“Sheffield’s place is just ahead of us.” DeMarco motioned to a dormered Old Quarter house on the right as he turned a corner in their Land Rover. “When I drove him over from the airport, the boss was in a pretty decent mood. Bushed, you know, but kidding with Wade and Ackerman in the backseat about it being a fancier Motel 6 than the one where he usually grabs a bed.” He shook his head. “I never would have thought I’d be here again tonight, bringing the kind of news we’ve got.”

Nimec glanced at him across the front seat.

“There’s no good time for bad news,” he said. “When things hit us over the head, we cope. Timing isn’t part of the bargain.”

DeMarco checked his mirrors and pulled to the curb. It was almost ten o’clock at night, twenty minutes having passed since he’d met Nimec’s chopper at the same field where Gordian had arrived some hours earlier.

The two men sat quietly in the vehicle’s dark interior.

“You think about how you’re going to break it to him?” DeMarco said.

Nimec’s smile was catacomb bleak.

“If I do that,” he said, “you can forget about me coping.”

He exited the Rover, strode into the building’s forecourt, and went up the steps to its entrance. The penguin who answered his ring reminded him of the waiters at the Rio de Gabao dinner reception. When did the black suits and ruffled white shirts come off?

A hurried introduction. Nimec said he needed to see Roger Gordian alone, was told Monsieur Gordian was in a meeting with his host and fellow house guests, explained he’d come about something very urgent, was then led into a side parlor, and invited to have a seat while he waited.

He stood instead with his back to the plush sofa.

Gordian was smiling as appeared through the parlor’s sliding walnut doors minutes later.

“Pete, hi,” he said. “I heard the doctors were checking you out and didn’t expect to see you until sometime tomor—”

He caught Nimec’s sober, uneasy expression and stopped in the middle of the room. The smile had faded.

“What’s wrong?” he said.

Nimec quickly went past Gordian to the doors, drew them shut, and then turned to face him.

“Boss,” he said. His hand went to Gordian’s arm. “It’s Julia.”

“That’s Rob over there on the tennis courts with the dogs,” Meredith Wagner said from the Jetta’s backseat. She motioned to the small community park on their left with her head. “He wanted to take them running while the rain gives us a letup.”