Berger got up from her desk.

“I’ll receipt these to you,” she said. “How did you get here?”

“Since you don’t have a helipad, I took a cab.”

Lucy had closed the office door when she’d come in. They stood in front of it.

“I assumed one of your troops would give me a lift back to the Village and up the stairs, straight into my office,” Lucy said. “And I’ll sign the appropriate paperwork. Pro forma, maintaining the chain of evidence. All those things I learned in law enforcement one-oh- one.”

“I’ll take care of it.”

Berger made the phone call.

When she hung up, she said to Lucy, “You and I have one last thing to discuss.”

Lucy leaned against the door, hands in the pockets of her jeans, and said, “Let me guess. That gossip column. Pedestrian programming, I might add. Do you believe in the Golden Rule? Do unto others?”

“I’m not talking specifically about Gotham Gotcha,” Berger said. “But it raises an important issue I need to tell you about. Marino works for me. I’m taking for granted you can and will handle that.”

Lucy put on her jacket.

“I need your assurance,” Berger said.

“You’re telling me this now?”

“Until earlier this afternoon, I didn’t know there was a reason to have this conversation. By then, you and I had already agreed to meet. That’s the chronology of things. That’s why I’m bringing it up right now.”

“Well, I hope you screen other people better than you did him,” Lucy said.

“That’s a topic for you and Benton, since he’s the one who referred Marino to me last summer. What I read today is the first I’d heard of why Marino really left Charleston. I’ll reiterate what matters right now, Lucy. You have to handle it.”

“That’s easy. I don’t intend to have anything to do with him.”

“It’s not your choice to make,” Berger said. “If you want to work for me, you’ll have to handle it. He takes priority over you because—”

“Glad to know your definition of justice,” Lucy interrupted. “Since I’m not the one who feloniously assaulted someone and then took a job under false pretenses.”

“That’s not legally or literally true, and I don’t want to argue about it. The fact is, he’s completely involved in this investigation and I can’t remove him without repercussions. The fact is, I don’t want him off the case for a number of reasons, not the least of which is he already has a history with it since he took a complaint from the victim’s boyfriend a month ago. I’m not going to get rid of Marino because of you. There are other forensic computer experts. Just so we’re clear.”