Diaz said, “Now we want to hear your side.”

Martel folded his hands across his chest and looked smug. “You’re total bullshittin’ me, man. You ain’t got no witness!”

“We’ve got a witness,” Decker said.

“Yeah?” Another sneer. “Who?”

“We know who set you up, because you’ve told the world in your download on MySpace.” Decker leaned toward him. “‘Like music and the crime—the shit of B and E.’”

Martel’s head snapped back. He attempted to recover and tried to stare down the cops, but he couldn’t pull it off. He finally figured out that the best way to combat undesirable information was to remain silent. Decker started to reel him in.

“B and E,” he repeated. “Very clever. To anyone not in the know, it’s just breaking and entering, right. But we know what the real crime is.”

Martel remained silent.

“Once we arrested him, how long do you think it would take Mr. B to start talking against you? Do you want to talk about Mr. B? He’s sure as hell talking about you.”

Martel didn’t answer. Decker kept at him without mentioning specifics.

B and E.

B and E.

The music and the crime—the shit of B and E.

The shit of B against E.

It took another hour before Martel’s cracks began to appear.

Martel opened and closed his mouth. “Mebbe I know whachu mean, mebbe I don’t.”

“We need more than a maybe if you want us to help you,” Garrett said.

“Mebbe I know, mebbe I don’t know.”

“So which is it?”

“If it be the same dude, mebbe I met him once or twice.”

“Once or twice, Travis?” Garrett questioned.

“Somethin’ like that.”

Decker said, “Mr. B liked your music?”

“That’s what he said.” Martel talked under his breath.

“He wanted to do a record deal with you?”

“That’s what he said.”

“But only if you’d whack Primo—”

“I didn’t do no whack and if Banks be sayin’ that, he’s lyin’! That’s whack!”

Yes, Decker said inwardly. The name has been verbalized! He wanted to play the video back just to make sure that it was recorded for posterity. The only thing lacking was the first name. He still wanted Martel to call him Rudy before Decker mentioned the name. “So what was the arrangement between you and Banks?”

“I didn’t do no murder! And if you pootbutts don’t know righteous from smack, that ain’t my problem, nomasayin’?”

Decker’s brain was firing snippets of past and present. Using the parallel from Little to Ekerling…Leroy Josephson is to Little as Travis Martel is to Ekerling. If his assumption was true, it made sense that Banks used Travis Martel in the same way as Leroy Josephson—either to do the hit or to dispose of the body and car.