“OK, then run the plate and you check it out.”

“The cases aren’t connected, Logan.”

“Two murders, days apart, one block apart, same street number, both middle-age Latinos, and they’re not connected? We have a saying where I come from, Czarnek: ‘If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, the goddamn murders are connected.’”

“There were two different weapons used. Echevarria got shot with a .40-cal. The teacher got it with a .45. Plus, every witness we talked to said Echevarria’s shooter had brown skin. Two wits on Elmira said the guy who shot the teacher was Caucasian. And nobody except Abnorman Buckhalter said anything about seeing any white Honda.”

I let Czarnek know about the white Honda that had been seen lurking near my garage apartment shortly before the place caught fire, and how Detective Ostrow from Rancho Bonita PD was eager to compare notes with him.

“There’s a million white Hondas in the United States,” Czarnek said. “It’s probably just coincidence.”

“This is hardly what I would describe as proactive law enforcement, Detective.”

“I told you, I got gang case files piling up on my desk faster than I can read ‘em. Look, I’ll get to your Detective Ostrow when I can. And if it’ll get you off my butt, I’ll drop by Abnorman’s place. Maybe next week, OK?”

“Joe Friday’s rolling over in his grave,” I said.

“I’m sure Joe Friday would find the situation less than ideal,” Czarnek said, “as we all do.”

“You know what I find, Detective Czarnek?” Savannah blurted into the phone. “I find it amazing that you’re getting paid to be a detective, because from where I sit, it doesn’t look like you could find your ass in the dark with both hands tied behind your back, let alone find the man who killed my husband.”

She hung up on him.

“Well played,” I said.

“You think that whacko knew what he was talking about, with the license plate?”

“Just because somebody’s nuttier than a port-a-potty at an almond festival doesn’t make them incapable of conveying the truth.”

“You are one profoundly articulate guy, Logan,” Savannah said, shaking her head in disgust.

“What can I say? It’s a gift.”

The sky was streaked brown. She sniffed the air. “There’s a fire somewhere. You can smell it.”

There was always a fire somewhere in Southern California this time of year, when the offshore winds turned the arroyos and hillsides to tinder. A spark from a weed wacker and entire neighborhoods went up in flames. Yet regardless of the risks, whether by fire or temblor or mudslide or murder, no true Angelino ever gave serious thought to living anywhere else. They were all too busy, I suppose, vying for their own reality shows.

“I’ll take you to the bus station now,” Savannah said.

I didn’t protest.

She slid the Jag’s polished walnut gear shifter into drive. We drove south on Elmira Avenue, toward the freeway.

Strange how random recollections can pop into your head at any given moment for every reason and no reason at all. At that moment, my mind’s eye filled with the image of Ray Allen, my high school football coach, flinging a helmet at me in the locker room after a game for failing to catch a pass. We’d been down by three touchdowns with less than a minute to play, and the football had been thrown ten yards in front of me, but that didn’t matter to Coach Allen. “If you don’t believe in your heart you can win,” he screamed, his cheeks florid with rage, “then there’s no point in getting out of bed at the end of the day.” No one dared to correct Coach Allen. Certainly not to his face.

“Never quit,” was the message Coach Allen was selling that day. Back then, I took to heart every dumb sports cliché every coach ever trotted out — too much, probably. Now I was stuck with them. My overwhelming urge was to get on the bus and get the hell out of Dodge. The only problem is, quitters never win and winners never quit.

Screw it.

I called Buzz and asked him to run the license plate the crazy ex-cop had volunteered. Buzz gave me grief about the illegalities of accessing official government records for unofficial purposes, and how I already owed him big-time for all the many other favors he’d done for me, then said it would probably take a few minutes to get back with the information I wanted. He was in the doctor’s office, he said.

“Nothing serious, I hope.”

“Hemorrhoids are flaring up. Plus, I’m out of Viagra.”

“Too much information, Buzz.”

“You ever wonder why they call it an asteroid when it’s outside the atmosphere, but they call it a hemorrhoid when it’s inside your ass?”

“Gotta run, Buzz,” I said and signed off.

“One of your marketing contacts,” Savannah said sarcastically.

“A buddy.”

“Why can’t you just tell me the truth, Logan?”

“That is the truth.”

She shook her head, aggravated with me per usual, and turned on news radio. The fire she’d smelled was burning in the mountains northwest of Los Angeles. Nearly twenty structures were already burned, and hundreds more threatened. Evacuations were being ordered. Water-bombing helicopters and a DC-10 carrying 12,000 gallons of retardant had been called in to stop the advancing flames. Much depended on the winds, and the winds weren’t cooperating. I ached for those who’d lost their homes, and those who soon would. I knew the feeling.

“People just don’t call up a ‘buddy’ and get confidential DMV records,” Savannah said.

“It’s a good buddy.”

“It’s the CIA. That’s who you and Arlo used to work for, isn’t it?”

“You know, Savannah, you could continue busting my huevos, or we could go get a drink and wait until my good buddy gets back to me with the information I requested.”

Savannah thought about it for a minute. “I’d prefer busting your huevos.”

“Why am I not surprised?”

Jingle’s Happy Place was anything but. Just another dive watering hole on Lankershim Boulevard, across the street from an empty used-car dealership gone bust. A big screen plasma was tuned to Sports Center. A hockey game was on. The Fun Room regulars, a handful of aging bikers and what looked to be blue collar retirees on fixed incomes, paid little attention to the television, preoccupied as they were with getting hammered on long-necked Buds and shots of tequila. They nudged each other and checked out Savannah as she walked in. We laid claim to two stools near the door.

The bartender was bald, with a wife beater T-shirt that afforded an unobstructed view of his heavily tattooed arms and neck — a multicolored kaleidoscope of hobbits, skulls and dragons. Five gold loops dangled from each of his earlobes. He tossed down a couple of cocktail napkins and stared in sullen silence at us, waiting. I ordered club soda with a lemon twist. Savannah went with a glass of Chardonnay.

“Something dry,” she said.

The barkeep stalked off to get our drinks without a word.

“I just realized something,” she said. “I don’t even know what your favorite season is.”

I looked over at her.

“I’m serious. We were married for how long? That’s how private you were, Logan. Always distracted, rarely engaged — except when we were in bed. And every year, it just got worse.”

“You should’ve said something.”

“Are you kidding? I said everything I could think of. Over and over. You just never heard me.”

A covert life is lived in boxes. Marriage and family are locked in one box; career in another. The arrangement isn’t for everyone. Every member of Alpha had been divorced at least once. Perhaps if I’d had it to do all over again, I might have gone a different route. Left the Air Force and gone to work for the airlines. Moved Savannah to the suburbs and started a family. Shared a life together. A real life. But that was the past. A Buddhist doesn’t dwell on the past. He concentrates on the present.