“Did you know there’s a glitch in some video-call software, Mr. Snow?” she said, packing her glass with fresh ice. “Apparently, most tech companies offering videoconferencing software have fixed the glitch. The software vendor city council uses hasn’t. The problem is this: if I call you on video, your laptop or tablet may ring—if your ringer setting is on—but if you don’t pick up, my call still opens a listening line.”

For a moment, she disappeared into a side room.

I was kind of hoping she wouldn’t return with a shotgun.

Instead, she returned with a tablet computer.

Handing me the tablet, she flopped back onto the sofa. The mescal added a sloppy weight to her body.

“I heard his conversation with Sloane,” she said. “And he must have seen me in his call log. I’m sure that’s what his visit was all about, trying to find out if I’d listened in through his tablet. I played dumb.” She paused, took an audible gulp of mescal, then in a quivering voice said, “I—I think they—this Sloane—he may have had Lincoln’s ex-wife killed.”

21

21

The women who ran Café Consuela’s in Mexicantown had decided to escape the early onset of another Michigan ice age by jetting off to Mexico for a month’s visit with family and friends, which meant my favorite restaurant haunt was closed. Since their homemade pulled pork stew was out of the question, my stomach led me to the change of pace offered by Flowers of Vietnam, a trendy yet intimate Southeast Asian restaurant that stood shoulder to shoulder with small Mexicantown businesses along Vernor Highway.

After a moment of letting the intoxicating warm and spicy aromas play merry hob with my senses, I ordered bò nướng lá lốt (sakura pork, prime beef, lemongrass and betel leaves), cơm chiên Sài Gòn (Saigon southern fried rice with Chinese sausage, shrimp and garlic lemongrass butter) and phở chay (soup with oyster mushrooms, purple yams, beachwood mushrooms and fresh bamboo).

Seated near me, a statuesque blonde woman, unafraid to show an impressive length of her well-toned, shiny legs, smiled. “Could you pass the chili oil?”

I pointed. “Looks like you’ve got some of your own already.”

Her smile faded.

Her legs didn’t.

Easing my gluttonous order down to my overjoyed tummy was a nước sâm herbal iced tea.

Accompanying me at my feast of Vietnamese delicacies were Council Member Nadine Rosado’s tablet and a pair of in-ear headphones.

[Door closing. Unintelligible voices.]

QUINN. I thought we agreed not to meet at my office. I don’t need mothafuckas nosin’ around.

SLOANE. I thought—[Clears throat.] Excuse me. I thought the urgency of the matter dictated a brief meeting.

QUINN. What the fuck’s so urgent? I told you I was in and so I’m in. Didn’t we set protocols for—