Then I heard a whisper from the other side.

“Kōhai.”

I knew it was a trick. Connor said he was at the airport, so it had to be a trick—

“Perhaps I can be of assistance, kōhai.”

Those were the words he had used before, at the start of the case. I was confused to hear them.

“Open the fucking door, kōhai.”

It was Connor. I reached up and opened the door. He slipped into the room, bent over. He was dragging something blue: a Kevlar vest. I said, “I thought you were—“

He shook his head, and whispered, “Knew they must be here. Had to be. I’ve been waiting in the car in the alley behind the house. How many are there in front?”

“I think, five. Maybe more.”

He nodded.

The accented voice on the phone said, “Lieutenant? You are there? Lieutenant?”

I held the receiver away from my ear so Connor could listen while I talked. “I’m here,” I said.

On the TV, there was a loud witch’s cackle.

“Lieutenant, I hear something with you.”

“It’s just Sleeping Beauty,” I said.

“What? Sreeping Booty?” the voice said, puzzled. “What is this?”

“Television,” I said. “It’s the television.”

Now I heard whispers at the other end of the line. The rush of a car going by on the street. It reminded me that the men were in an exposed position outside. Standing there on a residential street lined with apartment buildings on both sides. Lots of windows. People that might look out at any time. Or people walking by. The men would have to move quickly.

Perhaps they already were.

Connor was tugging at my jacket. Signaling me to undress. I slid out of my coat as I spoke into the phone.

“All right,” I said. “What do you want me to do?”

“You bring tape to us.”

I looked at Connor. He nodded. Yes.

“All right,” I said. “But first get your people back.”

“I am sorry?”

Connor made a fist. His face turned to a snarl. He wanted me to be angry. He covered the phone and whispered in my ear. A Japanese phrase.

“Pay attention!” I said. “Yoku kike!”

At the other end, there was a grunt. Surprise.

“Wakatta. The men come away. And now, you come, Lieutenant.”

“Okay,” I said. “I’m coming.”

I hung up the phone.

Connor whispered, “Thirty seconds,” and disappeared out the front door. I was still buttoning up my shirt around the vest. Kevlar is bulky and hot. Immediately I started to sweat.

I waited thirty seconds, staring at the face of my watch. Watching the hand go around. And then I went outside.

Someone had turned the lights out in the hallway. I tripped over a body. I got to my feet, and looked at a slender Asian face. It was just a kid, surprisingly young. A teenager. He was unconscious, breathing shallowly.

I moved slowly down the stairs.

There wasn’t anybody on the second-floor landing. I kept going down. I heard canned laughter from a television, behind one of the doors on the second floor. A voice said, “So tell us, where did you go on this first date?”

I continued down to the ground floor. The front door of the apartment building was glass. I looked out and saw only parked cars, and a hedge. A short section of lawn in front of the building. The men and the cars were somewhere off to the left.

I waited. I took a breath. My heart was pounding. I didn’t want to go out there, but all I could think was to get them away from my daughter. To move the action away from my—

I stepped out into the night.

The air was cold on my sweating face and neck.

I took two steps forward.

Now I could see the men. They stood about ten meters away, beside their cars. I counted four men. One of them waved to me, beckoning me over. I hesitated.

Where were the others?

I couldn’t see anybody except the men by the cars. They waved again, beckoning me. I started toward them when suddenly a heavy thumping blow from behind knocked me flat onto my face on the wet grass.

It was a moment before I realized what had happened.

I had been shot in the back.

And then the gunfire erupted all around me. Automatic weapons. The street was lit up like lightning from the gunfire. The sound echoed off the apartment buildings on both sides of the street. Glass was shattering. I heard people shouting all around me. More gunfire. I heard the sound of ignitions, cars roaring down the street past me. Almost immediately there was the sound of police sirens and tires squealing, and the glare of searchlights. I stayed where I was, face down on the grass. I felt like I was there for about an hour. Then I realized that the shouts now were all in English.

Finally someone came and crouched over me and said, “Don’t move, Lieutenant. Let me look first.” I recognized Connor’s voice. His hand touched my back, probing. Then he said, “Can you turn over, Lieutenant?”

I turned over.

Standing in the harsh light of the searchlights, Connor looked down at me. “They didn’t penetrate,” he said. “But you’re going to have a hell of a sore back tomorrow.”

He helped me to my feet.

I looked back to see the man who had shot me. But there was nobody there: just a few shell casings, glinting dull yellow in the green grass, by the front door.

Third Day

1

The headline read:

The story reported that Peter Smith, an L.A.P.D. Special Services officer, was the target of a vicious grudge attack by an Orange County gang known as the Bitch Killers. Lieutenant Smith had been shot twice before backup police units arrived on the scene to disperse the attacking youths. None of the suspects had been apprehended alive. But two had been killed in the shooting.

I read the papers in the bathtub, soaking my aching back. I had two large, ugly bruises on either side of my spine. It hurt to breathe.

I had sent Michelle to stay with my mother in San Diego for the weekend, until things were sorted out. Elaine had driven her down, late last night.

I continued reading.

According to the story, the Bitch Killers was thought to be the same gang that had walked up to a black two-year-old boy, Rodney Howard, and shot the child in the head while he was playing on his tricycle in the front yard of his Inglewood home a week earlier. That incident was rumored to be an initiation into the gang, and the viciousness of it had touched off a furor about whether the L.A.P.D. was able to handle gang violence in southern California.

There were a lot of reporters outside my door again, but I wasn’t talking to any of them. The phone rang constantly, but I let the answering machine take it. I just sat in the tub, and tried to decide what to do.

In the middle of the morning I called Ken Shubik at the Times.

“I wondered when you’d check in,” he said. “You must be pleased.”

“About what?”

“About being alive,” Ken said. “These kids are murder.”

“You mean the Vietnamese kids last night?” I said. “They spoke Japanese.”

“No.”

“Yes, Ken.”

“We didn’t get that story right?”

“Not really.”

“That explains it,” he said.

“Explains what?”

“That was the Weasel’s story. And the Weasel is in bad odor today. There’s even talk of firing him. Nobody can figure it out, but something’s happening around here,” he said. “Somebody high in editorial all of a sudden has a bug up his ass about Japan. Anyway, we’re starting a series investigating Japanese corporations in America.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Of course you’d never know it from today’s paper. You see the business section?”