“What is a broken smile?”

“His teeth were broken. A little. Not all the way.”

Cory Bonnett, thought Andy. “What was his name?”

“He didn’t speak to me. She blushed when I came in and didn’t look in my eyes. They looked like they were very…exhausted.”

“And this was when?”

“Friday. Before she died.”

ANDY DROVE to the RoMar Industries headquarters in Tustin. It was across town from the SunBlesst packinghouse, part of a light commercial zone up by State 55.

Marie Stoltz led Andy through the offices, warehouse, and shipping/receiving.

“None of the manufacturing is done here,” she said. She was dark-haired and pretty in a delicate way. Very small. Made Andy think of a Japanese doll. “The process is time-consuming and produces steam and noise. So we do the juicing, distilling, and blending up in Long Beach.”

“Interesting.”

“I’m happy that the Journal wants to do another story on us. Though I wonder why their crack crime reporter is writing it.”

She smiled sweetly.

Andy’s father came bustling into the office from the warehouse. Sleeves up, brow furrowed, clipboard in hand. He still wore the Irish Setters Andy remembered from his childhood. Still had the straight-backed alertness and sharp eyes that had helped him be such a good shotgunner and fisherman.

His eyes widened when he saw Andy. “Son, everything okay?”

“Journal wants another RoMar story,” said Andy. “Focus this time is on Marie, running the company while her husband saves the world from Communism.”

Andy smiled. Got a small one from Marie and none from his father.

“The label machine’s on the fritz again,” he said. “Just in time for the late morning run.”

“Maybe Rollins can fix it,” said Marie.

“I think Rollins broke it,” said Max. “I’ll have to shut down, see what I can do with it. If I can’t get it running right, we’re calling Federated Label again. If they can’t get here today this time, I’ll line up someone else.”

“Thanks, Max. You know those machines drive me loony.”

Max nodded and pursed his lips. Shook Andy’s hand. “Duty calls,” he said. “Nice seeing you, Andy. I’d like to talk to you about your piece on Nick when you have the time.”

Then he hustled back out, hailing Rollins before the door had even shut.

Andy watched him go. He had never realized until this moment how desperate his father was for distraction. Max wasn’t that way before Clay. Before Clay, Max did what needed doing so he could do what his heart enjoyed. Hunting. Fishing. Reading. Banging around the kitchen with his wife. Playing some catch or basketball with his sons. But now, Andy saw, he’d do anything to keep from having to deal with what was inside him. He’d take some lousy job to prevent Marie from behaving like the business fool she almost certainly was. Keep the dollars rolling in for a patronizing friend like Stoltz. Pretend RoMar Industries and some label machine and a guy named Rollins were worth more than about thirty seconds of his life. Drink half a quart of gin a night and God knew how many beers.

“He’s a good man,” said Marie.

“Thank you.”

“Five years since Clay.”

“Almost.”

“He’s lucky to have you.”

“So,” said Andy, taking out his notebook. “What prepared you to run a multimillion-dollar business?”

“Nothing,” she said. “All I had was a home ec certificate from a junior college before I married Roger. Here, I just basically do what Roger says. Most of it’s common sense. Building up a company like this, I couldn’t do. I’m not smart or imaginative enough. But once it’s up and running, well, it’s just lots of hours and details and worry. I’ve gotten migraines all my life. But more now. So often, it seems.”

Through the cracked back door he could see his father standing by a large shiny machine. Face-to-face with Rollins, no doubt. Hands on his hips. Leaning forward. Voice loud. Rollins shaking his head but not backing off.

Andy wanted to go flying through the air and spear Rollins like he’d speared Lenny Vonn.

Marie was watching, too. “It probably looks like Max is here to prop me up. But I help him, also. That’s why Roger set it up like this. It hurt him, what happened to your brother. And he sees what it did to Max and your mother. Excuse me. They’ll stop acting like boys if I wander over.”

BY THE TIME Andy was halfway through his interview, Marie Stoltz was concussed by headache. She offered him a smile that made him wince. She tried to talk about the growing “environmental movement,” which favored organic products like Orange Sunshine.

He thought she might vomit. He was going to ask some personal questions, such as her idea of trust in a marriage to a man who spent a lot of time three thousand miles from home. Maybe get her to corroborate that he was in Washington on that night. But he couldn’t. He talked her into letting him just walk around on his own, get the feel of the place, snap a few pictures. She shut the office door when he went out.

Andy walked the labeling floor and the warehouse, the shipping and receiving docks. Chatted with the marketing people and the salespeople and the R & D people. Rollins looked like a kicked dog. Max strode between the plant buildings in straight lines, clipboard tight, his steps spaced for best distance and speed. He nodded to his son.

Andy took some pictures but nothing the Journal could really use. If he did manage to get Teresa to approve a business-section puff piece on RoMar Industries, it almost certainly wouldn’t require art. But it didn’t hurt to have some file shots, just in case something interesting were to take place at RoMar.

It was a small miracle he’d even found the time to come here, with all the extra work Jonas was dumping on him. Since Nick’s penmanship demo, Dessinger was loading him up with the worst assignments-soft features, society events, charity fund-raisers, the damned art museums. Teresa tried to intervene but Jonas had rank.

He snapped the case back over his camera. Squinted up at the midday sky. He had come here for information but he had failed to find it. He’d wanted to get closer to Roger Stoltz. To see if Stoltz knew some things about the murder of the girl he was supporting. To see what Marie knew.

Hell, he’d wanted to shove Representative (R) Stoltz of California against a wall, grab his throat, and make him confess that he had murdered his mistress.

Even though he’d been three thousand miles away the night she died.

Like he was right now.

So why do all this? Because Andy didn’t like him? Because Stoltz was one of the few people who could make Monika smile? Because Stoltz had capitalized on the death of the orange groves, which had helped ruin Max, then employed him? Because he’d gotten Clay to join some heartless government agency that let him get killed in a worthless jungle? Because the good-looking, smooth-talking, vote-begging phony had had the balls to give Janelle Vonn money and a car and a place to live? Because Roger Stoltz had had the balls to offer her something real while he, Andrew James Becker, had been too timid and guilty to even call her when she’d asked him to?

Andy sighed and shook his head. Watched his father march from R & D to Admin.

Leave it to Nick now, he thought. He had given Nick everything he’d learned. Everything he’d seen. And read and heard and thought. From the fact that Janelle was a paid Sheriff’s Department informant to the wound marks on Stoltz’s hand. From Jesse Black’s story of Janelle’s pregnancy to the mystery man. From the guy with the FBI plates searching Janelle’s cottage to the letters she’d written to Lynette. And now Andy could tell Nick about Stoltz and the bedsheets missing from the apartment Stoltz had offered to Janelle. An apartment in which Janelle didn’t play house. Not with Stoltz, anyway. Where four days before she was murdered Janelle had sat at the kitchen table with a man suspected of two murders and who had beaten his own parents half to death. An apartment where, three days after she was murdered, Stoltz had stood at a window and wiped his eyes.