“Let’s roll,” Jack said as he slipped in beside Eddie.

Number 818 Jackson was on a street that slanted off the intersection of Jackson and Rainier, a quiet street this time of day. It was an old-style house with an addition built onto the back of it. There was a street-level back door that led inside.

An old Asian couple came out as the patrol car killed its flashing strobes.

Eddie stared at them from the backseat, his mouth quiet but his eyes scheming.

Jack came out of the cruiser and walked toward them. Korean, he guessed. The cops kept the cruiser’s interior lights on so the old couple could see Eddie behind the back cage partition.

Eddie finally bowed and twisted his face away.

Jack showed the man the business card.

“Ai goo,” the old man said. “He rent room from us.”

“Can I see the room?” Jack asked respectfully, offering a slight bow.

“Ari seyo,” the man agreed.

The inside hallway smelled like bulgogi and kimchi, with the menthol hint of salon pas drifting off the old couple. They led Jack to a side room. The small room had only enough space for a single bed with an all-purpose night table and a freestanding metal cabinet that doubled as a closet and a dresser. Some clothes were draped around a chair. No windows. No bathroom. Not many places to hide anything.

Jack considered the obvious: toss the bed, the cabinet, check the knapsack, and under the chair and night table. He gauged the concern on the faces of the Korean couple. Remembering the East Broadway railroad flat that Eddie and his victim Koo Jai had shared in New York’s Chinatown, he pictured the loose floorboards covering their stash spots.

The floor here was covered with old linoleum, and Jack didn’t see any loose edges or pried-up corners. He guessed Eddie was smarter than that. He heard a click, like a timer, then the hum of a fan unit nearby. Air. Since there were no windows, he looked for the vent, and saw the aluminum grate high on the wall, covering the extension of the ductwork into the room addition.

Too high up for Eddie to reach. Unless he stood on a chair.

Jack pulled the chair over, flashed his Mini Maglite into the grate. A shallow recess, empty. But there was a bend in the air duct. Although barely visible, he noticed a tiny plastic loop wrapped around the bottom slat of the vent grate. It looked like fishing line.

Jack opened his army penknife to the Phillips screwdriver and unscrewed the grate. It came free after a slight pry, but was caught on the nylon line. Jack tugged gently and saw a dirty plastic bundle emerge from the bend in the duct. He dragged it out and saw metallic watchbands inside. In one corner of the clear plastic bundle he could make out the denomination on a wad of fifty-dollar bills.

He unwrapped the plastic, then admired the expensive watches within: three Rolex Oysters, four Cartier Tanks, six Rados. And five black-dial Movado Amorosas. Probably fifty grand’s worth of deluxe timepieces, guessed Jack. He thumbed through the wad of cash, maybe five thousand, that had probably been ripped out of the victim’s pants pocket as he lay dying in the snow of the Doyers Street alley.

Damn clever, thought Jack, turning to the old couple as he scanned the room again. “Where’s the bathroom?”

Going back through the hallway, they came to a closet-size bathroom that consisted of a sink, a toilet, and a narrow shower stall with a sliding door and a vent fan in the ceiling.

Eddie was clever, Jack concluded, but in a predictable way.

Removing a roll of toilet tissue and a can of air freshener, Jack lifted the cover off the toilet’s water tank. The water was murky and he shined the flashlight into it. At the bottom of the tank there was a roll of black plastic. The cold tank water had pressed the plastic into the contours of a gun.

Jack felt the chill of the water as he pulled it out.

Inside the black plastic was a revolver, a .22-caliber Taurus with a nine-shot cylinder. The murder weapon from the OTB shooting. Jack took a breath. It had barely taken him a half hour inside the Korean house. He knew some of his effort here bordered on illegal search and seizure but he didn’t care. He had the killer, the murder weapon, and the swag all bundled up, just in need of a lab match for ballistics and forensics. What mattered was that the perpetrator was in custody, he thought. A lawyer, like Alex, might disagree, but Jack wasn’t feeling the need to be legally correct at this exhilarating moment.

Eddie was somber as Jack leaned into the back window of the cruiser and said, “We’ve got the gun, kid. You’re good, though, shooting .22s. A hitman’s caliber. You’re good for two kill-shots, and one critical hit.”

“Don’t know nothing about no gun,” Eddie insisted.

“How long do you think before we match up the ballistics? Before your prints come back off the watches? And off the vic’s VIP card from the titty bar, that you used for ID?” Jack shook his head dismissively.

Eddie grunted, smirked.

“What happened?” Jack needled. “You had a beef? Something over stolen watches? Come on, stop gassing me. It’s not like you’re going anywhere except to lockup. Right now, you’re good for the possession of the firearm, for the possession of stolen goods. Probably good for Murder One as well.”

“What the fuck is it to you anyway?” Eddie snapped. “The jerk-off scumbag had it coming.”

“Oh yeah, I’m sure,” agreed Jack. “But it’s not only that you shot this Koo guy in the back. And robbed him. Or even the big Ghost gorilla you took out.”

“What then?” was Eddie’s pained question.

“You also put two .22s into the head of a guy I used to know,” Jack said coldly. “It’s Yin-Yang, punk, and yours has come full circle.”

Jack turned to the patrol cop, asking, “How’d you make him?”

“We got the heads-up at roll call, for a Chinese,” the cop smiled sheepishly. “Exceptionally short, right? The update said he liked to shoot pool.”

“Good work,” Jack commended him, privately noting Detective Nicoll’s assistance.

“But if he hadn’t run,” the cop added, “we probably wouldn’t have had reason to hold him.”

“Thanks,” Jack offered. “I owe you guys big time. Pick the bar, the tab’s on me.” He clutched the two bags of evidence he knew he’d have to voucher with SPD, and realized he’d also have to advise his New York precincts of his actions.

By the time Jack was done at Seattle Police Headquarters, it was eleven thirty, with much of the International District already shut down. His adrenaline carried him until he remembered Alex and her events at the Westin. He felt like celebrating, wanting to tell her about the day’s investigations, the strenuous, dogged police work, then the collar. But he was too professional for that.

However, hooking up with her for drinks would be a treat, capping off a “mission accomplished” with a twist of jing deng, destiny.

He called Alex’s room at the hotel, and was surprised to hear a man’s voice. One of the CADS? Strangely, ADA Sing came to his mind. Music in the background. Caught offguard, he quickly hung up, going back into his jacket to confirm her room number.

When he called again, the phone rang until he got the hotel voice-mail message. Hadn’t Alex been rooming with Joann somebody? He decided not to leave a message, feeling conflicted, wanting to consider it just an innocent miscommunication.

After all, it wasn’t like they’d agreed to meet. He tried to downplay it. She was probably out with the ladies, the staffers. The uncertainty irked him and he didn’t know why, but he felt the fatigue of the long day setting in, and decided to return to the motel. He knew Alex still had one more day of the convention, and he hoped to see her at the gala finale.

Back at the motel room he sucked down four of the little bottles of vodka from the minibar, sitting at the window watching the night rain splatter against the glass. He thought about the fancy watches and the nine-shot revolver and the cold-blooded little man who’d shown no signs of remorse.