“Ever lose anyone to this car?” Jake asked as he strapped himself in.

“Sort of.”

“Sort of?”

Jake realized that this was the first time he had seen Hauser look even remotely comfortable around him; it was probably a home-court advantage. “City asshole tried to outrun me with his Ferrari and hit the corner at Reese’s dairy doing one-eighty. Went straight off the point and disintegrated. By the time we picked up all the pieces from the rocks, it was a different season.”

Jake shook his head. “In this line of work you get to see people at their best, no doubt about it.”

Hauser’s eyes slid over to Jake for a second. He swallowed and the comfortable body language of a few seconds ago was lost. “How’d you end up doing what you do?”

Jake reached into his pocket for a cigarette, then realized that Hauser wouldn’t want that new cop-car smell to get fucked up by his Marlboro. He let the smokes fall from his fingers and put his hand on his thigh. “Bad luck, I guess.”

Hauser shot another sideways glance at him and said, “You and those rose-colored glasses. You need yoga or tai chi. You ever try any of that?”

“Smoking relaxes me.”

They lapsed into a silence that lasted until Hauser’s cell phone pinged the national anthem. “Yeah?” the sheriff said into his hands-free earpiece.

Hauser listened for a few seconds, then glanced in the mirror, flipped the siren and cherries to life, and pounded down on the brakes. He spun the wheel and hit the gas and the big rear end of the Charger swung in an arc of squealing tires. The car fishtailed in a 180-degree high-pitched scream on the faded asphalt and pulsed forward in a smoking cloud of rubber, heading back the way they had just come.

He snapped. “Yep. Yep. Yep. Six minutes.” And threw his earpiece violently into the dashboard.

Hauser turned to Jake, his mouth curved down like the edge of a hunting knife. He punched the gas and the big Hemi pulled the car into the future. “Your skinner just hit a woman in Southampton,” he said.

32

It was a neat neighborhood of postwar cottages with single-car garages, predictably pruned yards, and lawn chairs set up on small concrete porches. Cars were being loaded for the evacuation, some on the grass in front of the concrete steps, some in the driveway, trunks and doors open, pet carriers and prized televisions waiting to be loaded. Some houses were already empty, shutters fastened over windows—some neatly done in plywood and cut to size, others haphazard patches of scrap lumber. One home had duct tape over the windows in a sloppy silver weave. Jake watched the hurried, nervous movements of the people leaving their homes, and wondered when, exactly, the American motto had changed to, I’ll give you my television when you take it from my cold, dead hands.

From the end of the block Jake saw the police cruiser parked at the curb, lights blinking, yellow lines of tape strung out in the web of a giant 1950s science fiction film spider. A police officer stood on the lawn, just back from the perimeter, his back to a bunch of kids that were milling about. Jake recognized the posturing gestures of a man trying to look like he is in charge. It was a few hundred feet before he recognized the officer as Spencer.

Hauser rolled to the curb and both men rose from the interior, Hauser in his crisp khakis, Jake in a pair of jeans and a black T-shirt. As they moved toward the police line, the children’s attention focused briefly on Hauser but quickly shifted to Jake, eyes going wide at the ink covering his arms and creeping out of the collar of his T-shirt. Many of them backed up from their positions near the tape. Spencer held up the yellow line of defense as Hauser and Jake crossed under.

The cloud cover had lost a little of its translucency and the lawn had grown dark. The house shifted in hue with the overlay of clouds, and Hauser and Jake led Spencer away from the line of children waiting at the yellow tape like a contingent of the world’s tiniest paparazzi.

Hauser faced the house, locked his jaw, and spoke through clenched teeth. “Please tell me what’s going on.”

Spencer had the same eerie complexion he had had last night at the house up the beach, his pale skin pulsing blue and red in the lights of the cruiser parked at the curb. This afternoon it was mixed with shock and a good dose of revulsion. He took a few deep breaths and began, his eyes locked on the toe of a boot that he used to pick at the grass. “Neighbor called in, said she knocked and there wasn’t any answer which she found weird because the car was in the driveway.” Spencer jerked a thumb over his shoulder at the Prius. “The victim was supposed to be home. Neighbor thought maybe she was in the shower and came back an hour later. Still no answer. She peeked in the window and saw some blood on the kitchen floor. Called us. I did a walk around. Peeked in a few windows. Went in the back door.”

“And?”

Spencer swallowed hard. “And she was right.”

“You found some blood on the floor?”

Spencer looked up, his eyes two pinholes in the fabric of his face. “Some? No, Mike, there ain’t some. There’s a lot.”

“You call the ME?” Hauser asked in a thousand-yard voice.

“Right after you.” Spencer was running his tongue over his teeth and Jake knew it was the coppery taste of blood he was trying to make sense of.

Jake took a step toward Spencer. “What’s inside, Billy?”

“Another one,” he said, his eyes dancing nervously away.

“Another one what?”

Spencer’s blue-and-white skin seemed to tighten on his body and he pursed his mouth. “Skinned like a hunting trophy, Jake. Fucking bucketloads of blood everywhere.” He turned away, spit into the grass.

“Don’t do that. If you have to spit or puke or contaminate the crime scene in any way, do it across the street. Don’t embarrass yourself and don’t fuck up the crime scene.”

Spencer’s complexion pulsed red. “Embarrass myself? It’s a horror movie in there, Jake, and you tell me not to embarrass myself? What the fuck is wrong with you? You have any emotions?”

Jake pointed over his shoulder. “You want to look like some hick cop on national news?”

A news van came down the street. It picked up speed when it saw the yellow bull’s-eye of police tape.

Jake pursed his lips and grumbled, “Try to look professional,” just above a whisper.

Hauser turned to him. “I thought the media was our friend. Let them help us and all that.” Hauser’s voice carried a thin veil of sarcasm. The distant wail of a police siren was getting closer.

The van rolled to a stop at the curb and the crew rushed out. “Every single news team in the country is going to be here if they think we have a serial killer.” He turned to Spencer. “Don’t let them past the tape.”

“And if they try?” Spencer asked, tapping his sidearm like he had last night at the gate to the Farmers’.

“Warn them twice real loud. Then fire a round into the air. Then warn them one final time. Warn that you will fire if they do not cease and desist. Then shoot someone in the leg.” Hauser eyed the news crew heading over. “Those are specific orders.”

Spencer smiled and a little of the color returned to his face with the prospect of being able to deal with a situation that was familiar.

As the news team marched over, lugging lighting, cameras, and microphones, Jake leaned over and whispered in Hauser’s ear. “Tell them it’s an unrelated crime that as of yet is uncategorized. If they ask if it’s a murder say you cannot make comments that might jeopardize the investigation.”

He turned back to Spencer, wishing he was working with a proper bureau team right now. “Spencer, you make sure they don’t talk to the neighbor who found the victim. Tell her that if she talks to the media she could face prosecution for tampering with a murder investigation. Tell her it might make her look like a suspect. Scare her but shut her up. Assign a cop to her to make sure she doesn’t get bullied.”