Jake went down the hall to his office, where every surface was covered in three-ring binders and case files filled with the usual small-town problems: drunk driving, petty theft, domestics. Detective Jimmy Murray was sprawled on a chair in the middle of the mess. “Counselor,” he said, nodding.

“Detective. To what do I owe the pleasure of your company? If you’ve got another DUI for me, you can add it to the pile.” He flicked his thumb at the stacks of documents.

“Oh, I got a few of those, and some drunk and disorderlies for you too; the usual Monday morning assortment. But that’s not why I’m here. You won’t believe this shit.” He tossed a slim folder onto Jake’s desk, but he launched into the story before Jake could open the file.

“So, Friday night, I get a call about a bunch of kids down by the river making a ruckus. Typical end-of-the-school-year stuff—we break up parties down there every spring. I head down to River Road, throw on the sirens to smoke ’em out, and sure enough, a few kids start coming out of the woods, running for their cars.”

“High school students. What a collar.” Jake smirked.

“Hold on, hold on. So, we round up half a dozen kids—some of them were pretty wasted—and we start collecting ID’s. A couple of them I already know; a few have Jersey licenses. One dumbass was actually still holding a beer, so he gets an underage-drinking ticket, and we start calling parents. But basically it goes down like usual: the parents show up, we give a little lecture, and everyone goes home. Typical Friday night.”

“And?”

“And I go home and crawl into bed with my wife, take the kids to Soccer Tots in the morning, and I don’t think about it again all weekend. Until six this morning. That’s when we get a call from a contractor working on that new house going up by the river. You seen it? It’s the all-glass one, looks like a spaceship. Anyway, the contractor goes over to open up the house for the painters, and finds the place completely trashed. He calls it in as vandalism, and Officer Cruz and I go down to check it out. Guess where it is? Less than a quarter mile from where we found those kids on Friday night.”