“Have a visit,” Tony said. “You know, friendly. Remind him of his court-ordered responsibilities. How’d that be?”

“Shit.” Connie dropped them both a grin and kept moving. Over her shoulder she said, “Long as you still plan on leaving a tip.”

Worth didn’t know how much time had passed. He hadn’t worn his watch, and there wasn’t a clock on the wall. Twenty minutes, maybe half an hour.

While he sat there, he overheard muffled snippets of information on passing voices, chattering radios.

Captain Torres was the first person to return to the meeting room. She came in, looked all around, and said, “Where’s your rep?”

“He went to the bathroom,” Worth said. That had been fifteen minutes ago. Worth hadn’t minded the time alone.

Captain Torres stepped out, scanned the floor, stepped back in and sighed. “Come with me.”

He rose from his chair and followed her out.

Gina headed around the far side of the bullpen, angling toward the interview rooms tucked back in the corner on the other side. On the way, Worth saw Vargas sitting at his desk, working the phone. Two other detectives shrugged into their sport coats and headed for the elevators. One of them was the guy Worth had seen standing over by the printer before.

She kept walking. Worth followed along.

In the room, she pointed to a chair and said, “Sit tight.”

It was like any other interview room he’d ever been in, except it had new carpeting and a long window looking out over downtown. The blinds were open; beams of morning sunlight made stripes on the table.

In one corner, on a wheeled cart, sat a polygraph machine. He knew it wasn’t for him; they’d schedule something formal through his rep and whoever he ended up hiring for a lawyer. But lie detectors didn’t normally sit around idle in interview rooms. He was meant to see it.

Worth pulled the chair out, but he didn’t sit.

He said, “Am I in custody?”

Another sigh. “For now? If you don’t ask that question, we won’t have to get into answering it. Just sit tight. Okay?”

Worth sat down.

As Captain Torres turned to leave, he said, “Gina.”

She stopped, looked back.

“Come on,” he said. “You know me.”

“Do I?”

“What do you think?”

Captain Regina Torres looked him square in the face. Worth could tell by looking at her that she hadn’t decided the answer to that question yet.

But she stepped back into the room. Lowered her voice.

“What are you doing here, Matt? I mean, Jesus Christ. What happened to you?”

Worth didn’t know how to respond. He said, “I heard the chatter out there. You caught a double?”

“If you heard, then you already know.”

Two bodies, somewhere in the city. He couldn’t help but think back to what Gwen had said before: One or the other of them has been calling every two or three hours. Now all of a sudden it’s been six.

What do you think that means?

“It isn’t them,” he said. “Is it?”

“Who?

“Briggs and Salcedo.”

She gave him a look. “Why would you ask that?”

“Because we haven’t heard from them. Two plus two, okay?” He pointed at his wrist where his watch would have been. “That’s all.”

“No,” she said. “It isn’t them.”

Worth said, “What’s going on?”

Captain Torres pulled the door closed until it clicked.

“Look,” she said. “Narco’s had Tony Briggs and Ray Salcedo under investigation since they rotated back out to patrol. Okay? I’m choosing to believe you really didn’t know that already. For now.”

“I didn’t, Gina.”

It was all he could do to keep his face neutral. Every step he took, something new clicked into place. It was like he had St. Michael running interference strictly on his behalf.

“I swear.”

“Save it,” she said. She looked at her pager. “I can’t tell you anything more now. I shouldn’t be telling you anything at all.”

“I appreciate it.”

“You’d better not be wrapped up in this, Matt. Swear to God. You know?”

She turned and opened the door to walk out. Worth’s union rep stood there on the other side, raising his hand to knock.

Gina didn’t miss a beat. “We’re in here.”

She stood a full inch taller than the rep. The rep tiptoed, craning for a look past her shoulder, finding Worth sitting in the chair.

He said, “What is this?”

“You were in the bathroom,” she said. “I needed to shuffle up.”

“This is an interview room,” the rep said.

“Well observed.”

“Has Officer Worth been placed in custody?”

Captain Torres looked at the ceiling and walked out without answering.

The rep had to step aside to let her by. After she was gone, he just stood there in the doorway, smelling like cigarette smoke, apparently vexed.

“We’re not supposed to ask that question,” Worth said.

“Theoretically,” Tony said. “Say you needed to disappear somebody. And their little Goat, too. How would you do it?”

Ray triggered the utility compartment in the console above the rearview mirror and took out his sunglasses. He put them on, waited for a gap in traffic, and pulled into the westbound lane. “It’s never come up.”

“Dude, you’re not even trying.”

“I’m driving.”

“Okay, forget it,” Tony said. “Ask me how I’d do it.”

Ray checked his mirrors. “How would you do it.”

“Who, me? Easy.” Tony pointed over his shoulder, behind them. East toward the river. “I’d take ’em both sixty, seventy miles across the state line, where my brother owns this junkyard out in the middle of nowhere. He’s got all this demolition-type shit, right? A bunch of land. Nice and secluded.”

The department Web site had a whole corner dedicated to the twenty-odd cops who’d died in the line of duty in the past hundred-odd years. The front page contained the same names as the ones carved into the marble monument that stood out front of Central Station. Except here you could click on the photos of all the dead officers and get a couple paragraphs of extra info. Career history, the nutshell story on how they’d gone down. Quotes from cops who had known them. Survived-by information.

They’d looked up Kelly Worth on Ray’s computer even before the storm hit Saturday. But they hadn’t been looking for anything in particular then. Just brushing up on basics.

“Sounds perfect,” Ray said. His voice seemed flat.

“Tell me about it,” Tony said. “I mean, here’s this kid riding around on a shitload of dirty cash. Right? I mean, he’s into something with somebody. But if he disappears? It’s not like they’re calling the cops.”

“He’s got a mom somewhere.”

“Maybe. How do I know?”

“He’s got somebody somewhere.”

“So?”

“So somebody wants to know where he is. And the cops are already looking out.”

“Yeah, but how much time has passed by now? I got time to arrange things. Order a new mattress for my girlfriend’s apartment, for starters. Clean up all the little odds and ends.”

“You’d miss a couple,” Ray said. “They’d come up sooner or later.”

“And then?”

“And then some smart cop would ask his partner, hey, if you needed to get rid of a car, how would you do it?” Ray hit his blinker, slowed for the car beside him, and merged left. “And the partner would say, hey, you know what? This guy has a brother who junks cars for a living.”

Tony smiled. “Shit. Nobody’s looking at me, man. I’m a cop, too.”

Ray shook his head.

“Besides, by then, these smart cops have talked to enough people to get the picture. This guy who went missing? He was into something with somebody. Maybe he’s hiding out somewhere. Hell, maybe…”