He sighed hugely. "I'll take care of it. Trust me."

"I can't trust you," she said softly. "I'll tell the police about Dylan myself."

"You don't mean that, sweetheart. She's your baby. You don't want to hurt her, expose her to all kinds of questions and ridicule, do you? Really?"

"I mean it." Grace's eyes flooded. "The children have to come first this time."

"Okay." His facade cracked, and he caved in the way he had over the raises but not anything else. "Okay, there is somebody I can tell. Not the police. But somebody who can help. Okay? Are you satisfied now?"

"I'll be satisfied when both your children are safe." Grace got up and walked out of the office without another word.

Evelyn was at her desk with that smug smile on her face. "Raise time again, Grace?" she said as Grace passed her on the way out.

Forty-one

When baby April opened her eyes with Thursday's dawn, her daddy was standing watch over her crib, wearing a T-shirt and purple briefs. Today, she didn't even have to look around for him or whimper for attention. He'd been awake, worrying for hours. He was actually waiting for her to wake up and keep him company.

"Hey, little sweetheart," Jason cooed at her.

"Aa aa." She smiled and reached up her arms.

Not quite Dada, but close enough. He picked her up, hugged and kissed her a little, changed her diaper, gave her a bottle, played with her for a few minutes, then went into the bedroom.

"Hi," Emma murmured.

Jason sat on the bed, kissed Emma for a while, then put April down beside her sleepy mother. Bolstered by the love of his family, he began his day. He had a seven a.m. patient, an eight o'clock patient, a nine o'clock patient, and a dozen messages, including calls from Ted Tushy, Bernie Zeiss, Miss Vialo, and three other prominent members of the Institute. They might all have innocent reasons for calling late last night, and again before he was even in the office this morning, but Jason thought it was more likely that he was in trouble. Last night he'd gone to the Institute in search of Maslow's and Allegra's files. Several events were going on when he got there. Dr. Cone's second Wednesday of the month discussion group, two committee meetings, and a supervisory group were enough activity to cover his unauthorized visits to the education office for Allegra's file and to the boardroom where, due to overcrowding at the Institute, some of the personnel and candidate files were kept.

He collected them with no trouble and left, thinking it was likely to be more difficult to obtain a list of all the patients with whom Maslow had come into contact at Manhattan East. After he got home and studied the files without learning very much that was new, he rolled around all night wondering if there was any possibility that Allegra could have been a patient and seen Maslow at Manhattan East. Allegra wasn't her real name, and it was possible that Maslow didn't know her personally from there, but she might have seen or known him and been attracted to him for some reason or another of her own. Maybe she'd seen him treat a patient there with kindness.

It was very common for patients to contact each other when they were "out," why not a doctor? In any case, it was Maslow himself who had proposed Allegra to the Institute program. The file said what Jason already knew, that she'd come to him as a patient. What the file didn't say was how she'd come to him. Who had referred her?

Now it was clear his visit to the Institute had been noted, and there were people who wanted an explanation. He didn't call anyone back. Instead he watched his caller ID box. At eight-forty-five and eight-forty-nine he had hang-ups that the magic screen told him were from Jerome Atkins's private line. At nine-fifteen, the phone rang again from the same number. Jason picked up again and this time, Jerome Atkins spoke.

"Dr. Frank," he said formally.

"Yes."

"This is Mr. Atkins."

"Yes." Jason was in a session and couldn't reveal too much. He gave his one-word answers with his eyes on his patient, who, unluckily enough, happened to be the paranoid investment banker, Jergen Walsh, who had scheduled two extra sessions this week to work out the Sprite incident of yesterday (why had Jason insisted on offering him a soda when Jason knew Jergen only liked Sprite? Why had he been denied the Sprite, etc.?) Jergen's session this morning had already been interrupted by a ringing phone twice. He was audibly grinding his teeth.

"I need to talk with you," Jerome Atkins said.

"Of course. That would be fine."

"I will come to your office." The man's voice was authoritarian. Yesterday, he'd insisted that Jason come to his home.

"Fine." Jason's appointment book was open, secured by a rubber band on his schedule for that day. Last evening when he'd left his office for the night, he'd had a fully booked eleven hours of patients. Since then, on his office phone, he'd received a miraculous two cancellations in a row, starting at nine-thirty. Throughout his session with Jergen he'd been debating canceling the rest of the morning to continue his background check of Maslow. "When did you have in mind?"

"I'll be there in twenty minutes," Atkins said. "Where are you located?"

"Fine. I'll see you then."

"Very good." Jerome sounded pleased. The dumb luck of two cancellations allowed him to think Jason had nothing else in the world to do but receive him.

Nonetheless Jason was pleased himself. He gave his Riverside Drive address and hung up. Immediately, Jergen turned on him. How dare he take a call on his time? This was the price Jason would have to pay. He braced in his chair for the attack. It came right on schedule.

Jerome Atkins arrived thirty-five minutes later, after

Jergen had verbalized all his violent fantasies about Jason and left feeling better. Jason used his few free moments between the two appointments to run through his messages again. There was still nothing from anyone he wanted to talk to. When the doorbell announced Atkins, he buzzed him in, then quickly dialed the cell phone number that April had given him last night so he could stop trying to reach her through the frustrating precinct phone system.

"Sergeant Woo." She picked up after the first ring.

"April, this is Jason. Anything new?"

"I can't say on the phone." April's voice had the flat tone that meant something was up.

Jason's heart rate spiked. "Can we meet, then?" he asked.

"I'm working now, give me a call later."

"That will be difficult." He had patients. He needed to schedule his day. The phone made some noise and she was gone with no further comment. This alarmed Jason even more. With Maslow's father there, however, he didn't have time to call her back.

He hurried from his desk to his waiting room, where Jerome Atkins stood examining the display of three antique clocks on a table along with some fairly recent issues of nonthreatening magazines for activities that attracted Jason but he knew nothing about, like Yachting and Field and Stream and The Book of Everything, a tome that amused some people and irritated others because it didn't have anywhere near "everything" in it.

Atkins wore a black suit, a white shirt, and an unexpectedly jaunty black-and-white polka-dot bow tie. The outfit made him look pale and gave something of a mixed message about his state of mind. When Jason opened the door, Atkins raised an accusing finger to the brass bull with a clock on its back. "This clock is broken," he announced angrily, demonstrating that he was a man who had his own view of things.

"Good morning, Mr. Atkins, please come in," Jason replied.

Atkins hesitated, glancing around at the stylish wooden chairs and bench that were not very comfortable, the lovely Persian rug, the flowers that Jason had set out on Monday. He scowled at the clock that wasn't broken at all. It wasn't ticking because Jason had forgotten to wind it. Then slowly Atkins moved forward into Jason's office, where he was met with more upsetting obstacles.