I whispered, "I couldn't see anything in there. Did you?"

"Every damned window is like this. I couldn't see anything and didn't hear anything. If he ain't our guy, he's a goddamned vampire. Let's try the door."

Stan Watts and Harvey Krantz came down the drive, and froze when they saw us. Krantz made an angry wave for us to come over to him, but Dolan gave him the finger.

"You're cutting your own throat with that guy, Dolan."

"He's fucked me long enough. You got your gun?"

"Yeah."

"Let's try the door."

Dolan went to the front door and knocked, just the way you'd knock if you wanted to ask your neighbor for a small favor. I stood three feet to her left, gun out, and ready to get on Sobek if he answered.

Stan Watts drew his gun and hurried over beside me. Krantz stayed out by the duplex. I could hear Williams and Bruly in the next yard.

Watts said, "Goddamnit, Samantha." But it was only loud enough for me.

Dolan knocked a second time, harder, and said, "Gas company. We got a problem we've traced to your house."

No answer.

She said it louder. "We've got a gas company problem out here."

Still no one answered. Watts stood, and Krantz hurried over from the duplex. His face was red, and he looked like he wanted to bite someone in the neck.

"Goddamnit, Dolan, I'm going to have your ass for this." He was whispering, but it was harsh and loud, and if anyone was inside they would've heard. "This is my collar."

I said, "He's not here, Dolan. Pull back and let's figure out what to do."

Krantz put away his gun and jabbed me with his finger. "I'm going to have your ass for this, too. You, and her. Stan, you're a witness."

The three of us were still off to the side when Dolan touched the knob. "Hey, I think it's open."

I said, "Dolan. Don't."

Samantha Dolan eased open the door just far enough to peek inside, but she probably couldn't see anything.

Dolan relaxed.

"We're clear, Krantz. Looks like I've done your job again."

Then she pushed the door open and something kicked her backward with a sound like a thunderclap.

Stan Watts yelled, "Gun!" and hit the ground, but I didn't hear him.

I pushed low through the door, firing at a smoking double-barrel shotgun even before I knew what it was. I think I was screaming.

I fired all six rounds before the hammer clicked on nothing, and then I was running back into the yard, where Watts was trying to stop the bleeding, but it was already too late.

The point-blank double load from the shotgun had blown through her vest like it wasn't there.

Samantha Dolan's beautiful hazel eyes stared sightlessly toward heaven.

She was dead.

As Detective Samantha Dolan's blood seeps into Los Angeles ' dry earth, Laurence Sobek parks his red Cherokee in the next victim's drive. He no longer carries the little.22 with his homemade Clorox suppressors; he carries a full-blown.357 magnum loaded with light, fast hollow points. When he shoots his victims now, they will blow apart like overripe avocados, with no chance for survival.

Sobek has the gun in his waist, his hand tight on its grip as he goes to the door. He knocks, but no one answers, and, after knocking again, walks around to the back, where he tries the sliding glass doors. He considers forcing the doors, but sees a Westec alarm light blinking from its control panel.

Sobek is ready to kill. He is ready to do murder, and wants to with such a ferocity that his palm is slick on the pistol's wood grip.

He goes back to the Jeep, and drives up the hill until he finds a parking place with an unobstructed view of the house.

He waits for the child.

Krantz said, "Oh, holy Jesus. Oh, Christ."

He dry-heaved, and turned to lean against an avocado tree. Williams and Bruly came around the corner, guns out and eyes wild, the four uniforms following with their shotguns. Someone shouted from one of the surrounding houses. The yellow dog howled.

Bruly yelled, "Is she dead? Jesus, is she dead?"

Watts 's hands were red with Samantha Dolan's blood. "Krantz, clear the house. Williams, clear the house, goddamnit."

No one was paying any attention to the house. If Sobek had been in there, he could've shot the rest of us.

I said, "It's clear."

Watts was still shouting. "Williams, secure the evidence. Wake up, goddamnit, and be careful in there. Do not contaminate the evidence."

Williams crept to the door, gun out and ready. Watts went over to a garden spigot, washed his hands, then took out his radio and made a call.

I draped my jacket over Dolan's face, not knowing what else to do. My eyes filled with tears, but I shook my head and turned away. Williams had stopped outside the door and was staring at her. He was crying, too.

I felt her wrist, but it was silent. I rested the flat of my hand on her belly. She was warm. I blinked hard at the tears, then put Samantha Dolan and everything I was feeling out of my head to concentrate on Joe.

I went to Sobek's garage.

Krantz saw me from the tree and said, "Stay out of there. It's a crime scene. Williams, stop him, goddamnit."

"Fuck you, Krantz. He could be out there killing someone else right now."

Williams went back to staring at Dolan. "She's really dead."

"She's dead."

He cried harder.

Watts called, "Cole, be careful. He could have the whole fucking thing booby-trapped."

I went inside without stopping, and Krantz came in behind me. Bruly came to the door, but stopped there.

The air was layered with drifting gun smoke. It was intensely hot and dark, with the only light coming through the open door. I turned on the lights with my knuckle.

Sobek didn't have furniture; he had weights. A weight lifter's bench sat squat and ugly in the center of the room, black weight disks stacked on the floor around it like iron toadstools. No one walked in front of the shotgun even though smoke still drifted from both barrels. Residual fear. Articles from the Times about the killings and Dersh and Pike were pinned to the wall, along with a Marine Corps recruiting poster and another poster depicting LAPD SWAT snipers.

Bruly said, "Jesus, look at this shit. You think he's coming back?"

I didn't look at him; I was looking for trip wires and pressure plates, and trying to smell gasoline, because I was scared that Sobek had rigged the garage to explode. "You don't rig a booby trap the way he's rigged this place and expect to come back. He's abandoned it."

Krantz said, "We don't know that, Cole. If we can get Dolan cleaned up fast enough, we can secure the area and wait for him."

Even Bruly shook his head.

I said, "You're really something, Krantz."

Bruly took a small book from a cardboard box, then a couple more. "He's got the Marine Corps Sniper Manual in here. Check it out: The Force Recon Training Syllabus, Hand-to-Hand Combat. Man, this turd is the ultimate wannabe."

Krantz opened the fridge and took out a glass vial. "It's filled with drugs. Steroid products. The guy's a juicer."

It wasn't much of an apartment, just one large room divided by a counter from a kitchenette, with a bath and closet. All I cared about and wanted was to find a slip with Dersh's address, or the clothes that Sobek used to dress as Pike – anything at all that would tie Sobek to Dersh and clear Joe.

"Over here, Lieutenant."

Bruly found seven empty Clorox bottles in the closet, along with three.22 pistols and some ammunition. Two of the Clorox bottles had been reinforced with duct tape.

Krantz slammed Bruly on the back. "We got the sonofabitch!"