He got on 280 and at 120 miles an hour made it to San Jose Police headquarters in under fifteen minutes. By the time he arrived he had calmed down a little and was starting to think. Weirdly, the thing he was most grateful for was that he had a set of workout clothes in the trunk. Otherwise, what the hell would he do, barge into the police station stark naked in the middle of the night?

The parking lot that had been nearly full a day earlier was empty now, and he was able to scurry around to the trunk of the car and dress without anyone seeing him. It couldn't have been more than forty degrees out and he could see his breath fogging. By the time he walked through the lobby doors his teeth were chattering and he was completely broken out in gooseflesh.

He walked up to the information window, rubbing his palms furiously against his arms and shoulders to generate a little friction heat. “I want to report a burglary,” he said. “Someone just broke into my house.”

The woman behind the glass asked, “What is your address, sir?”

Alex gave her his Ladera address. The woman said, “Sir, that's San Mateo. You need the San Mateo County Sheriff's Office.”

Jesus, what had he been thinking? San Jose had just been on his mind because he'd been here recently; he hadn't even thought about the jurisdiction.

“Right,” he said. “Look, I surprised this person in my house. He had a gun and I just ran out. I got confused. Can you… I don't know what to do. Can you call the San Mateo police for me?”

The woman nodded and picked up a phone. She gave Alex's information to someone and hung up.

“Sir, the Sheriff's Office is sending a patrol car to your address right now. They're going to wait for you outside the premises and escort you in when you arrive. They'll ensure the premises are secure, take your statement, and collect any evidence.”

Alex thanked her and went back to his car. When he got home, there was a police car waiting in front. He parked in the driveway and walked over. Two uniformed cops got out, one a tall skinny guy, the other with shoulders as wide as a refrigerator.

“Alex Treven?” the skinny one said.

“Yes, I'm Alex. Thanks for coming.”

“No problem. I'm Officer Randol, and this is Officer Tibaldi. We understand you had an intruder in the house this morning?”

This morning… right, it was morning, technically. “Yes, that's right. I think he had a gun, but I didn't see that well.”

“Okay. We'd like you to wait here while we go in and ensure the house is secure. Once we've done that, we can take your statement inside.”

“Uh, yeah, sure, of course.”

Alex waited while Randol and Tibaldi walked up the path to the front door, which Alex noticed for the first time was closed. He was surprised to see them draw their guns, then realized, of course, they had to assume someone was still in there, no matter how unlikely.

Tibaldi tried the door, then called to Alex, “You're going to have to unlock it.”

Alex walked up and unlocked the door. Tibaldi opened it, waited a moment, then went in, followed by Randol.

The house wasn't huge, and in five minutes they had turned on every light, opened every closet, and looked under every bed. It was empty.

Alex told them exactly what had happened. He showed them the bathroom. The tub was still full of water. They examined the door and the lock, but there was no evidence that it had been picked. The room stank of bleach and the cleaner had gotten all over the walls and floor.

“We ‘re going to check the front door and have a look around,” Randol said. “Why don't you inventory the house and see if anything is missing?”

Alex did. Nothing was gone or even out of place. Even his wallet and cell phone were where he always left them when he was home, on the table in the foyer. He'd been so batshit scared when he ran out that he'd grabbed only his keys and nothing else.

“The front door is intact,” Randol told him. “No sign of forced entry.”

“Well, someone got in here,” Alex said, feeling foolish.

“I can see that. Is anything missing?”

Alex shook his head.

“Do you have any enemies, sir?”

“Enemies?”

“You know, were you doing something that made a husband jealous, or maybe you took something you weren't supposed to from someone you shouldn't have taken it from.”

“No, nothing like that. Nothing. Are you saying this guy was looking for me personally?”

Randol shrugged. “Most burglars are pretty inept. The ones adept enough to break in quietly and without damaging anything are too smart to carry a gun. It ups the penalties if they're caught.”

“Well, I'm not sure he had a gun. I told you, I didn't see that well. It was dark, there was a flashlight in my face, and I was pretty damn scared.”

“All right. No gun, my guess is, someone broke in here hoping to burglarize the place, and when you surprised him, he got the hell out.”

“And closed the door as he left?” Alex asked.

“Sure,” Tibaldi said. “You'd be amazed at the weird things perps do. He probably thought if he closed the door, no one would notice he'd been inside.”

Alex wasn't persuaded. If the guy had bolted out in such a hurry that he'd missed the wallet he'd gone right past on his exit, what had possessed him to take the time to close the door?

“Why would he break in if he knew someone was home?” Alex asked.

“How would he have known you were home?” Tibaldi asked.

“My car was right in my driveway.”

Tibaldi nodded. “I noticed you've got several newspapers at the end of the walkway. Burglar thinks, ‘This guy's not home-he caught a taxi to the airport.’ Or whatever. Point is, he thinks the newspapers trump the car. You have to put yourself in the perp's shoes. They look for things like that. Newspapers in the driveway, mail in the mailbox, packages in front of the door.”

“Why pick the bathroom lock, then? By then he knew someone was home.”

Tibaldi shrugged. “At that point, he's committed. He's already made his decision, already committed a crime. Some mentalities, they'd rather double down than back off. Look, you have to accept that in all crimes, there's a certain random element. It's why conspiracy theorists love JFK's assassination and nine-eleven so much. You can't ever get all the threads to tie up neatly. There's always something that doesn't make sense.”

Randol asked, “Did you get a good look at him? Could you describe him, pick him out of a lineup?”

Alex tried to picture what he'd seen. “It was dark. I…” What had he seen? Suddenly, he wasn't sure about any of it. He felt drained and useless.

“Black? White?”

Alex shook his head. “I don't know.”

“Well, at least you scared him off,” Tibaldi said. “Nice move, with the bleach. And you didn't lose anything.”

Alex looked at them. “So you think this was just a random break-in?”

Randol didn't answer, and Alex realized he was assessing his own confidence in Alex's responses. After a long moment he nodded and said, “If he didn't have a gun, and you don't have enemies, that's what it looks like. I think you had a bad guy casing the neighborhood, he saw those newspapers, he took a closer look, he saw the door has only one lock, not even a deadbolt, which looks to be what, forty years old, I'm guessing?”

“Yeah,” Alex said. “Probably that old.”

“Watch this,” Randol said. He stepped out and closed the door behind him. From the other side, Alex heard a rasping sound, then a click, and then the door opened.

“Damn,” Alex said. “How did you do that?”

Randol handed Alex a thin piece of plastic, hard but flexible, about four inches by four. “Slide it between the door and the jamb, push back the mechanism, you're inside in less time than it takes to use a key. Get deadbolt locks. Have the jambs and frames reinforced. Make it harder for the criminal.”

Alex didn't like the rebuke behind the words, but the man had a point.