Alan. This is a surprise.

A sleek Mercedes convertible was parked off the road behind him, but Alan didn't look sleek. He looked awkward and worried, and his bulging frog eyes flickered as if he was nervous.

I hope you don't mind, me dropping in like this. I thought we could speak more freely outside of the office.

This, from a man who made his living as a criminal defense attorney having the most private conversations in the world.

I stepped back to let him in. Levy noticed my loft, then stared out through the sliders into the canyon. The morning haze filled the house with a milky glare.

Hey, this is nice. You're very private up here.

What's up, Alan? I have to leave for an appointment.

He turned from the view and put his hands in his pockets like he didn't know what else to do with them.

Angel Tomaso was murdered.

I know.

I know you know. The police found you with the body.

Are you here as an attorney, Alan? Are they going to charge me?

No, nothing like that, but

He managed to look pathetic. I had never seen Alan Levy look pathetic before, but then he suddenly frowned.

Tomaso was murdered. Tell me a young man found himself in a relationship that resulted in murder, I would say that sort of thing happens all the time. But not this particular young man. Not at this particular time. Maybe you were right about there being more to this than the pictures recovered with Byrd.

The frog eyes blinked.

Tell me what's going on.

Marx is still working the homicides.

Levy's eyebrows arched in surprise.

But Marx closed the case. He shut down the task force.

Marx kept his top people on, what they call his inner circle. The task force might have been officially shut down, but Marx is still kicking rocks. The problem is, I'm not sure whether he's trying to find evidence or hide it.

I told him how Marx was connected to Leverage and how he had interfered with the Repko investigation even before Byrd's body was found. When I described the video disk of Debra Repko's murder, Levy grew irritated and stopped me.

What did they do with it?

No one knows. Marx took it away from the CGI house before the work was finished. It's possible he sent it to the FBI lab, but that's only a guess.

So the FBI has it?

I don't know where it is, Alan. For all I know, Marx is using it as a bookmark. Either way, it was probably garbage like SID said.

Levy told me to go on, and I did, anxious to finish so I could leave for my meeting with Maldenado. When I told Levy about Ivy Casik, he leaned forward.

This woman claims someone was writing a book about Lionel Byrd?

She's claiming Byrd told her someone was writing a book about him. He could have made it up.