He tried to bring Eve’s face to mind—her looking up at him, searching his eyes in that way of hers. But instead he kept picturing Marilyn—the peaked brows, those heavy-lidded eyes, the beauty spot, her fleshy lips. He could hear her breathy voice. He could see the vampish way she smoothed down her dress at her hips. He saw that sad, shattered look in her eyes that the soft-focus lens tried to hide.

He shook his head. He was hopeless. His was a soul lost. He couldn’t at this moment conjure up the slightest shred of faith—even for a woman like Eve, a woman he thought he could fall for.

For a few seconds he stood with his eyes closed, listening to the sound of the breakers, inhaling the salty air—and then he cursed himself and slipped back up the street the way he’d come.

THE PARKING ATTENDANT rapped on the driver’s-side window with the butt of his silver flashlight. “Hey, boss,” the man said. “You’re not supposed to be here. You have to pay.”

Keegan pulled himself up behind the wheel and fumbled to pull out his wallet. He cranked down the window and passed the man a twenty-dollar bill. “Here,” he said. “This will cover it. Keep the change.”

The attendant tipped his Dodgers cap back a little on his head, wary of this windfall. He looked down at the money a second or two before he folded it and slipped it into the pocket of his shirt. “Sure thing, boss,” he said. “Sorry to wake you.”

Keegan began to crank the window back up, but he stopped. “Oh, and do me a favor, buddy,” he said. “Wake me up in an hour?”

“Will do,” the man said. He tapped the bill of his cap with his flashlight, a kind of salute, and whistled some tune as he headed over to his shack.

WHEN KEEGAN GOT to Pershing Square, Lusk’s truck was already parked with two wheels up on the sidewalk and the tailgate open. Lusk had his leather work gloves on and was lifting stacks of papers and magazines down to the sidewalk by their twine bindings. The sky farther down Hill Street was edging towards a lighter shade of gray. It would be another half-hour before the streetlamps flickered off, and the morning rush of commuters began.

Keegan paused in the alcove of the Owl drugstore. Someone must have slept there; the space smelled of liquor and urine. He stood watching a minute or two to make sure the coast was clear. His good Nikon camera, the one he kept locked in the office, the one with the expensive telephoto lens, dangled from the leather strap wrapped around his fist.