Riker thought the boss was curiously calm.

"So thanks for all your help, Lieutenant," said the agent, "but we'll take it from here."

Mallory was silently coming up behind Hennessey's back when Riker had second thoughts about the impending violence. He grabbed her by the shoulders as her nails – call them claws – were on the rise, then whispered in her ear, "Let Coffey go off on the bastard. Trust me on this one." His tip-off was the lieutenant's composure.

Jack Coffey was actually smiling when he pulled up a chair at the table. "Hennessey, here's a little something your boss probably didn't mention. It happened three minutes ago. Somebody called 911 for a disturbance at the radio station, and six patrol cops responded. The FBI agents tried to stop them from going up to Ian Zachary's floor. Well, the uniforms don't take orders from feds." The lieutenant propped his feet up on the table, and the FBI agent stiffened his own posture, bracing for more bad news.

"Sorry, Hennessey. It seems one of your guys is losing a little blood. But the good news? Our guy didn't break his damn jaw. It's just a split lip. A few stitches, he'll be fine. And that disturbance call?" Coffey shrugged. "Turned out to be a false alarm."

Normally, Riker would have suspected Mallory of making that bogus 911 call, but she had an alibi for the time frame. Evidently, the lieutenant was picking up her bad habits.

Jack Coffey turned to Detective Janos. "Those uniforms belong to the midtown precinct. Keep an open line to their sergeant. They have orders to hold that floor. Make sure that's all they do. I don't want anybody rattled till we're ready to make an arrest." And last, but with the greatest satisfaction, he turned back to the FBI man, saying, "We'll take it from here."

"You have no jurisdiction on a jury tampering charge," said Agent Hennessey.

"Oh, that's all changed," said Coffey. "We have a few charges of our own." He glanced at Mallory. "You didn't tell him about that yet? Sorry, I ruined your fun."

Hennessey would have left the room with his document cartons, following in Jack Coffey's wake, but Riker was now blocking the door. "Not so fast, pal. You made a deal with Mallory. You're going to keep it." He looked down at the boxes of Reaper files. "Or maybe you'd rather leave all that stuff here."

Over the next thirty minutes, Dr. Apollo's voice was heard on radios all over New York City and the portable set in the interview room.

Riker turned down the volume as he faced the one-way mirror. "What's taking so long on that arrest warrant?"

Jack Coffey's voice came over the intercom, saying, "We're shopping for a judge who isn't afraid of the ACLU. Shouldn't be much longer."

The contents of the Reaper file were spread across the long table, and Agent Hennessey could only watch this invasion of his paperwork. His fingers lightly drummed the table to advertise a bad case of arrogance withdrawal. The FBI man's detainment had not been formalized, though a strong suggestion was made by the massive bulk of Detective Janos leaning against the only door.

Mallory owned the agent now, and she was in the early stages of toying with her food. After scanning the contents of an FBI folder, she looked up from her reading. "So Dr. Apollo was always on the shortlist for the jury murders." She crumpled a sheet of paper, and Hennessey watched, fascinated, as the wad rolled between her palms, compacting into a perfect ball the size of a marble.

"That's destruction of government – "

"It's bogus," she said. "And you knew it when you padded out the Reaper file. Now I want the good stuff, the personal notes that never made it into your database. How many screwups were purged from the computer?"

Hennessey hesitated too long. Her paper marble shot past his right ear and bounced off the wall behind him.

"If I have to find those mistakes by myself," she said, "then I add them to the rest of the mess your people made of this case. I might hold a press conference – all the major networks – national publicity, all of it bad."

And those were the magic words.

Hennessey retrieved the wadded paper from the floor. "This sheet isn't total crap. When Agent Kidd was murdered, Dr. Apollo was our prime suspect for a copycat killing. She had her own history with psychiatric treatment, long-term therapy as a child and a teenager. Maybe our man said the wrong thing and she snapped. It happens. Or maybe he was the one who snapped, and the doctor killed him in self-defense. But we know the Reaper didn't murder Timothy Kidd."

"You're wrong," said Riker. "And that's one more screwup for the feds." He looked up at his partner. "Mallory, are you keeping score?"

Agent Hennessey might be on the defensive, but he was showing no signs of backing down from this theory. The FBI man was adamant when he said, "Timothy Kidd's murder didn't have the elements of a Reaper killing except for the penknife, and that detail was in the newspapers. There was no scythe drawn in blood, nothing written on the wall of the doctor's reception room. There was no note stuffed in his mouth. And even the cut to the throat was different, less damage and not as deep."

"But then that homeless man was killed with a penknife," said Mallory. "The same sloppy cut as the one that killed Timothy Kidd."

"Right," said the agent. "We figure the doctor killed Bunny, too. Argus misread the whole thing. He thought Bunny's death meant that the Reaper was keeping tabs on Dr. Apollo."

Mallory seemed genuinely offended, for the agent was putting no earnest effort into any of these lies. "You knew they were both Reaper victims, Bunny and the fed. Argus was tailing her long before that. He was using her as a lure for the Reaper, and then he did the same thing to MacPherson, hanging him out as bait."

"Argus wasn't on the Reaper investigation," said Hennessey. "His only job was coordinating juror protection, and he screwed that up. No one was authorized to use the jurors as bait. The agents in Behavioral Sciences were making a case for – "

"The profilers?" Mallory nodded. "Not a decent psych credential between them. If it hadn't been for their interference, the case would've been closed by now. You never asked the right question, the one that begins every cop's investigation – who benefits?"

"It's not that kind of crime," said Hennessey.

"Sure it is," she said. "You messed up because you were all trying to think like psychiatrists. Dr. Apollo was the only one thinking like a cop."

Jack Coffey's voice came over the intercom. "We've got the warrant. Let's move, people."

Hennessey was rising, perhaps believing that he was invited to go along.

A uniformed officer entered the room and set a formidable power tool on the table before Riker. "Big enough for you?"

"That'll do me. Thanks."

"What's the drill for?" asked Hennessey.

Riker plugged it into a wall socket to test it. "Ian Zachary's studio has a world-class security door, three inches of metal and an electronic lock. Can't force it, can't pick it." He switched on the drill for the full effect of a squadron of dentists from hell, then cut the power. "So we go right through the lock."

"Let's do this the smart way," said Hennessey, sincerely deluded in the idea that he might have some influence in this room. "We wait till the show's over. We'll let the doctor play it out, maybe collect more evidence that way – recorded evidence."

"Bad idea," said Riker. "She's locked in that room with a stone killer." He turned to the one-way mirror. "Ready when you are, boss."

"The Reaper can't be Ian Zachary," said Hennessey. "The man has an unbreakable alibi for Timothy Kidd's murder. Agents were parked right outside his door round the clock."

"Yeah, right," said Mallory. "He could never get past one of your guys."