"I've had numerous complaints about you over the past three months." She lifted a small stack of papers. "Would you like to see them?"

"That's okay."

"These complaints, along with your unprofessional connection to Flora Martinez, reflect poorly on the police department. I have to let you go."

David placed his badge on Major Hoffman's desk. Then he pulled out his police department gun, unloaded it, and put it and the bullets beside the badge.

He didn't blame the major. She couldn't take a chance on him. And then there was the media. They were going to love this.

"This is a real shame," Major Hoffman said sadly. "I think you could have been one of my best detectives. Too bad you're hell-bent on self-destruction."

David thought about Strata Luna's curse and the cluster effect. All excuses. The major was right; he'd brought this on himself.

"Stay in town," she told him. "We may need to bring you in for more questioning."

He nodded and backed out the door, closing it firmly behind him.

In Elise's office, David shook the contents of his desk drawers into a cardboard box.

It was amazing how much shit a person could accumulate in a short time. It looked like he'd been there for years, not months.

He regarded his loot.

Pens. Pencils. Paper. Receipts. Notebooks. Notes.

Nothing. Just stuff taking up space.

He carried the box to the trash can and dumped it.

From the bulletin board, he removed the photo of him and Elise. He stared at it a moment before tucking it into his jacket pocket.

Footsteps sounded in the hall.

The door crashed open. "I just heard," Elise said.

She was out of breath. She was pissed. At him?

"They can't do this!" she said angrily.

"Forget it, Elise. Let it go," he told her softly.

He'd felt this kind of calm a few times in his life. It was a nice feeling. As if some gentle saint had taken up residence in his body. "It's okay."

"It's not okay."

"I wasn't going to last here. We both knew that. Everybody knew that. Didn't expect it to happen this way, but does it really matter?"

He was actually surprised to find that it did matter. To him.

All along, he'd been thinking he maybe needed to get out of law enforcement completely. But now that it was happening, it seemed wrong.

And then there was Elise.

She'd been a good partner. And they were really starting to click.

"Of course it matters!" Elise said. "I can't believe you're giving up so easily. That you allowed Mason and Avery to get to you."

"Who are Mason and Avery?"

She glared at him. "Starsky and Hutch."

"Oh. Them."

He let out a heavy sigh. "Elise, this has nothing to do with them. It has nothing to do with the fact that I keep losing popularity contests around here. I'm a murder suspect."

"That's bullshit if you think this has nothing to do with your status. Do you think Mason-Starsky- would be fired over this? No! They would cover it up until the real killer was found, and then all would be forgotten. He might get a little slap on the wrist for such a personal endorsement of prostitution."

"I'm sorry." He really was. He liked Elise.

"What were you thinking? Calling a prostitute to begin with? Getting mixed up with her?"

"That's rather self-explanatory."

His answer seemed to make her uncomfortable.

"David… did your ex-wife have long dark hair?"

"Yeah, but-"

"You know what people downstairs are saying? They're saying that the anniversary of your son's death was May twelfth, the same night Flora visited your apartment."

"That's right."

"And when Flora arrived that night with her long dark hair, you flipped out and killed her, thinking she was your wife."

He stared at her for a long time as she waited for an answer, a reaction. Not Elise… that hurt. That really hurt. "Thanks for the vote of confidence," he said.

He left the office.

As he passed a trash receptacle, he paused and pulled the photo from his jacket. He held it above the container for what seemed like minutes, but in real clock time was probably only a second or two.

He'd lived a lot of lives. Even though the photo now represented the end rather than the beginning, he couldn't make himself pitch it.

He stuck it back in his pocket and kept walking.

Outside, the media was waiting.

Bad news traveled fast.