I shrugged my agreement. There was some battle being waged, but I wasn’t going to engage with it until I understood what it was. Janis rattled off what sounded like seven courses, the waiter left, and a silence fell. The morning haze had burned off, and the patio was blinding. Across the street, a couple of mothers with small children entered a Pentecostal church, its red marquee letters blazing, JESUCRISTO ES EL SEÑOR.

Janis began, “Let me first say that you would be paid well for your time, and that I can’t have any gossip about this, regardless. Not to anyone.”

“I understand,” I said, and then my heart sank, though I didn’t know why. Janis gripped the table, as if momentarily unsteady, and then released it. She sighed.

“You brought the DVD?” she asked Ray.

He looked confused by her question but nodded.

“Give it to me,” she said.

She held up the silver disc in its sleeve, shining it at me.

“For a variety of reasons, some quite alarming, I had to fire my personal assistant of ten years in July,” Janis said. “My new assistant found an entire closet full of mail that had never been touched, mostly pleas for my appearance at openings I could never attend. Among them was a package with this video and a note.” Janis paused. “Brenae Brasil sent it to me before she died.” She examined me. “You want to know why you’re here. I believe that something systemic is wrong with that school—something you’ll see on this video—and it led to Brenae Brasil’s suicide. I want that uncovered. The artist asked for my help, and I didn’t give it in time. I want to remedy that now, as best I can.”

So many questions flew into my head, I didn’t know which one to pick. The odd mix of sympathy and frustration on Detective Ruiz’s face made me choose.

“Brenae Brasil,” I repeated. “But her death was investigated already last spring. By you?” I asked the detective.

“By LASD, not LAPD,” the detective said to me. “It happened in Valdivia, so it was a county job. But yes, it was thoroughly investigated.”

“And there’s no doubt it was a suicide?”

“There’s always doubt. But very little this time.” Her phone buzzed. She glanced at it and turned it off, stuffing it in her pocket. “First, I just want to interject, with all due respect to you, not knowing what the hell this is all about, that everything we say is confidential from here on out.”

“Okay,” I said. “Except—”

“Completely confidential,” the detective said again in a firm tone.

“Got it,” I said.