The squad room was busy. Almost every desk was occupied with detectives working their phones. Pardy was the only detective in the room who didn't look busy. He was slouched at his desk on the far wall, staring at nothing with his arms crossed. The dark blue murder book was open on his desk, but he didn't seem to be looking at it. Diaz called out to him, and waved toward her desk.

"Hey, Sherlock. Come see."

Pardy considered her for a long time before he got up. He was probably getting tired of her put-downs. He closed the murder book, checked his pager, then made his way over. He pulled up a chair as far from us as he could get.

I said, "You making any progress?"

"I'm working a few leads. You know."

"Got any ideas?"

"I'm not looking for ideas."

Diaz said, "Okay, Cole, let's see it. What do you have here?"

While the computer booted up, I gave them the page with Edelle Reinnike's and Marjorie Lawrence's names and numbers. I gave them the copies of the newspaper articles and told them what I had learned. Diaz glanced at each item, then passed them to Pardy. Pardy looked up when I told them about David Reinnike.

"I guess that leaves you out, Cole. Unless you were separated at birth."

Diaz flushed like she was pissed off.

"The one doesn't have anything to do with the other. How about you run the name and see if we get a hit?"

"I'm just saying. Why would Reinnike think Cole was his son if he already had a son? It doesn't make sense."

"Why would he tattoo crosses all over himself and pay hookers to pray? We'll find out when we find some people who really knew the guy."

I found the photo file, and opened the picture. Reinnike and Dana filled the little screen, standing beside Reinnike's brown Accord. The license plate was a blurry rectangle in the lower right corner of the screen. Pardy stood closer.

"She has the boyfriend, Thomas Monte."

"That's right."

Pardy looked disappointed.

"Not bad, but not great. It's blurry."

Diaz said, "SID might be able to pull it out. We could snatch the registration with just a couple of digits."

Pardy went back to his chair.

"I'm not getting my hopes up. That backlog is a bitch. If we have to wait months to get a gun checked, how long will it be before they get around to this?"

I interrupted them.

"I can help you with that, too."

Pardy said, "What, you have your own private Walk-in Wednesday?"