He smiled. “I caught this case,” he said.

“And messed it up.”

“I may have gotten it wrong to start, but I’m still here. Doesn’t matter what I think of you. Doesn’t matter what you think of me. All that matters is that we find justice for my victim.”

25

M O drove them to the Bronx. He parked in front of the address Anthony had given him.

“You’re not going to believe this,” Mo said.

“What?”

“We’re being followed.”

Mike knew better than to turn around and be obvious about it. So he sat and waited.

“Blue four-door Chevy double-parked down at the end of the block. Two guys, both wearing Yankee caps and sunglasses.”

Last night this street had been teeming with people. Now there was practically nobody. Those who were there either slept on a stoop or moved with amazing lethargy, legs congealed together, arms melted against their sides. Mike half expected a patch of tumbleweed to blow through the middle of the street.

“You go in,” Mo said. “I got a friend. I’ll give him the license plate and see what he comes up with.”

Mike nodded. He got out of the car, trying to be subtle about checking out the car. He barely saw it, but he didn’t want to take the chance of looking again. He headed toward the door. There was an industrial-gray metal door with the words CLUB JAGUAR on it. Mike pressed the button. The front door buzzed and he pushed it open.

The walls were done up in a bright yellow usually associated with McDonald’s or the children’s ward at a trying-too-hard hospital. There was a bulletin board on the right blanketed with sign-up sheets for counseling, for music lessons, for book discussion groups, for therapy groups for drug addicts, alcoholics, the physically and mentally abused. Several flyers were looking for someone to share an apartment and you could tear off the phone number at the bottom. Someone was selling a couch for a hundred bucks. Another person was trying to unload guitar amps.

He moved past the board to the front desk. A young woman with a nose ring looked up and said, “Can I help you?”

He had the photograph of Adam in his hand. “Have you seen this boy?” He put the picture down in front of her.

“I’m just the receptionist,” she said.

“Receptionists have eyes. I asked if you’ve seen him.”

“I can’t talk about our clients.”

“I’m not asking you to talk about them. I’m asking you if you’ve seen him.”

Her lips went thin. He could see now that she also had piercings in the vicinity of her mouth. She stayed still and looked up at him. This, he realized, was going nowhere.

“Can I speak to whoever’s in charge?”

“That would be Rosemary.”

“Great. Can I speak to her?”

The well-pierced receptionist picked up a phone. She covered the mouthpiece and mumbled into it. Ten seconds later she smiled at him and said, “Miss McDevitt will see you now. Third door on the right.”

Mike wasn’t sure what he expected, but Rosemary McDevitt was a surprise. She was young, petite and had that sort of raw sensuality that made you think of a puma. She had a purple streak in her dark hair and a tattoo that sneaked up her shoulder and onto her neck. Her top was just a black leather vest, no sleeves. Her arms were toned and she had what looked like leather bands around her biceps.

She stood and smiled and stuck out her hand. “Welcome.”

He shook the hand.

“How can I help you?

“My name is Mike Baye.”

“Hi, Mike.”

“Uh, hi. I’m looking for my son.”

He stood close to her. Mike was five ten and he had a little over half a foot on this woman. Rosemary McDevitt looked at Adam’s photograph. Her expression gave away nothing.

“Do you know him?” Mike asked.

“You know I can’t answer that.”

She tried to hand the picture back to him, but Mike didn’t take it. Aggressive tactics hadn’t gotten him much, so he bit down, took a breath.

“I’m not asking you to betray confidences-”

“Well, yeah, Mike, you are.” She smiled sweetly. “That’s exactly what you’re asking me to do.”

“I’m just trying to find my son. That’s all.”

She spread her arms. “Does this look like a lost and found?”

“He’s missing.”

“This place is a sanctuary, Mike, you know what I’m saying? Kids come here to escape their parents.”

“I’m worried he might be in danger. He went out without telling anyone. He came here last night-”

“Whoa.” She held up a hand to signal for him to stop.

“What?”

“He came here last night. That’s what you said, Mike, right?”

“Right.”

Her eyes narrowed. “How do you know that, Mike?”

The constant use of his name was grating.

“Pardon me?”

“How do you know your son came here?”

“That’s really not important.”

She smiled and stepped back. “Sure it is.”

He needed a subject change. His eyes took in the room. “What is this place anyway?”

“We’re a bit of a hybrid.” Rosemary gave him one more look to let him know that she knew what he was trying to do with the question. “Think teen center but with a modern twist.”

“In what way?

“Do you remember those midnight basketball programs?”

“In the nineties, right. Trying to keep the kids off the streets.”

“Exactly. I won’t go into if they worked or not, but the thing is, the programs were geared toward poor, inner-city kids-and to some, there was clearly a racist overtone. I mean, basketball in the middle of the city?”

“And you guys are different?”

“First off, we don’t cater strictly to the poor. This may sound somewhat right wing, but I’m not sure we’re the best source to help the African American or inner-city teens. They need to do that within their own community. And in the long run, I’m not sure you can stop the temptations with something like this. They need to see that their way out isn’t with a gun or drugs, and I doubt a game of basketball will do that.”

A group of boys-cum-men shuffled by her office, all duded out in goth black accessorized with a variety of items in the chain-n-stud family. The pants had huge cuffs and you couldn’t see their shoes.

“Hey, Rosemary.”

“Hey, guys.”

They kept walking. Rosemary turned back to Mike. “Where do you live?”

“ New Jersey.”

“The suburbs, right?”

“Right.”

“Teens from your town. How do they get in trouble?”

“I don’t know. Drugs, drinking.”

“Right. They want to party. They think they’re bored-maybe they are, who knows?-and they want to go out and get high and go to clubs and flirt and all that stuff. They don’t want to play basketball. So that’s what we do here.”

“You get them high?”

“Not like you think. Come on, I’ll show you.”

She started down the bright yellow corridor. He stayed by her side. She walked with her shoulders back and head high. The key was in her hand. She unlocked a door and started down the stairs. Mike followed.

It was a nightclub or disco or whatever you call them nowadays. It had the cushioned benches and round tables that lit up and the low stools. There was a DJ booth and a wooden floor, no mirrored ball but a bunch of colored lights that swirled in patterns. The words CLUB JAGUAR were spray-painted graffiti style against a back wall.

“This is what teens want,” Rosemary McDevitt said. “A place to blow off steam. To party and hang with friends. We don’t serve alcohol, but we serve virgin drinks that look like alcohol. We have good-looking bartenders and waitresses. We do what the best clubs do. But the key is, we keep them safe. Do you understand? Kids like your son drive in and try to get fake IDs. They want to buy drugs or find a way to get alcohol even though they are underage. We are trying to prevent that by channeling it in a healthier way.”

"With this place?”

“In part. We also offer counseling, if they need that. We offer book clubs and therapy groups and we have a room with Xbox and Playsta- tion 3 and all the rest of what you often associate with a teen center. But this place is the key. This place is what makes us, pardon the teenage vernacular, cool.”