The first book in the Wyatt Hunt series, 2006

From the outside, the large four-story San Francisco apartment building on Twenty-second Avenue near Balboa in the Richmond District was well kept up, but I had seen that before when I'd been called on complaints, and by itself it meant nothing. This building probably had forty units, each one a self-contained and discrete universe inhabited by singles, doubles, students, old folks, happy and unhappy, married and unmarried, gay and straight couples, with or without children.

On this cold and dreary morning, the mandated call had come from Cabrillo Elementary, where the kids were in sixth and fourth grade, respectively. Both of them had been absent the entire previous week of school, and no parent had called the office with an excuse. When the school's attendance officer had phoned the Dades' home for the first time last Wednesday, she'd left a message that no one returned. On Friday, she called again and talked to Tammy, the sixth grader, who said everybody had the flu, that was all. No, her mother was too sick and sleeping and couldn't come to the phone. Tammy thought that she and her brother would probably be better by Monday and she'd bring a note from her mother or the doctor. Somebody, anyway. Monday, they didn't make it, though, and the attendance officer had called Child Protective Services to check out what might really be going on. She noted on the complaint that both children appeared to be under-nourished and poorly clothed.