Like the first victim, Repko was white, educated, and professional. She had recently earned an MA in political science from USC, after which she was hired by a downtown political consulting firm called Leverage Associates. Sometime between eleven P.M. and two A.M. thirty-six days before Lionel Byrd's body was discovered, she was struck from behind and suffocated by having a plastic garbage bag held over her head. This event occurred behind a strip mall two blocks from her apartment on the outskirts of Hancock Park, just south of Melrose Avenue. She was survived by her parents and three brothers, all of whom were heartbroken by the news of her death.

I pushed the articles aside, got a bottle of water, and went out onto my deck. The wind had died sometime during the night, and now two red-tailed hawks floated overhead. They had been down with the wind, but now they were up. They appeared to be hunting, but maybe they just enjoyed being in the sky. Maybe, for them, there was no difference.

Thirty yards away, my neighbors were out on their own deck, reading the morning paper. They waved when they saw me and I waved back. I wondered if they were reading about Byrd.

I drank some of the water, then stretched through the traditional twelve sun salutes from the hatha yoga. My neighbor Grace shouted across the hillside.

Do it naked!

Her husband laughed.

The yoga flowed into a tae kwon do kata. I kicked and punched with focus from one side of the deck to the other, running one kata into the next, not the classic Korean forms, but combinations I had created: a little wing chun, a little krav maga, a little shen chuan. I moved through all three planes of space, working with greater intensity until sweat splattered the boards like rain and the pictures of dead people had faded. When I finished, Grace jumped to her feet and applauded.

I shouted, Your turn. Naked.

She lifted her T-shirt, flashing her breasts. Her husband laughed again.

These neighbors are something.

I drank the rest of the water, then went back inside as the phone rang. It was Alan Levy's assistant.

Mr. Cole?

Did Alan see the news about Lionel Byrd?

Yes, sir. He'd like you to bring by your file at ten if that time works for you.

I told him the time worked fine, then returned to my notes. I combined the information I learned from Lindo and the Times with the facts I found online, then organized it into a chart:

1 Frostokovich wht 10/2 strngld dwntn (Marx!)

2 Evansfield blk 9/28 stab Brtwd jog (?)

3 Morrow blk 10/7 blntfc Hywd pros (?)

4 Trinh asn 9/23 stab Slvrlk pros (?)

5 Bennett wht 10/3 blntfc Slvrlk pros (Crimmens)

6 Escondido lat 10/9 fire StCty hmls (?)

7 Repko wht 7/26 suff HanPk conslt. (?)

When you study these things you look for patterns, but patterns were in short supply.