Lack of sleep and the number of things I needed to do were making me frenzied. I kept buzzing from task to task, starting things that I couldn’t finish. I looked up Eddie Mohr, the guy whose stolen car had rammed the Trans Am. Before calling him I remembered I wanted to get in touch with Freeman, and dropped the city directory to hunt for my address book. In the midst of my search I wondered if I should go see Mr. Contreras, get him to check on whether Jake Sokolowski had rousted out Mitch Kruger’s son in Arizona.

And what about my gun? If someone was peeved enough with me to go ramming my car and assaulting the driver, I ought not go out unarmed. I went to the safe I’d built into my bedroom closet and took out the Smith & Wesson. It’s the one thing in the house I always keep clean: an automatic that jams causes a lot more grief to the shooter than the shootee. Just to be sure I took it apart and started working a rag through the barrel. The methodical work helped steady my frenzied brain.

I was reassembling the gun when my phone rang. I carefully slipped the magazine in and reached across the bed for the phone.

“Vic! Freeman here. I left a message with your answering service. Didn’t you get it?”

“Sorry, Freeman. I haven’t checked with them.” Before he could expostulate on my untidy business habits I explained about the accident to Lotty. “You must be a mind reader—calling you was my next to-do. Where are you?”

“Minding my own business in Northbrook. What the hell do you want with Diamond Head’s directors?”

I’d been sprawled across the bed since reaching the phone, but at the vehemence in his voice I sat up straight. “Material to an investigation I’m undertaking. Why do you care?”

“You wouldn’t be trying to spin me around without telling me the rules of the game you’re playing, would you?”

“No games here, but it sounds pretty playful at your end. I went to your office without knowing your pals had locked the door after you. When I saw Catherine, she offered to do a search for me. Tell me how that spins you around.”

“It’s time you got your own computer, Warshawski. I’m not going to do that kind of errand for you. We may not have parted in the way I’d like best, but I’m not going to sign onto a vendetta against my partners. Former partners.”

I clutched my hair, trying to steady the wobble in my head. “Why is it a vendetta for me to look something up on Lexis—to ask you to look it up, I mean.”

“I wish I could see your face, V.I. I just can’t be sure.…”

“About what?”