“Always the same time?”

“Five o’clock.”

“Where in Murray Hill?”

“Not far from here. You could walk from here. Near Loews theater. We go to the movies sometimes and eat hot dogs and cheese fries when we’re splurging.”

His back trembled as she touched it. Grief welling up inside of him.

“Both of us are careful about our weight,” he said. “I never had any reason to believe they’d followed me to Murray Hill, to any place we’d been together. I had no idea or I would have done something to protect her. I wouldn’t have let her live alone. Maybe I could have convinced her to leave the city. I didn’t do it. I would never hurt her. She’s the love of my life.”

“I’ve been meaning to ask.” Berger’s shrewd, pretty face studied Benton. “If Kay’s Lucy’s aunt, does that make you Lucy’s uncle? Or are you a de facto uncle, an almost uncle? Does she call you Uncle Benton?”

“Lucy doesn’t listen to her almost uncle or her aunt. I hope she’ll listen to you.” Benton knew damn well what Berger was doing.

She was sticking him, goading him. She wanted him to bring up that damn gossip column, to confess and surrender himself to the mercy of her court. But he had his mind made up. He wasn’t going to volunteer anything because he’d done nothing wrong. When the timing was right, he could defend himself easily. He could explain his silence and justify it by reminding her that, legally, Marino had been neither charged nor accused of anything, and Scarpetta’s privacy wasn’t Benton’s to violate.

“Does Lucy have the laptops?” he asked.

“Not yet. But she will. And as soon as she determines the details of the e-mail accounts, we’ll go to the providers and get the passwords. Including Oscar’s.”

“When you met with her to discuss what she’s going to—”

“I haven’t met with her yet,” Berger interrupted him. “Only talked to her briefly over the phone. I’m surprised you never told me she’d moved to the city. On second thought, I shouldn’t be surprised.” She reached for her coffee. “I had to find out from several sources she’d recently moved here and started her own company. She’s built a reputation rather quickly, which is why I decided to ask for her help in this particular case.”

She drank coffee and set the mug back down, her every move thoughtful and deliberate.

“You have to understand that he and I don’t routinely have contact with each other,” she said.

She meant Marino. The cross-examination had begun.

“Knowing what I do, assuming there’s any truth to it,” she said, “I can’t imagine Lucy told him she was here or has had any contact with him at all—or even knows that he’s here. I’m wondering why you didn’t tell her. Or am I making an unfair assumption? Have you told her?”

“No.”

“That’s quite something. She relocates to New York, and you’ve never told her he’s here. Alive and well in my DA squad. And maybe his secret would have been safe a little longer if it wasn’t his bad luck that he’s the one who took Oscar’s call last month.”