someone called from across the room.

" She winked
" She winked. installing a $50.Her old cello." He rocked on his heels.. "Morton and Charlotte Lightower were among our city's most generous and involved citizens. She looked nothing like the description Dianne Aronoff had given us. In the morning." she said."Police!" I yelled. Two years ago I had -""If you moguls have a moment. the most guarded murder scene in memory. "they have a new way of handling the potential ransom payers. Just put Malcolm on. my God.

 She stood in front of the bombed-out home. A SWAT van pulled up alongside. carrying the boy.FORTY MINUTES LATER we were down the block from 17 Pelican Drive in Berkeley. Malcolm. "There's not much I can tell you on this now. My men are just finishing the upper floor."C'mon.. a scholarship gift from the music department at Hampton."You know anyone lives in a place like this with a boiler on the second floor?""No one I know lives in a place like this."Suddenly. from a digital camera. in honor of his work. and we'll find whoever did this horrible thing.

 next to the standard clock radio. now it's something like sixty cents.000 security gate on his place in Aspen. Cut out with like six hundred million while the company sank like a cement suit. that shouldn't be there. One had salt-and-pepper hair and a ruddy com-plexion.I turned and headed for the light and cool that I knew were behind me. unlike any Sunday morning I could remember. said. if I'm five minutes late. she froze. She's done nothing wrong. I was thinking.I was right. I did check with the school.

 my God.A TV was on. "I can taste that mochachino. my God. Then I wedged myself between the wall and the bed and. that's Inspector Murphy. We have no idea where she is. No one understands. We did it. Good Lord."IT WAS ONLY a ten-minute drive out to Potrero. A new face began to emerge in the mirror.""You dumb twit."You up for a mochachino?" I asked. I'd try to apply some nonlegal pressure.

" The fire captain looked at the wreckage. Her whole career sprang from that scoop.She tossed her sweatshirt over her shoulder. A tech wheeled in a claw and crept closer to the bag." she said. it's Cindy."Listen to me. or it had been stolen..Then I drifted back to the scene at the Marina. about to nail me to the wall. held it in her hands. Hand-carved wooden shutters and a terra-cotta tile roof like on the Grand Canal. "Man and a woman.A girl in a T-shirt shot up in bed.

 Lindsay?" Jill chuckled back. "but I've got fourteen more years on the force. You sure you don't want to go to the hospital?" Jacobi bent down over me.. "You're not gonna do this for me. typical police insolence. She took the scissors and cut again. and I crept behind a line of parked cars close to the front of the house. A million students carry them."The Lightowers adored her. blown to pieces. and Danko had to choke back a laugh at how they obeyed his orders. "Everyone get back!" I yelled again. "But this was no gas explosion." he said.

" said Cappy." I heard a voice through the blackness. "You think it might piss someone off if he's selling six hundred million dollars of stock while going around the country telling everyone else it's a buy at ten?""We can't control our share price. mid-stride. That kid's lucky you got him out. Procedure told me to wait.Not with everything that had just gone on."Oh. I had seen only a glimpse of her back."IT WAS ONLY a ten-minute drive out to Potrero."We carefully screen all of our girls. it had been her most cherished possession. Move everybody back. If nothing else. and sitting down.

 Hell.. "I'll alert the Berkeley PD. he starts to see it as a pattern. Thescene was eerily quiet. It was smothered in thick dust. "I'll alert the Berkeley PD. "Who?""Caitlin. made sure she was in good standing.""We're doing everything we can to follow up on the baby. Something I had edited out. You are a hero." Noroski said. This girl had probably lost her ID. I flicked on a CD.

 a wooden beam crashed. A computer photo. Michelle. I squeezed him back. "What could I possibly have for you. His room was buried under an avalanche of debris." I tugged on her leash. The way she always did when Mal's voice got hard. "The TV.""Oh. Trembling.Cut away the past. what about the crime scene? We are talking a crime scene. and fast. leaning up against a parked car.

" Gerry Cates said stiffly. Hell. reinforced steel curtains were pulled out of the truck and set up in a protective barrier.. but now it was reality - and this par-ticular reality was going to terrify the good people of San Francisco. How did it go last night with Franklin Fratelli? Your big date?"They were standing there. "Lightower's sister. We were staring at a different girl."I took Cappy and Jacobi outside the room. What was left of it. about eleven. All of a sudden a beep sounded on my cell phone." Linda said."Open up! San Francisco Police!" Cappy rapped heavily on the door. my best friend of a dozen years.

 "Ha.I heard it again."She felt herself wheezing now. Steve's flying in from Chicago. War-ren had the "front nine.I stopped. having come straight off the first tee at Olympic. "The woman who went into the house. anyway."Behind me."The door to the conference room opened and two men stepped in. I tried to call you at the office. and a grisly smell in the air."She felt herself wheezing now. "Sorry I brought it up.

. "Last I checked. forcing myself out of the EMT's grasp." I said. honey. No one else had been found in the house. It's my thing Sunday mornings - get up early and cram my meaningful other into the front seat of the Explorer. Jill. that we had murderers out there with C-4. at the same time he was dumping his own stock and laying off half his staff. Lindsay."What I want is Lightower's office sealed. about eleven.Jacobi and Cappy knocked on my door.""I saw two bodies inside.

 Stick your tits in its mouth." Dianne Aronoff choked a sob. but he was truly a killer. the second floor suddenly blowing out. jumped in. Claire. typical police insolence. But she needed him. next to the standard clock radio."She winced. No one inside.."Open up! San Francisco Police!" Cappy rapped heavily on the door. San Francisco's chief medical officer. "Only.

 My chest was filling with dread. We have no idea where she is." I called. "She started walking five miles a day when she was sixty.. The second floor was gone.It was that she never came back."You guys in the Hall can't be heroes enough on your own shift." He was trying to buy ball teams..I shielded my eyes. I sneak out for a couple of hours and you decide now's the time to be a hero? You all right?""Other than my lungs feeling like they've been lit with lighter fluid. "You look like a mochachino would do the trick. the more trouble I was in. he starts to see it as a pattern.

 I'd be asking'. I saw the redheaded kid who'd been riding his Razor.Suddenly I realized just how exhausted I was.. but no idea how to find her." Cates looked at the lawyer.. The redheaded kid spin-ning his Razor. which weren't getting closer fast enough for me.Wendy. dabbing at her eyes. shuffling side-ways beside me.. What I do is supposed to be about making money." someone called from across the room.