The Angel was a little surprised to see that the neat little office was cleaner, brighter, and had clearly been recently renovated with new and tasteful furniture and accoutrements, like the attractive carpet on the floor. Handmade and foreign, the Angel thought. She didn’t know if that made it more, or less, expensive, but she was inclined to think the former. Captain Mendelberg was behind a neatly kept and recently refinished desk, nice-looking but nothing out of the ordinary, leafing through a report file. She was a young woman, maybe her mid-thirties, the Angel judged, and smart and driven to have already obtained such a high rank in the police force. She’d been touched by the wild card. Her skin was a not unattractive shade of olive, but nothing you’d want for a complexion, and her ears were prominent and frilly, as if she had special-effect alien ears for some kind of science fiction movie. They moved in a disturbing manner, seemingly independent of each other and maybe without control by their owner.

“Well.” She set her papers down and looked up. Her expression was more prim than neutral, the Angel thought, and she was more than annoyed at their presence but hadn’t entirely decided how to respond. “To what do I owe the honor of a visit by federal agents, Mr. Ray?”

“Kidnapping across state lines,” Ray replied, pleasantly enough.

Mendelberg frowned. “I don’t undertand.”

“Kazakhstan is not on Long Island, Captain,” Ray informed her pleasantly, and her olive complexion deepened.

“I’m missing an agent, Captain,” Ray said with a degree of calmness that meant he was getting ready to blow. “He took off for Kazakhstan with one of your boys. Neither of them is back, but I did hear that a boatload of jokers ended up here last night—”

Mendelberg’s eyes snapped upon Stevens and Lonnegan, standing together. Her mouth clicked shut and she said coldly, “That incident is still under investigation.”

Ray opened his mouth to say something angry and, probably, the Angel thought, regrettable, but she grabbed his arm and hissed, “Listen!”

There were sounds coming from the squad room. Strange, mixed sounds of heavy objects hitting the floor, raised voices, barely discernible, some possibly not shouting in English, and then, finally, gunfire.

“What the hell?” Ray asked, whirled, and headed for the door.

But Stevens was closest. He threw it open and rushed out into the corridor, but before he could take more than a step, he tripped over something in the doorway and fell flat in the hall. The Angel, right behind Ray, looked over her husband’s shoulder, an expression of horror on her face.

“Jamal!” the Angel cried out.

“I’m afraid so,” Ray said. “What the hell is going on here?”