sara said. “I have to prepare for – Hey!” Sara had the wind knocked out of her when someone walking in the opposite direction crashed into her. She lost her balance and fell back on the concrete. Caught up in the momentum, he stumbled over her.

Looking up, Sara saw a dark-haired man.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “That was completely my fault.”

“Don’t worry about it.” As Sara picked up her briefcase, she couldn’t help but notice how his sunken cheeks punctuated the edges of his face.

“I guess I was thinking about something else,” the man explained, taking a close look at Tiffany.

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m positive,” Sara said. “No harm done.”

As she and Tiffany continued their walk toward the main part of campus, Tiffany said, “Freaky-looking guy, huh?”

“He was kind of weird,” Sara admitted. When she readjusted her purse on her shoulder, she realized something felt wrong. She looked down in her purse. “Son of a bitch!” she shouted, spinning around.

“What?” Tiffany asked.

“That guy just lifted my wallet.” Sara ran as fast as she could up Amsterdam Avenue and turned the corner on 117th Street. The stranger was gone.

Chapter 8

CLIMBING THE STAIRS TO HIS APARTMENT, JARED NOTICED that the broken glass was completely cleaned up and the picture of the sunflowers had been reset in a new frame. The night of the break-in was now a two-day-old memory, but to Jared, the sound of crunching glass was still a raw wound. At the top of the stairs, he wondered why anyone would ever smash the hallway picture in the first place. It makes no sense, he thought. There’s no benefit – except for the joy of mindless violence. And then it all became clear. To Kozlow, it’s just a game.

Unable to shake the image of Kozlow smashing the original frame, Jared heard the entryway door on the first floor slam shut. Someone else was in the building. Was it Sara? No, the footsteps were too heavy. Refusing to look over the railing, Jared raced to find the key to his apartment. He dropped his briefcase to make it easier. Behind him, he could hear someone lumbering up the stairs. As he opened the top lock, his hands were shaking. Bottom lock, bottom lock, bottom lock, he thought, fishing for the key. When he finally put it in, he turned it toward the left. It was stuck. Damn it, not now! Open up, you prewar piece of – Suddenly, the lock clicked, the door flew open, and Jared stumbled inside. He slammed the door shut and looked through the peephole. The man on the stairs was Chris Guttman, their neighbor from the third floor.

Annoyed at his own paranoia, Jared headed for the bedroom. “Sara? You here?” There was no reply. He threw his briefcase down next to his nightstand and took a seat on the bed.

Take a breath, Jared told himself. Don’t let him have this one. He went into the bathroom and splashed cold water on his face. Out of the corner of his eye, he thought he saw something move in the shower. He quickly pulled open the curtain. It was nothing. Empty. He ran back to the bedroom and checked under the bed. Then his closet. Then Sara’s. Then the linen closet. Nothing in any of them. Empty. Empty. Empty. Without a doubt, there was no one else in the apartment. It didn’t make Jared feel any safer.

By eight-thirty, Jared was sitting in the living room, fighting with the New York Times crossword and anxiously awaiting the return of his wife. She’s fine, he told himself, glancing at his watch and then checking the clock on the VCR. It’s a long commute – that’s why she’s late. In the past half hour, he’d called Sara’s office three times. No answer. Determined to distract himself, Jared started wondering how she was going to react to two of her witnesses canceling on her. He imagined she’d first blame him, then start fishing for information. His analysis complete, he looked back at his watch. And the VCR clock. She’s fine, he repeated. Please, let her be fine.

Ten minutes later, Sara finally arrived home. The moment Jared heard her key in the door, he pulled the paper back onto his lap. “How was your day?” he called out.

“It was wonderful,” Sara said sarcastically. “First your client threatens two of my witnesses, then someone smashes into me and steals my wallet.”


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