"I'm taking precautions." He took one hand off the wheel to pat hers. "Be sure." She shifted toward him. "You've been my father since

I was twelve. The one I looked up to, depended on and, in a lot of ways, the one I've tried to emulate. If he knows me, and he must, he knows that."

This time his hand squeezed hers. "I've been proud of you since before I ever met you face-to-face. Fact is, I love you like my own. I'm not going to let him use me to hurt you. All right?"

"Yes. Yes. All right." She took in a breath, let it go. "Why did they bring Arnie in? I thought they were going to question him informally at home."

"They did, or attempted to, then hauled him in when he took a swing at one of the detectives. Little bastard put his own ass in the sling."

"Short fuse," Phoebe replied. "The man who killed Roy has a long one. Long and cold. Arnie Meeks doesn't fit the profile, Dave."

"Maybe not. Could be he has a friend or family member who does. Let's put it through the process, Phoebe. One step, then the next." He hadn't asked for a lawyer. That was to prove he was a hard-ass, Phoebe concluded as she studied Arnie through the one-way glass. It was also monumentally stupid. He'd been a cop long enough to know better, but he wanted to show that he could tough it out, this was no big deal.

He wore a gray T-shirt and jeans, scuffed Nike low-tops and a surly expression. He hadn't shaved, so there was a rough stubble on his face that suited the look in his eye. The screw-you-all look.

He'd hurt and humiliated her, laid in wait for her and violated her.

She understood the knot squeezed in her sternum was a normal, natural reaction to that, to standing here looking at the man who'd bound and beaten and stripped her.

But she couldn't loosen it.

"You don't have to do this." Dave put a hand on her shoulder, gave it a quick squeeze.

"Yes, I do."

"You've already faced him down once, Phoebe. There's nothing to prove."

"I have to do this. I have to see him while they question him." Look in his eyes, listen to his voice. "It's the only way I'll know, that I can be sure, if he's the one who killed Roy. Or if he knows who did."

"I'm going to say what has to be said. You don't owe Roy anything."

"Maybe not. But I owe it to Carly. I'll be fine."

Fine might have been an exaggeration, but she got through and that was good enough. She watched Sykes and Liz double-team him, work him around, and poke and prod at Arnie's non-answers. All three knew how to play the game, she thought. But Arnie was outnumbered, outmatched. "Can't deny you've got it in for Lieutenant MacNamara," Sykes said casually.

"Old news."

"A man pounds on a woman that way, it never gets old. The kind of man who does that?" Sykes stopped, shook his head. "On my gauge he's low enough to do anything."

"Oughta have your gauge checked."

"Tell you what mine says, Arnie." Liz circled around to speak from behind him. "It says you're a fucking coward. The kind of sick son-ofabitching coward who'd blow some helpless bastard to pieces. Did it make you feel big? Make you feel important to take him out?"

"I didn't even know the asshole. I told you. I never touched the bastard. Why would I? Seems to me he had the good sense to dump that know-it-all bitch. I'da bought him a drink if I'd met him."

"He was nothing to you, right?" Liz leaned in. "Nothing but a tool you could use to fuck with the lieutenant."

"I don't need to fuck with her. Like I said, old news."

"How do you like playing rent-a-cop for a bunch of yuppies in

Calvin Klein suits, tourists in flip-flops, Arnie? Bet that never gets old." Arnie's face darkened-anger, Phoebe thought, and more. Embarrassment. "It's temporary."

"Oh yeah? You think your daddy's going to get you back on the job?" Drumming the flats of his hands on his own belly, Sykes let out a hoot. "Pig's eye, Arnie, and you know it. You're done, broke the family chain. Some bitch cost me my badge, I'd sure as hell want payback. Why don't you tell us where you were last night, Arnie? Where you were from ten to three in the morning?"

"I toldyou. I was home, with my wife."

"Stupid to lie, don't you think? Doesn't show a bright light." Sykes tapped his temple. "Especially when the wife's not too happy with you to begin with." Sykes pushed through the file in front of him. "Her statement says she doesn't know when you got home, but you weren't there when she went to bed at eleven."

"She's wrong." After a shrug, Arnie tipped his head back to study the ceiling. "I was down in the den, fell asleep watching TV."

"She locked up, Arnie. She did the walk-through before she went up to bed. If you were there, snoozing in front of the tube, where was your car?"

"She didn't see it. She's pissed at me, sure. Just giving me a hard time."

"He's lying," Phoebe stated. "He's lying about being home. And he's nervous."

"She can't place you on the day of the Johnson shooting either. Too bad."

"It was my day off, goddamn it." Anger punched through the shaky nonchalance. "I was running errands. I had things to do."

"Yeah, things to do," Liz agreed. "Like set yourself up in an apartment window and shoot an unarmed man, a surrendering teenager."

"Fuck that. Fuck this. Fuck you. I'm not getting screwed on this because that bitch MacNamara wants more blood. She's got you bowing and scraping and doing whatever she wants. I wanted to kill anybody, you can bet your ass it'd be her."

"Killing her ex in front of her, that's a handy way to shove it in her face. Killing Johnson after she'd spent hours talking him down, that's rubbing it in." Sykes shot out his index finger like the barrel of a gun. "You've got a twenty-two pistol, Arnie. You shouldn't have left the slug in that dumb rabbit."

"What? What rabbit? What the fuck are you talking about?"

"He's not lying about that." Phoebe shook her head. "He doesn't know what they're talking about."

"Once we match the bullet and the gun, we'll have ourselves stalking and harassment charges. Breaks your probation. You'll do time. You'll go inside. No way your daddy's going to be able to dig you out this time."

"Leave my father out of this."

"You won't," Liz tossed back. "You'll be calling Daddy for help any minute. We'll match the bullets from the rabbit. Then there's the dead snake, the dead rat. Upped it from the doll you mutilated and left for her. I'm betting you upped it from wildlife to Roy Squire."

"I don't know anything about any damn dead rabbit."

"The doll," Phoebe said quietly, even as Sykes narrowed his eyes. "You know something about the doll, don't you? You got sweatier over the doll."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Messed up the doll like you'd planned to mess up the lieutenant," Sykes continued. "Rang her bell one night and left it outside her door. Then the dead rat, then right up to Roy Squire. Yeah, smells like pattern to me."

"That's bullshit. Maybe I tossed a doll by her house, so what? That was weeks ago, and I haven't gone near her place since. I haven't gone near MacNamara since…"

"Since you beat her in the stairwell?" Sykes finished. "Since you put a fucking bag over her head and stripped her down? You don't have any friends here, Arnie. Nobody wants to help you, so you keep lying. Makes me warm inside. You keep right on lying your way into a cage, and this time there's going to be a hotshot on the other side. There's a needle waiting for you, you sack of shit."

"You're out of your goddamn mind." Arnie was sheet white now, and running sweat. "I didn't kill anybody. I didn't shoot any damn rabbit either."

"We got motive, means, opportunity. Yeah, keep lying, fuckhead. You know how the DA loves it when a coward killer whines and lies. He'll go for the needle, no question."