Jack flips open the phone, effectively wrecking his plans.

“One question,” Tolliver says brusquely, sirens in the background. “Did you happen to drop by Jonny Bing’s boat today? Or his ship or yacht or whatever it is?”

“I did.”

“Good answer. Get down here.”

“The marina? What happened?”

“That’s what you’re going to explain. Pronto, if not sooner.”

“Twenty minutes.”

Some idiot tipped over a box truck on the Southeast Expressway, scattering a few tons of watermelons, so it’s more like forty minutes before Jack eases his boaty Lincoln Town Car into the Quincy Bay Marina visitor’s parking lot. Hard to find a space, what with all the fire trucks and patrol cars. The last flush of late June twilight lingers, so all the flashing lights make for a festive sunset. If he didn’t know better he’d think a traveling carnival had set up along the waterfront, complete with glittering arcs of spray from the fireboats out in the harbor.

The object of all this attention is the Lady Luck. To all outward appearances Bing’s massive yacht is unharmed, but Jack has a pretty good idea this is about more than a false alarm. He finds Glenn Tolliver in uniform, confabbing with plainclothes detectives, state and local. Tolliver catches sight of him and dismisses his troops.

“Hey,” says Jack, trying to sound casual. Captain Tolliver in full regalia is an imposing sight. “What’s with the bag?”

“Never mind my uniform. I want to know everything you know.”

“That’ll take a lifetime.”

“Can the wiseass.”

“Fine. No problem. Is Bing alive or dead?”

“I’m asking the questions. Over there,” he says, jutting his massive chin at a white canvas crime scene tent that’s been staked into the asphalt a few feet from the dock system.

Jack follows him to the tent and sits, as indicated, in one of several folding chairs situated near a portable table equipped with a couple of big coffee urns. Tolliver grabs himself a cup, doesn’t bother offering. Not that Jack, spoiled by the good stuff, has any interest in gray, parboiled caffeine.

Tolliver takes a seat, heaves a sigh. “What a mess,” he says. “I was speaking at a graduation ceremony. Supposed to.”

“Your daughter.”

“My daughter, yeah. Made it through eighth grade. With honors, actually. My ex was there, of course. And I get the call ten minutes before I’m due at the microphone, prepared to drone on about how the future has yet to be made, and how they’ll be making it. Her generation.”

“I thought she was in, like, first grade.”

“She was, seven years ago. Time flies, Jack. They say life is like a roll of toilet paper—the closer you get to the end, the faster it rolls.”

“That’s a lovely image, Glenn. What happened to Bing?”

The big trooper’s smile is thin enough to have been cut with a scalpel. “You first. Your visit with Jonny Bing. Word for word, or as close as you can get.”

“No problem,” says Jack, and begins his recitation.

Fifteen minutes later, Tolliver heaves another sigh. “That’s it?”

“My best recollection.”

“Ace interrogator like you, there’s still no clear indication as to who might have killed Professor Keener, or why? Assuming, for the sake of argument, it wasn’t your pal Shane.”

“It wasn’t, and no. Bing seems genuinely puzzled. Convincing on the subject of how the sudden death of his partner might wreck the company and ruin his investment. If he’s lying, he’s damn good at it. Which he might be, for all I know.”

Tolliver studies the back of his meaty hand. “Maybe.”

“My gut says the only thing he was holding back concerns Keener’s missing kid.”

“Holding back what?”

Jack shrugs. “Claimed he never heard of Keener having a child, in or out of wedlock. But he knows something. I’m going to have another go at him.”

“No,” Tolliver says. “You’re not.”

“I’m not?”

“Not unless you can commune with the dead.”

The news doesn’t exactly shock Jack, given the general mood, not to mention the overwhelming response from law enforcement. “Well, that sucks,” he says, lightly drumming his well-manicured fingers on the tabletop. “How’d it go down?”

“You know I can’t share details of an ongoing investigation.”

“Walk me through it, maybe something will pop. Something he said that I couldn’t recall at first. I’ll share.”

Tolliver favors him with a sour look. “You neglected to tell me something, in your exhaustive recollection of the interview?”

“I’m just saying.”

The big man considers. “Walk with me,” he says.

Lady Luck has had a bath, mostly seawater from the fireboats. Jack can smell the tang of salt, and under that a lingering odor of gasoline and smoke, and something worse than smoke. He’s not keen about getting the drips on his shoes—fine leather doesn’t like salt—but knows better than to complain as Tolliver stomps through the slop in his highly polished knee-high dress boots, heading along a companionway. They haven’t bothered with crime scene tape because the entire yacht is a crime scene.

As the big state cop leads the way, he says, “Surveillance cameras show you boarding this tub at 10:20 a.m., exiting by the same route at 11:10 a.m. Sound about right?”

“Yup.”

“Silly question, but was Bing alive when you left him?”

“Not a silly question, and yes, he was. Alive and more or less relaxed. Certainly unaware that something bad was about to happen.”

“No security on board, you said. Or staff.”

“Yeah, and I thought that was a little odd. But then Jonny Bing is—I mean was—more than a little odd. Wealthy enough to be eccentric, I guess. He apologized for the lack of fawning servants—his words—and said the crew had a few days off because the boat would soon be leaving for Bermuda. So, far as I could tell, he was alone. But then he could have had a dozen blondes stashed in his master bedroom, for all I know.”

Tolliver glances back. “Or a dozen disco boys.”

Jack hazards a raised eyebrow. “Is that the word on Bing?”

“Word is Jonny wasn’t particular as to gender. But you got the blond part right, apparently. And it was only one. Maybe he was cutting down.”

“So it was a lover’s tiff?”

“Nah,” Tolliver says, gesturing for Jack to step ahead of him. “Go through that door or hatch or whatever they call it, then turn left.”

“Door, I think,” says Jack, lifting his cuffs as he steps into about an inch of standing water flecked with suds of chemical foam.

Unlike Jack and Tolliver, the on-site crime team members are wearing white rubber boots and white disposable overalls. They have digital cameras set up on tripods, laser measuring devices, a chemical sniffer, all the toys. The objects of forensic interest lie on a partially melted bed—a giant round mattress, like something out of an old Hugh Hefner fantasy—set up on a hardwood pedestal. Behind the thronelike bed, the curving wall is mirrored. Narrow, vertical mirrors joined together like some giant diamond. More like cubic zirconia. Because to Jack the whole setup looks cheesy, very unlike the elegant salon where Bing had made him welcome, or the rest of the luxuriously appointed yacht. Maybe the sleaze of the playboy bedroom made it appealing, a retro thing. Different strokes.

Jonny Bing, still recognizable even in sudden, violent death, lies on his side among the pink satin sheets. Pink from the blood that was washed away before it had time to soak in. In the strobe flash of the cameras, the glittery wetness makes him seem almost alive. Almost. Bing’s left eye looks wrong.

“Shot to the head took him down,” Tolliver explains. “We think small caliber because there’s no apparent exit wound. Same with the shot to the heart—no exit. So, a classic double tap. Same deal with the boyfriend, except he got it in the forehead instead of the eye. Small entry wound, no apparent exit. Bullet bounces around, it’s like an instant Cuisinart for the brain.” The trooper gives Jack a look, almost friendly, like the old days when they were professional colleagues of a sort. “Tell that to Naomi Nantz the next time she dices up sweetmeats, what a bullet does when it rattles around inside a skull.”