“Anton reached out to Faye Simpson about twenty minutes ago,” Frank said. “He wants to take her out to lunch so he can pick her brain on—and I’m quoting here—why women are such ungrateful bitches.”

Sebastian didn’t have to ask how Frank had found out about the call, nor did he need to ask about the contents of the Simpson woman’s conversation with Anton. Faye Simpson’s phone, like that of every other employee they brought into their blood world, was bugged, along with the employee apartments and every single thing inside them.

“Lunch,” Sebastian said. “Should I call the press conference, or are you going to take care of that?”

“Reason I’m calling you is to figure out coverage.”

Which had become a major problem and a major headache since the house explosion.

Three of Ron’s men had died in the explosion, and there was no way to cover up that fact. Their remains would be identified at some point, so it was best for Ron to get ahead of the problem—and he did, using a story they had locked down in the event something catastrophic happened. He called a detective on the Blood Unit, Mark Alves, and explained that he had received a credible tip on his toll-free hotline about a sixteen-year-old carrier named Jonathan King, who had been abducted five months ago in Orange County. King, the caller said, was in a home in Cudahy. Ron had men in the area, working on an unrelated security matter, and he sent them to check out the lead. When they approached the house, Ron’s team leader, Marty Straton, heard what he thought were gunshots, and decided to enter the premises. That was the last word he’d received from Marty.

But an explosion in a residential area that had left three dead and many injured and hundreds of thousands of dollars in property damage was another matter. A reporter had a source who had confirmed the explosion wasn’t caused by some amateur junkie chemists trying to make meth but by “a sophisticated improvised explosive device utilizing fertilizer—the kind of IED used by terrorists.” The terrorism angle was about to invite even more scrutiny, on a federal level, to Ron and his employees, who were already under the microscope, being questioned, possibly even watched. Ron had to divert his resources away from blood world matters until things quieted down. It was the safe play for everyone involved.

Frank said, “You know the guys Ron gave us, the ones who aren’t on the books?”

“The guys we have keeping an eye on the Celebrity Center.”

“Right. I say we divert them from the Center and have them follow Anton for the day, see if anything develops. I can remotely turn Faye’s phone into a listening device. My tablet has all the software I need to listen in. All I need is to be somewhere in a radius of seven hundred and fifty feet.”

“Here’s an idea: how about turning the dial down on the paranoia?”