A loud humming sound suddenly burst through the speakers, causing everyone in the immediate area to cover their ears. A technician came out and made an adjustment to the main microphone, and Lynch stood back, thankful for the interruption. He cast a sideways glance at the deputy commissioner, who shook his head slightly to indicate that he hadn’t yet received the call. Slowly, Lynch made his way back to the podium.

“Testing, one, two, three,” he said, prompting laughter from the assorted media who were gathered in front of him.

“As I was saying, we have been working diligently to come to some resolution on this case, and we have conducted multiple operations in an attempt to find the person or persons responsible for these heinous acts. As you all know, a male fitting the description of the perpetrator was found dead of a gunshot wound early this morning.”

A breeze whistled through the parking lot and blew his paper off the podium. When he bent down to pick it up, the deputy commissioner was on his cell phone. He tapped Lynch on his shoulder as Lynch retrieved the paper and went back to the podium.

The commissioner paused long enough to allow his deputy to call the radio room and give the order. When he saw him disconnect the call, he spoke slowly and purposefully into the microphones.

“The male we found dead of a gunshot wound this morning in a church on Cecil B. Moore Avenue has been identified as Phillip Little, twenty-five, of Fargo, North Dakota,” he said, pausing once again. “We have also been informed by the medical examiner’s office that the cause and manner of death have been determined. One Phillip Little died twelve to fifteen hours ago, according to forensics reports. The cause of death was a heroin overdose. The manner of death was homicide.”

The press corps exploded. Questions were shouted from every direction. Cameras were thrust into the commissioner’s face. Voices overlapped in a cacophony of sound that made it impossible for any one person to be heard above another.

Lynch was in no hurry to respond to any of them. His answers would come from the raids.

Everything about the house was dark. The bricks, worn and weather-beaten over the course of a century, were dark from the carbon exhaust of cars and buses. The steps were dark with years of grime.

Its windows covered with yellowing newspapers and its door falling slowly apart, the house appeared to be abandoned. Were it not for the fact that a single lightbulb was on in the vestibule, no one would believe it was inhabited.

“Team one in position,” Mann said, as he and the narcotics officers from the prior raid pulled up near the front of the house.

“Team two in position,” Coletti said, as he and four homicide detectives pulled up in the back.