“I certainly hope you’re not asking a police officer to be concerned about the well-being of your molester bestie.”

Reynold clamped his mouth shut.

Larkin laid out the present murder’s timeline in his head and then spun the mental Rolodex in reverse, stopping on Sunday, May 10, the estimated date of death for John Doe in the utility closet. He shifted forward again. Three days. “On Wednesday, May 13, at 7:12 in the morning, you texted Archie a final time, suggesting you’d find a girl on your own. Where were you that night.”

“I was at home.”

“Mr. Reynold, this is my good cop persona. I have a DB at Fifty-Seventh Street station with a connection to St. Jude’s Mission that is painting you in a very bad light.”

“W-wait… what? I didn’t—I mean, holy crap, no. Is Dicky dead? I didn’t kill him. I went to St. Jude’s last Saturday to see if he was there, to ask about girls he might know, and pay him.”

“Pay him in what.”

“Uh… Archie said he’d give you whatever you asked for if you offered heroin. And I’ve been a public school teacher a long time. You learn a thing or two about how to buy drugs.”

“Brilliant.” Larkin sighed and pressed his thumb against his left eye again—he still had a throbbing headache, despite the Tylenol.

“He wasn’t there,” Reynold insisted. “And since they’re closed on Sundays, I took a chance and followed some of the punk kids who had been eating there.”

“Was one of them Megan.”

“Yeah,” he whispered. “They went down to the Fifty-Seventh Street station—the F. They were down there for hours, so I thought, maybe that was one of their spots. I went back to the subway Monday night.”

“And that’s when you offered Megan five hundred dollars in exchange for allowing you to take pictures of her in your home.”

Reynold licked his chapped lips and nodded.

“So where’s Dicky.”

“I have no idea. I swear.”

Larkin started to speak, but the hospital room door opened. Larkin turned as Doyle entered, set his portfolio bag against the wall as the door clicked shut, and then approached Reynold’s bedside. “Did you—”

Doyle lunged before Larkin could finish his thought. He grabbed the front of Reynold’s hospital gown, tore a heart monitor free from his chest, the machine beeping erratically, and drew Reynold up so they were face-to-face. “She’s a child,” he shouted. “A fucking child, you disgusting pig!”

“Doyle!” Larkin grabbed his arm and yanked, but Doyle was a hell of a lot stronger than he looked.

Reynold was screaming.

The door was thrown open a second time, the uniformed officer putting a hand to her service weapon, then faltering as she took in the sight.

Larkin sidestepped, wrapped both arms around Doyle’s chest, and yanked him backward so hard, so fast, they both tripped and stumbled into the wall on their left. Shoving Doyle off, Larkin turned, got in the path of the bed before Doyle could go at Reynold a second time, and shouted, “Get out of here.”