Liz's parents were full professors with Yale degrees. Poli sci at Howard for Mother, sociology at GW for Father. She still hadn't told them about Moe.

The first time she and Moe met, she was waist-deep in marsh muck, pulling up frags of human skeleton. Moe, the first D at the scene, had stood on the banks, conferred with Hargrove, not noticing Liz at all.

Then he'd spotted her, and darn if he didn't take a second look.

Long second look.

She'd been intrigued by him from the beginning. So young and intense-that earnest boyishness you didn't see much anymore.

Cute, too.

In a Celtic way.

When he asked her out, she accepted without hesitation, despite the fact that Moe wasn't her type.

Light-years from her type. Her upbringing in the rarefied world of black academia had funneled her dating contacts to articulate men with advanced degrees and accomplishments to match.

Men whose skin tone matched hers.

Half a cookie…

Moe reached over and touched her hand in that gentle way she adored. The athletics of the previous hour had rubbed him pink in spots and the blotches hadn't faded.

Delicate boy, he never tanned. Strawberry yogurt was the last thing Liz had figured she'd ever find attractive.

Go know. She kissed his knuckles.

He said, “You are unbelievable.”

“Keep thinking that, Moses.”

“I always will,” he assured her. Like a six-year-old promising to be good. Not a trace of postmodern irony. That was a novelty.

She'd rehearsed her little speech a hundred times. He's highly intelligent, Mother. Intuitive. Anything but simple.

All of it true, but it rang hollow. Trying too hard.

She was twenty-nine and Moe was barely that. Both of them paying their own bills, they didn't have to answer to anyone.

Right.

He finished his sandwich. She pushed half hers toward him. “I'm full, finish it.”

“Thanks.” Five bites did the trick. Hungry boy-sometimes, Liz couldn't help but think in kid terms when she was with him.

She adored the way he held on to the guileless part of himself, despite the job. Wondered how the job would play at the Georgetown salons Mother favored.

No, she didn't. She knew how he'd be treated.

He got up and cleared the table. Rolled his neck.

Liz said, “Got a crick?”

“Not really.”

She stepped behind him and massaged that incredibly dense hunk of neck.

“Oh, wow, that's great.”

“Any reason for all these knots, Detective Reed?”

“Not really.” Two beats later: “I'm back full-time on Caitlin. Pressure from above.”

“That'll screw up the trapezius, all right.”

“Hey,” he said, “no big deal. I'll work it.”

“I know you will. But sorry for the hassle, baby.”

“Anything interesting at the lab?”

“No new cases,” she said. “Catching up on grant applications.”

He turned to face her, slipped his arm around her waist. “Want your own massage?”

“No, thanks, you've loosened me up quite well, sir.”

He smiled. A flicker of anxiety sprinted across his eyes. Split-second storm, then it was gone.

“What?” she said.

“It's a loser, Liz.”

“You can't create facts on the ground, baby.”

“I know… it sticks me with a crappy close rate, right at the outset.”

“You closed the marsh murders, Moses.”

“Sturgis really did that.”

“Now, that I won't listen to, Moses. You and Sturgis. It's not like he didn't give you credit.”

“He's a gentleman.”

“Maybe so,” said Liz, “but he was only doing what was right.”

“Yeah… Aaron's on Caitlin, too.”

That caught her off balance. “How'd that happen?”

“Caitlin's father's boss is footing his bill. Aaron thinks all he needs to do is chew through enough billable hours and he'll close it.”

“Oh, sure.”

“Maybe he's right, Liz.”

“At this stage, how would he know if it's closable or not?” she said.

Moe didn't answer.

She massaged him some more. “C'mon, let's get mindless and watch some tube.”

“Sure,” said Moe. But the evening had changed.

♦

During the months Liz and Moe had dated, she'd met Aaron Fox exactly once.

Six, seven weeks ago, while walking up the leafy pathway to Moe's mom's house, meeting Maddy for the first time-an experience in itself.

Halfway up, a black man appeared around a bend.

Moe tensed up and for a second Liz wondered if the guy posed some sort of threat.

A brief handshake and Moe's curt introductions dispelled all that, but the entire time, Moe never relaxed.

Aaron, on the other hand, had been nothing but mellow. One of those people who make you feel you've been friends for years.

Growing up in D.C. she'd seen that brand of charisma in politicians and financial types, distrusted it instinctively.

As Moe and Aaron made small talk on the pathway, Liz tried to figure out how Moe knew him.

Maybe another cop? Then what was he doing visiting Moe's mom?

Sensing a long story, she bided her time.

A personal trainer?

No, something more, he definitely had made her baby tense.

Maybe Mom's young black boyfriend?

Aware that she categorized people too quickly, she still couldn't stop herself.

Good looking, but spends way too much time at the mirror.

Great clothes, same issue.

He'd been nothing but polite, with polished diction and intelligent eyes, but way too smooth. What Liz termed Upper Division Player.

Not all that different from the guys she'd dated prior to Moe, minus the Ivy League Polish.

What did he do for a living?

A lawyer making a house call? Possibly.

Or something in show business-an agent? Moe said Maddy had once aspired to stage and screen, never got very far.

Or an acting coach. Guy was handsome enough and the clothes and that snappy little Porsche out by the curb said he was doing just fine. Or pretending, this was L.A.

Maybe that's why he came across as Instant Friend-expecting to be recognized.

Liz couldn't recall ever seeing him on anything.

By the time he'd walked off, she'd compiled a dossier. Moe watched the Porsche speed away, a brow-wrinkling frown implying disapproval.

Conspicuous consumption wasn't Moe's game. Something else he and Liz had in common.

Elizabeth Mae, you really need to make more of the looks God gave you.

The sports car was long gone but Moe continued to stare down the street.

Liz took hold of his tree-trunk arm. “C'mon, I want to meet the woman who gifted you to the world.”

They resumed their walk.

Liz couldn't control herself. “Does Aaron work with your mother?”

“He's my brother.”

“As in, he ain't heavy?”

“As in sibling.”

“No really, baby, seriously.”

“I wish I was kidding.”

Over the next few weeks, Liz teased out details of the brothers’ upbringing.

Both of their fathers had been cops, both were deceased.

Maybe that was the issue: one dad stepping in for another, all that blended-family tension. If so, Mama had made her sons’ lives even more complicated.

An apparent serial marrier, Madeleine Fox Reed Guistone Entley (“but we don't talk about Entley, dear”) had buried her third husband fifteen years ago. A wealthy orthodontist and “visionary entrepreneur,” Stan Guistone had invested in enough real estate to ensure his widow a lovely lifestyle. Two years after his death, she'd tried yet again, divorced “Shiftless Bum Entley” within months.

The woman kept framed photo portraits of hubbies one, two, and three propped on her bedroom dresser, a fact that Liz had gleaned during that same Sunday visit, after ducking into Maddy's private bathroom because the main one was occupied by Moe.

Two cops in uniform and a squat, beetle-browed, white-haired man in a wide-lapeled suit.