The tech men carefully replaced the ceiling panels. Boland put his finger to his lips, reminding them that everything they said could be heard downtown. While this was going on, Eddie Dunne looked inside every folder in the file cabinet. He looked through the employee files, the manager's appointment calendar, and the

Rolodex. He found Fredek Dolgev's file, although not one single notation regarding Zina. Then he found her name on that month's pay sheet. Zina Rabinovich… with a line drawn through the name, the word terminated, and the initials Y.B. The date was April 6, the day Kate was kidnapped. Borodenko was in Russia on April 6. He'd fired her from Russia.

In under fifty minutes, the members of the task force were walking out of the club one by one. They waited until the street was empty and then hustled into the waiting vans. It was done smoothly and efficiently. Eddie might have to take back some of the nasty things he'd said about the feds.

There were four in the van as they rode back to the underground Queens garage they called "the bat cave." Matty Boland lit a big Cuban cigar and talked about the importance of what they'd just done. If the bug turned out to be as good as it seemed at this point, it would strike a death blow to the Borodenko operation. Boland was flush with his success.

"If this goes right," Boland said, "I've got First Grade detective in the bag. No way they can't promote me."

Human nature, Eddie thought, it comes down to thinking about number one. Numero Uno. He'd once read that people expend by far the most energy on the preservation and enhancement of their self-image. We see ourselves in splendor. Perhaps this is why we are so devastated when tragedy hits home. How can God do this to me? The great me. But deep inside, you know exactly why.

Chapter 34

Tuesday, April 14

11:00 A.M.

Eddie stumbled into the kitchen, limping almost as much as the psycho Sergei Zhukov. That shooting pain that Babsie called sciatica came and went for no reason he could understand. Every day, more of his life seemed to be breaking down. He felt old for the first time, his breath sour, skin dry and itchy. Just another unshaven old man scuffing through the corridors of some rest home. Babsie sat at the kitchen table, a magnifying glass up to her face.

"I put this photograph together," she said. Detective Barbara Panko never wasted any time with "Good morning" or "What's with the limp?" She went straight to the heart of the matter.

The house was quiet, the weather too warm for the clank of steam in the pipes. Grace was at school, no TV, no radio. Eileen had always had to have the TV on; silence made her antsy. Just the two of them now. Babsie had worked out a schedule with the Yonkers PD wherein they only watched the house when she wasn't there. But every single school day, a uniformed cop sat outside Christ the King.

"What photograph?" Eddie said.

"The one from the trash at Freddie Dolgev's house."

It had been after 5:00 a.m. when he'd gotten home from Brooklyn. The fluorescent light over the stove had led him to a note written in big block letters. It was signed by Babsie and Grace, but one signer had written her name too large and too near the end of the page. She'd had to slide the "ce" under the "Gra." It said that a piece of "angel foot cake" was waiting for him under the cake tin. It was signed "Love." He hadn't been hungry, but he'd poured a glass of milk and finished the cake. Then he'd collapsed into bed, hoping not to dream.

"Grab some coffee and come over here and look at this picture, will you?" Babsie said.

"Soon as I get my eyes open."

He'd slept miserably. The first time he woke up, the morning sun was angled low in his bedroom window. Loud voices and the rumble of heavy equipment shattered the usual early-morning peace-a city road crew getting an early jump on resurfacing the street. First time in twenty years, and they chose now to do it.

"How did you make out last night?" Babsie asked.

"The Mazurka is wired."

"Another feather in Boland's cap, thanks to you."

"Can't hurt. They might pick up a mention of Kate's name."

"They won't say anything to you; it might jeopardize their almighty case."

"They'll tell us, Babsie. Good bunch of guys on the task force."

"A few maybe, and that's only because Louie Freeh dumped that stupid lawyer or accountant requirement and brought some cops and street kids aboard."

The second time he woke up that morning, he'd heard Babsie sliding the glass pot back into the Mr. Coffee. A kitchen chair squeaking against the tile floor; a cup set down on the table. Grace's voice complaining about school. He'd thought about Kate, how loud she was in the morning, banging pots and pans. Over a week had gone by, but Eddie had no doubts that his daughter was alive. Not that he believed in ESP or any of that occult crap, but a parent and child must be able to tune in on the same wavelength. So much is genetic, he thought, why not a common wavelength?

"Come over here," Babsie said. "This picture is really interesting."

In his mind, Eddie saw Kate tied up and blindfolded. He tried to imagine the room. Sense it as she was doing. They'd have to tie and blindfold her because she'd be fighting and cursing like the tough pain in the ass he'd raised her to be. No one doubted that. She could be a pain in the ass. God bless her. Amid all this going on, it made no sense that these people outside woke up today, showered, went out to blacktop some curvy, hilly little side street, thinking only of their own lives: dinner, sex, golf, the weekend, whatever. It wasn't right.

"Hey, Dunne," Babsie said. "Get your ass over here and look at this picture."

"All right, all right," he said, carefully lowering himself into the chair. He'd decided that sciatica made sitting worse than standing.

Working on an old wooden chessboard, Babsie had connected the pieces of the torn photograph she'd found outside the apartment in Coney Island. Last time Eddie saw it, she'd had pins in the pieces. Now they were glued down with a white gooey stuff she insisted wouldn't stick permanently. With more patience than Eddie could imagine, she'd turned and twisted dozens of small pieces of a black-and-white photograph until they made sense. She turned it around so Eddie could see.

"A regular puzzle whiz," he said. "I can't believe you did this."

"Recognize anyone?"

Although it was obvious the picture had been ripped to shreds, you could make out what the photographer first saw staring up at him through the developing fluid. Three people: two men and a woman, standing on a dock in front of a powerboat. The woman was in the middle. They had their arms around one another and were smiling broadly. Eddie was squinting into the sun.

"You look so young here," Babsie said, pointing to the man on the right. She'd pointed to a slender man in jeans and T-shirt, taller than the others. His hair appeared darker than it did in real life, as it did in all his old pictures. His eyebrows looked bushier than they did now.

"I hardly remember this," he said.

"I'm guessing the other guy is your partner."

"The one and only Paul Caruso," he said.

Eddie couldn't remember the picture being taken or who took it. Another woman probably. Some Brooklyn divorcee Paulie'd brought along for him. Paulie'd had an endless supply of gum-popping Donnas and Dianes he knew from the days before he fell madly in love.

"You remember where this was taken?" Babsie asked.

"Sheepshead Bay Marina."

"How about the year?"

"Early eighties. That's Paulie's boat behind us. Two big staterooms. He loved to brag about those staterooms."