“Everything’s done with landmarks. You go to the market, turn left until you reach the post office, turn right, go straight until you reach Dovid’s cleaners—”

“I don’t know what possessed me to think I could handle an investigation here,” Decker groused. “Can’t you tell me where I am?”

“Haven’t the foggiest notion,” Rina said.

He drove a few blocks in darkness. A haze began to settle over the streets. Just what he needed to further confuse whatever meager sanity he had left. He spied another group of kids walking, but at least this one had two girls among three scumbags.

“Can I try them?” Rina said. “They have girls.”

“Ever see the damage that female gang members have done?”

“We’re not in America, Peter!”

“What if you’re wrong? What if they try to rob us? I don’t have my gun.”

“I’m not wrong,” Rina said, forcefully. “Pull over, please.”

Decker pulled over. “At least you said please.”

As soon as the car stopped, Rina opened the door and jumped out of the car, speed-walking her way to the pack. Decker bolted from the rental and caught up with her. He took her arm, but they both kept walking.

He whispered, “We’re going to have to have a serious talk.”

“When we’re not sleep deprived,” Rina whispered back. She pulled away from Decker as she yelled out another s’lichah to the group. They stopped walking and Rina went over to them, showed them her map, and spoke. They answered back en masse, a few studying the map, one of them pointing the way, two pointing in another direction. Decker couldn’t understand how any of them heard a damn thing because they were all talking at once. Finally, the whole group headed toward Peter.

Rina said, “They said it would be easier if they just rode along with us.”

“There’re five of them,” Decker said.

A boy with dark curly hair and a wispy mustache answered in broken English. “The girls sit on us.”

Involuntarily, Decker smiled at his misuse of the language. Under his breath, he said, “In your dreams, kiddo.” Out loud he said to Rina, “What are they doing? Bumming a ride?”

“Yes, I believe that’s exactly what they’re doing.”

Decker rolled his eyes. Up close, the kids looked less fearsome—like kids. They must have been around fifteen, sixteen. He waved his hands forward. “Come on.”

Excitedly, the kids piled into the backseat of the rented Subaru—boys sprawling their spindly, adolescent legs, girls giggling on their laps. Decker started the car. Three spoke at once, using their hands as well as words.

“You go straight,” Rina announced.

“For how long?”

Rina asked, then answered back. “Just go straight.”

Decker threw up his hands and drove.

“Where you from?” asked a girl in English. She was pretty—black hair, hazel eyes, and dimples. She had a cherubic face.