Ah, she's meticulous too.

He thought for a moment, disoriented by the hunger more than the bitter cold. "That'd be southeast."

She looked at her notebook, laughing. "Can hardly read it-the shivering. This cold is too much. I can't wait to get back to California."

And you'll be waiting a purty long time, missy…

They resumed walking.

"You have a family?" she asked.

"Yep. A wife and two kids."

"I have two children. Son and daughter."

Vincent nodded, wondering: How old is the daughter?

"So this's the alley?" she asked.

"Yep. There's where he ran to." Pulling the grocery cart behind him, he started into the alley that would lead to their love nest, the abandoned building. He felt a painful erection.

Vincent reached into his pocket and gripped the handle of his knife. No, he couldn't kill her. But if she fought back, he'd have to protect himself.

Slash the eyes…

It'd be gross but her bloody face wouldn't be a problem for Vincent; he preferred them on their bellies anyway.

They were walking deeper into the passageway now. Vincent looked around and saw the building, forty or fifty feet away.

Dance paused again, opened the notebook. She recited what she wrote: "The alley runs behind six, no, seven residential buildings. There are four Dumpsters here. The surface of the alley is asphalt. The perpetrator ran this way, going south." Gloves back on, over her quivering fingers, which ended in deliciously red nails.

The hunger was consuming Vincent. He felt himself withering away. He gripped the knife in a tense hand, breathing quickly.

She paused once more.

Now! Take her.

He started to pull the knife from his pocket.

But the bark of a siren cut through the air, coming from the other end of the alley. He glanced at it in shock.

And then he felt the gun muzzle touch the back of his head.

Agent Dance was shouting, "Raise your hands. Now!" Gripping his shoulder.

"But-"

"Now."

She shoved the gun harder into his skull.

No, no, no! He let go of the knife and lifted his arms.

What was going on?

The police car skidded to a stop in front of them, another right behind it. Four huge cops jumped out.

No…Oh, no…

"On your face," one of them ordered. "Do it!"

But he couldn't move, he was so shocked.

Then Dance was stepping back as police officers surrounded him, pulling him to the ground.

"I didn't do anything! I didn't!"

"You!" one of the men cried. "On your belly-now."

"But it's cold, it's dirty! And I haven't done anything!"

They flung him to the hard ground. He grunted as the breath was knocked from his body.

It was just like with Sally Anne, all over again.

You, fat boy, don't fucking move! Pervert!…

No, no, no!

Hands were all over him, grappling. He felt the pain as his arms were pulled taut behind him and cuffs were ratcheted on. He was searched, pockets turned inside out.

"Got an ID, got a knife."

It was now, it was thirteen years ago, Vincent could hardly tell.

"I didn't do anything! What's this all about?"

One of the officers said to Agent Dance, "We heard you loud and clear. You didn't need to go into the alley with him."

"I was afraid he'd bolt. I wanted to stay with him as long as I could."

What was going on? Vincent wondered. What did she mean?

Agent Dance glanced at the officer and nodded toward Vincent. "He was doing a good job until we got into the diner. Once we sat down I knew he was faking."

"No, you're crazy. I-"

She turned to Vincent. "Your accent and expressions were inconsistent and your body language told me you weren't really having a conversation with me at all. You had another agenda, trying to manipulate me for some reason… Which turned out to be getting me alone in the alley."

She explained that when she'd paid the check she'd slipped her phone out of her pocket and hit REDIAL, calling an NYPD detective she'd been working with. She'd whispered briefly what she'd concluded and had him send officers to the area. She'd kept the phone line open, hidden under her notebook.

That's why she was reciting the names of the streets out loud; she was giving them directions.

Vincent then looked at her hands. She caught his eye. And held up the pen she'd been writing with. "Yep. That's my gun."

He looked back at the other cops. "I don't know what's going on here. This is bullshit."

One of them said, "Listen, why don't you save your breath. Just before she called we got a report that the getaway driver in the attack earlier was back in the neighborhood with a cart of groceries. He was a fat, white guy."

Her name's Sally Anne, fat boy. She escaped and called the police and told us all about you…

"That's not me! I haven't done anything. You're wrong. You're so wrong."

"Yeah," one of the uniformed cops said with an amused expression, "we hear that a lot. Let's go."

They gripped him by the upper arms and hauled him roughly to the squad car. He heard Gerald Duncan's voice in his mind.

I'm sorry. I've let you down. I'll make it up to you…

And something hardened within pudgy Vincent Reynolds. He decided that nothing they could do to him would ever make him betray his friend.

The large, pear-shaped man sat next to the front window of Lincoln Rhyme's laboratory, hands cuffed behind him.

His driver's license and DMV records revealed that he wasn't Tony Parsons but Vincent Reynolds, a twenty-eight-year-old word-processing operator who lived in New Jersey and worked for a half dozen temp agencies, none of which knew much about him, other than what the basic employment checks and résumé verification had revealed; he was a model, if unmemorable, employee.

With a mix of anger and uneasiness, Vincent alternated glances between the floor and the officers around him-Rhyme, Sachs, Dance, Baker and Sellitto.

There were no priors or warrants out on him and a search of his shabby apartment in New Jersey revealed no obvious connection to the Watchmaker. Nor evidence of a lover, close friends or parents. The officers found a letter he was writing to his sister in Detroit. Sellitto got her number from Michigan State Police and called. He left a message for her to call them.

He was working Monday night, at the time of the pier and Cedar Street killings, but he'd taken time off since then.

Mel Cooper had emailed a digital picture of him to Joanne Harper at the florist shop. The woman reported that he did resemble the man staring in her window, but she couldn't be certain, because of the glare, the dirty glass in the front windows of her workshop and his sunglasses.

Though they suspected him of being the Watchmaker's accomplice, the evidence linking him to the scenes was sketchy. The shoe print from the garage where the SUV had been abandoned was the same size as his shoes, thirteen, but there were no distinguishing marks to make a clear match. Among the groceries-which Rhyme suspected he'd bought as a cover to get close to Dance or another investigator-were chips, cookies and other junk food. But these packages were unopened and a search of his clothes revealed no crumbs that might specifically match what had been recovered in the SUV.

They were holding him only for possession of an illegal knife and interfering with a police operation-the usual charge when a phony witness comes forward.

Still, a good portion of City Hall and Police Plaza wanted to pull an Abu Ghraib on Vincent and browbeat or threaten him until he squealed. This was Dennis Baker's preference; the lieutenant had been getting pressure from City Hall to find the perp.

But Kathryn Dance said, "Doesn't work. They curl up like rolly bugs and give you garbage." She added, "For the record, torture's very inefficient at getting accurate information."