Diesel nodded adios to Lydia, took my hand, and pulled me down the hall toward the back door. “They were a Christmas present from one of my handlers. He said I had to stop writing my phone number on people‘s foreheads.”

“Handlers?”

“The guys who move me around.”

“So you can follow the cosmic dust?”

Diesel opened the back door and pushed me through. “Very funny. Keep in mind not everything I say is bullshit.”

“What would you say is the bullshit percentage? Twenty? Thirty?”

“Thirty might be low.”

We circled the building and jumped into my Jeep. I cranked the engine over, and an animal control van rolled into the lot just as we were leaving.

“Now what?” I asked Diesel.

“Did you thoroughly search Munch‘s house?”

“Lula and I walked through the rooms and looked in closets and drawers. There wasn‘t much to see. The house was empty. No clothes, no food, no toothbrush in the bathroom.”

“Maybe we should take a second look.”

I made the trip back to Trenton in less than thirty minutes. Traffic was non ex is tent at midday, and I didn‘t get a single red light. Diesel took credit for this, but I thought his claim might register a ten on the bullshit-o-meter. Then again, maybe not.

I turned onto Crocker and immediately saw two cop cars and an EMT truck angled into the curb in front of Munch‘s house. I did a slow drive-by, turned at the corner, and stopped at the entrance to the alley. There were two more cop cars parked with lights flashing halfway down, plus a crime lab truck, an unmarked cop car, and what looked like the medical examiner‘s meat wagon.

“This doesn‘t look good,” I said to Diesel.

Diesel stared down the alley. “Call your boyfriend and find out what happened.”

I crept forward, parked just past the alley, and dialed Morelli.

“Is there something going on in Martin Munch‘s house on Crocker Street?” I asked him.