Deborah nodded. "I'm very sorry for your loss," she said.

Mr. Spanos sobbed. It was a very wet sound, and it took Deborah by surprise, because she goggled at him as if he had started to sing.

"Stop it," Daphne Spanos said to him. "You have to pull yourself together."

"My little girl," he said, and it was very clear that he was not really pulling himself together quite yet.

"She's my little girl, too, goddamn it," Daphne hissed at him. "Now quit blubbering." Mr. Spanos looked down at his feet and shook his head, but at least he did not make any more wet noises. Instead he took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and then sat up as straight as he could and looked at Deborah.

"You're in charge of finding the animals that did this," he said to Debs. "That killed my little girl." And I thought he was going to snivel again, but he clamped his jaw shut tightly, and nothing more came out except a ragged breath.

"It's a task force, Mr. Spanos," she said. "We have a team made up of officers from all the different branches of-"

Mr. Spanos held up his hand and waved it to cut her off. "I don't care about the team," he said. "They said you're in charge. Are you?"

Deborah glanced at Alvarez, who looked away with a suddenly very innocent face. She looked back at Spanos. "That's right," Deborah said.

He stared at her for a long moment. "Why not a man?" he said. "Is this a politically correct thing, they put a woman in charge?"

I could see Alvarez struggling to control himself; Deborah didn't need to struggle. She was used to this, which is not the same thing as saying she liked it. "I am in charge," she said, "because I am the best and I have earned it. If you have a problem with that, too bad."

Spanos looked at her, shook his head. "I don't like this," he said. "It should be a man."

"Mr. Spanos," Deborah said, "if you have something to say, spit it out. If not-I am trying to catch a killer here, and you are wasting my time." She glared at him, and he looked uncertain. He glanced at his wife, who compressed her lips and then nodded, and Spanos turned to Mr. Ponytail. "Clear the room," he said, and Ponytail took a step toward Deke.

"Back off," Deborah barked, and Ponytail froze. "We're not clearing the room," she said. "This is a police station."

"I have something for your ears only," Spanos said. "I want it confidential."

"I'm a cop," Debs said. "You want confidential, get a lawyer."

"No," Spanos said. "This is for you only, for the head of the investigation, not these other guys."

"It doesn't work that way," Debs said.

"Just this once," Spanos said urgently. "It's my little girl."

"Mr. Spanos," Deborah said.

Mrs. Spanos leaned forward. "Please," she said. "It will only take a minute." She reached over and grabbed Deborah's hand and gave it a squeeze. "It's important," she said. "For the investigation." She saw Deborah look uncertain, just for a second, and she squeezed the hand again. "It will help you find them," she said in a seductive whisper.

Deborah pulled her hand away and looked at the two of them. Then she glanced up at me for an opinion, and I admit I was curious, so I just shrugged.

"Your guys wait in the hall," Deborah said at last. "I'll send out two of my guys."

Spanos shook his head. "Just you and us," he said. "So it's family."

Deborah jerked her head in my direction. "My brother stays," she said, and Mr. and Mrs. Spanos looked at me.

"Your brother," he said, and looked at Mrs. Spanos; she nodded. "All right."

"Mackenzie," Mr. Spanos said, holding out his hand. The guy with the buzz cut came over and gave him the suitcase. "You and Harold wait outside," Spanos said, placing the suitcase on his lap, and the two bodybuilders marched to the door and went out. "Sergeant?" he said to Debs, and she waved at Deke.

"Deke, Alvarez," she said, "keep an eye on those two guys in the hall."

"I'm s'posa keep an eye on you," Deke said. "Captain said."

"Get out," Debs said. "Two minutes."

Deke stared at her stubbornly for a moment, and then Alvarez stepped over and put a hand on his back. "Come on, sport," he said. "Boss lady says go, we go."

Deke jutted out his dimpled chin at Deborah, and for just a second he looked every inch the manly Saturday-morning TV hero. "Two minutes," he said. He looked at her a little longer, as if he was going to say something else, but apparently he couldn't think of anything, so he merely turned away and went out. Alvarez gave Debs a mocking smile and followed.

The door closed behind them, and for a second nobody moved. Then Mr. Spanos made a grunting noise and plopped the aluminum suitcase into Deborah's lap. "Open it," he said.

Deborah stared at him. "Go on, open it," he said. "It won't explode."

She stared for just a second longer, and then she looked down at the suitcase. It had two locks holding it closed and she slowly undid them and then, with a last look at Spanos, she flipped the lid open.

Deborah looked inside and froze absolutely still, her hand motionless on the raised lid and her face caught between expressions-and then she looked up at Spanos with one of the coldest expressions I had ever seen. "What the fuck is this," she said through her teeth.

Having human feelings was new to me, but having curiosity was not, and I leaned forward for a look, and it did not take a great deal of scrutiny to see what the fuck it was.

It was money. Lots of it.

From the visible top layer it appeared to be bundles of hundred-dollar bills, all with the bank's tape around them. The suitcase was crammed full, so full that I didn't see how Spanos had gotten it closed, unless Mr. Ponytail had stood on top while Spanos locked it.

"Half a million dollars," Spanos said. "In cash. Untraceable. I deliver it anywhere you say. Cayman Islands bank, whatever."

"For what," Deborah said in a very flat voice, and, if he had known her as I did, Mr. Spanos should have gotten very nervous.

But Spanos did not know Deborah, and he seemed to gain confidence from the fact that she had asked what it was for. He smiled, not really a happy smile, more like he wanted to show his face could still do that. "For almost nothing," he said. "Just this." He held up his hand and wagged one finger in the air. "When you find the animals that killed my little girl…" His voice broke a little and he stopped, took his glasses off, and wiped them on his sleeve. He put the glasses back on, cleared his throat, and looked at Deborah again. "When you find them, you tell me first. That's all. Ten minutes before you do anything else. One phone call to me. And that money is all yours."

Deborah stared at him. He stared back, and for a few seconds he was no longer a sniveling, snuffling man, but instead a man who always knew exactly what he wanted, and exactly how to get it.

I looked at the money in the still-open suitcase. Half a million dollars. It seemed like an awful lot. I had never really been motivated by money-after all, I had not gone to law school. Money to me had always been merely something the sheep used to show each other how wonderful they were. But now, as I looked at the stacks of cash in the suitcase, it did not look like abstract markers for keeping score. It looked like ballet lessons for Lily Anne. An entire college education. Pony rides and new dresses and braces and finding shells on the beach in the Bahamas. And it was all right there in that one small suitcase, winking its sly greenbacked eyes and saying, Why not? What could it hurt?

And then I realized that the silence had gone on a little too long for comfort, and I tore my eyes away from Lily Anne's future happiness and looked up to Deborah's face. As far as I could tell neither she nor Spanos had changed expression. But at last Deborah took a deep breath and put the suitcase on the floor and looked back at Spanos.