Alonso Herrera, nicknamed Cloudy by his fellow Santa Fe police officers because of his piss-poor attitude and constant complaining, cursed as he rolled his unit to a stop in front of the metal security gate at the front end of a dirt driveway. He didn't like working day shifts, didn't like driving through snow and slush, and didn't like checking on some rich-bitch citizen an out-of-state relative was worried about.

He opened the window and punched the call button on the speaker box. An early-morning storm had left two inches of snow on the ground, and the cold wind felt raw against his face.

Fuck February, Herrera thought.

The absence of tire tracks in the driveway probably meant that Mrs.

Phyllis Terrell wasn't at home. He would have to hoof it up the driveway and get his feet wet and his shoes dirty, just to report he'd been unable to make contact with the occupant.

He reviewed the notes he'd scribbled when dispatch had assigned him the call. He was looking for Mrs. Phyllis Terrell, age fifty-two, five four, blond and blue, weight 120, health excellent.

When Terrell had failed to show up on an early-morning flight from Albuquerque to Washington, D. C." her sister, who had been waiting at the airport for her, immediately called the house only to get an answering machine.

The sister, Susan Straley, had then called the shift commander, made a big deal about how Terrell was an ambassador's wife, and asked to have an officer sent to check on the woman.

Ambassador to what, Herrera wondered. Santa Fe had more than its share of media celebrities, movie stars, trust funders, and rich arty-farty types, but the politicians who lived in the city were the local garden variety, not prominent national figures.

After buzzing again with no response, Herrera got out of his unit. The ex-chief of police had purchased white patrol cars for the department, which always looked like shit in bad weather. He hated driving a dirty unit, and today his vehicle was splattered with mud and road slush.