“Right, right.”

Nixie heard footsteps, crouched.

“And stop pacing about. It's annoying. Why don't you leave me to this for a half hour, go downstairs-or at the very least go hound someone.”

“I sent my team home. You're what's left for me to hound.”

“Just my lucky day.”

There was a beeping, an oath that would have gotten Nixie grounded for a month if she'd so much as thought it.

“ Dallas.”

Dispatch, Dallas, Lieutenant Eve. Compromised police seal, main front entrance, Swisher murder scene.

“Goddamn kids.”

Patrol dispatched. Acknowledge you have been informed of compromise.

“Acknowledged. Have the patrol hold at scene. Have officers in light armor as precautionary measure. I want to check it out myself. ETA, ten minutes.”

Acknowledged. Seal requires replacement. Dispatch out.

“If there's a patrol heading there, it seems unnecessary for you to go as well.”

“I chased a bunch of kids away earlier. Should've kicked some butt, but I didn't want to chance another chase. If they're inside, I want to correct that error in judgment, personally. If they're nearby, I'm going to take a few minutes of my time to round them up, and kick said butt.”

“I'll go with you, then.”

“Jesus, Roarke, it's a kid butt-kicking detail. I can handle it.” There was a long pause, a hiss of breath. “Okay, okay, no unnecessary risks. I'll catch Baxter, take him along. I need you to stay on this and coordinate with Peabody once she gets to Central.”

“Wear your vest.”

“Oh Christ!” There was a sharp thud, as if something had been kicked. “Yes, mommy.”

“And later when I take it off of you, you'll be calling me something entirely different.”

“Ha-ha. Ten minutes there, ten back, ten to kick teenage butt. Back in thirty.”

In the hall, Nixie streaked away. With her heart drumming, she raced down the stairs, found an elevator, and ordered it to take her to the ground-floor library.

There was an outside door there, and she knew which car Dallas drove.

Eve caught Baxter on the stairs. “I need you to ride with me. Seal's compromised at the Swisher house. I chased a bunch of teenagers away from it this afternoon. Looks like they came back. Trueheart, take the vehicle. I'll stick your partner in a cab when we're done slapping around a bunch of kids.” She tossed Baxter a vest. “Suit up. I take no chances.”

He started to take off his jacket.

“Upstairs. Jesus, you think I want to see what you refer to as your manly chest?” She took a small remote out of her pocket, tapped in a code.

“What's that?”

She felt the heat rise up the back of her neck. “It's a remote, brings my ride around on auto.”

“Sweet. Let me-”

She stuck it back in her pocket. “Just suit up, Baxter. I'd like to get this annoying little detail accomplished so I can get back to work.”

She took enough time to signal Mavis out of the parlor. “Listen, I've got to go out for a few, and I might be pretty jammed up when I get back. Can you keep everybody happy?”

“It's what I do best. Hey, maybe I'll get everybody down to the pool before we eat. That chilly with you?”

“It's great.” She tried to envision Mavis cavorting in the water with Elizabeth and Mira. “Ah… But wear a suit, okay?”

Outside, Nixie dashed behind a tree when she heard the engine. She watched, breath quick and short as Dallas 's car streamed out of the garage and toward the front of the house. She watched it stop, heard locks click.

It was wrong. She shouldn't do it. But she wanted to go home. Even for a little while. Before they sent her away, before they made her have another mom and dad.

She took one last glance toward the house, then ran for the car and crawled onto the floor of the backseat. She pulled the door shut only a moment before the door of the house opened. And she lay there, eyes squeezed shut.

“Some smooth ride you scored this time, Dallas.”

Baxter. He was nice, funny. He wouldn't be too mad if they found her.

“Don't play with my controls. When we're done with this, I need you to hook up with Peabody, keep pushing the property angle. We're going to find them Upper West. Shit, they could be a fucking block away.”

“There goes the neighborhood. We scattering for the night because of the IAB hound?”

“Webster's okay-but if I've got the team officially on the clock, and working out of my home, it's a gray area. Politicians grumbling, and they don't like gray unless they're painting it. We got dead cops, we got injured cops, we're poking into other cops' cases-one of them closed with a guy doing cage time for it. And I'm not shutting it down fast enough to suit them. I'm not going to give them a reason to pull me off.”

“Taking the kid into your place opened you up to it.”

“I know it.”

“It was the right thing, Dallas. The right thing for her. Kid didn't just need protection. She needed… comfort.”

“She needs me to close this thing, and I can't if I get jammed up with bullshit. So we straddle the line, and Webster will keep the brass off our ass until we do. There's the black-and-white. Let's get this done.”

Eve strode to the two uniforms. “Either of you go inside?”

“No, sir. We were ordered to hold. Light was on up there, right front window, second floor.” One of them nodded toward the house. “Switched off when we pulled up. No one's come out.”

“You check the back?”

“We were told to hold.”

“Jesus, don't either of you have possession of a brain today? Kids've probably scrambled. Baxter, go around the back. I'll take the front. The two of you stand here and give the appearance of being cops.”

She approached the front entrance, examined the seal and lock. Both had been hacked and mangled. It screamed kids, but she followed the suggestion of the tingle at the base of her spine and drew her weapon before she booted the door.

She swept, center, right, left, back to center. Called for lights and listened. There was some debris scattered around. Home brew bottles, bags of soy chips. Snack food littered the floor, and had been crushed underfoot. It all said kids, disrespect, party.

When she heard a soft creak overhead, she crossed to the stairs.

Because she couldn't hear anything, Nixie risked easing her head up, peeking out the window. She saw the two policemen and bit her lip when her eyes welled with tears. They wouldn't let her go inside. If she tried to, they'd see her.

Even as she thought it, there were two bright flashes, and the policemen flew backwards and fell down the steps to her mother's office. So quickly it seemed like pretend, two figures in black ran across the sidewalk and into her house.

The shadows.

She wanted to scream, to scream so loud, but nothing came out of her throat as she squeezed her body down onto the floor again. The shadows would kill Dallas and Baxter, just like they'd killed everybody. While she hid. They would cut them up while she hid.

Then she remembered what was in her pocket, and fumbled out the 'link Roarke had given her. She pushed the button, hard, and began to weep as she crawled out of the car. “You have to come, you have to help. They're here! They're going to kill Dallas. Hurry and come.”

Then she ran home.

At his desk Roarke felt the cool satisfaction of outwitting a foe. He was peeling away layers. He didn't have the core yet, not yet, but it was only a matter of time. Dig deeply enough, and there were always footprints under the muck. He could follow them now. Triangle to Five-By, Five-By to Unified Action-another military term. And all the crisscrossing threads between. He came across the name Clarissa Branson, listed as president of Unified. Jolt from the past, he thought. One of Cassandra's top-level operatives.

Eve had caught her, he remembered, before the crazy bitch could kill them both and blow up the Statue of Liberty for good measure. Clarissa and William Henson, the man who'd trained her. Both dead now. But…