Pike tried to get his head around it. Then he remembered seeing the box of Pampers in Ana’s room. He had seen it, but thought nothing of it because it was just another box. There had been no crib, or bassinet, or baby food—just the one box of Pampers.

“A baby.”

“Yes.”

“How old?”

“Ten months.”

She sat up straighter, pulling her shoulders back and chest out.

“I look good, yes? I do much hard work.”

“Michael and his crew, they’ve invaded six other homes. They’ve killed other people. He have kids in those places, too?”

Her eyes flashed, angry.

“I don’t know nothing about other things. All I know is this. Michael want his child. He take him back to Serbia.”

Terrio hadn’t mentioned a kidnapping. Neither had Chen or anyone else, and then Pike realized why.

“You didn’t tell the police, did you?”

“Of course not. They cannot help me.”

Of course not.

Yanni was waking up. He touched his face, then looked at the blood on his palm as if he wasn’t quite sure what it was. Pike moved the gun toward him.

“This one your boyfriend?”

“No. He want to be, but, no. I hide with him when I hear Michael wants the baby, but then I get scared and I have much to do, so I give the baby to Ana.”

Yanni stirred. A knee came up, then he rolled onto his side, trying to rise.

Pike said, “Tell him to stay down.”

“In English?”

“In whatever he understands. Tell him if he gets up, I’ll shoot him.”

“Would you?”

“Yes.”

She spoke the language, and Yanni turned toward Pike. Pike showed him the gun. Yanni sighed, then rested his head on the floor. His face was a mess.

Pike said, “I want to be clear. Your husband, this guy Michael Darko, he went to Frank’s house to steal his kid from your sister?”

“Yes.”

There it was. Michael Darko was the fourth man.

“What happened that night, it had nothing to do with Frank. It was all about taking your kid.”

“Michael is going back to Serbia. He wants to raise his son there. Me, he wants to kill.”

“Why?”

“I am nothing. Do you see? A whore he made pregnant. He does not want his son to be the child of a whore.”

“So he murdered your sister and an entire family?”

“My sister was nothing to him. Your friends, nothing. I am nothing, too. He will kill me if he can. He will kill you, too.”

Pike said, “We’ll see.”

He closed his eyes and saw the bodies: Frank, Cindy, Little Frank, Joe. He saw the oily, irregular pools of blood. The Day-Glo green yarn that traced the bullets’ paths.

Collateral damage.

Bystanders in a domestic dispute.