“I understand,” I said. “It would certainly sound better for the kids to say Mommie's in homicide.”

“Dexter, for Christ's sake,” she said.

“It's a natural thought, Deborah. Nephews and nieces. More little Morgans. Why not?”

She blew out a long breath. “I thought Mom was dead,” she said.

“I'm channeling her,” I said. “Through the cherry Danish.”

“Well, change the channel. What do you know about cell crystallization?”

I blinked. “Wow,” I said. “You just blew away all the competition in the Subject Changing Tournament.”

“I'm serious,” she said.

“Then I really am floored, Deb. What do you mean, cell crystallization?”

“From cold,” she said. “Cells that have crystallized from cold.”

Light flooded my brain. “Of course,” I said, “beautiful,” and somewhere deep inside small bells began to ring. Cold… Clean, pure cold and the cool knife almost sizzling as it slices into the warm flesh. Antiseptic clean coldness, the blood slowed and helpless, so absolutely right and totally necessary; cold. “Why didn't I-” I started to say. I shut up when I saw Deborah's face.

“What,” Deb demanded. “What of course?”

I shook my head. “First tell me why you want to know.”

She looked at me for a long hard moment and blew out another breath. “I think you know,” she said at last. “There's been another murder.”

“I know,” I said. “I passed it last night.”

“I heard you didn't actually pass it.”

I shrugged. Metro Dade is such a small family.

“So what did that ‘of course' mean?”

“Nothing,” I said, mildly irritated at last. “The flesh of the body just looked a little different. If it was subjected to cold-” I held out my hands. “That's all, okay? How cold?”

“Like meat-packing cold,” she said. “Why would he do that?”

Because it's beautiful, I thought. “It would slow the flow of blood,” I said.

She studied me. “Is that important?”

I took a long and perhaps slightly shaky breath. Not only could I never explain it, she would lock me up if I tried. “It's vital,” I said. For some reason I felt embarrassed.

“Why vital?”

“It, ah-I don't know. I think he has a thing about blood, Deb. Just a feeling I got from-I don't know, no evidence, you know.”

She was giving me that look again. I tried to think of something to say, but I couldn't. Glib, silver-tongued Dexter, with a dry mouth and nothing to say.

“Shit,” she said at last. “That's it? Cold slows the blood, and that's vital? Come on. What the hell good is that, Dexter?”

“I don't do ‘good' before coffee, Deborah,” I said with a heroic effort at recovery. “Just accurate.”

“Shit,” she said again. Rose brought our coffee. Deborah sipped. “Last night I got an invite to the seventy-two-hour briefing,” she said.

I clapped my hands. “Wonderful. You've arrived. What do you need me for?” Metro Dade has a policy of pulling the homicide team together approximately seventy-two hours after a murder. The investigating officer and her team talk it over with the Medical Examiner and, sometimes, someone from the prosecutor's office. It keeps everyone on the same heading. If Deborah had been invited, she was on the case.

She scowled. “I'm not good at politics, Dexter. I can feel LaGuerta pushing me out, but I can't do anything about it.”

“Is she still looking for her mystery witness?”

Deborah nodded.

“Really. Even after the new kill last night?”

“She says that proves it. Because the new cuts were all complete.”

“But they were all different,” I protested.

She shrugged.

“And you suggested-?”

Deb looked away. “I told her I thought it was a waste of time to look for a witness when it was obvious that the killer wasn't interrupted, just unsatisfied.”

“Ouch,” I said. “You really don't know anything about politics.”

“Well, goddamn it, Dex,” she said. Two old ladies at the next table glared at her. She didn't notice. “What you said made sense. It is obvious, and she's ignoring me. And even worse.”

“What could be worse than being ignored?” I said.

She blushed. “I caught a couple of the uniforms snickering at me afterward. There's a joke going around, and I'm it.” She bit her lip and looked away. “Einstein,” she said.

“I'm afraid I don't get it.”

“If my tits were brains, I'd be Einstein,” she said bitterly. I cleared my throat instead of laughing. “That's what she's spreading about me,” Deb went on. “That kind of crappy little tag sticks to you, and then they don't promote you because they think nobody will respect you with a nickname like that. Goddamn it, Dex,” she said again, “she's ruining my career.”

I felt a little surge of protective warmth. “She's an idiot.”

“Should I tell her that, Dex? Would that be political?”

Our food arrived. Rose slammed the plates down in front of us as though she had been condemned by a corrupt judge to serve breakfast to baby killers. I gave her a gigantic smile and she trudged away, muttering to herself.

I took a bite and turned my thoughts to Deborah's problem. I had to try to think of it that way, Deborah's problem. Not “those fascinating murders.” Not “that amazingly attractive MO,” or “the thing so similar to what I would love to do someday.” I had to stay uninvolved, but this was pulling at me so very hard. Even last night's dream, with its cold air. Pure coincidence, of course, but unsettling anyway.

This killer had touched the heart of what my killing was about. In the way he worked, of course, and not in his selection of victims. He had to be stopped, certainly, no question. Those poor hookers.

Still… The need for cold… So very interesting to explore sometime. Find a nice dark, narrow place…

Narrow? Where had that come from?

My dream, naturally. But that was just saying that my unconscious wanted me to think about it, wasn't it? And narrow felt right somehow. Cold and narrow-

“Refrigerated truck,” I said.

I opened my eyes. Deborah struggled mightily with a mouthful of eggs before she could speak. “What?”

“Oh, just a guess. Not a real insight, I'm afraid. But wouldn't it make sense?”

“Wouldn't what make sense?” she asked.

I looked down at my plate and frowned, trying to picture how this would work. “He wants a cold environment. To slow the blood flow, and because it's, uh-cleaner.”

“If you say so.”

“I do say so. And it has to be a narrow space-”

“Why? Where the hell did that come from, narrow?”

I chose not to hear that question. “So a refrigerated truck would fit those conditions, and it's mobile, which makes it much easier to dump the garbage afterward.”

Deborah took a bite of bagel and thought for a moment while she chewed. “So,” she said at last, and swallowed. “The killer might have access to one of these trucks? Or own one?”

“Mmm, maybe. Except the kill last night was the first that showed signs of cold.”

Deborah frowned. “So he went out and bought a truck?”

“Probably not. This is still experimental. It was probably an impulse to try cold.”

She nodded. “And we would never get lucky enough that he drives one for a living or something, right?”

I gave her my happy shark smile. “Ah, Deb. How quick you are this morning. No, I'm afraid our friend is much too smart to connect himself that way.”

Deborah sipped her coffee, put the cup down, and leaned back. “So we're looking for a stolen refrigerator truck,” she said at last.

“I'm afraid so,” I said. “But how many of those can there be in the last forty-eight hours?”

“In Miami?” She snorted. “Somebody steals one, word gets out that it's worth stealing, and suddenly every goddamn two-bit original gangsta, marielito, crackhead, and junior wise guy has to steal one, just to keep up.”

“Let's hope word isn't out yet,” I said.