Frank put down his mug. “Yeah. She had a hard time. She’s a tough lady.”

“Yes. No.”

“Yes? No?”

“Yes… she had a hard time. No… tough is raising a good kid. It’s easy to do what she did.”

“What’d she mean by that crap about her looking at Skeeter’s killers?”

Jose shook his head. “Partner, I done finished with my psychoanalysis for the night. We got to get back to detecting.”

Frank drank the last of his coffee. “Might not be too hard.”

“How?”

“Guy who did Skeeter’s out there somewhere”-Frank thumbed over his shoulder-“still on a high… pupils still dilated with excitement… king of the world. Absolutely…”

“Out there feelin’ bulletproof,” Jose said.

“Absolutely bulletproof.”

Jose tried to picture the killer, but Teasdale’s living room came on instead.

Teasdale in his button-up sweater sits in his Barcalounger. TV reflections flicker across the big man’s broad face.

Somewhere off in the distance, he heard Frank. “And he’ll talk,” Frank was saying.

Bedtime. Teasdale fires the remote at the TV. The tube dies.

“He’ll talk…”

Teasdale gets up. He checks the locks. The curtains are closed. But Teasdale pulls them tighter anyway.

“… absolutely have to talk…” Frank batted his empty mug between his hands. Back and forth over the countertop. “… get credit for the score… big man… capping Skeeter Hodges…”

Jose caught his own image in the mirror opposite the counter. “What kind of life is that?” he asked himself quietly.

Frank closed his hands, capturing the sliding mug. “What?”

“Oh,” Jose said, “thinking about… how we have to live.” He stood and reached for his wallet. “How much we owe?” he asked Adair.

Frank shot him a puzzled look. “You forget,” he said, “it’s my turn.”