"Cheeto?" Vicki offered, discouraged, pointing the fragrant end of the bag to Reheema. "It's lunch. And dinner."

Reheema didn't say anything.

"You're not feelin' the Cheetos?"

Reheema didn't smile.

"You didn't want the Doritos either. You off carbs, too?"

"No, just food that glows in the dark."

"Seems unduly restrictive." Vicki brushed orange dust off the front of her parka. She had consumed one 64-ounce Wawa coffee, and six hundred thousand calories. The Sunbird reeked of Cigar-Smoke-in-a-Can and her Master Plan sucked. Vicki scanned the cars parked in front of the house, but they were covered with snow mounded like sugar frosting. "Wonder which car is Browning's. They use the crappy ones for work, right? So which is the crappiest?"

"Ours."

Vicki eyed Browning's row house, her frustration intensifying. "This isn't going well, none of it. You know, I feel like your neighborhood is right on the brink of something. Like it could go either way, up or down, depending on what happens on Cater. You know what I mean?"

Reheema didn't say anything.

"The crack dealers get established in the hole, making addicts, then they buy a house and sell crack in it, making more crack addicts, and there goes a perfectly fine neighborhood, with law-abiding people and Christmas wreaths. And if that happens all over the city, pretty soon the city is lost. And city after city, it happens all over."

Reheema still didn't reply.

"That's why I want to shut them down, get them behind bars. Not only because of Morty and your mother, but because we can actually save your neighborhood."

"It's not my neighborhood," Reheema said, finally. "You keep saying Devil's Corner is my neighborhood, and it's not. I told you, I'm only living there until I sell."

"It's my dad's old neighborhood."

"Oh, I get it. That's why you care." Reheema snorted. "You're doing it for your daddy. To get Daddy's approval."

"No. He hated it there."

Reheema faced Vicki, her sunglasses masking her eyes. "Then why do you care?"

"Why don't you?" Vicki asked, glad for some reason that she was wearing sunglasses, too. Suddenly, something caught her attention at Browning's house. The front door was opening. She grabbed the camera and snapped a photo as a man emerged. But it wasn't Mr. Black Leather, it was Eagles Coat. "Here's the other go-between. So they take turns. Alternate, like last time."

"So there's two on a shift," Reheema said, from behind the binoculars. "And two shifts a day, maybe three. I don't see anybody at the door."

"Me, neither." Vicki took a photo anyway, then lowered the camera and watched Eagles Coat walk to the Navigator, get in, pull out of the space, and take off. This time she got a clear shot of the license plate and lowered the camera. She knew cops who could run the plate for her, and maybe Dan would have an idea. Then she realized she'd gone the whole day without thinking about him; she'd even left her phone turned off. She was in Married Man Rehab.

Reheema twisted on the ignition, but Vicki raised a palm.

"Don't follow him. We know where he's going. Probably back to Cater, if the pattern is the same, right?"

"Probably."

"So he's just the runner, he brings the crack back and forth." Vicki was thinking out loud, which was okay to do in front of someone who barely liked you, and vice versa. "He's not the one we really want."

"What do you mean?"

"This is Jamal Browning's house, where he brings the stuff and bags it for sale. Odds are he doesn't live here, right? You tell me, you're the bad-guy expert." Vicki thought back to what she knew about the crack trade. "I mean, I know that most drug dealers have a separate car for business. Do they have more than one address, too?"

"Yeah. Browning won't live here. This is where he does his business."

"That's what I thought." Vicki flashed on the unopened bills of Jackson's. "And where would he keep his supply? Here?"

"Probably."

"Not at his house."

"Not usually. The idea is to keep that clean."

"And he'd keep some at a stash house, like his girlfriend's. Shayla Jackson." Vicki couldn't put the memory of the murdered Jackson out of her mind. Or Morty. "I want to get to Browning, not his delivery boy. I want to understand this whole organization, then I can bring it down."

"You serious?" Reheema slid off her sunglasses, her gaze dead even. "This could be big, an operation this size, this much money, two guys on each shift, three shifts. Plus two lookouts on three shifts, and the dealer, three of them twenty-four/seven?" She rattled it off like the business student she used to be. "Probably got three cooks and coupla baggers. And an army of young 'uns like the ones you ran into, Jay and Teeg. Helpers. Runners. Gofers. That's a lotta personnel, and this might not be Browning's only operation."

Okay, I knew that. "Then that's all on the Master Plan."

"Browning might even be a connect."

"Meaning the one who deals weight?" Vicki asked, but it wasn't a question. The answer was the bricks in Jackson's house. "He might be. If he is, he's going down."

"Why? He's not the one who killed your partner. You know who killed your partner, those kids did."

"That's right, but they were just kids. Pawns." Vicki thought a minute. "It's all of a piece. I'm gonna find and indict those kids, but that won't go far enough. This month it's Morty, but next month it'll be another agent, or a cop, or an AUSA. This has to stop."

Reheema smiled crookedly. "What got into you?"

"It's time to change things, to get things right. I'm tired of the way things are. And I'm tired of eating Cheetos and crushing on the wrong guy." Vicki sensed there was a connection, but she had no idea what it was. She pointed at Browning's house. "Either Browning's in that house and he's got to come out. Or he's coming here. Or he's not in there at all and he won't be coming anytime soon."

"Somebody's in there."

"So let's see who comes out, and see if he looks like Browning, the guy in the photo on Shayla Jackson's dresser. If it's him, wherever he goes, we follow him." Vicki liked it the more she thought about it. "We don't take any unnecessary chances. We just take a little ride and a few pictures. No big deal."

"We got the car for it." Reheema laughed, her features relaxing into a beautiful smile, for the first time since they'd met.

"So, you wanna?"

"Why not?" Reheema settled back into the driver's seat, facing the house.

"Goody." Vicki did the same, newly content in the passenger seat, and after a minute, Reheema asked:

"So, who's the wrong guy?"

TWENTY-EIGHT

"GO!" Vicki couldn't help shouting. It was almost midnight and there was finally activity at Browning's house. The front door opened, barely visible in the streetlight, and two men emerged, mere shadow figures.

"Not yet. I'll start the engine after they're in their car. Then they won't hear it."

"Of course. Right. Good thinking. That's what I meant, too."

"Calm down, girl." Reheema laughed softly

"I can't." Vicki fumbled to find the camera, shivering with cold and excitement, as the two men walked down the steps in front of the row house. It was impossible to tell if either of them was Browning. "Damn!"

"Don't take a picture."

"I won't use the flash." Vicki disabled the flash and used the telephoto to see the men more clearly. It was absurd in the dark, but she took three photos anyway. They were both about average height and wore thick dark coats and dark knit caps, pulled low over their foreheads. "What is it with the knit caps?"

"Another black culture question? It's cold out."

"Damn it to hell! I can't see their faces." Vicki still couldn't tell if either was Browning and she gave up trying, for now.