And those readers looked at that face, and they began to wonder if it had been necessary for the undercover cop to shoot to kill. Never mind that Robby had run from the police, that he'd drawn first, and that he had a history of drug abuse. In a city struggling with growing pains, a city that had a blatant tendency to blame all its problems on the influx of foreigners and out-of-staters, a nineteen-year-old homegrown dope dealer, born at the hospital downtown, didn't sit real comfortably with the citizens' views of themselves and their city.

And they questioned their police force. They wondered if the city needed a citizen review board to evaluate the police department's deadly force policy, and they wondered if they had a renegade undercover cop, running around killing their young men.

The chief of police had appeared on the local news and reminded everyone of Robby's record. Toxicology had found significant traces of methamphetamine and marijuana in his blood. The Department of Justice and Internal Affairs had cleared Joe of any wrongdoing and had determined that deadly force had been necessary. But every time Robby's picture was flashed across the screen or appeared in the papers, the people still wondered.

Joe had been required to see the police psychologist, but he'd said very little. What was there to say, really? He'd killed a kid, not even a man yet. He'd taken a life. He'd been justified in what he'd been forced to do. He knew with absolute certainty that he'd be dead if Robby had been a better shot. He hadn't had a choice.

That’s what he'd told himself. That's what he'd had to believe.

After two months of sitting on his ass at home and four more months of intense physical therapy, Joe had been cleared to return to work. But not to the narcotics division. He'd been quietly transferred to property crimes. That's what they'd called it, a transfer. But it had sure as hell felt like a demotion to him, like he'd been punished for doing his job.

He pulled the Caprice into a parking spot half a block away from Anomaly and retrieved a can of paint and a sack filled with brushes and a roller and pan from the trunk. Although he'd been transferred, he'd never considered what had happened in that alley with Robby a mistake. Sad and unfortunate, and something he tried not to think about-something he refused to talk about-but not his mistake.

Not like Gabrielle Breedlove. Now that had been his fuck up. He'd underestimated her, but really, who would have thought she'd come up with such a lamebrained plan as to lure him into the park with nothing more than an antique derringer and a can of hair spray?

Joe walked into the back of the store and set the paint and sack of supplies on a counter next to the sink. Mara Paglino stood at the other end of the counter unpacking freight the store had received the day before. The shipment didn't appear to include antiques. "What do ya have there?"

"Gabrielle ordered some Baccarat crystal." Her big brown eyes stared at him a little too intensely. She'd curled her thick black hair, and her lips shined a glossy red. Since the moment he'd met her, he'd been aware that she might have a small crush on him. She followed him around and offered to bring him things. He was a little flattered but mostly unnerved. She was only a year or two older than Tiffany, his niece, and Joe wasn't interested in girls. He liked women. Fully developed women who didn't have to be shown what to do with their mouths and hands. Women who knew how to move their bodies to create just the right friction. "Do you want to help me?" she asked.

He took a paintbrush out of the sack. "I thought you were supposed to be at the park helping Gabrielle."

"I was going to, but Kevin told me I had to unpack this crystal and get it out of the way in case you wanted to measure the countertop today."

His carpentry skills didn't extend to replacing countertops. "I won't get to that until next week." Hopefully, he wouldn't have to worry about it next week. "Is Kevin in his office?"

"He hasn't come back from lunch yet."

"Who's out front?"

"No one, but I'll hear the bell if a customer comes in."

Joe grabbed a brush and the paint can and walked into the small storage room. This was the part of undercover police work that drove him just south of sane-the waiting around for a suspect to make a move. Still, he supposed working inside the shop was better than sitting outside in an unmarked car and getting fat on Yankee Dogs. Better, but not by much.

He covered the floor with a drop cloth and leaned the boards he'd cut for shelves the day before against the wall. Mara followed him like a puppy and chatted nonstop about the immature college guys she'd dated. She left once when the bell rang, but she reappeared shortly to assure him she was in the market for a mature, older man.

By the time Kevin returned, Joe had just finished painting the two shelves and was preparing to paint the walls of the small room. Kevin took one look at Mara and sent her to help Gabrielle, leaving the two of them alone.

"I think she has a crush on you," Kevin said as Mara cast one last look over her shoulder and walked out the door.

