He stumbled to the shower, shaved, picked clothes randomly, got the coffee machine going, looked at the clock. Seven-thirteen. An emergency call had yanked Rick out of bed three hours ago. Milo had watched in the darkness as Rick slipped into the scrubs he kept neatly folded on a bedroom chair, picked up his Porsche keys from the nightstand, and padded out the door.

Rick stopped, returned to the bed, kissed Milo lightly on the forehead. Milo pretended to be sleeping, because he didn’t feel like talking, not even “Good-bye.”

The two of them had talked plenty all night, sitting up late at the kitchen table. Mostly Milo had blabbed and Rick had listened, maintaining a superficial calm, but Milo knew he was shaken by the Paris Bartlett encounter and the HIV rumor. All these years, and Milo’s work had never intruded on their personal life.

Milo reassured him, and Rick nodded, complained of crushing fatigue and fell asleep the moment his head hit the pillow.

Milo cleaned up the Chinese take-out cartons and the dinner dishes and slipped into bed beside him, lying there for an hour or so, listening to Rick’s even breathing, thinking.

The Cossacks, Walt Obey, Larner Junior, Germ Bacilla, Diamond Jim Horne.

Plus the player who hadn’t shown up. He saw that face, clearly: a stoic, ebony mask.

Smiley Bartlett, the personnel inquiry, and the HIV rumor said John G. Broussard’s hand was in all of it.

He recalled Broussard—smelled Broussard’s citrus cologne in the interview room, twenty years ago. The hand-stitched suit, all that confidence, taking charge. He and his pink pal—Poulsenn. Milo had no idea what had happened to his career, but look how far John G. had come.

A white man and a black man teamed up, and the black man had been the dominant partner.

A black man advancing that quickly, back in LAPD’s bad old racist days. That had to mean Broussard had harpoons in all the right whales. Had probably used his IA dirt to build up leverage.

Mr. Straight and Narrow. And he’d covered up Janie Ingalls and Lord knew what else. Milo had been part of it, allowed himself to be swept along, pretended he could forget about it.

Now he wondered what that had done to his soul.

He poured coffee but the muddy brew tasted like battery acid and he spit it out and gulped a glass of tap water. The light through the kitchen window was the yellow-gray of old phlegm.

He sat down, kept thinking about Broussard, a South Central guy who’d ended up in Hancock Park.

Neighbor to Walt Obey.