“Then why are your initials on the stand for a hummingbird?”

With some difficulty, I’d managed to get my phone out with one hand and show her the image.

She shrugged.

“Why would Silvina give this to me?”

That lit up her features, but I couldn’t read the emotion.

“She gave you this?”

“Yes. And a note saying I’m supposed to look for a salamander.”

Such a complicated look on Ronnie’s face. Hope mixed with anger or sadness or…?

“She always was paranoid. Didn’t trust people. Played games. Tricks. Tests.”

“I don’t care about that. Why me?”

A look I couldn’t interpret again. Wistful, strange.

“Maybe it’s an experiment. She was big on experiments. Like, looking at you, maybe it’s ‘Will some giant-ass, middle-class suburban woman with no clue about anything be moved enough by the plight of the planet to…’” She trailed off.

It took more than that to bait me.

“To what? What is this giant-ass, middle-class suburban woman supposed to do?”

“I don’t know.”

“But you know Langer, right? You must know Langer.”

Something rigid about her dissolved; her hands wavered. Maybe it was just that she thought if I was asking about Langer, I wasn’t with Langer.

“An asshole,” she said.

“Seems like it.”

We both relaxed, a little.

“What were you to Silvina?”

“I helped her. For a time.”

This was like pulling teeth. Fusk all over again.

“I got that already. But she hated the wildlife trade, so why taxidermy? Why did she have taxidermy?”

“That was her business. Not my place to tell you.” Loss? Something she’d lost.

“Where would I find a salamander?”

She shrugged, folded her arms, considered me a moment. Was that a hint of a smirk?

“There’s a warehouse full of this stuff. Abandoned. Silvina’s family owns it,” she said.

I wasn’t sure I liked how easily she’d given that up.

“Where?”

She gave me the address. Not as far as I’d feared. East side of town, about half an hour from my house, and forty minutes from the storage palace.

“I don’t know anything else. That’s literally the only thing I know. I’ve been out of her circle for a while.”

“What circle?”

“Friends of Silvina. Rebel angels.”

I’d seen “Friends of Silvina” in Allie’s reports. That almost sounded like an organization. Hilariously innocuous, like a fund-raiser for fighting some disease.

“Are they still around?”

“I don’t know.”

“Did you leave because you realized what Silvina was really doing?”

It just came out unintended.

Her resistance stiffened. “How about we back up a step. How did you find me? And who do you work for?”

Like I didn’t have a gun aimed at her.

“I found you through a taxidermist named Carlton … Oh fuck—”