“That’s the theory.”

“It might work.” Jazz shrugged. “But Hat-Dog is cold-blooded. There’s every chance he got your call and rolled over and slept like a drunk baby.”

“We’re just using everything in our arsenal.”

“Who’s conducting the actual interrogations?” Jazz asked.

Without a moment’s hesitation, Morales spoke up. “I am. Along with a male NYPD detective. This guy has issues with both sexes. We’re going to play off of that.”

“I want to be in the room, too.”

“Not a chance in hell,” Montgomery pronounced, in a tone that said he was used to having even jaded New Yorkers obey him. “Not risking it, for one thing. For another thing, you’re like a celebrity. These guys see you, recognize you, who knows what it’s gonna do to the interrogation?” Before Jazz could protest, he held up a hand. “You watch with the rest of us through the glass. If you have a problem with it, don’t even bother leaving the hotel tomorrow. That’s it.”

Jazz appealed to Morales, hoping for an override, but the special agent shook her head. “It’s the right call, Jasper. You know it.”

“Fine. Give me whatever you have on these suspects. I’ll look at it all tonight. For now, I need some sleep.” He hadn’t even realized how tired he was until the words were out of his mouth. But something like fifteen hours ago, he’d been sitting on the floor of his father’s old room in the Nod, talking to Connie on the phone. He’d done so much since then that he couldn’t sort through it yet.

“Yeah, sure. Let me take you to the hotel,” Hughes offered.

Hughes ended up staying with Jazz at the hotel. Hat-Dog knew that Jazz was involved in the investigation, after all, and the last thing the task force needed was for Billy Dent’s kid to be killed while assisting on the case. The detective sacked out on a rollaway cot while Jazz slipped into the bathroom for some privacy while calling Connie.

But Connie didn’t answer. Jazz wondered if maybe her dad had confiscated her phone again. He left her a quick voice mail, ending with, “Miss you. I love you.” As he hung up, he wondered about that. When had it become so easy to say “I love you”? At first, he had stuttered and struggled to say it in person. Now he could toss it out to voice mail. Was that a good thing or a bad thing? It could go either way, he realized. It could be that the words passed so effortlessly through his lips because he meant them deeply and truly.

Or it could be that he didn’t mean them at all. And that—like all the lies we tell ourselves—it was easy to repeat.

He crawled into bed. It was better this way, he knew, the two of them separated. With Connie back in the Nod, it was safe for Jazz to lust after her, to yearn for her, to be weak for her. No one could be hurt if they were apart. And that was good.

Hughes’s snores already filled the room. Even though it was still relatively early and he was slightly horny from the mere thought of Connie, Jazz drifted right off to sleep.

CHAPTER 29

Connie stared at her cell phone. A message. From Jazz. She couldn’t believe she had just let her boyfriend go to voice mail as she watched.

But she knew what would have happened if she’d answered. He would have known something was up, the way he always knew something was up. That bizarre, slightly creepy sixth sense he had. He could read your mind by reading between the lines. And she would have told him about the texts and then he would have warned her off—It’s too dangerous, Con! Call G. William!—and Connie wasn’t about to be waved off. Not this time.

I can do this. I can help. I saved Jazz from the Impressionist. I found the Ugly J clue in Brooklyn. I. Can. Do. This.

She would be careful. She would be more than careful; she would be super-careful. And she would let Howie in on it, so that someone knew what was going on, where she was headed…. That was the responsible way to handle it. Almost eighteen, almost a legal adult. Who could tell her not to handle this?

i kno something abt ur boyfriend

Simple as that. That made it Connie’s business to find out.

And maybe…

The little voice tickled at the back of her brain, right on the edge of her thoughts. She chased it away, but she knew what it wanted to say.

And maybe you get on TV doing this. It’s like a reality show, but better because it really is real. And maybe…

Stop it.

And maybe that’s how you get noticed and get famous.

The voice, having had its say, went silent, and Connie pretended she’d never heard it in the first place.

Convincing her parents to let her out of the house would be nearly impossible, Connie knew. But the mystery texter had given her her first instruction—go 2 where it all began—and Connie was damn sure that whatever “it” was, it hadn’t begun in her bedroom, where absolutely nothing remotely interesting or important had ever happened.

It was getting late, but Howie would most likely still be awake, so she called him. He answered on the fourth ring, just as she had resigned herself to being sent to voice mail.

“Sorta busy here, Connie,” he said brusquely.

She glanced at her clock. It was almost eleven at night. “Doing what? Masturbating?”

“Jeez!” he exploded. “No! Gross! I don’t do that. I’m saving myself for that special someone, and that special someone is not me.”

“Howie, you’d jerk it if you saw your mom’s bra in the dryer.”

“I would not. I so totally would not. My mom’s bras are like, like grandmother bras, okay? Strictly utilitarian. Functional. Not like that sexy lacy number you wore last week when we all went to Grasser’s for burgers.”

Connie felt herself blush. “Howie! You peeked!”

“If you wear a white shirt with a red bra underneath, you’re just asking for it. I’m sorry, but in this isolated instance, you really, really can’t blame me.”

Connie made a mental note to watch what she wore around Howie. She liked being sexy and looking good, but she didn’t want one of her best friends thinking about her bras. Ew.

“In any event,” Howie went on, “I’m busy, doing the exact opposite of playing with myself, for your information.”

“What’s the opposite of that?”

“Trying to get Jazz’s aunt into bed,” Howie said with a matter-of-factness that was both hilarious and horrifying.

“You’re doing what?”

“She’s hot,” Howie said. “Older-lady hot, you know? Cougar-y? MILF-y? Plus, Jazz doesn’t want this to happen, so she’s got that whole ‘forbidden fruit’ thing going for her, too. I just can’t resist that. I’m, like, a slave to my passions and stuff.”

Connie’s head spun. Howie… and Jazz’s aunt? Billy Dent’s sister? “How the hell did this happen?”

“Well, nothing has happened yet. But I’m over here helping her get the crazy racist lady to sleep and I’m using all my best moves. Trust me, this is happening. The ladies always eventually succumb to Howie Gersten.”

“When has anyone ever succumbed to you?”

“The succumbing part is strictly theoretical at this point,” he admitted. “But I have high hopes.”

“If you can stop thinking with the contents of your jock strap for a second, I need your help.”

“Yes,” Howie said solemnly, “I can teach you how to be more ‘street.’ ”

“For God’s sake…”

“Or is it ‘urban’? I can’t remember. Anyway, I can teach you, grasshopper. Or hip-hopper.”

“Be serious for just a minute. I need help in your area of expertise.” Before Howie could say “pleasing women of all ages,” she pressed on. “I need to sneak out of my house.”