“Go left here,” Blumenthal says. A stenciled plastic sign on a glass door is meant to spell out the words INTERROGATION ROOMS. Instead some clever asshole has blacked out the first seven letters of the sign and inked in SEGRA. So now it says SEGRAGATION ROOMS.

“Very classy signage,” I say. Then I add, “Ignore the fact that the word’s misspelled. What the hell does that mean?”

Blumenthal shrugs. “Who the hell knows?” he says. “A lot of angry, crazy people pass through every precinct in this city.”

We arrive at a door marked ROOM 1. Next to that door is another door. This second door is marked OBSERVATION ROOM 1.

“You wait out here for a minute, Lucy. I’m going in to clear you with the interviewer and, even more important, with the guy we’re interviewing.”

So it’s a guy.

Blumenthal knocks and enters. I immediately recognize Bobby Cilia’s voice coming from inside the room.

“Detective Leon Blumenthal enters the room at ten seventeen. Good morning—”

The door closes, and I’m left standing alone in the hall. Not many people are walking this hallway. One officer with one weeping woman in cuffs. Two officers walking together while both are looking at the screen of a cell phone.

I’m about to check my phone, but before I can punch in my code, a young and quite pretty woman appears next to me. The woman is blond and unnecessarily skinny. She is wearing a sundress—light, cotton, sleeveless, big red floral print on a white background—and carrying a chic brown Birkin bag. She speaks to me.

“Forget it.” She points to a sign: NO CELL PHONES IN INTERROGATION ROOMS.

“Wow,” I say. “I should read more. That sign is bigger than my car.”

Then she says, “Have you by any chance seen Leon Blumenthal slithering around here?”

“Yeah, he slithered into this room right here,” I say, pointing to the interrogation room.

“I’d better not interrupt. Leon hates that,” she says. At first it seems as if the woman is going to walk away with her sunny little sundress, in her heels with red soles, but then she stops.

“Hey,” she says. “I have to ask you something: are you Lucy Ryuan?”

“How’d you know that?” I ask.

“I only figured it out because you’re here, and he’s there, and whenever I see Leon, he talks about you. By the way, I’m Barbara Holt.”

I should introduce myself, of course, but what I end up saying is this: “Blumenthal talks about me?”

“Yeah, he refers to you as ‘his unofficial special assistant.’”

It takes me a few moments to process this info. I wonder if he says it sarcastically or respectfully. Probably both ways, depending on his mood and our relationship of the moment.