At that point I pushed past him and went to the desk to beep my lawyer. “Freeman,” I said to his machine. “It’s V. I. Warshawski. The cop who was harassing me last week is in my office. I had a break–in; he came around accusing me of dealing drugs. And now he’s ripped my couch and is wreaking havoc with my papers. If you get this message I’d appreciate your earliest possible response.”

Lemour’s thin lips were a line of rage. He shoved the uniforms out of the way and yanked the phone from my hand, then slapped my face hard with his open palm. I kept my arms at my side through an effort of will so intense that my shoulders ached.

“You think you’re smart, don’t you, Warshki?” he hissed.

“Phi beta kappa my junior year at Chicago. That’s usually for smart people, Lemming.” I was taking singer’s breaths, pushing air to the front of my mouth, keeping my voice light so that no cracks of fury showed in it.

He slapped the other side of my face. “Well, you’re not as smart as you think you are. If I have to take this room apart brick by brick, I will find where you put that stash. I know it’s here, you smart–assed broad. Cuff her while you finish searching,” he added to the woman who’d answered my original call.

She couldn’t look at me. Her dark face turned purply–black with shame as she locked my wrists together; she muttered, “I’m sorry,” through lips that barely moved.

The glasses had slipped off my face at a cockeyed angle. She settled them back on my nose. My neck ached. Tension. Or maybe whiplash from the force of Lemour’s blows.

The crew went through the room, then the hall and the bathroom. Brick by brick. Lemour watched, patches of red on his white cheeks, spittle forming around his mouth. I kept my video glasses on him as best I could with my arms hooked to a radiator coil.

When the team didn’t find the drugs, I thought Lemour was going to go over the brink and choke me. He may have thought so too, but his cell phone rang before he could do it.

“Lemour,” he snarled. “Oh … no, sir, it wasn’t … we did, sir, all three places … bitch must’ve … I did, sir, but I couldn’t be here twenty–four hours a day … I could still bring her in … I see. You can?” His pike’s teeth showed in an unpleasant grin. “I’ll look forward to that, sir.”