Due to legal and liability requirements, we are unable to provide call-log records for the above-referenced number until in receipt of an appropriate court order. Once in receipt of such order, we will be happy to comply.

Sincerely,Michael TomanOperations Manager

Pike said, She had two conversations with the highlighted number on the day she was murdered.

Joe. Bastilla was trying to identify the caller.

Looks that way. Looks like they were trying to identify someone else, too.

Pike drew out a folder that was thick with documents about Wilts, but none of the reports and files were anything I expected. This file was labeled FBI, and contained a letter from Marx to the FBI director in Washington, D.C. It was marked PERSONAL & CONFIDENTIAL. A short list of phone numbers was attached, including the number that had been highlighted in yellow.

This letter will serve as my official request that your agency obtain the proper court instruction for, and initiate and maintain, recorded phone monitors on the attached Los Angeles area code phone numbers, and do so independent of and without the knowledge of my own agency, the Los Angeles Police Department, or any other local personnel, officials, or local judicial members. As Councilman Nobel Wilts is believed to have knowledge of or possibly have committed multiple homicides over a seven-year period, I cannot stress enough the need for utmost security in this matter.

I stared at the page, but the words had lost focus. I pushed past a growing sense of frustration and checked the date. Marx had faxed his request to the head of the FBI only eight days ago two days before he told the world that Lionel Byrd had committed the murders.

I said, Joe.

I gave him the page.

They aren't protecting Wilts. They're investigating him. It's an active investigation.

We were reading through the rest of the files when the first car arrived. They didn't scream up Code Three with the lights and sirens, and SWAT didn't rappel from hovering choppers. Gravel crunched outside my door, followed by the soft squeak of brakes.

Pike went to the window.

It's Marx.

The Inner Circle had arrived.

Chapter 35

MARX AND Munson unfolded from his Lexus. Bastilla eased up from the opposite direction with a black-and-white Metro car behind her. They saw me at the same time, but no one shouted or tried to knock me down.

Marx was calm, but somehow larger, as if swollen with tension.

I said, You heartless sonofabitch. You told those people it was over.

Munson flicked his fingers, telling me to move out of the door.

Let's go in, Cole. We need to have a little talk.

Do you have a warrant?

Bastilla said, You're in no position. Act like an adult.

The uniforms stayed in their car, but the rest of them came inside. Marx glanced at Pike, then frowned at the files and murder books spread over the table. He told Bastilla to gather their stuff, then frowned at me.