“Or both.”

“Yeah, well, either one’s a bitch.” Jenkins lowered his dense, muscular frame into his chair, working his jaw like he was still mulling something over. “We have a situation. And I’m not saying anything until you take a seat. You’ve got too much energy, Hatcher.”

Ellie did as she was told, but Jenkins’s jaw was still grinding. The lieutenant did that a lot. Hatcher suspected he maintained that stoic facial expression and the close shave of his dark black skull for a reason. His look was unambiguously serious. Authoritative. One eyeful of him, and the largely white detectives he supervised knew he was the real deal. No handouts when it came to Jenkins. But Hatcher had realized about a month into the detective bureau that the movement of Jenkins’s jaw gave a hint at what went on beneath the hardened exterior. And now it was telling Ellie that he was bothered.

Jenkins was bothered, and she was in his office. Sitting, not standing. Something was definitely up.

“I got a call from a homicide detective this morning.”

“Is everything all right?” She could hear the alarm in her voice. Ellie’s job had nothing to do with the homicide division. She’d made detective just thirteen months earlier and was lucky to work scams and robberies. The one and only time she’d received a surprise call from the police about a dead body, she had been fourteen years old, and the body had been her father’s.

“I suppose that depends on what you mean by ‘all right.’ A detective over there has a couple of dead women on his hands and seems to think you can help figure out who might have put them there.”

“Excuse me?”

“No offense, but I was surprised too. Apparently someone’s got himself a theory and thinks you’re in a unique position to help him. You’ve got a special assignment.”

“To homicide?”

“Now don’t go getting that tone. It’s an assignment. Temporarily. You’ll help out as you can, and then you’ll come straight back here when you’re done playing with the big boys.”