Young people, living beyond their means in cramped apartments, walking to the corner deli for takeout – tiny specks moving intently, carving out their own patterns among the chaos. Life in the city was exciting and unpredictable, exactly the opposite of the endless enclaves of ranch homes she’d known as a child. She was turned down for every paralegal job she applied for, but she learned not to care. Waiting tables paid more anyway, at least on the good nights.

Then a stranger thing happened. As is inevitable in any relationship, Ellie started to notice the darker side of the city she loved. Beneath the tall buildings, upscale boutiques, and bright lights lived signs of a seedier and more harsh New York. A woman with fading bruises, pausing discreetly at the garbage can outside of the bakery, eyeing the half-eaten croissant lying just under that discarded cigarette butt. A homeless man tucking himself more tightly beneath urine-soaked cardboard boxes, hoping to avoid a roust to the shelters that would not permit his one and only possession – the matted beagle snuggled into the crook of his knees. Too many men waiting at the Port Authority for the young girls who arrive from faraway towns with big dreams but nowhere to sleep.

Ellie tried to look away – to ignore the signs like everyone else. But as she strived for blissful ignorance, the problems only grew more glaring. She realized that only one job would allow her to love this city the way she wanted to: She could be the person who stopped to help instead of looking away. It took three years of part-time classes at John Jay, but she finally became a cop. Then after four years of hard work, she made detective. One serious boyfriend had come and gone along the way, but she still had New York. And she still had her job.

Now that job was taking her to the Thirteenth Precinct, home of the Manhattan South Homicide Task Force, a boxy six-story building on East Twenty-first Street between Second and Third avenues. At the front desk she asked one of a handful of uniformed officers for Flann McIlroy, and he escorted her to the task force offices on the third floor.