"Yeah, maybe." Joe placed one hand on the back of his own shoulder and raised his arm above his head. As much as he hated to admit it, his muscles ached like a bitch. He kept his body in good shape. There was only one other explanation. He was getting old.

"Is Gabrielle paying you enough to put up with sore muscles?" Kevin was dressed in designer everything and held a sack from a party outlet store in one hand and a bag from the women's underwear shop down the street in the other.

"She pays me enough." He dropped his arms to his sides. "Money isn't all that important to me."

"Then you've never been poor. I have, my friend, and it sucks. It affects your whole life."

"How do you figure?"

"People judge you on the brand of your shirt and the condition of your shoes. Money is everything. Without it people think you're trash. And women, forget it. Women won't have anything to do with you. Period."

Joe sat on the edge of a trunk and crossed his arms over his chest. "Depends on what kind of women you're trying to impress."

"Strictly high maintenance. Women who know the difference between a Toyota and a Mercedes."

"Ahh." Joe tilted his head back and looked at the man before him. "Those women cost serious cash. Do you have that kind of money?"

"Yeah, and if I don't, I know how to get it. I know how to get the things I need."

Bingo. "How's that?"

Kevin just smiled and shook his head. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

"Try me," Joe pressed.

"Afraid I can't."

"Do you invest in the stock market?"

"I invest in me, Kevin Carter, and that's all I'm going to say."

Joe knew when to back off. "What's in the sack?" he asked and pointed to Kevin's hand.

"I'm giving a birthday party for my girlfriend, China."

"No shit? Is China her real name or her stage name?"

"Neither," Kevin chuckled. "She just likes it better than her real name, Sandy. I mentioned the party to Gabe this morning when I stopped by her booth. She said the two of you had made other plans."

Joe thought he'd made himself real clear when he'd told Gabrielle she had to stop getting in the way of his investigation. Obviously, he was going to have to talk to her again. "I think we can make it to your party for a little while."

"Are you sure? She seemed pretty set on spending the evening at home."

Normally, Joe wasn't the sort of guy to sit on a bar stool and talk about women, his or anyone else's. But this was different, this was his job, and he knew how to play. He leaned forward slightly as if he were about to share a secret. "Well, just between you and me, Gabrielle is a nymphomaniac."

"Really, I always thought she was a prude."

"She's the closet kind." He leaned back and grinned like he and Kevin were of the same hound brotherhood. "But I think I can hold her off for a few hours. What time is your party?"

"Eight," Kevin answered as he headed to his office, and Joe was stuck painting for the next two hours. After Anomaly closed for the evening, he drove to the police station and read over the daily report on the Hillard theft. Nothing much in the way of new information since that morning's roll call. Kevin had met an unidentified woman for lunch at a downtown restaurant. He'd bought party supplies and stopped at a Circle K for a Big Gulp. Exciting stuff.

Joe reported his conversation with Kevin and let Luchetti know he'd been invited to Kevin's party. Then he grabbed a stack of paperwork off his desk and headed home to Sam.

For dinner, he barbecued some ribs and ate the macaroni salad his sister Debby had left in his refrigerator while he'd been at work. Sam stood on the table next to his plate and refused to eat his bird seeds and baby carrots.

"Sam loves Joe."

"You can't have my ribs."

"Sam loves Joe-braack."

"No."

Sam blinked his yellow-and-black eyes, raised his beak, and mimicked the telephone ringing.

"I haven't fallen for that in months." Joe speared some macaroni with his fork and felt like he was taunting a two-year-old with an ice cream cone. "The vet said you need to eat less and exercise more or you'll get liver disease."

The bird flew to his shoulder, then rested his feathery head against Joe's ear. "Pretty bird."

"You're fat." He remained strong during dinner and didn't feed Sam, but when the bird mimicked one of Joe's favorite phrases from a Clint Eastwood movie, he relented and fed him bites of Ann Cameron's cheesecake. It was as good as she'd claimed, so he guessed he owed her coffee. He tried to remember Ann as a kid, and vaguely recalled a girl with wire glasses sitting on one of those emerald green crushed velvet couches at her parents' house, staring at him while he'd waited for her sister, Sherry. She'd probably been about ten, six years younger than him. About Gabrielle's age.