His body had been removed, Stevens detailed to take care of it.

“I’ve been afraid that might have happened,” the Angel admitted.

“The thought of dying is always somewhere deep within us,” Ray said. “You can’t let it out. Can’t dwell on it. But Norwood—”

“Do you think this Tesseract was somehow responsible?”

The Angel shook her head. “She’s more sneak thief than murderer. But how did it end up at Mendelberg’s door? Did she put it there?”

Lonnegan shrugged. “Got me.”

“Where’s this Francis Black?” Ray asked suddenly.

Lonnegan shrugged again. “Got me. What’s he got to do with this?”

“Fits with what Stevens told us last night,” the Angel said.

Ray took over the story. “Stevens said Black and Norwood had peeled back some of the layers of this rotten onion. They knew that the Russian mob was yanking jokers off the street and using this teleporter to bring them to some foreign casino where the owner, an ex-KGB agent with the lovely Russian name of Baba Yaga, made them fight like gladiators. And this shitbag Michael Berman made and sold videos of the fights.”

“Berman…” Lonnegan said thoughtfully, then snapped her fingers. “He was brought in the other day. Made bail, though. And that Mollie kid—she was a production assistant for his skuzzy production company.”

Ray nodded. “Which matches the info we picked out off Norwood’s computer.” He looked at Lonnegan. “What happened after the jokers started arriving?”

“There was complete chaos,” Lonnegan said. “Some babbled crazy stories—which might not have been crazy after all. Father Squid dead—”

Ray and the Angel exchanged glances.

“Father Squid—” His expression suddenly went slack.

“The soul of Jokertown,” the Angel whispered.

Lonnegan nodded. “Nobody believed it, but the rumor swept the precinct. And now…”

“And now,” Ray said, “it feels true, in my gut.”

“I know, right?” Lonnegan said. “He was just … always been here. Always quiet, gentle, but a rock of strength the whole community could shelter against. Nothing could stop him. Nothing could bring him down. He helped hundreds—hell, thousands—of jokers.” She paused, briefly. “Hell, you didn’t have to be a joker.” The Angel was astonished to see tears form in the cop’s eyes.

“What else did they say?” the Angel asked quickly.

Lonnegan took a deep breath. “Death matches took place in some club or something—obviously this casino. That kid who calls himself the Infamous Black Tongue was one of the captives. Mendelberg,” Lonnegan said in a flat, affectless voice, “immediately clamped down on it. Shut them all up and marched them all off into protective custody in the old holding cells. She slapped a guard on them, wouldn’t let anyone near.”

“I’m not a lawyer,” the Angel said, “but she can’t do that.”

“She did.”

The Angel could see the tautness in Ray’s body suddenly disappear, just like that. “Mendelberg ran the investigation—or rather noninvestigation—on those joker kidnapping cases and as far as I can see, she did more to discourage investigation than encourage it.”