“No one,” Mendez said, scowling. He hated being wrong. “If we were on television, I would get a warrant.”

Hicks laughed. “If we were on television, we could just go bust into her house without one.”

“And we could wear T-shirts and jeans to work, and we’d all drive Porsches,” Mendez said.

“And we’d have hot babes all over us,” Campbell said.

Mendez looked at him with a straight face. “You don’t have hot babes all over you? Man, that’s sad.”

Campbell fired a wad of paper at him, laughing. “Screw you!”

Mendez sighed. “Damn, I want in that house.”

“Hey, man,” Hicks said. “I’m just trying to save you from a certain death. If you go knocking on ADA Worth’s door at this time of night with what you’ve got, she’ll have your ass.”

True enough, Mendez thought. “I’d have to have my fingers crossed while I typed my affidavit.”

Every unit on the streets of town and the roads out in the county would be looking for Gina Kemmer’s car. If she was parked at the home of a friend in town, it shouldn’t take that long to find her.

Mendez tossed the last of his bad burrito into the trash and stood up.

“Where are you going?” Hicks asked.

“I’m going to drive around and look for her.”

This was one of the benefits of not having a life: He could feel free to drive around town in the dead of night, looking for a needle in a haystack.

Hicks had opted to go home to his wife, who was pregnant with their third child.

No pregnant wife for Mendez, much to his mother’s dismay. Why you don’t marry, Anthony? Why you don’t give me any grandchildren? she would ask practically every time he talked to her, and certainly every time he went to see her. His sisters were no better.

The rest of them had reproduced prodigiously enough he didn’t really feel like he had to be in a hurry. He had been too focused on his career to devote much time to looking for a wife.

He had goals. He was still thinking seriously about making the move to a career with the FBI. He wanted to see Peter Crane put away for his crimes first, then he would go after it. It didn’t make sense to put roots down deep only to have to pull them up again and relocate to the other coast.

In the meantime, he didn’t have any trouble getting a date when he wanted one. But he never let a relationship get too serious.