And even if they could, Jo thought, something told her it wouldn’t get her very far. If a man took the trouble to try and dissolve a body in a tub of acid, he’d take the time to buy an untraceable gun for thirty bucks from some fence at the bus terminal.

‘All right,’ she said, ‘keep me up to date, okay?’

‘I will.’

‘And enjoy the visit from City Hall.’

‘I won’t.’

She put the phone down and returned to the teletypes she’d already been over. This time, though, she changed direction, pausing in her efforts to try and ID Gabriel Wilzon, or match details of his murder to others in the county. Instead, she focused on possible sightings of a red station wagon with a Caraca car sticker on it.

Again, she came up with nothing.

Undeterred, she headed downstairs to Records and started going through the archives, only coming up for air an hour later when she hit another wall. Back up at her desk she grabbed a White Pages, even though – in her gut – she knew Caraca was unlikely to be a surname: windshield stickers tended to celebrate sports teams, cite political campaigns or slogans, or foist humorous messages and jokes on to the world. What they didn’t do was announce your family name in big, bold type.

But then she had a thought.

What if it was the name of a family business?

Jo quickly amassed the details of the twelve Caracas living in the greater Los Angeles area and then switched to the Yellow Pages, feeling a charge of electricity as she did. Business names were just the sort of thing you’d put on a windshield sticker.

Inside a minute, she’d found something.

Caraca BuildIt.

They were a supplies yard, out in the City of Industry. And there was something else: when she ran a DMV check, she discovered they owned a fleet of seven vehicles. One of them was a Volkswagen Quantum.

It wasn’t red, it was maroon.

But it was a station wagon.

She grabbed her phone, dialled their number and asked to be put through to the manager. When he finally picked up, she introduced herself and asked his name.

‘Paolo Caraca,’ came the gruff-sounding response.

‘Were any of your vehicles out and about on Saturday or Sunday night, sir?’

A confused pause. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean, any chance you or one of your employees took one of your vehicles for a spin on the weekend?’

‘What?’ He made the question sound like an affront. ‘No, of course not.’

‘Because a vehicle matching the description of the Volkswagen Quantum you have registered to Caraca BuildIt was seen at a motel over in West Hollywood, is all.’

‘Is this a joke?’

‘No, sir, it’s definitely not a joke.’

‘Well, whoever told you that is a liar,’ Caraca said.

‘You don’t own a maroon Volkswagen Quantum?’