But wait… a twelve-year-old drawing stick figures?

He must really be backward.

Maybe some mental defect from his mother smoking crack when she was pregnant. Or from bad diet. Or just being dropped when he was a baby.

Maybe he's got that-what's it called?-Tourette's syndrome.

Then again, he probably hears people swearing all the time, and no one tells him not to do it himself.

The kid went back to drawing clouds.

"Nice clouds," Curtis said. "What's your name?"

"Michael," the boy said. Then he nodded once, as if making a point.

Michael? Well, at least something's normal around here. But I bet it's probably spelled weird, like Leroy is "LeRoi."

"Michael what?"

"Michael Floyd," he said, and again nodded once.

"Nice to meet you, Michael Floyd."

The kid suddenly pointed to the medium-size stick figure. "That be Mama," he said.

"Very nice. Who is the other one? Your father?"

The kid shook his head and said, "That my uncle."

"Does he live here?"

Michael shook his head again.

"What's your uncle's name?"

"Uncle LeRoi," he said, punctuating that with a nod.

Ding-ding! We have a winner! Will Curtis thought as he glanced at the door of the house. And if he's in the "family" drawing…

He said: "LeRoi Cheatham? Is he home?"

"Don't live here no more. Told you that, muthafucka."

"Is your mother home?"

He shook his head.

"You're home alone?"

He nodded.

"Look, Michael, I have this very important envelope for your uncle." Curtis held it out toward the boy, who turned to look at it. "See? Says right here, 'to LeRoi Cheatham.' Do you know where I can find him so he can have his mail?"

The boy nodded. "He at Demetri's."

"Can you tell me where that is"-Curtis motioned with the envelope-"so I can give him this?"

"It that way," Michael said, pointing with the chalk to the south.

"What's the address?"

He shrugged.

"Is it close? Can you show me?"

He shook his head, then said, "Don't walk there no more."

"Why not?"

"Gangstas. Muthafuckas hit me. Kick me."

He gets beat up?

"Nobody will bother you with me around, Michael."

The boy shook his head vigorously.

Well, he must've really gotten his ass kicked.

No surprise. Law of the jungle is to prey on the weak.

"Michael, listen to me. This envelope is very important. I'm sure your uncle would really want to have it."

Curtis pointed to the minivan.

"You want to ride in my new delivery vehicle? You show me where he lives, we'll give him the envelope, then I'll bring you back here."

The boy jerked his head to look across the street. His eyes grew wide. Then he turned back to Curtis and nodded enthusiastically.

"Yeah, muthafucka! I ride to LeRoi! I tired of drawing." [TWO] Executive Command Center The Roundhouse Eighth and Race Streets, Philadelphia Sunday, November 1, 4:29 P.M. "Okay," Matt Payne said, rubbing his eyes, "let's bring up the last one, Kendrik Mays. Not that it's likely we'll find anything new on him yet. But in the spirit of leaving no stone under the stone unturned…"

Matt felt a brief vibration in his front pants pocket, and he reached in and pulled out his cell phone.

He looked at the screen. It read: "(2) TEXT MESSAGES FROM AMANDA LAW."

"Oh, shit!" he said aloud. Then he thought, Two? I never felt the damn phone vibrate before.

As he started thumbing the phone to read the texts, he saw the signal-strength icon.

Not even one goddamn nanobit or -byte or whatever of signal!

He looked at Kerry Rapier and said, "Is it just me, or is the cell service in here worthless?"

"Just you, Marshal," Rapier said with a straight face.

Harris snorted, then said, "My signal reception's lousy, too, Matt."

Payne eyed Rapier, who smiled back.

"Seriously," Rapier then added, "it's ironic that we have some four million bucks' worth of high-tech commo equipment in here but, except for over there by the window, we can't get decent cell service." He paused, then added: "If it's any consolation-as in, misery loves company-I heard the top guy at AT amp;T couldn't get a signal in his Hops Haus Tower penthouse. So he personally ordered that a cellular antenna be added on the roof of the building-and he still couldn't get a reliable connection!"

Payne shook his head.

"Gotta love technology," he said, his eyes falling to his phone's screen. The text message, which had a time stamp of 2:45 P.M., read:

I KNOW YOU HAVE A JOB TO DO. I WAS JUST CAUGHT OFF GUARD BY THE MAYOR'S ANNOUNCEMENT.

Payne felt his throat tighten.

What a wonderful woman.

All I had to do was shoot back, "Sorry, I'll make it up to you"-or something.

But, being a cad, I didn't. And still she sends this.

I damn sure don't deserve her…

Then he scrolled to her most recent text message:

Damn, it's nice to have someone like her to look forward to after a day like this.

Hope I don't manage to fuck up this relationship.

Matt had a mental image from the previous night of Amanda walking completely naked toward the master bath, her thick ponytail of wavy blond hair bouncing as her toned, athletic body floated fluidly across the room.

What a goddess. Then he grinned at the thought of a reply: "Love to see you too, baby-starkers!"

He buried his face in both hands, rubbing his eyes again. As he did so, he felt the stubble on his face.

And I do need a break, if only for a shave and bath.

He thumbed the REPLY key, then typed out:

I AM REALLY SORRY. I GOT YOUR FIRST MESSAGE RIGHT AS CARLUCCI WAS BLOWING HIS CORK. I MEANT TO REPLY… BUT FORGOT. I'M SORRY. REALLY. AND… THERE WASN'T TIME BEFORE CARLUCCI WENT ON THE NEWS TO LET YOU KNOW ABOUT MY HEADING UP THE TASK FORCE-WHICH RIGHT NOW IS JUST ME, TONY amp; KERRY, THE ECC TECH. SOME FORCE, HUH? WORSE, WE'VE MADE NO PROGRESS. JUST KEEPING UP WITH THE BODY COUNT HAS BEEN CHALLENGING ENOUGH.