“Wait!” Kravis said. “What do you want?”

“For you to cut the bullshit,” Salovitz bounced back at him. “What in the fuck have you people gone and done? There’s a gang war broken out in my precinct, and you’re the heart of it. Why?”

“This is all wrong,” Rose said. “We didn’t want any of this to happen. That’s the truth.”

“What did Samantha warn you about?” Alik asked. “And before you claim memory loss, she’s the one that gave you a massage with added extras. I’ve already talked to her tonight—in her hospital bed.”

Rose gave Delphine an anxious glance. All the housekeeper did was stare at her toes.

“Waiting,” Alik said.

“She assaulted my wife,” Kravis said heatedly. “A sexual assault.”

“Gonna count to three,” Salovitz said. “And if I don’t get an answer—”

“She told me to back off Delphine,” Rose said wearily.

“I never asked her to do anything to you,” Delphine said quickly. “I don’t even know her.”

“Back off why?” Salovitz asked.

“All I said was to return Bailey’s game matrix, and I wouldn’t enter a formal complaint with the housekeeping agency,” Rose said.

“You’re saying my boy stole from you?” Delphine said in outrage. “Lying bitch! Alphonse is a good boy, aren’t you, honey?” She gave him a reassuring squeeze. The kid’s head was bowed.

“He was with you the day it went missing,” Rose countered. “Who else would take it? And you never asked permission to bring him into my home.”

“It was the goddamn Christmas vacation! What am I supposed to do with him?”

“Ask his father to look after him?” Rose sneered. And Alik suddenly understood why Kravis married her, not just for plenty of hot sex with the finest piece of ass on the block. She belonged in his uptown world just as much as he did.

“Fucking bitch!” Delphine spat.

“Cool it, both of you,” Salovitz said. “So”—he eyed Delphine—“Rose accuses your boy of stealing, and you go running to Rayner? That’s the story here?”

“I didn’t do that. What am I, stupid? It’s only a goddamn matrix, a couple of hundred bucks. And that brat has dozens of them anyway. He probably just put it in the wrong case.”

“You’re blaming Bailey?” Rose shrieked.

“You called Al a thief!”

“Je-zus wept,” Salovitz grunted.

“Alphonse,” Alik said softly. The boy still didn’t look up. “What did you tell your uncle Rayner?”

All that happened was the kid shook his head.

Delphine suddenly gave her son a suspicious look. “Hey! Did you go and see Rayner?”

“I don’t know,” Alphonse sobbed. “Maybe.”

“You dumb—”

For a moment Alik thought Delphine was going to smack him in the head there and then.

“Did you take that matrix?” she challenged. “You answer me! You tell me the truth right now. Did you?”

The boy’s shoulders were shaking now as tears dripped onto the floor. “I was going to give it back,” he wailed. “I was. Next time we went back there, honest. It’s Star Revenger Twelve, it’s only just come out. I wanted to see what it was like. That’s all.”